KATHMANDU, DECEMBER 10

Political analyst Uddhab Pyakurel says that Nepal's political parties need to learn the culture of coalition politics as it is here to stay for a long time.

The November 20 parliamentary and provincial elections have produced hung parliaments/assemblies.

On the question of how parties should manage the conflict that could arise due to their differences on the spoils of power, Pyakurel said that political parties should learn a lesson from examples elsewhere. In almost all the European countries, Israel, and India, parties have no problem working as partners in coalition, then why should parties in Nepal squabble? He said the former prime ministers should be able to live with the reality that if they cannot become the PM, then they can either retire or serve as minister in somebody else's Cabinet. 'In Finland, Alexander Stubb who had served as prime minister (2014-2015) while his party was the largest in size, later served as finance minister (2015-2016) after his party became second largest in the coalition. The problem here is that all former PMs neither go away from politics after losing popularity nor are they ready to join Cabinet taking lower position as per the mandate.

Matrika Prasad Koirala had agreed to become Nepal's Ambassador to the United States of America as a former PM' he argued.

On the CPN-MC's grudge that the transfer of votes from NC to the CPN- MC was not easy, Pyakurel said: NC has more sympathisers and cadres, and they definitively are more autonomous in exercising democratic values and norms in all their social behaviours, including election. He said the CPN-MC's grudge has been countered by the votes the party secured in the PR in different constituencies.

Had CPN-MC contested Parliamentary elections on its own without being part of any alliance, it could have won only six to seven constituencies.

He said the CPN-MC should have done better if it focused on its stronghold areas, including the rural hills where it had strong support base, instead of fielding candidates in Kathmandu and other urban constituencies.

Stating that there were loser and winner sentiments among voters due to the coalition, Pyakurel said many voters did not cast their votes because most of ruling coalition sympathisers thought that their candidates would easily win due to the co-alition, resulting in a big difference in the number of voters, and it also helped create an opposition psychology that they would lose the election anyway. As a result, cadres mobilised less with the feeling that the votes of their family members would not matter much in this particular election.

Results state that PR votes are linked with which party candidates have been fielded in the FPTP elections.

Congress got quite less votes in the PR in almost all constituencies where it had no candidates for the FPTP. NC had candidates in only 91 out of 165 seats, and couldn't bag a good numbers of votes from the remaining 74 constituencies. As a result, it got almost 7 per cent less popular votes than earlier. The Maoists faced similar situation in 119 areas as they could fill up only 46 candidates under the coalition. The CPN-UML is saying that it succeeded somehow in the election, but in fact the UML is the biggest loser in this election because it had fielded the largest number of candidates (141 out of 165) in the first-past-the-post constituencies, but lost 6 per cent proportional representation vote this time and that is the largest loss among the parties.

If there was more turnout on election day, the likely scenario would be that UML could have lost more percentage of votes.

On the electoral loss of CPN-MC and Janata Samajwadi Party-Nepal Pyakurel said their failure to deliver from the government and the status-quoist nature of Nepal's bureaucracy were mainly responsible. He said Nepali voters had the misconception that their lawmakers would address all their problems. 'It is the lawmakers' duty to educate voters that they cannot, and are not there as MPs to solve all their problems. They are only members of one of three major organs of a government with limited roles and responsibilities .'

The emergence of new political forces such as Rastriya Swatantra Party and Rastriya Unmukti Party and the revival of the old monarchist Rastriya Prajatantra Party is manifestation of voter's disenchantment with 'traditional' parties. 'Lack of active youth and Student wings of existing parties created a vacuum within the youth, and media-friendly orators filled the space convincing urban voters, including youths,' he added.

On the question of RSP and RPP's dislike of federalism, Pyakurel said it was wrong on their part to resent federalism.

'Federalism ensures autonomy and eliminates any chance of secessionist attitude. Indian federalism is a good example of it,' he said. In Nepal, dominant social groups launched agitation for federalism.

Even the Madhesis accepted the new constitution due to federalism. Federalism, secularism and inclusive nature of the state are still major agendas of the marginalised majority of Nepal, and no political force can convince the majority to go against these fundamentals. This is why all the political parties kept silent on the issue even if they didn't like these changes.

A version of this article appears in the print on December 10, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.