Parliament finally ratifies the MCC Compact NEPAL, NEWS 2022

 After years of delay, Parliament finally ratifies the MCC Compact.

One of the most contentious agreements, the US grant, passes the House of Representatives after a coalition decides to pass it with an interpretation declaration.

After years of delay, Parliament finally ratifies the MCC Compact.

 

On Sunday, lawmakers in Kathmandu's federal parliament voted in favor of approving Washington's MCC Nepal Compact.

 

After weeks of wrangling among political parties, Nepal's Parliament ratified the Millennium Challenge Corporation Nepal Compact on Sunday.

Deliberations began on Sunday afternoon, after the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre), the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist), and the Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP), the Sher Bahadur Deuba government's three partners, agreed earlier in the day to vote in favor of the compact with a "interpretative declaration."

With the ratification of the agreement, which had been in Parliament since July 2019, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has pulled off a coup, as he has not only met the February 28 deadline set by the US, but has also prevented the coalition from dissolving.

 

After holding a harsh stance against the American grant's approval for days, the Maoist Centre and the Unified Socialist were left with no choice but to join the coalition.

 

Deuba, who is also the president of the Nepali Congress, had used numerous routes to try to reach out to the main opposition CPN-UML for cooperation in ratifying the accord before the February 28 deadline, even if it came at the cost of breaking the current alliance.

The Congress, the Maoist Centre, the Unified Socialist Party, and the JSP reached a tentative agreement on passing the compact with the "interpretative declaration" appended late Saturday night. It was dubbed the "middle route" by the leaders because it allowed them to keep their issues alive.

 

The Maoist Centre agreed to vote in favor on Sunday morning, reversing its Parliamentary Party's decision on February 16 to resign the government if the agreement was carried forward in Parliament. Following suit was the Unified Socialist Party. As Parliament began deliberations on the compact, which was introduced on February 20, a Cabinet meeting developed 12 points of the interpretive declaration.

 

Speaker Agni Sapkota placed the compact and the interpretative declaration to a voice vote on the table after deliberations on the agreement.

After deliberations on the two proposals, Speaker Agni Sapkota declared, "The Millennium Challenge Corporation agreement and its interpretative declaration have been adopted with majority votes."

 

The MCC compact, which was signed in September 2017 and is intended to create energy transmission lines and improve roads in Nepal, has become a highly polarizing subject in Nepal. Opponents of the compact have increased their ultranationalistic rhetoric, claiming that several of the compact's terms threaten Nepal's sovereignty.

 

Speaker Agni Sapkota granted opportunity for parliamentarians to express their opinions when Parliament met on Sunday afternoon after being postponed for many days due to disagreements over the compact, just as the UML continued to stall. 

Apart from UML's Bhim Rawal, Nepal Majdoor Kisan Party's Prem Suwal, coalition partner Rastriya Janamorcha's Durga Poudel, and Rastriya Prajatantra Party's Rajendra Lingden, most MPs from the Maoist Centre, the Unified Socialist Party, and the JSP opposed certain of the MCC's provisions.

Rawal was the only speaker from the UML, which decided to boycott the entire MCC process because it pledged to keep obstructing the process. The party, on the other hand, did not prevent MPs from taking the stage. They didn't even put a stumbling block in the way of the MCC's ratification.

 

Rawal, one of the most outspoken opponents of American aid, urged all parliamentarians not to approve the agreement.

Former Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai of the Janata Samajbadi Party, Mahantha Thakur of the Loktantrik Samajbadi Party, Congress members Minendra Rijal and Gagan Thapa, and Hridayesh Tripathi, who was elected to Parliament under the UML's election symbol, all called for the ratification of the compact.

Thapa, who is also the general secretary of the Congress, believes the government should issue an interpretative pronouncement to address concerns voiced by some parties and members of the public.

"The MCC will not be implemented if the US administration refuses to recognize our interpretative pronouncement," Thapa added. "If the other party goes beyond our interpretative declaration, we should proclaim our determination to cancel the agreement in a minute."

