KATHMANDU: CPN Maoist Center leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha has expressed his disagreement over the passage of the Citizenship Bill.
A day after the House of Representatives endorsed the Citizenship Bill, leader Shrestha made public his dissatisfaction through social media.
“The Citizenship Bill has been passed 7 years after the promulgation of the Constitution. As this law is passed, the children of Nepali fathers and mothers will get the citizenship certificate in line with the constitution, which is going to relieve them from the pain of being without citizenship. This should have happened long ago. However, what has happened now is also positive. But the process that was adopted while passing this bill and what was arranged in the case of naturalized citizenship is wrong from both angles,” he wrote.
Shrestha’s dissatisfaction is towards the incumbent government drafting a new bill despite the old bill, presented by the previous government, being passed by the majority of the State Affairs Committee of National Assembly.
“The controversial issue of naturalized citizenship should have been put on hold for some time. The bill should have been forwarded to address a pressing issue of providing citizenship to children of Nepali parents for now.”
Recalling the process of passage of United States-backed Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), Shrestha said, “Due to pressure of the coalition government, MCC was approved with a 12-point explanatory note amid differences within the party. Even Now, as our party shared the view of State Affairs Committee on the issue of citizenship, it was decided to pass the government prepared new bill.”
“The government cannot withdraw a bill simply because it has different views than a parliamentary panel. Given this, how will the government implement the law of democracy and parliament if its tendency is to advance new bills that are only supported by the minority? This is a serious matter,” he said.
“In addition, if the government is unwilling to write a letter to explicitly reject US’ State Partnership Project (SPP), do we continue to support the government under pressure?” he questioned.
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