SABIN TULADHAR HOWDY: Prime Minister Dahal receives American ambassador Nancy Powell in Singha Darbar on Tuesday. USAID announced a $42 million aid package this week, but the CA hasn't yet started the constitution-drafting process.

Six months have passed. Four months were spent forming the government, and two more were taken up with the budget and Dasain. The government has formed neither a high-level political council nor a special committee for integration and rehabilitation of the PLA.

With 18 months to go, there has been no work on writing the constitution. At this pace, there seems little chance the constitution will be written by April 2010.

"The government is not concerned at all and the CA members are helpless," said constitutional expert Bhimarjun Acharya, who doubts whether the government is even committed to getting the document written. The CA Rules and Procedures are yet to be finalised as debate rumbles on about whether CA members are subject to the party whip or not.

But some people remain confident of progress. "The rules will be finalised by mid-November," says Radheshyam Adhikari, a member of the drafting committee.

Donors have taken some committee members abroad for a first-hand look at how federalism functions, administrative and educational reforms in the hope of providing ideas for Nepal. But the drafting committee has remained inactive.
The parliament secretariat appears unaware of these trips. "We have not received any formal requests," said Mukunda Sharma, the secretariat's spokesman, who doesn't know when the members will return.

The CA was elected for a two-year period, but government ministers are now saying they might extend the drafting period for a further six months. "We have not completely run out of time," says Acharya. By his perhaps optimistic calculations, six months will suffice for deciding on the constitution's content. It will then take three months to write it with the correct legal terminology, a further three months for public consultations, and the rest of the time for parliamentary discussion and eventual endorsement.

Adhikari blames the political parties' squabbles for the delay in finalising the Rules and Procedures. "If the parties cannot reach agreement over their differences, the writing of the constitution will be delayed," he says.

Subhas Nembang, chairman of the Constituent Assembly, is staying positive. He told Nepali Times: "The schedule might have changed a bit, but we will finish the constitution on time."