 

Thapa claimed that the leaders who were in charge of bringing the MCC to power were still making misleading claims rather than clarifying matters to the people who had been misled by false information.

 

"Let's not be deceitful. We've said things like the deal is more important than Nepal's constitution," Thapa added. "All other parties have been involved in the MCC except Nepal Majdoor Kisan Party."

 

However, another Congress member, Rijal, stated that the interpretative pronouncement will have no effect if the MCC cannot be amended, revised, or developed.

 

"This interpretative pronouncement was only introduced to manage the egos of a few leaders," Rijal remarked. 

Despite the Maoist Centre and the Unified Socialist threatening to pull out of the coalition, the Deuba government, after postponing its plan by two days, tabled the MCC compact in Parliament on February 20.

 

A 315-kilometer double-circuit 400-kV transmission line will be built under the MCC agreement. New Butwal-India Border (18 km), New Butwal-New Damauli (90 km), New Damauli-Ratmate (90 km), Ratmate-New Hetauda (58 km), and Ratmate-Lapsephedi (58 km) are the five transmission line segments to be built (59km).

 

These infrastructures are planned to offer a critical missing link for power plants in various river basins to connect to Nepal's current high-voltage grid once finished. A portion of the $500 million will go toward road improvements.

The American gift, which sparked political controversy in Nepal, also exposed Dahal's dishonesty, as the two leaders had requested four to five months to ratify the compact in a letter to the MCC headquarters on September 29. While Dahal continued to deny having sent such a letter, his political statement, in which he vehemently opposed the American donation, was passed by his party's general assembly in December.

 

But it wasn't just the letter that went public; the MCC's reaction to it did as well, demonstrating that Dahal was not opposed to the MCC accord despite catering to his party's supporters.

 

Despite Dahal's agreement to pass the accord with the interpretive proclamation attached, sister wings of his party were out on the streets on Sunday as well, protesting against the compact.

 

 

Deuba had been put under a lot of pressure to ratify the agreement after receiving back-to-back communications from the US, citing the Nepali leadership's failure to work on their signed duties. On February 10, Donald Lu, the US assistant secretary of state, told Deuba over the phone that if the Nepali government failed to ratify the accord by the deadline they had set, Washington would reconsider its ties with Nepal.

 

The US grant support has recently drawn Nepal into a geopolitical game, with Beijing slamming Washington for giving Nepal a gift with an ultimatum for the second time in a week, first warning the US against pursuing "coercive diplomacy" in Nepal.

 

Finance Minister Janardan Sharma, who had abstained from the February 20 meeting, had urged that deliberations on the MCC compact be held earlier on Sunday.

 

Minister Sharma stated that the MCC will be implemented to benefit the country, and that an interpretative declaration would be made to Parliament.

 

"The deal will be executed with the goal of serving the national interest," Sharma stated. "The government will respond to the concerns in a responsible manner."

 

The main opposition, which elected to keep out of the MCC ratification process entirely, has stated that the interpretative pronouncement has no meaning.

 

Subas Nembang, deputy leader of the UML's Parliamentary Party, remarked, "The [governing parties] have not been honest to the people." "There have been questions as to why the ruling parties are in power resorting to such an irresponsible act."

 

 

Deuba was close to reaching an agreement with UML chair Oli, whose administration had registered the compact in Parliament in 2019, as the two coalition partners continued to reject it.

 

The interpretative declaration was issued to save the face of some leaders, according to Nembang, referring to the Maoist Centre and Unified Socialist.

 

 

 

"Today, even some lawmakers said such," Nembang remarked. "We felt the same way."

 

 

Tika R Pradhan

Tika R Pradhan is a senior political correspondent for the Post, covering politics, parliament, judiciary and social affairs. Pradhan joined the Post in 2016 after working at The Himalayan Times for more than a decade.