While all major Nepali and English broadsheet dailies published from Kathmandu on Tuesday have given the top priority to the nomination of incumbent secretary Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya for the vacant position of Chief Election Officer, Nagarik and Republica have highlighted that the decision was made in absence of main opposition leader Sher Bahadur Deuba.
Meanwhile, the signing of an agreement between Nepal and Japan over the labour migration of Nepali workers to the Asian economic leader has also received significant coverage on the front pages of broadsheets published from the capital. As in past weeks, the front pages also have some other reports about the government crackdown on activities of the Netra Bikram Chand ‘Biplav’-led party and ongoing preparations for the Investment Summit that the government is hosting this weekend.
Here is a summary of important, ignored and interesting stories from the cover pages of national broadsheets:
Important
NC protests Thapaliya’s nomination
Former Prime Minister Deuba had wrote a letter to Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli, who chairs the Constitutional Council meeting, on Monday morning and asked him to postpone the meeting as the time clashed with the meeting of his parliamentary party. Oli, however, did not pay any heed to the letter, Nagarik reports in its lead story.
Republica quotes Nepali Congress spokesperson Bishwa Prakash Sharma to say that the ruling party had tried to completely undermine the role of the main opposition envisioned in the constitution.
It reminds that the CC meeting had earlier picked the heads of five constitutional bodies with the participation of Deuba.
PM, Defence Minister lock horns over Biplav
Prime Minister Oli and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Ishwar Pokharel are apparently at odds over the possibility of talks with the Biplav-led Maoist group, Nagarik reports in a snippet.
While Prime Minister has given a two weeks’ time to come to the negotiation table, Pokharel says the talks cannot be held unless the group surrenders arms.
Ignored
Two killed in Sindhupalchok cooking gas explosion
Four persons have been killed when a cooking gas cylinder exploded in Bhotekoshi of Sindhupalchok district on Monday, according to a brief story in Nepal Samacharpatra.
The District Police Office has confirmed the incident, but says the victims are yet to be identified as the incident site is quite far from the district headquarters and other market hubs.
OPMCM directs officials to fix BP Highway potholes
Rajdhani reports in a four column story that the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers has directed officials to fix all potholes of BP Highway within next 50 days. Earlier, the newspaper had published a report that there are at least 264 potholes along the 160 km road.
Following the publication of the report, OPMCM Secretary Shishir Kumar Dhungana called a meeting of concerned officials and made the directive, the newspaper informs.
TIA keeps emergency exits locked
There are 12 emergency exit doors at the terminal building of Tribhuvan International Airport, the country’s sole international airport, but all of them are kept locked, The Himalayan Times reports in its lead story for the day.
“As the doors are linked to other areas of TIA, people were using them as shortcuts. They also started throwing packets of noodles, cigarettes, biscuits, paper cups and other garbage on the escape route. That is why we decided to shut the doors,” TIA General Manager Raj Kumar Chhetri has been quoted in the report.
Businesses want to revoke chopper seat removal decision
After the fatal helicopter crash that killed Tourism Minister Rabindra Adhikari among seven last month, the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal concluded that the number of passengers could be one cause of the accident and decided to remove one seat from all seven seater choppers.
Aviation businesses, however, are not satisfied with the decision and they have launched backdoor efforts to revoke it, Nagarik reports in its anchor story.
Earlier, they had welcomed the government decision and begun its implementation.
Experts pinpoint errors in SEE question papers
Kantipur lead story for the day informs that experts have identified various forms of errors in question papers of Secondary Education Examination underway across the country.
So far the grade 10 students took two examinations—of English and Nepali. Question papers of these subjects prepared by the provincial governments had various mistakes and they left the students baffled, the report quotes experts as saying.
Interesting
NOC preparing 10 year strategy
The government run fuel distribution monopoly, Nepal Oli Corporation, is preparing a 10 year strategy in its bid to reduce supply cost and improve its effectiveness, according to a report published in Karobar.
The strategy will also focus on investments in infrastructure development and utilisation of information technology, the report informs quoting NOC Executive Director Surendra Kumar Paudel.
