Nepal PM-designate too sick for swearing-in

NEPAL: Nepal's 84-year-old Prime Minister-designate Girija Prasad Koirala was unable to attend his own swearing-in ceremony on Friday morning because of bronchitis, relatives and officials said.

The decision to postpone his swearing-in means that parliament, due to open in the afternoon for the first time in four years, might not be able to make any substantive decisions.

Koirala's daughter Sujata said her father had bronchitis and was on antibiotics. He had been also been given oxygen and a saline drip on Thursday, but his health was gradually improving.

"He is an old man, he is taking rest," she told Reuters outside his room. "The only problem is that it was too hectic a schedule and he is tired."

Sujata said the veteran politician would be sworn in later on Friday if he felt better.

Koirala's ill-health has got his fifth term as prime minister off to an inauspicious start.

On Thursday, he was too ill to attend a large rally in the capital Kathmandu to celebrate victory for the country's pro-democracy movement, sparking anger among many in the crowd.

It will also undermine the eagerly awaited opening session of parliament, which had been expected to move quickly to pave the way for elections to a special assembly to write a new constitution for the Himalayan kingdom.

"Parliament will sit but it will only be a formal sitting," said Krishna Prasad Situala, spokesman for Koirala's Nepali Congress party, the country's largest.

On Thursday, Maoist rebels declared a three-month unilateral ceasefire, and the government is expected to move swiftly to match the truce once it takes office.

But the rebels have made it clear they were expecting parliament to declare elections for the constituent assembly on Friday.

Earlier this week, Nepal's King Gyanendra backed down after weeks of often bloody street protests, agreeing to revive parliament and hand over power to an alliance of seven political parties which led the protests.Kathmandu, Friday, Reuters