Nepali Congress (NC) General Secretary Gagan Thapa will be the unanimous candidate for parliamentary party leader from the anti-establishment faction.
The meeting of leaders from the anti-establishment faction on Tuesday has decided to field Thapa as the candidate on proposal of Shekhar Koirala who had lost the runoff for NC president to Sher Bahadur Deuba in the last general convention.
A leader has confided with Setopati that the leaders reached agreement in a way that leaders including Thapa would support Koirala in the next general convention.
Koirala has said that he has proposed Thapa for parliamentary party leader as he is the candidate of change who can lead transformation.
The anti-establishment faction has claimed that it currently has 32 lawmakers. Another General Secretary Bishwa Prakash Sharma, who is not from the faction, has also already announced support for Thapa’s candidacy and the faction claims that the number will grow further with Sharma’s support.
Deuba is set to contest for parliamentary party leader from the establishment faction.
The grand old party secured a total of 89 House of Representatives (HoR) seats including 57 seats in the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) electoral system and 32 in the Proportional Representation (PR) system.
