Nepali Congress (NC) will start the process of electing parliamentary party leader only after Sunday.
The grand old party will start the process only after the Election Commission awards certificate to the House of Representatives (HoR) members elected through the Proportional Representation (PR) electoral system on Sunday, according to Joint General Secretary Jeevan Pariyar.
NC has won a total of 89 seats including 57 elected through the First-Past-The-Post electoral system and 32 through the PR electoral system.
NC had held election for parliamentary party leader even after the general election in 2017, and voting may be held even this time as many lawmakers have expressed interest to become parliamentary party leader.
NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba is preparing to again become parliamentary party leader and then prime minister (PM). Ram Chandra Paudel has been demanding that he be elected parliamentary party leader and then PM, and broached the topic meeting PM Deuba a few days backs.
General Secretary Gagan Thapa had announced that he would contest for parliamentary party leader and become PM if he wins while campaigning in his HoR constituency of Kathmandu-4. Lawmakers close to Shekhar Koirala also claim that he will contest for the post even though he has yet to publicly announce that.
One has to get majority in the parliamentary party (45 votes this time) to become parliamentary party leader, according to the NC statute. There will have to be reelection among the top two contenders if no one manages to get majority in the first round of voting.
Deuba should win the election for parliamentary party leader as he distributed election tickets to candidates and prepared the PR list picking leaders who are close to him. But there are voices inside the party that a younger leader should be elected parliamentary party leader this time pointing at the people’s aspirations for change.
General Secretary Bishwa Prakash Sharma has already proposed to make Thapa the parliamentary party leader.
