By Our Reporter
Parliament is a place to make laws. The people-elected representatives discuss the people’s problems and formulate required laws. There are also rules and laws to conduct the parliament proceedings. But we hardly see these activities in our parliament. It hardly makes laws and the lawmakers hardly discuss national issues, nor does the Speaker follow the laws and international practices while running the House businesses. Instead, it is turning into a battlefield. Political parties are misusing the forum to fulfill their petty interests. These are what we have been noticing in the parliament in recent days.
The main opposition Nepali Congress and other opposition parties have been obstructing the parliament, but Speaker Dev Raj Ghimire is conducting the meetings amidst sloganeering with the help of the marshals. Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ showed his majority amidst protest from the opposition with the help of marshals on Monday. Likewise, the House expressed gratitude to the President amid a protest on Tuesday.
Moreover, Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane, whose main job is to maintain law and order by arresting the culprits, used the House to issue threats to the opposition leaders citing their unlawful acts of the past. When the opposition parties accused him of involving in cooperative frauds and demanded a parliament committee to investigate his alleged involvement in the frauds, he spate venom against the leaders of the opposition parties terming them corrupt in his address on Sunday. What Lamichhane said on Sunday did not match his post as the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister. Instead of labelling the blame, as a powerful Home Minister, he should have shown the guts to arrest the corrupt leaders. However, he revealed that he was offered the post of Prime Minister by NC president Sher Bahadur Deuba for a term of 18 months.
Had he been innocent, he could have allowed the formation of the parliament committee. When Lamichhane was facing the charge of corruption fraud, the Supreme Court in its latest verdict revealed how KP Oli, the chairman of the CPN-UML, had resorted to policy-level corruption in the Giri Bandhu Tea Estate land scam. Now when Oli is likely to face similar criticism from the NC, he has given protection to Lamichhane applying his full strength. Moreover, if a parliament committee is formed as demanded by NC, the political career of many UML and Maoist leaders could end because, in most of the cooperative frauds across the country, the UML leaders are involved followed by the Maoist leaders. This is why Oli is against the committee formation. It means the Parliament has turned into a place to give protection to corrupt politicians.
Moreover, when the leaders in the parliament continue to sling mud at each other exposing the unlawful works of the leaders of the rival parties, people will soon come to know how they were voting for the corrupt leaders and sending them to the parliament, and the corrupt leaders are using their might to cover up their corrupt and illegal acts. The activities of the ruling parties, their leaders and their expressions over the past 14 days have only uncovered their corrupt faces.
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