Interestingly, these 22 UML lawmakers included eight leaders close to former PM KP Sharm Oli.

Here is the list of UML leaders who voted in favor of PM Deuba:

22 UML Leaders Voted in Favor of PM Deuba

The post 22 UML Leaders Vote in Favor of PM Deuba, The Oli-led Party Demands Clarification! appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

The writ was petitioned by advocate Omprakash Aryal as the legal practitioner claimed that the Presidential ordinance was unconstitutional.

A meeting with the Constitutional Council was conducted after the ordinance was issued on May 9. In this meeting, new names for the vacant council seats were already suggested.

The petitioner who challenged declared these recommendations as unconstitutional as he deemed the ordinance to be invalid.

The writ opines that these recommendations made in this meeting are against constitutionalism and the balance of constitutional power.

Subsequent to the ordinance, two appointments were pitched so far. The first recommendation was for the Constitutional Committee, and the second appointment was recommended for the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority.

The petition demanded that the Presidential ordinance should be invalidated, and the recommendations ought to be annulled.

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The post Writ Filed in Nepal Supreme Court Challenging Constitutional Council Annulment appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

In the Final Election Observation Report, EU-EOM termed the recently-concluded Nepali elections as ‘historic’ and a milestone activity.

In her comments, Zeljana Zovko, Chief Observer of EU-EOM appreciated the way elections were conducted and said these polls form a key milestone in the implementation of the new Nepali Constitution promulgated in 2015.

Zovko said the legal framework formed a strong basis for the successful conduction of elections.

She further lauded Nepal for ensuring proper implementation of the Right to Vote during the election campaigning process.

Special Recommendations

The EU-EOM final report included a total of 29 recommendations to the Government of Nepal regarding enforcement of laws to control vote-buying, review of First-Past-The-Post (FTFP) constituency boundaries for effective exercising of Right of Vote and increased transparency from the Election Commission of Nepal.

While the report highlighted’ that ‘the Election Commission of Nepal failed to publish critical information on voter turnout across polling centers and invalid votes along with lack of procedural weaknesses,’ the Election Commissioner Sudhir Shah responded saying, “We also can’t expect standards as high as those applicable in the UK and the US in Nepal at a time when the EC was forced to hold so many elections in less than a year.”

EU also urged for the removal of certain well-represented communities from the inclusion quota under the Proportional Representation (PR) electoral system.

“Review the impact of the quota system on the ethnic composition of the House of Representatives and Provincial Assemblies and ensure the measures of affirmative action apply only to groups that are the subjects of negative discrimination,” noted the report.

Mission Complete

Upon the request from the Government of Nepal, EU had deployed around 100 election observers representing 28 EU member states along with Switzerland and Norway, as the special election observation team to monitor the two phases, Phase-I and Phase-II, of Nepal legislative polls for House of Representatives and Assemblies on November 24 and December 07, 2017.

EU had spent an estimated EUR 3.5 million for the mission and had appointed around 38 Long Term Observers (LTOs) across different parts of Nepal to monitor the election preparations and related logistics issues.

 “It is a great honor for me to lead the EU Election Observation Mission to Nepal. I’m very committed to accompany Nepal in this important phase of its democratic process,” Zovko stated earlier after the announcement of his team’s help to Nepal elections.

Apart from EU, various other teams including as General Election Observation Committee (GEOC), National Election Observation Committee (NOEC) and Inclusive Women Network for Peace, Justice and Democracy (Sankalp) had also deployed their teams for the successful conduction of elections.

EU had appointed similar missions in 2008 and 2013 as well.

The post Mission Accomplished! EU Observation Team Lauds Nepal Polls appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

Backed by the Left Alliance, Bhandari (56) fought back the Nepali Congress’ Presidential candidate Kumari Laxmi Rai with a grand majority.

Since the time she filed her nomination for the post, Bhandari has been receiving a positive response for her candidature from various political parties.

Bhandari’s victory is majorly attributed to the strong support by the ruling Left alliance (CPN-UML and CPN-MC), Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum-Nepal and other political parties.

