National
EC awards electoral symbols to 26 parties
The Election Commission (EC) on Friday awarded electoral symbols to 26 political parties—out of 27 parties represented in Parliament—for local level elections set for May 14.The Election Commission (EC) on Friday awarded electoral symbols to 26 political parties—out of 27 parties represented in Parliament—for local level elections set for May 14.
The election body said in a notice on Friday that it could provide electoral symbols only to 26 parties as four parties merged to become two, one party was scrapped and another had not registered itself with the poll body. Initially, there were 30 parties represented in Parliament.
The Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) was formed after the earlier RPP merged with RPP-Nepal in November 2016. Likewise, the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum-Nepal and Sanghiya Samajbadi Party-Nepal merged to become Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum-Nepal in June 2015.
The election authority had scrapped Samajbadi Janata Party in March last year after it failed to submit its annual audit report to the EC.
Nepa Rastriya Party didn’t register itself with the EC to participate in locals elections as per a notice issued by the election body. Most of the parties represented in Parliament got their usual electoral symbols as per the provision of Local Level Election Act.
But, the RPP, after the merger, has chosen cow as its electoral symbol. The Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum-Nepal has got hand carrying a flame as its electoral symbol which was previously Madhesi Janadhikar Forum-Nepal’s symbol.
A total of 79 political parties have been registered with the EC to participate in the upcoming local elections. Of them, 66 parties have their own symbols that they had received for the Constituent Assembly elections in 2013. But, Local Level Election Act has not guaranteed the usual electoral symbols for the parties which are not represented in Parliament.
EC Spokesperson Surya Sharma said that parties not represented in Parliament could get the symbols they were given in the previous elections, but different candidates from the same party could not get same symbols.