KATHMANDU, OCTOBER 6
A Standing Committee meeting of the CPN-Maoist Centre today decided to send lawmakers Devendra Paudel, Shashi Shrestha, and Maheshwar Jung Gahatraj as ministers in the Sher Bahadur Deuba Cabinet. The party also decided to make lawmaker Bodhmaya Kumari Yadav a minister of state.
CPN-MC leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha said the ruling coalition had not yet clearly decided which ministries would go to which coalition partners.
The CPN-MC has got five Cabinet berths.
The CPN-MC already holds the portfolios of finance and energy, water resources, and Irrigation.
All the four party lawmakers slated to be ministers are members of the House of Representatives.
While Paudel and Gahatraj were elected under the first-past-the-post election system from Baglung-2 and Banke-1 constituencies, respectively, Shrestha and Yadav were elected under the proportional representation system from Kathmandu and Dhanusha, respectively.
Meanwhile, the Nepali Congress held its office bearers' meeting today to dwell on who could be inducted in the Cabinet.
According to Joint General Secretary of NC Prakash Sharan Mahat, leaders had reached an understanding about who all should go to the Cabinet and the names would be finalised a little while before the Cabinet expansion.
The Deuba government is expected to expand the Cabinet in the next two days.
According to an NC leader, senior leader Ramchandra Paudel demanded that his faction get three Cabinet portfolios, but Deuba said the Paudel faction would get two Cabinet berths, whereas one ministry would be given to the Krishna Prasad Sitaula faction.
Mahat said party leaders were not making public the names of party leaders who could be inducted into the Cabinet ahead of expansion because they feared that it would be difficult to deal with so many aspirants who could mount pressure on the party leadership.
The Madhav Kumar Nepal-led CPN (Unified Socialist) and the Upendra Yadav-led Janata Samajbadi Party-Nepal had not made public names of their leaders who could be inducted into the Cabinet.
Recently, media outlets had stated that the CPN (Unified Socialist) would send lawmakers Birodh Khatiwada, Jeevan Ram Shrestha, Ram Kumari Jhankri, Prem Ale, Kishan Shrestha, and Metmani Chaudhary to the Cabinet. A CPN (Unified Socialist) leader said since the party had got only four Cabinet portfolios, it would have to drop two names.
Jeevan Ram Shrestha told THT that his party did not get a good deal from the government -- neither in terms of the number of Cabinet berths, nor in terms of the significance of the portfolios.
"We were expecting more ministries and that too plum ones," he added. JSP-N leader Rajendra Shrestha said his party would select the names of ministers tomorrow as senior leader Ashok Kumar Rai was out of Kathmandu valley. He said party Chair Upendra Yadav had told leaders that he would not become a minister this time.
Deuba has told ruling alliance partners that he would not have any deputy prime minister.
A version of this article appears in the print on October 7, 2021, of The Himalayan Times.