While CPN-UML has a 23,356 vote-bank with 243 lawmakers in Provincial Assemblies and 148 in the Federal Parliament, its alliance CPN-MC has 108 lawmakers in Provincial Assemblies and 65 lawmakers in the Parliament accounting to a 10,319 vote-bank.

Samajbadi Forum-Nepal and other parties favouring Bhandari’s candidature also hold a decent vote bank.

Whereas, Nepali Congress, the prime opposition of Left Alliance, has a vote bank comprising of
11,248 members together with 113 Provincial Assembly seats and 76 Parliamentary seats.

With this situation in place, garnering a majority vote bank against the Nepali Congress candidate was not a herculean task for Bhandari.

While Bhandari garnered a total of 39,275 votes, Rai lost it out at 11,730 votes, says the Election Commission of Nepal.

Earlier, Nepali Congress had also fielded Man Bahadur in the Presidential race.

Overall, a total of 334 the Federal Parliamentary members including 275 members of the House of Representatives, 59 National Assembly members and 550 Provincial Assembly members were eligible for this election.

Bhandari is the first woman president to Nepal elected in 2015 and has also been elected twice to the parliament in 1994 and 1999.

The post Nepal Presidential Polls 2018: Bidya Devi Re-elected with Majority Voting appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

The Election Commission has announced March 13, 2018 as the date for conducting Presidential elections after a round of discussions with the newly-appointed Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and various political parties, informed EC Spokesman Navaraj Dhakal.

“There will be a separate election to choose new Vice-President a week after the presidential election,” added Dhakal.

The new President and Vice-President of the country will be elected through a voting by Electoral College that includes members of the Federal Parliament and Provincial Assemblies, a month after the formation of Federal Parliament.

These elections for the posts of President and Vice-President will see the replacement of Bidya Devi Bhandari and Nanda Bahadur Pun whose tenure began in October 2015 and will be ending very soon.

These polls are also crucial for the implementation of the Nepal’s new Constitution promulgated in 2015.

Left Okay for Constitutional Amendment

Meanwhile, as per the recent update, the Left Alliance Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML) has expressed its willingness for Constitutional amendments. 

CPN-UML has reportedly agreed to the amendment draft made on the basis of recommendations by Upendra Yadav led Federal Socialist Forum Nepal (FSFN).

“The government has marched closer to make the revision on the clause that creates a hurdle for naturalized citizens to a take over the key post of the country,” say the sources, adding that a finalized decision in this regard is yet to be made.

“Sooner or later, the Federal Socialist Party will join the government over heading the Rashtriya Janata Party Nepal (RJP-N) and this instance has increased the distance between the two parties who once took to the streets with the same demands and issues,” informed a statement.

In another major move, the Left party leaders Oli and Pushpa Kumar Dahal have also proposed collaboration with FSFN to hold two-third majority in the House of Representatives.

Out of the 275 seats, the Left Alliance parties (CPN-UML and CPN-MC) won 121 and 53 seats respectively in the lower house in the recently-held elections, and a coalition with 16 FSFN members will get the Left Alliance two-third hold in the House of Representatives.

Oli Extends Cabinet Further

In another major update, newly-elected Prime Minister of Nepal KP Sharma Oli has extended his cabinet strength inducting four new ministers, taking the total number to seven.

The newly-appointed ministers took their oath of office at a recently-held ceremony at Presidential Palace Sheetal Niwas in Kathmandu.

The list of new ministers includes Ram Bahadur Thapa (CPN-MC) as the Minister for Home Affairs, Yubaraj Khatiwada as the Minister for Foreign Finance, Matrika Yadav as the Minister for Industry and Ishwar Pokharel (CPN-UML) as the Minister for Defence.

The new finance minister is a notable veteran economist of Nepal and also served in key positions as the Governor of the Nepal Rastra Bank and as the Vice-chairman of National Planning Commission (NPC).

Oli formed his own cabinet on February 15, 2018, the day of his election as the new Prime Minister with Lal Babu Pandit as the Minister for Environment and Tham Maya Thapa as the Minister for Women and Social Welfare.

The post Nepal Politics 2018: Presidential Election, Constitutional Amendment Make Headlines appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

In a recent update, the formation of the new Nepali Government has been postponed to March 2018 post to the completion of National Assembly elections.

