Nepal’s political history marked a decisive turn on Monday as Maoists formally joined a parliamentary system they fought to demolish through armed struggle for 11 years.A 330-member interim parliament with 83 members from the communist party of Nepal-Maoists (CPN-M) began its inaugural session at 9.20 pm Nepali time¿about 45 minutes after the previous house stood dissolved soon after it adopted the interim constitution.With the new constitution in force, the country with a 238-year old institution of monarchy looks set for a republican set-up with the king’s status suspended, and the Prime Minister discharging responsibilities of both head of the government and head of the state. The dissolved house stalled the move by about a dozen members to curtail the prime minister’s power. According to the understanding reached, the Maoists will be joining the interim government in the first week of February as the depositing of their arms under United Nations supervision is expected to be complete by end of January. “We expect that major positions in the government would be equally distributed among the three parties¿Maoists, Nepali congress and the Communist Party of Nepal-United Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML),” Maoist leader Dev Gurung said.All the Maoist members—men and women—presented themselves in grey coat under instruction from the party while they took oath as new lawmakers. The House will be replaced by a Constituent Assembly, elections for which are slated to be completed by June. Krishna Bahadur Mahara, spokesperson of the Maoist party, will be their new leader in the House.The top five Maoist leaders—Prachanda, Baburam Bhattarai, Badal, C P Gakurel and Mohan Vaidya¿have chosen to remain outside Parliament.PTI adds:“Today is a day of reconciliation among all the political parties and the people,” Koirala said in the House. “I, being the Prime Minister with the consent of the seven parties, want to assure all that I will never deviate from the democratic principles, for which I have been fighting for the past 60 years,” he said.Communist Party of Nepal (UML) leader Madhav Kumar Nepal told a TV channel “the House has made historic decisions which will be written in golden letters in Nepali history.”Speaker Subhash Nemwang declared the Constitution passed after 185 lawmakers present in the House approved it.
