Nepal’s government is still up in arms over claims by the European Union that Christians are not being fairly represented in parliament, while sensitive issues such as the eating of beef or the rights of Hindus and mino-rity groups get much greater consideration.

On March 21, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) drew attention to the conclusions and recommendations in the final report on the House of Representatives and provincial assembly elections by the European Union’s Election Observation Mission (EUEOM) to Nepal, which was released in February.

The EUEOM raised the point that Christians were not represented in the election, which operates on a proportional representation system, despite comprising 1.4% of the population.

This would seem to indicate that Nepal’s electoral system is not fully inclusive, as has been claimed. In fact, the charter sets out no provision for religious inclusion apart from guaranteeing this for Muslims. Instead, inclusion is worked out on the basis of people’s caste or ethnicity.