This was announced after a cabinet meeting on January 05, 2017 to discuss about the upcoming Assembly election.

Clearing the confusion over PM candidate, the recent announcement also informed that Khadga Prasad Oli would most likely be the next Nepali Prime Minister for a period of two-and-a-half years.

Following Oli, another key PM candidate of the left alliance Pushpa Kamal Dahal is likely to rule for the other two-and-a-half years of the term.

Constitutional Deadline Missed!

This update is coming at a time when the global Nepali community is waiting for the announcement of new government that was earlier planned at the end of December 2017.

While the constitution promulgated in 2015 called for the formation of new Nepali Government by mid-January 2018. However, political analysts feel that the constitutional deadline would be missed this time.

That is obvious because the Upper House is yet to be formulated. The Lower House is yet to be completed,” says Dr Surendra KC, a Kathmandu-based political analyst.

According to the analysts, delay in submission of final election results to the President’s office is resulting in the postponement of the new government formation.

National Assembly Election

Meanwhile, the National Assembly elections are scheduled for February 07, 2017.

The upcoming National Assembly election will see the election of 56 members including eight representatives each from seven provinces of the country.

And, the remaining three representatives will be directly selected by the President upon the government’s recommendations.

The post New Nepal Government Likely by March 2018 appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

The FPTP election vote count for 165 House of Representatives (HoR) and 330 Provincial Assembly (PA) seats declared the victory of the Communist Party of Nepal (CPN)-Unified Marxist-Leninist (UML) in the recent polls.

With 80 HoR seats & 167 PA seats by UML and 36 HoR & 74 PA seats by its poll partner CPN (Maoist Centre), the left alliance finally emerged as the single largest party as per the FPTP results.

With this, the ruling Nepali Congress (NC) could find its presence only in 23 HoR and 41 PA constituencies, followed by Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal (RJP-Nepal) that received 11 HoR and 16 PA seats.

While the independents proved their presence in 1 HoR constituency and 3 PA constituencies, 6 women candidates made it to HoR.

According to EC, the vote counting of both HoR and National Assembly has come to final stages with 164 parliamentary and 329 provincial representatives elected so far in the polls held for 165 parliamentary and 330 provincial seats.

PR Counting Underway

Overall, the left alliance won 116 of 165 FPTP seats for HoR and was leading the Proportional Representation (PR) count, held for 60 districts, for 110 seats.

Out of the 7,684,328 PR votes counted so far, “CPN-UML has so far secured 2,631,991 votes followed by NC (2,546,069), CPN-MC (1,045,446), Federal Socialist Forum Nepal (351,525) and the RJP-Nepal (295,448),” informed Nepal Election Commission (EC) Spokesperson Nawaraj Dhakal.

The PR vote counting is currently underway in around 17 districts and the final PR result is expected by December 15, 2017 evening.

Once the parties submit their HoR winners under PR category, EC will take the process ahead to President for further approval before making the list public.

Decline in Women Representatives

The number of directly-elected women to the HoR seats under the FPTP category has decreased this time as only 6 women candidates made it to HoR.

This number indicates a gradual decline in women representatives in Nepali elections over a period.

While the first Constituent Assembly (CA) elections in 2008 saw 30 women representatives, the number declined to 10 in 2013 CA elections, and now it has come down to 6.

This situation lies in contrast to the constitutional rules that recommend 33 percent women representatives in the House.

This time, only three parties including CPN-UML, CPN-MC and Rastriya Janamorcha the winning female candidates.

While UML had only 3 female winners in a total of 80 FPTP seats, CPN-MC also saw a similar number among its 36 total FPTP winners.

Meanwhile, the ruling NC party saw the failure of its 9 female candidates fielded for HoR seats.

Brainstorming Begins

With the results announced, now the winner leftist alliance is brainstorming on the formation of the new Nepali government with key discussions on power-sharing, among others.

According to the senior left leaders, KP Oli, UML Chairman and the next PM of Nepal (likely), and the MC Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also called Prachanda, are likely to hold discussions during December 14-15, 2017 over the formation of new government at the Center.

