Kathmandu: The Nepali Congress (NC) and Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) (CPN-UML) have reached an agreement to form a new alliance, which will see the exit of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda and his Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) from power.
While a formal announcement is expected soon, UML's K P Sharma Oli will lead the new government expected to be formed soon for more than a year and then will hand over to NC's Sher Bahadur Deuba for the remaining term until the next election.
The details of the meeting between Deuba, accompanied by his parliamentarian wife Arzu Rana, and Oli have been kept secret, but Oli said “the country can not be run in the current form”, the Indian Express reported. A senior NC leader told the daily that the two leaders have agreed to review the expensive and almost non-functioning federalism and electoral system and build a wider understanding of necessary changes.
Dahal came to power in December 2022 when he aligned with arch-rival CPN-UML duping the Nepali Congress with whom he had allied in the November 2022 election. However, within three months, he dumped CPN-UML to walk out of government again aligning with the NC, and managed to secure a majority in the vote of confidence on March 20 last year.
On March 4 this year, Dahal made a surprising turn by deciding to revive a coalition with the CPN-UML which caught the largest coalition partner, NC, off guard.
