Constituent Assembly Election 2013 126 Constituent Assembly Election 2013 127 Constituent Assembly Election 2013 Monitoring Report Advisers Subodh Raj Pyakurel Bijay Raj Gautam Compilation Sushil Chaudhary Executive Editors Prashannata Wasti Nir Lama Editors Ganesh Bhadari Data Analysis Pramin Ghimire Anuj KC Graphic Design Gita Mali Citizen's Campaign for Clean Election Secretariat: Informal Sector Service Centre (INSEC) Syuchatar, Kalanki, P.O.Box: 2726, Kathmandu, Nepal Tel: +977-1-4278770, Fax: +977-1-4270551 E-mail: [email protected] Web site: www.insec.org.np, www.inseconline.org Constituent Assembly Election 2013 Monitoring Report Published Date: May 2014 Publish Quantity: 500 Copies Copyright: INSEC Photo: Bimal Chandra Sharma and INSEC District Representatives Constituent Assembly Election 2013 ISBN: 978-9937-8583-8-0 Printed: Dream Graphic Press, Kuleshwor 2 Contents Foreword 5 Abbreviation and Acronyms 6 Executive Summary 7 Part One Constituent Assembly in Nepal: A Historical Background 13 Part Two Citizen's Campaign for Clean Election 21 Part Three Constituent Assembly Election 2013: Monitoring Report 43 A. Pre-Election Observation Activities 44 Violation of Code of Conduct on Regional Basis 44 - Eastern Region 48 - Mid Region 54 - Western Region 75 - Mid-Western Region 88 - Far-Western Region 98 Violence of Code of Conduct and Other Related Information 103 B. Election Day: Election Observation 107 C. Post-Election Observation Activities 120 Part Four Recommendations 123 Annexes 1. Code of Conduct Issued by Election Commisssion and Acts, Laws related to Constituent Assembly Election, 2070 (2013) 126 - Constituent Assembly Member Election Code of Conduct, 2070 (2013) 126 - Election (Offences and Punishment) Act, 2063 (2007) 141 Constituent Assembly Election 2013 - Ordinance on Election of Members of Constituent Assembly, 2070 (2013) 153 3 2. Details of Candidates Elected Under FPTP 184 3. The multiplicity of Madheshi parties - their number has been 34 in these elections - has led to a decline of directly 196 4. Ethnicity of the elected FPTP candidates 197 5. Final Result of PR Vote Count 198 6. Name List of CA Members Elected under PR 203 7. Individuals and Organizations Involved in Citizen’s Campaign for Clean Election 212 8. Name List of Observers Involved in the Observation of CA Member Election, 2070 (2013) 213 9. Details of Violation of Constituent Assembly Member Election Code of Conduct 222 10. Press Releases Issued after Constituent Assembly Election 223 11. Sample of Daily Report Published by Citizen's Campaign for Clean Election (CCCE) Secretariat 251 12. Members involved in the Secretariat of the Citizen’s Campaign for Clean Election 253 13. Brief Observation Report on Constituent Assembly Elections-2013 submitted to the Election Commission 254 14. Polling Station Observation Form 256 Constituent Assembly Election 2013 4 Foreword epali people cast their votes for Constituent Assembly (CA) members for the second time. This election was not for the formation of a government or for localN autonomous ruling. It was rather a complimentary of the 2008 CA elections for which their ballots had gone in vain. There is no contesting the claim that the former election could not be held in fearless environment. This tragic sense prodded the civil society into ensuring free and fair CA elections at any cost this time around. This urge resulted in Citizens’ Campaign for Clean Election. This Campaign not only conducted extensive monitoring of the election, it also went to the people telling them about the importance of clean election and taught them to vote only after judging the candidate’s past and appraising social reverence towards them. It launched a campaign for people to make them select the candidate without being influenced by fear, concern, intimidation or financial promises and not to choose anyone corrupt or convicted or their accomplices and choose only the honest candidates. The Campaign activists were not limited to the capital and the urban areas, they were involved at local level too, through public debate, radio programs, local television stations bearing the torch for clean election. Modern communication equipments were used quite well. The activists were connected through sky-pro (EVDO) phone network whence they could transmit the message in seconds. The Campaign reached nearly 100 million people across the country as the Report suggests. The successful campaigning for clean election by a civil society organization with paltry fund has made us deduct that the biometric system can be used in coming elections, if the government is willing. All the sectors involved in the elections concluded that this CA election was much cleaner, freer and conducted in a fearless environment in comparison to the previous one. There