The constituent Assembly (CA) in Nepal has unprecedented diversity with 33 percent representation of women and a large number of dalits and janajatis. However, the challenging issue is how to ensure the real participation of these Constituent Assembly members, as they are not adequately skilled to speak the parliamentary language. Despite the diversity of elected representatives in the CA, external actors within political parties are still making decisions about the constitution writing process. All major political parties have undergone major changes and challenges through Comprehensive Peace Agreement and elections to current day, and generational gaps and tensions exist among party members.

 

The vote of people in the last elections to the CA has overturned many political parties’ beliefs and understanding about electorate and their position within it. Therefore, there is a hope in Nepal that the CA members are able to challenge their political party leadership to bring about change. There is recognition among members that when parliamentarians in the 1990s did not perform, they lost face among their communities. It is really important, at this stage, to build the linkages between grassroots constituencies and the CA members to challenge and influence their political leaders. The non-government sector has been doing grassroots consultations and trying to bring that voice into the national processes, however CA members themselves have been more absorbed by disturbances and wrangling in the national political process, concentrating efforts more in Kathmandu than their constituencies.

 

The reviews and consultation discussion also highlighted that the key issue in the Constitution writing process is for the constitutional committees not to start from the scratch, instead to identify what is good within the interim constitution and where the gaps are. Some of the gaps in the Interim Constitution are around decentralization and devolution of powers and land reform. The other gaps of the interim constitution are about the inability to effectively implement and put policies and frameworks into action in favor of the poor, women, ethnic groups and Dalits.