Kathmandu, May 27:

Prime Minister Dr Baburam Bhattarai Sunday expressed regret over failure to promulgate constitution despite utmost efforts by the ruling parties.

Organising a press meet at his official residence at Baluwatar after he informed President Dr Ram Baran Yadav about the Cabinet decision to hold fresh CA election on Nov 22, Prime Minister Dr Bhattarai urged the people to keep their morale high and make the political forces that favour federalism victorious in the upcoming election.

Saying that political agreement was still needed for moving ahead, he urged all the parties to cooperate in the new task.

In the context of SC verdict, we held a Cabinet meeting and saw that there was no alternative to a fresh election and the cabinet decided to hold the election on Nov 22. I, along with DPM and ministers, have informed the President about the Cabinet decision to hold fresh CA election on Nov 22, said the Prime Minister.

Of course, this is not a happy occasion. The Nepali people had expected to have a new constitution. And that constitution would be not the old status quo constitution but the new one that institutionalizes the changes, republicanism, federalism, inclusiveness and proportionate systems.

At this moment, I do not think it appropriate to go for blame and counter blame but would like to share a bitter fact that the old political parties had accepted republicanism only out of compulsion. Federalism was not in their dictionary and had accepted it in the background of people’s war, people’s movement, the Madhes movement and janajati movement.

We exercised maximum flexibility for the constitution. As the largest party we tried to go through consensus. But the old parliamentary parties, which did not want to go for federalism, finally rejected to move a step ahead for federalism, which resulted in the failure of constitution building.

Even if there was no consensus, we had proposed for adopting the CA procedures so as to decide on federalism presenting the CA thematic committee and State Restructuring Commission’s reports in the CA. But they did not agree. Instead they threatened in different pretexts and prevented the process. This brought about a situation where there is neither constitution nor the CA.

The CA could not meet today. This is a very painful situation. We have to take a negative lesson from this and move the nation forward. We have to move ahead to safeguard our goals of democracy, republic, federalism, secularism and progress. Though we have failed, the Nepali people will evaluate everything.

The people had fought in people’s war, people’s movement, Madhes movement to end feudal, unitary ruling system, for republican, federal, forward looking system. We needed a constitution that would address the desire of change of the women, dalit, backward community, Madhesi, Muslim and janajatis. However, the old parties did not embrace it. And as they prevented the process and agreement, we found them to be working for dissolving the CA.

We urge all the people not to be frustrated. The future of our country is bright. We have to move ahead with forward looking mission. Despite our worry, we should not give up our courage.

I urge all countrymen to learn lesson from the failure, errors and move ahead. We have decided to go to the people once again and I hope all the political parties, civil society, media will cooperate in this. The Nepali people should identify who wants change and who does not, the Prime Minister said.