were some incidents of breach of Code of Conduct and irregularities. However, we found that the Election Commission was trying its best to discourage such malpractices. The election result has proved that the people were able to distinguish those not wishing and not able to ensure rule of law, living an opulent life by accumulating money through irregularities, assaulting the people’s life by being engaged in criminal activities and that they were not afraid of them. This has begged a need to have similar campaign to clean constitution. At the end, I would like to thank all the campaign activists, general public, voters, media and the friends involved in this publication, including Yogish Kharel of INSEC. Constituent Assembly Election 2013 Subodh Raj Pykaurel Coordinator Citizen's Campaign for Clean Election 5 Abbreviation and Acronyms ANFREL : Asia Network for Free Elections APF : Armed Police Force ANNISU-R : All Nepal National Independent Student’s Union (Revolutionary) CA : Constituent Assembly CCCE : Citizen’s Campaign for Clean Election CDO : Chief District Officer CJMC : College of Journalism and Mass Communication CN : Constituency Number CoC : Code of Conduct CPN-M : Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) CPN-ML : Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist Leninist) DR : District Representative DSP : Deputy Superintendent of Police EC : Election Commission FAYA Nepal : Forum for Awareness and Youth Activity (FAYA) Nepal FLSC : Federal Limbuwan State Council FNJ : Federation of Nepali Journalist FPTP : First Past The Post FSP : Federal Socialist Party HRERLIC : Human Rights Education Club INSEC : Informal Sector Service Center MJF-L : Madhesi Janadhikar Forum, Nepal (Loktantrik) MJF-N : Madhesi Janadhikar Forum, Nepal NA : Nepal Army NC : Nepali Congress NEMA : National Election Monitoring Alliance NEOC : National Election Observation Committee NWPP : Nepal Workers’ and Peasants’ Party PSA : Public Service Announcement PR : Proportional Representation RJM : Rastriya Jana Morcha RPP : Rastriya Prajatantra Party RPP-N : Rastriya Prajatantra Party-Nepal SAFHR : South Asia Forum for Human Rights SC : Supreme Court Constituent Assembly Election 2013 SPA : Seven Party Alliance TMDP : Tarai Madhes Democratic Party TMLP : Tarai Madhes Loktantrik Party UML : Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist) 6 VDC : Village Development Committee Executive Summary Citizen's Campaign for Clean Election, 2013 he CA election has been concluded with the publication of all the results of FPTP and Proportional Representation System and the first meeting of the TCA has also been held. The Citizens’ Campaign for Clean Election, formed with an intention of maintaining CA election’s cleanness, had monitored the pre- election, during the election and post-election situation. The Campaign conducted programs such as voters’ education, public vetting of the candidates, public meetings, interactions at the central, regional, district and local level. Over 10,000 people participated directly in these programs. The support put forth by the means of mass communication, especially community radios, local level community television stations and newspapers also facilitated listeners, audience and readers to be better acquainted with the Campaign messages. Considering the coverage of such local media, total beneficiaries could have reached nearly 100 million people. The Campaign’s 301 monitors had the EC election observer recognition. The observers were helped in gathering information by the members of local network, 20,000 members of HRERLIC and local INSEC staffs that made it possible to collect information from all 240 constituencies. A new website was constructed for effective dissemination of monitoring, observation and documentation under the Campaign. The said website, www. cleanelections.org was visited by 4,108 in a month. For effectively feeding the website, all 75 INSEC district representatives (DRs) were provided with CDMA Sky data card of Nepal Telecom. With the help of that device, the DRs were able to send the Constituent Assembly Election 2013 information to the CCCE secretariat as soon as they verified it. Such information was uploaded in the website and disseminated in the media and even to the EC as needed. The Campaign concluded that the biometric election was possible in Nepal if the newly available communication technologies are utilized. 7 This election saw influence of the different contexts existing in the run up to previous CA election and this one. The CA election 2008 was said to a peaceful election in the environment as the incidents of killing, attempted killing, abduction, battery and intimidation well before the beginning of election campaign but the second CA election was much more peaceful.