The country will get provincial assembly members for the first time after the second stage of election on Thursday.
The Election Commission (EC) has said counting in the 32 districts where voting was done in the first round on November 26 will start Thursday evening itself. This means results in the the mountainous districts with small number of voters will start to arrive by Friday.
The country will get a total of 330 provincial assembly members elected through the first past the post (FPTP) system. They and another 220 members to be elected through the proportional representation (PR) system will elect their respective chief ministers, speakers, provincial capitals and names.
But where those assembly members will assemble, how the meetings will be convened and how the expenses will be managed have yet to be decided.
The government still has to do almost a dozen absolutely essential works before the provincial assemblies start to function. It has to choose temporary provincial capitals, appoint provincial chiefs, chief secretries, and formulate working procedures for provincial funds and operation of assemblies before the first meeting of provincial assemblies.
The government is preparing to fix the temporary provincial capitals immediately after the election, according to Minister for Information and Communication Mohan Basnet. It has waited till the completion of voting fearing that the situation can turn explosive as fixing of provincial capitals became an election agenda.
Provincial chiefs will be appointed by the president on recommendation of the government once the temporary capitals are fixed. Provincial chiefs will remain as the representative of the federal government in the province and will administer oath of office to the provincial assembly members.
The first meeting of provincial assemblies will be convened after that. The government has made up its mind about the seven places where the meetings will be convened. Preparations have been started in those seven cities in a way to hold the first meetings there based on the study by a technical team, according to a source at the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers.
The team of Urban Development Ministry has suggested to hold the first meeting of Province 1 in Biratnagar, 2 in Janakpur, 3 in Lalitpur, 4 in Pokhara, 5 in Ghorahi, 6 in Surkhet and 7 in Dhangadi.
“The team studied about the government buildings there, security and other facilities,” the source added. “We will send a report to the Cabinet saying interim management will be easier in these cities,” the source stated.
The source revealed that other cities have also been studied as alternatives. “The provincial assemblies have the rights to fix their respective capitals as per the constitution. These cities are appropriate now in term of convenience. Other cities can also be made capitals if the provicnial assemblies decide so.”
