नवीनतम
Nepal records over 10% turnout till 11 am
NEW DELHI [Maha Media]: NNepal which went to polls on Thursday, the first since a violent Gen Z protest that toppled the K P Sharma Oli-led government last year, recorded a turnout of about 10.18 per cent till 11 am, according to the Election Commission.
The Election Commission said that around 1.93 million people have exercised their franchise till 11 am.
Nearly 19 million of Nepal’s 30 million people are eligible to vote in the for the 275-member assembly.
About one million of the voters – most of them youth – were added after last year’s protests, which killed 77 people and injured more than 2,000.
While direct contests will decide 165 seats, which means the person who gets the most votes will win, the rest will be filled through proportional representation, where seats are allocated to parties in proportion to their vote share.
Election authorities say 65 political parties are in the fray.
Apart from corruption, job creation is among the main issues, analysts say, with about a fifth of the population living in poverty, and high youth unemployment.
Ties with India and China, which border Nepal and are among its major trade partners, will also be a factor in the election as the landlocked nation negotiates a balance between the Asian powers.
While India accounts for two-thirds of Nepal’s international trade, China accounts for 14% and has also lent the country – among the world’s poorest – more than $130 million, according to the World Bank.
Rapper-turned-politician and former Kathmandu mayor Balendra Shah, 35, of the centrist Rastriya Swatantra Party is among the frontrunners for prime minister.
Facing him in the Jhapa 5 constituency is four-time prime minister Oli, 74, of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist–Leninist), vying for the top post again but facing an uphill battle to win back young voters who ousted him barely six months ago.
Other contenders include the centrist Nepali Congress party’s 49-year-old Gagan Thapa and three-time prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, 71, who now leads the Nepali Communist Party.
Oli has been a liberal communist since the 1990s while Dahal led a bloody Maoist insurgency for a decade before joining mainstream politics in 2006.