While some experts feel the formation of central government will be possible only after Assembly results, UML feels that the Assembly (Upper House) election will not be an issue and aims at the formation by the end of December 2017.

Following the formation, the President will call for the first Federal Parliament session under the new government, within 30 days of the declaration of final results of HoR as recommended by the Nepali Constitution.

The post Nepal General Election 2017: Left Alliance Wins FPTP Polls, New Govt Likely by Dec End appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

The two-phase Nepal’s parliamentary and provincial elections 2017 was a three-way fight among the democratic alliance led by the ruling Nepali Congress party, the Madhes-based parties’ alliance called Rastriya Janata Party and the leftist alliance of CPN-UML and Maoist Center parties.

The counting results of the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) election of the Provincial Assemblies and House of Representatives of 16 districts, released on December 10, 2017, have shown victory for the communist alliance in 70 federal and 134 provincial constituencies with leading positions across 11 other federal and 20 provincial constituencies, so far.

Whereas, the ruling Nepali Congress has so far won 15 federal constituencies continuing the lead in another seven constituencies.

Meanwhile, the Madhes-based alliance registered 11 seats under the FPTP system.

According to the Election Commission, the FPTP electoral process saw election of 98 out of the total 1944 contestants.

74 of 165 parliamentary constituencies and 161 of 333 assembly constituencies have been covered with the FPTP results on December 10, 2017, informed EC.

New Laws for First Assembly Session

Meanwhile, EC has called for framing of new laws for the formation of the National Assembly.

“We are not able to begin the process of electing National Assembly members without laws governing elections of NA members. We want new laws to be framed as soon as possible,” EC Spokesperson Navaraj Dhakal said on December 10, 2017.

Article 93 of the Nepali Constitution requires the first meeting of the Parliament and the National Assembly within 30 days of the announcement of parliamentary poll results.

Meanwhile, Bheshraj Adhikari, Personal Secretary of President Bidhya Devi Bhandari informed that “The National Assembly Election Ordinance is being considered by the President. She will take a call on this as soon as possible.”

The National Assembly Members Election Bill is currently under scrutiny following a difference between the ruling Nepali Congress and the communist parties of CPN-UML and Maoist Centre on the contents of the bill.

The post Nepal General Elections 2017: Left Alliance Leading the Way appeared first on Nepali Sansar.

Post the completion of first phase polls with 65 percent voter turnout on November 26, 2017, Nepal went on for the final phase of its most-awaited parliamentary and provincial polls across 15,344 polling centers in 45 districts.

A total of 4,482 candidates including 1,663 candidates for 128 parliamentary seats and 2,819 for 256 provincial assembly seats contested in the final phase that has involved around 12.1 million eligible voters, nearly 80% of the Nepali population.

This is the first election conducted for Nepali Parliament and Provincial Assembly after the new constitution was promulgated in 2015.

Public Response

All sections of Nepali society eagerly participated in Nepal’s 2017 provincial and parliamentary elections.

“I am voting after many years because there is new hope in the country with the establishment of provinces,” said Iswor Prasad Shrestha (70), a Nepali businessman.

Kedar Sharan Raya, a retired senior lawyer, said, “I am here to vote today because it is the first election for provinces with the hope these provincial governments will be able to deliver development.”

Election observers from foreign countries did not report any discrepancies in the electoral process.

It’s Counting Time!

The Election Commission (EC) of Nepal has promised to complete the vote counting process within two weeks from the day of election conclusion.

“Counting of votes of both parliamentary and provincial FPTP elections and both parliamentary and provincial Proportional Representation (PR) elections can begin together. We are confident that the counting could be completed, if there is no obstacle or setback within the set deadline,” says the Election Commissioner Ishwori Prasad Poudel.

 “Vote counting should be done at the earliest. Therefore, we have issued orders from center to all the vote counting centers,” reads a statement by the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Ayodhee Prasad Yadav, who said the First-Past-The-Post (FTFP) voting will be out in a week from the date of completion of election.

The post Nepal General Election 2017: Voting Concludes, Now It’s Counting Time appeared first on Nepali Sansar.