‘Disagreement with the citizenship bill; passed to impress the foreign Godfathers’- UML

Kathmandu: The main opposition party CPN (UML) has halted the House of Representatives meeting. CPN (UML) along with Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) halted the scheduled meeting.

The Members of the Parliaments of UML-RSP began the protest by standing at the beginning of the meeting. Speaker Devraj Ghimire had requested them to take their sit but they denied it and continued the protest.

Then, Speaker Devraj Ghimire asked the Chief Whip of UML Padam Giri to put his opinion in brief. Giri dived straight into the Citizenship Bill context.

Giris said, ‘President authenticated the old bill to impress the foreign Prabhus (Godfather). We are not agreeing on this.’ He demanded to register a new citizenship bill.

Giri claimed that the authentication of the old bill was unconstitutional. He added, ‘That dormant bill must be kept as it is and a new bill must be drafted. After discussion on the new one, it must be authenticated.’

Giri said, ‘New citizenship must be registered as per the constitutional procedures. Let’s discuss day and night to authenticate the new bill to provide citizenship to the citizens within a week. Government is not in favor of choosing the right way. Government is not in the state of obeying the constitution.’

Likewise, Chief Whip of Santosh Pariyar claimed that the government has authenticated the bill with a selfish mindset. He said, ‘There is a sense of selfishness, how the government has authenticated the bill. We are completely against the decision.’

The meeting has been adjourned for an hour. There was a schedule of beginning the discussion over the budget.