On Saturday, Nepalese President Bidya Devi Bhandari announced the dissolution of the country’s Parliament and called for fresh elections, which will now be conducted on November 12 and 19, 2021. She said that the decision was made as both caretaker Prime Minister (PM) K.P. Sharma Oli and the Opposition parties were unable to materialise an alliance to stake a claim and form a majority government. The president also said that the move was recommended by Oli.
The opposition in Nepal, however, has vowed to take legal action against Oli and Bhandari’s decision. Opposition leaders—including CPN-Moist Centre leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal, CPN- Unified Marxist-Leninist (CPM-UML) leader Madhav Kumar Nepal, Chairperson of the Janata Samajbadi Party-Nepal (JSP) Upendra Yadav, and Vice-Chair of the Rastriya Janamorcha Durga Paudel—issued a joint statement in which they accused Bhandari of siding with Oli in his “attack on the constitution and democracy”. They argued that this would push Nepal “towards new political polarisation and complexity”.
Meanwhile, on Sunday, protests broke out in the country opposing the parliament’s dissolution, which resulted in the arrest of three members of the Nepali Congress (NC). The demonstrators opined that Bhandari’s decision was unconstitutional and undemocratic. The latest move, they claimed, was a means to further Oli’s autocratic rule in the country.
This comes as both Oli and the Nepali Congress President, Sher Bahadur Deuba, failed to secure the support of 136 members of the Parliament and be appointed as the incumbent PM on Friday. However, both candidates had claimed that they had secured the required number of signatures to successfully form a new government. Oli asserted that he had secured the support of 153 lawmakers by securing the signatures of the leaders of the CPN-UML, which include Oli himself, and JSP leader Mahanta Thakur. However, he failed to account for the fact that 16 members of the JSP had signed in favour of Deuba’s candidacy.
On the other hand, Deuba claimed the support of 149 lawmakers, which included 28 members of the Madhav Nepal-led faction of the CPN-UML. However, right before the deadline for staking a claim for the government, Oli secured Madhav Nepal’s support by withdrawing Nepal’s and other rebel leaders’ suspension from the party and engaging in conciliatory talks. Consequently, the 28 leaders decided against resigning, thereby ending Deuba’s efforts to become the PM.
This is the second time in five months that Nepal’s Parliament has been dissolved on the advice of Oli. In December 2020, Bhandari had decided to dissolve the Parliament and call for fresh elections on April 30 and May 10, 2021. At the time, the dissolution was met with fierce opposition from rivals in the Nepal Communist Party, including Prachanda. In February, however, the Nepalese Supreme Court annulled the government’s move and reinstated the dissolved Parliament, ordering the leadership to summon the House within 13 days.
Nepalese President Dissolves Parliament Following Opposition’s Failure to Form Majority
Following the failure of the opposition parties to form a majority government in the Parliament, Nepalese President Bidya Devi Bhandari has once again dissolved the Parliament.
May 24, 2021
SOURCE: REUTERS