Nepal: Government formation to begin any time

The process of forming a new government is likely to start after five days when the Election Commission formally submits results of the parliamentary proportional representation elections to the president.

Chief Election Commissioner Ayodhi Prasad Yadav said results of the National Assembly election could be out by tomorrow morning after which the EC would write letters to political parties telling them how many seats they

had won under the PR electoral system and how many women representatives they needed to elect under the PR system.

“We’ll give political parties three days to come up with their lists. If they elect representatives as per our guidelines and meet the PR cluster criteria, we can submit the report of the parliamentary elections, particularly results of the House of Representatives, immediately but if any party makes mistake, then we might need a few more days,” Yadav said.

He said the EC expected to submit the parliamentary PR results to the president within five days.

Once the parliamentary PR results are out, political parties will have to elect their parliamentary party leader who normally is the candidate for the prime minister.

UML leader Agni Kharel, who is also a senior advocate, said since no single party commanded majority in the House of Representatives, a new government could be formed under Article 76 (2) which had a provision for coalition government.

“There is no mention of the process to be followed for forming a new government but it is more about setting practices. I think it will be appropriate if the president tells political parties to stake claim under Article 76 (2),” Kharel said. He added that a person who would be the prime minister under that article should not necessarily be the parliamentary party leader of his/her party.

Another UML leader Pradeep Gyawali said the left alliance would be ready to stake claim to form the government once the president called for the same as per the constitutional provision. He said the left alliance would propose UML Chair KP Sharma Oli’s name as the prime minister under Article 76 (2) of the constitution. Gyawali said the Election Commission misinterpreted the constitution when it decided to announce results of the House of Representatives only after the National Assembly election. “It never happened in a democracy when the winner had to wait this long to form a government,” he said. He added that system in the US was different, as they had legal arrangements that clearly stated that the presidential election would happen in November and the new president would assume the charge of executive in January.

CPN-MC Spokesperson Pampha Bhusal said although her party was in favour unifying with the CPN-UML before the formation of the government but since time was running out to form the government, her party would continue unification talks and give preference to the formation of the government.

Senior Media Expert of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba Govinda Pariyar said the PM had no plan to address the nation till the EC submitted the parliamentary PR election results to the president.

NC leader Bal Krishna Khand, who is close to PM Deuba, said the process of forming a new government could start within a week and his party would play the role of principal opposition.

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