After giving a thumping victory to the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP), which went to the March 5 polls projecting Balendra Shah as its prime ministerial candidate, Nepalis now need to remain vigilant about a possible power struggle in party leadership. In Nepal’s multiparty political history spanning three and a half decades, leadership tussles are nothing new. There are countless instances within the Nepali Congress and communist parties, including the CPN-UML and the now-extinct Maoist Centre, where leaders routinely butted heads for control, often breaking away from the parent party. The RSP, which was founded in July 2022, presents itself as separate from such politics. It needs to prove that.

The elections were the direct result of the September 8-9 Gen Z revolt. In the aftermath of Prime Minister KP Oli’s resignation, Sushila Karki took over as the interim prime minister to hold the elections. Millions of supporters hoped that Shah, elected mayor of Kathmandu in May 2022 and popularly known as Balen, would form a new party and join national politics. He instead joined the RSP, whose founding president, Rabi Lamichhane, a firebrand TV host himself before jumping into politics, deserves full credit for convincing Balen to come on board the RSP.

On December 28, Shah and Lamichhane signed a seven-point agreement, which stipulated that the latter would lead the party, and the former would become the prime minister should the RSP form the next government. It was a commendable move on their part—a marriage of convenience of sorts. Even if Balen had decided to contest the elections by forming his own party, he would have faced time constraints to create a nationwide organisation. Lamichhane, on the other hand, has to defend multiple lawsuits, including one related to the embezzlement of funds from cooperative organisations. He was also heavily criticised for jailbreaking from the Nakkhu Prison on September 9. The unity was a win-win for both.

Bulldozed by the RSP

As the fourth-largest party with 20 seats in the dissolved House of Representatives, all signs pointed to the RSP gaining additional seats in the snap elections, but there was no way an RSP without Balen would have ended up where the party is. Out of 275, the RSP won 182 seats, made up of 125 directly elected and 57 under proportional representation, with the highlight being Balen’s 49,614-vote win over Oli in the latter’s home constituency of Jhapa-5. Balen’s national appeal among voters paid off big for the RSP. The party is only two short of the 184 required for a two-thirds majority needed to carry out broad reform.

Odds are very good that the RSP would be able to fulfil a two-thirds super majority with the help of a couple of additional MPs. Amid this, while most of the nation is cherishing the RSP’s success and looking forward to a Balen-led government, an unfortunate development has arisen to unnecessarily—and unwisely—muddy the water.

Dol Prasad Aryal, one of two RSP vice-presidents, answering a reporter’s query as to whether Balen would become the next prime minister, said recently that he did not remember every detail of the seven-point agreement. This immediately set in motion speculation that the old RSP leadership was looking for a way to back out of the agreement. Balen supporters were furious. This was then followed by TV interviews by Shishir Khanal, a member of the RSP central committee, who appeared emphatic that Balen would be the prime minister for five years. If this was Aryal’s faux pas, then it is water under the bridge, and we should all move on. If this was by design, then this is likely to occur again, sooner or later, and that is risky.

Seeds of misunderstandings

Shah and Lamichhane both possess strong personalities and ambitions. It is like trying to fit two swords into one sheath. After Aryal’s possible trial balloon was met with fierce criticism, the manufactured uncertainty over whether Shah would be made the RSP parliamentary leader has been put to rest. But the scenario can quickly change if Lamichhane gets a clean chit from the courts. The danger then is that the two contenders will sooner or later collide, bringing down the now-vaunted RSP edifice. But if Shah and Lamichhane grow up and avoid the mistakes repeatedly made by the top leadership of the major parties that the two got together to rout in the March 5 polls, then they would both win.

There will be attempts—both internal and external—to sow seeds of misunderstandings between Shah and Lamichhane, and that is the biggest risk they face, as the risk posed by the three septuagenarians—Oli, Dahal and Sher Bahadur Deuba—is now gone. For the good of the country, the RSP majority needs to be preserved. Towards this end, honouring one’s commitment—either now or in the future—goes a long way. The RSP sought votes using Shah’s face as the would-be prime minister, and it is a shame that the voters even had to dread a scenario in which that would not be the case. History is full of instances in which a seemingly minor mistake leads to a major downfall.