Stability or chaos, What next in Nepal?

Rohan Giri

Amid political uncertainty and bleak future, Himalayan former Hindu Kingdom, Nepal elected its new President in 78-year-old Ram Chandra Paudel.

Paudel is a senior Nepali Congress leader and defeated Nepal Communist Party (United Marxist Leninist) backed Subas Chandra Nembang. In the 52,628 weightage-based votes, Paudel secured 33,802 and was anointed Nepal’s President while Nembang polled 15,518 votes.  

After Nepal Pratinidhi Sabha or House of Representative was in session for 64-days with 275 members, Nepal Communist Party (United Marxist Leninist) broke away from the ruling coalition alliance and the government.

The break up in ruling coalition was triggered by reported disagreement on the presidential candidate.

As per Nepal Parliament’s current status, a party or an alliance will have to muster the support of at least138 members to gain majority and continue in governance.

Nepal Communist Party (United Marxist Leninist), the second-largest party in the coalition government with 79 members has recently deserted the ruling alliance.

The alliance, however, does not appear to have suffered significant losses since the Nepali Congress Party has 89 members, Nepal Communist Party (Maoist Center) – 32 members, and Rashtriya Swatantra Party has 20 members. These three parties command a comfortable majority with no threat to the government as of now.

Desertion of CPN (UML) is widely being attributed to Prime Minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, “Prachanda” violation of December 25, 2022 agreement put together to assume power by the coalition.

As a consequence, eight CPN (UML) ministers including Deputy Prime Minister in the Prachanda-led incumbent government resigned en masse thereby creating a flutter.

Previously, in 2017, the alliance between China’s front-man Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli and Maoist guerrilla Pushpa Kumar Dahal fell apart. The churn in political coalitions demonstrates the potential for future uncertainties in Nepal.

In an earlier report, it was predicted that the coalition would be difficult to survive as the co-existence of Maoists and Marxists influenced by China has seen about ten swearings-in and then thrown out of power in the last few years.

To deal with such a situation, “under Clause 2 of Article 100 of the Constitution of Nepal, a prime minister would be required to seek a vote of confidence again if a coalition partner or political ally broke away or withdrew support from the government. In such a situation, Prime Minister will have to secure a fresh vote of confidence in 30 days.

If the prime minister failed secure confidence vote by March 26 in the present context, Prachanda will lose office. Given the present numbers and assuming there would be no further cross overs or desertions, Prime Minister Prachanda is expected to sail through in the Parliament.

Nepal, which established democracy in 2008 by ending the monarchical system of about 240 years, was successful in establishing democracy.

However, with the change in the design, have they left behind their values as well? Nepal, a Hindu nation, has fallen into China’s trap. As a result, China’s debt has grown in the name of the country’s development, the leaders have become China’s puppets, and the path to instability is being taken in the name of disagreement. This mountain kingdom was different from that.

The way to increase Nepal’s development and reduce instability will come from the nation’s own values, which are the Hindu values of a Hindu nation. Looking back ten to fifteen years, the contradiction between Hindu majority India and Nepal, which were very close, has grown. The Nepali leadership’s increasing closeness to the dragon is the only reason for this.

So the actual cause for breaking the alliance is different from what we see on the information mediums; in reality, Beijing’s representative, KP Sharma Oli, wanted to take all the important political, economic, and strategic calls internally and externally but failed to do so. The following trust vote will decide who will lead Nepal and the next strategy. If the situation as it is now seen remains the same, then the current coalition can stay in power even further.

(Rohan is a journalism graduate from Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) New Delhi, and Manager Operations at CIHS.)