The government has announced local level elections for May 13 in one phase as per the recommendation of the Election Commission.

The decision was taken by a regular Cabinet meeting held on Monday.

“Today’s Cabinet meeting decided to hold the local level polls on May 13 in one phase throughout the country,” said Gyanendra Bahadur Karki, minister for communication and government spokesperson, after the meeting.

Before the Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba and some ministers had held a discussion with Chief Election Commissioner Dinesh Thapaliya and election commissioners and asked whether the Election Commission can hold the elections on May 13.

Then the team of the Election Commission informed the prime minister that they were ready to hold the elections on May 13 and that they are prepared, sources said.

“Earlier today, we recommended that the government hold the local level polls on May 13 so that local governments won’t remain vacant even for a single day,” Thapaliya told the Post.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Election Commission authorities had recommended Prime Minister Deuba to hold the local polls on May 18.

Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba had agreed to hold the local polls on the commission-proposed date.

The commission had earlier proposed April 27 and May 5 if local polls were to be held in two phases.

But Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Chair) suddenly muddied the waters by proposing parliamentary elections in April-May instead of local polls, citing some constitutional provisions.

His proposal set in motion a lot of debates and arguments on legal and constitutional provisions.

Nepal held local elections in 2017 in three phases—on May 14, June 28 and September 18.

As per Article 215 (6) of the constitution, the terms of office of the chairperson, vice-chairperson, ward chairperson and members shall be of five years after the date of being elected. Article 225 says that the term of the village and municipal assemblies is five years from the date of elections. “Another Village Assembly and Municipal Assembly shall be elected no later than six months of the expiration of such a term,” it further states.

But Section 3 of the Local Level Elections Act-2017 states that elections at the local federal units shall be conducted two months prior to the completion of their terms. This means local body representatives must be elected by March 19, 2022.

But some legal experts including the Election Commission said that no amendment was necessary in the existing laws if the local polls were held before May 19 while some experts have been saying that the legal complications won’t end even if the local polls were held before May 19.