NEPAL PARLIAMENT DISSOLVED ELECTIONS SET FOR NEXT YEAR

Sun 20 December 2020:

Nepal President Bidya Devi Bhandari today dissolved the country’s parliament on the recommendation of Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli following a political stalemate over an executive order issued last week. The decision to seek the disbandment of the House of Representatives was taken at an emergency meeting of the Cabinet this morning.

Nepal’s House of Representatives, elected in 2017, has 275 members. The next general election in the Himalayan country was due in 2022. President Bhandari today announced that the national polls will now be held between April 30 and May 10 of 2021.

“PM Oli was under pressure to withdraw an ordinance related to the Constitutional Council Act that he had issued on Tuesday and got endorsed by President Bidya Devi Bhandari the same day,” The Kathmandu Post newspaper reported today. It also said that today’s Cabinet meeting was expected to recommend the replacement of the ordinance.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister’s Nepal Communist Party today said he had lost majority support, according to a Reuters report. “The prime minister has lost the majority in the parliamentary party, central committee and the secretariat of the party,” said Bishnu Rijal, a Central Committee member of the NPC, the report said.

PM Oli, whose handling of the coronavirus crisis has been criticised as the economy takes a beating, had come under pressure to either leave the premiership or the reins of the party, Reuters reported.

PM Oli’s move also comes amid a tussle for power with former Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, known as Prachanda.

FOLLOW INDEPENDENT PRESS:

TWITTER (CLICK HERE)
https://twitter.com/IpIndependent