Nepali Congress (NC) has decided to forge electoral alliance for National Assembly election.
The grand old party’s central committee meeting held from Thursday-Saturday at Sanepa has decided to field common candidates on the basis of agreement with parties in the ruling coalition in the election to be held on January 25 next year for 19 National Assembly seats that will be vacant from March 4, 2024.
The term of Bimala Rai Paudel, who was nominated by the then president on recommendation of the then KP Sharma Oli government, is also set to expire on March 4.
NC has also prepared standards to select party’s candidates for the election whose nominations must be filed on January 8.
The standards would prioritize those who have contributed to the party by considering geographical and ethnic balance from among the names recommended by the districts and provinces. The standards would also prioritize those with capacity to contribute in the electoral constituency, committed toward the party and with clean image.
Nine of the 20 members whose term is set to expire in March are from UML including Bimala Rai Paudel nominated by the president. The National Assembly members whose term is set to expire also includes four from NC, three from CPN (Maoist Center), two from CPN (Unified Socialist), one from Janata Samajwadi Party (JSP) and independent lawmaker Khim Lal Devkota.
NC has staked claim for 10 out of the 20 seats but the ruling coalition has yet to agree on sharing of seats.
There have been demands in NC to prioritize new face in the National Assembly election this time. But many leaders have requested removal of their names from the closed list of candidates for Proportional Representation electoral system of the House of Representatives (HoR) to become candidate for the upcoming National Assembly election, while some who had lost in the last HoR election are also aspiring to become National Assembly member.
NC leader Min Bahadur Bshwokarma has told Setopati that the party’s parliamentary board has received names of a large number of aspirants for National Assembly election. The board, that includes NC office-bearers, would now discuss on the names.
