US embassy cable - 02KATHMANDU1901

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KATHMANDU 001901 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SA/INS 
LONDON FOR POL - RIEDEL 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/29/2012 
TAGS: PGOV, NP, Political Parties, Government of Nepal (GON) 
SUBJECT: NEPAL:  ALL-PARTY CONSENSUS TO POSTPONE ELECTIONS 
 
REF: A. (A) KATHMANDU 1811 
     B. (B) KATHMANDU 1781 
     C. (C) KATHMANDU 1772 
 
Classified By: AMB. MICHAEL E. MALINOWSKI.  REASON:  1.5 (B,D). 
 
1.  (C) Summary:  On September 29 an all-party meeting 
recommended that national parliamentary elections, originally 
scheduled to begin November 13, be postponed.  The 
recommendation--reached just one day after the Election 
Commission finally announced the long-awaited schedule for 
the polls--was made after the parties reached a consensus 
that the deteriorating security situation warrants postponing 
the elections.  A Cabinet meeting September 30 decided that 
the Government should discuss a possible new date for polls 
and the make-up of a suggested all-party government with 
political party leaders.  If the Prime Minister decides to 
take the recommendation to the King, the decision would give 
the monarch the all-party, public consensus he required 
before invoking his Constitutional authority to postpone the 
polls (Ref B). End summary. 
 
2.  (SBU) On September 29 an all-party meeting at the 
residence of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba recommended 
that the Prime Minister ask King Gyanendra to postpone 
mid-term parliamentary elections, originally scheduled to 
begin November 13, because of the uncertain security 
environment.  The meeting proposed that a new interim 
all-party government, with representation from each party in 
the former Parliament, be formed until elections can take 
place.  The meeting did not address fixing a date for the 
deferred elections.  A Cabinet meeting September 30 decided 
that the Government should continue discussion of the matter, 
including a time-frame for the deferred election and the 
make-up of an interim government, with political party 
leaders. 
 
3.  (SBU)  Hom Nath Dahal, a former MP and now spokesman for 
PM Deuba's newly formed Nepali Congress (Democratic) Party 
(Ref A), said that the PM and his party were the only 
participants in the meeting urging that elections take place 
as scheduled.  When it became apparent, however, that the 
other parties were strongly in favor of postponement, the NC 
(Democratic) had to go along with the consensus, Dahal said. 
He suggested that the new interim all-party government would 
likely be headed by Deuba. 
 
4.  (U)  The decision to postpone elections comes just one 
day after the Election Commission finally announced a 
schedule--pending since the dissolution of Parliament May 
22--for phased polling throughout the country.  The Election 
Commission timetable called for polling to occur in six 
discrete phases, extending from November 13 to January 10. 
Filing of cadidacies was to have begun October 5. 
 
5.  (C)  Despite the all-party consensus, there are a few 
voices of dissension.  Former MP Narayan Singh Pun, who left 
the Nepali Congress to form his own political party to 
contest the November elections (and thus did not attend the 
September 29 meeting), complained that postponing the polls 
in response to Maoist terrorism amounts to an admission of 
defeat by the Government.  We are ceding the ground to the 
Maosits and letting them win, he argued.  If the mainstream 
political parties show they are too afraid to campaign and 
shut themselves up in Kathmandu, the Maoists will fill the 
vacuum left in the districts and become stronger, rather than 
weaker, in the interim until elections, he predicted.  He 
expressed great disappointment with his political colleagues' 
timidity, adding that no one will ever be able to guarantee 
an environment of complete safety--even six months or one 
year from now--for elections.  He said that many of his 
former party workers when he was in the Nepali Congress have 
become so disenchanted that they have joined the Maoists. 
 
6.  (C)  Comment:  Although few people we have talked to over 
the past six weeks expected the elections to proceed as 
scheduled, no political leader seemed willing to say so in 
public.  As long as the Election Commission delayed 
publishing the schedule--and as long as no one had to file 
for candidacy and show up in any potentially dangerous 
constituencies--the various parties seemed willing to 
continue the increasingly implausible charade that voting 
would take place on November 13.  But less than 24 hours 
after the long-delayed schedule was finally announced, the 
leaders of seven different parties had  hammered out, in 
uncharacteristically short order, a consensus that they 
didn't want to have the elections after all.  Whatever its 
timing, the recommendation seems to fulfill the two 
conditions for a request for royal intervention--that it 
arise from consensus and be made in public--that King 
Gyanendra had stipulated he was looking for before invoking 
his constitutional authority to postpone elections (Ref A). 
We expect the Prime Minister will forward the request to the 
King--along with his own recommendations for the composition 
of a caretaker government--soon. 
MALINOWSKI