Nepali Parliament to resume session

Nepal’s parliament will reconvene today after the Supreme Court declared its December dissolution by Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli unconstitutional.

Prime Minister Oli is currently in a power struggle with a splinter faction within his own Nepal Communist Party (NCP). Oli now faces a no-confidence motion by rival NCP leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as ‘Prachanda’. The Prachanda faction recently ousted Oli as NCP’s party leader.

Both sides claim to have support from more than 100 of the NCP’s 173 members in Nepal’s House of Representatives. To prevail, Prachanda needs support from NCP’s main opposition, the socialist Nepali Congress. He offered the premiership to Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba, who declined – Deuba insists he will support neither faction until the ruling NCP officially splits.

Expect Oli to survive the vote of no-confidence. Opposition leader Deuba would rather a divided NCP, since he is unlikely to peel away voters. A defeated Prachanda will have to decide whether or not to officially split from the NCP. The two-year-old political party will likely not remain a cohesive party in the run-up to the 2023 elections, foreshowing a return to Nepal’s previous political instability.