Nepalis are
braving bombs, bandh and the poll-opposer 33-parties led by CPN-Maoist Mohan
Baidhya today and voting for a peaceful, democratic, free and prosperous future.
Dismissing various
political pundits' prediction of low voter turnout, the people – mostly the
youths – exercised their rights today across the country for the second
Constituent Assembly (CA) election that is crucial not only to n complete the
drafting of democratic Constitution but also kick start the stalled economic
movement.
Though the
first and the historic CA election in 2008 was able to throw away the over two
centuries old Monarchy, it could not chart out the course of a developed and
prosperous Nepal due to UCPN-Maoist's ideological and economic policy
confusion.
The
UCPN-Maoist that had an overwhelming victory in 2008 failed the people as it
could not get out of war era mentality and tried to backtrack the liberal
economic policy, used its labour wing to disturb the investment-friendly
environment and disappointed the private sector and foreign investors.
They neither
could deliver the Constitution through Constituent Assembly that took almost
seven decades to materialise. However, the political parties – in the last six
years – completed the peace process and settled the thorny issue of Maoist combatants.
Despite the
poll boycott by some of the parties, the peaceful election of CA will certainly
give the economy a boost. "The interim election government is going to
handover a robust economy to the elected government," according to the
finance minister Shankar Prasad Koirala.
But the
transition has taken its toll in the market as it has been witnessing price hike and shortage of essential
commodities. "The government has to concentrated fully on to hold CA
election and could not regularly monitor the market," accepted Koirala,
who is also commerce and supplies minister.
The election
also has its own impact on economy as the political parties and the government
spending is expected to exceed Rs 40 billion. The over supply of money will
fuel the inflationary pressure on economy.
"The
over flow of money in the market will challenge the government and central bank
that have targeted to contain inflation at eight per cent," said former
chief adviser to the Finance Ministry Keshav Acharya.
Most of the
expenses in election will go to unproductive sectors, he said, adding that that
will increase the inflationary pressure. "But the election will also give
new hope to the economy also."
Formation of new elected
government could help boost the economy like in 2008 post CA election. Likewise,
the Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index – that is considered as a mirror of
economy – also closed four year high of over 600 points – on Thursday – after
2008.
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