Madhesh Province is set to get a new chief minister. The ruling coalition has decided to elect Satish Singh of the Janamat Party to the position after Saroj Kumar Yadav of the Janata Samajwadi Party lost the vote of confidence following the withdrawal of support by the CPN (Unified Socialist). With this, Madhesh has joined the club of the provinces that have already had one or more government changes in the ongoing term. Now, only Bagmati province has not had any change of government since the provincial governments were formed in November 2022.

While Madhesh is about to get a second government, Karnali has seen two, Lumbini and Sudurpaschim three each, Gandaki four, and Koshi six governments. Koshi also holds the distinct record of having a chief minister for the shortest period of 22 days. Sudurpaschim has also seen a chief minister for just a month while Gandaki has had a chief minister for 43 and 104 days respectively. In some cases, friends, family and cadres wouldn’t even have the opportunity to meet and congratulate the chief minister when he—it’s invariably a “he”, considering how even these temporary positions are usurped by the male top leaders of contemporary patriarchal political parties, except in the case of Asta Laxmi Shakya in the previous term in Bagmati—would have been thrown out of the government.

Altogether, provinces have seen 21 government changes and 23 floor tests in the year and a half since the provincial elections. This is as pathetic as it gets. The very idea of adopting federalism was to ensure that the state's resources would be distributed evenly to all parts of the country. In theory, this was an excellent idea, one that would provide stable governments, leading to uninterrupted growth and development. But what we have got is quite the opposite. It is as if the devolution of power has been translated into devolution of self-serving interests, coalition politics and an utter disregard for people’s concerns. The lack of strong provincial parties means that the provincial governments are stable only as long as the political parties at the centre stick to their coalitions.

Considering how the coalition government at the centre is carved out of a potpourri of political parties with a common greed for power, the political equations might change anytime. Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has already taken a floor test four times in the current term of Parliament, and has vowed to take more such tests if necessary. With a history of changing associations at will, Dahal cannot be trusted to stick to a coalition. Therefore, the change of guard at the federal power centre in Kathmandu is an open possibility all the time. Such changes have had a cascading effect on provinces, with six provincial governments crumbling along with the federal government.

The chain of instability that flows from the centre to the provinces must break at some point, and parties must sit together to come up with a common plan to ensure this. Otherwise, the people who fought hard to re-establish democracy and institute federalism will start looking for alternatives to these systems. If that happens, the biggest losers will be the big parties that helped usher in this system.