Wins five parliamentary seats in valley, placed 3rd in PR vote count
KATHMANDU, NOVEMBER 24
The November 20 elections witnessed good performances by a host of new parties, but none came close to performing as well as the Rabi Lamichhane-led Rastriya Swatantra Party.
The rise of RSP, which was established only a few months ago, has stunned many as it has already won seven parliamentary first-past-the-post seats, including five in Kathmandu valley.
Lamichhane himself has won from Chitwan-2 with a huge margin and the party has done considerably well even in the parliamentary election under the proportional representation system, garnering more than three lakh votes and is placed behind UML and NC.
Lamichhane, the founder of the party, quit journalism just a few months ago to jump into politics. His decision was apparently influenced by the success of independent candidates in the local level polls, particularly that of Balen Sah in Kathmandu Metropolis and Harka Sampang in Dharan Sub-Metropolis.
The vote count trend shows that the RSP has won most votes in urban centres, including Kathmandu valley, and along the East-West Highway.
Political analyst Bijay Mishra said disenchantment with old parties - the Nepali Congress, the CPN-UML, and the CPN-MC - was the main reason behind many frustrated voters choosing to vote for the RSP. There were some independent candidates in almost all constituencies, but voters did not vote in overwhelming numbers for independent candidates because they knew that independent lawmakers may not be able to do anything much and could later join old political parties, said Mishra said.
According to him, RSP has found support among families of migrant workers. "Nepali migrant workers who are worried about the level of development in the country, lack of transparency, and problems of corruption phoned their families back home to persuade them to vote for the RSP," Mishra told THT.
According to Mishra, committed Nepali Congress voters in constituencies that had no NC candidate voted for the RSP as they did not want to vote for rightist or leftist forces.
"The NC and the CPN-MC have a poll alliance but NC voters who were tormented by the CPN-MC during the 10-year Maoist insurgency did not want to vote for CPN- MC candidates. CPN-MC candidates more often than not vote for the party they have been told by their party leaders to vote for, but NC voters are much more democratic and do not dictate even to their family members to vote for a particular party or a candidate," Mishra argued.
Out of 165 parliamentary FPTP seats, the NC fielded candidates in 91 constituencies across the country and left 74 constituencies for coalition partners, including the CPN-MC, leaving considerable number of their supporters to vote as they wished.
Another political analyst, Uddhab Pyakurel, said the ruling coalition did the right thing by opposing the dissolution of the Parliament by former prime minister KP Sharma Oli and rescuing democracy in Nepal, but some envious political forces built a narrative against Sher Bahadur Deuba that the Deuba-led government was no different from any government of the past. Some conservatives within the party also protested the party's decision to form a poll alliance with the CPN-MC and CPN (US), two parties that ideologically are poles apart from the NC, Pyakurel added.
The RSP is not the first party to offer alternative politics. Bibeksheel Party and Sajha Party gave the slogan of alternative politics, but in the past five years they failed to prove their relevance. In fact, one of the founders of Sajha Party, Rabindra Mishra, has joined the rightist Rastriya Prajatantra Party!
How the RSP fares in the long run only time will tell, but its policies seem noteworthy. The party has stated in its documents that it will not have any sister wing and party candidates will be selected from election within the party. The RSP is for directly-elected prime ministerial system. It did not field any candidate for provincial assemblies as it wants revision in the current model of federalism, particularly the structure of provinces. "We firmly believe that we cannot afford the current model of provinces. We want some revision in this," RSP Vice-chair DP Aryal said.
A version of this article appears in the print on November 25, 2022 of The Himalayan Times.
