A meeting of the National Assembly elections coordination committee on Saturday decided to request the top leaders of the ruling alliance to issue a joint appeal to vote in favour of the alliance’s candidates.

In order to ensure their victory in all 19 seats, the ruling alliance formed the coordination committee headed by Nepali Congress Chief Whip Ramesh Lekhak where other representatives are from the CPN (Maoist Centre), the CPN ( Unified Socialist) and the Janata Samajbadi Party.

The ruling coalition, having fielded its candidates in all 19 seats, is confident it will win all of them. However, there are doubts in Koshi Province, where former Congress general secretary Krishna Prasad Sitaula is contesting.

The term of 20 lawmakers in the 59-strong upper house expires on March 3. Besides the 19 candidates elected, one member will be nominated by the President on the Cabinet’s recommendation. Durga Poudel, vice-chairwoman of the Rastriya Janamorcha, is almost certain to be recommended for the seat.

Sitaula, who is currently in Ilam, is busy campaigning for the January 25 elections and has a potential marginal lead of about 1,000 weightage. This poses a danger for the ruling alliance but the alliance is confident of his victory. Sitaula has asked Nepali Congress leader Shekhar Koirala not to leave Birantnagar until the elections are over.

“We don’t think there will be cross-voting against Sitaulaji,” said Koirala from Biratnagar. But he also admits that if some 10 voters, such as provincial lawmakers and mayors of municipalities, vote for a rival candidate, Sitaula’s victory is threatened. The Congress party has projected Sitaula as chairman of the Assembly.

Koirala said that since most of the voters are from the Congress and the Maoist Centre, there is no chance of them voting for the alliance’s candidate. But a Congress leader said the UML could influence voters from parties other than the Congress, arguing that they have no compulsion to vote for a candidate that is not from their own party.

Another notable factor is discontent among some ruling partners over the denial of candidacy for their members. The largest party, Congress, has fielded its candidates for 10 of the 19 seats to be vacant on March 3. The Maoist Centre got six while the Unified Socialist and the Janata Samajbadi Party got two and one seats, respectively. Janamat Party, one of the partners in the alliance, has fielded rival candidates in Madhesh and Lumbini provinces. The Madhesh-based Loktantrik Samajbadi Party also could not secure a single candidate for itself.

According to the Election Commission, Koshi Province has 367 voters for the Assembly election. Of them, 274 are from local governments while the 93 members of the provincial assembly also cast their ballots. In the Electoral College, the local unit chiefs and deputy chiefs have a combined weightage of 5,206. The total vote strength of the assembly members is 4,929.

“We are doing a serious homework to keep our vote base intact,” said Min Bahadur Bishwakarma, the publicity department chief of the Congress. The difference of vote weightage between the ruling alliance and the main opposition is narrow, ruling party leaders acknowledge, stressing the need for a vigil. “Our leaders are laying enough groundwork to ensure Sitaula’s victory,” said Bishwakarma.

In the last National Assembly elections, despite having votes enough for victory, Gopal Basnet of the Congress won the race by a lucky draw after a tie between two candidates and Gyaljen Sherpa of the UML pulled off a surprise victory, said another Congress leader, to stress the unpredictability of elections in the volatile politics of Koshi. Even within the Congress, there is strong opposition against Sitaula because he has repeatedly got opportunities in major positions of the government, the legislature and the party. This sentiment among Congress voters may be unsupportive for Koirala, the Congress leader said.

Rastriya Prajatntra Party, another power in Koshi Province, is undecided on whether to contest the elections together with the ruling alliance or to tie up with the UML. The UML has nominated Rukmini Koirala (Sunsari) to represent women in the province while Parshuram Adhikari (Bhojpur) is the candidate from “other” category.

Ram Hari Khatiwada, a Congress lawmaker from Okhaldhunga district, said Sitaula’s chances look strong but considering the past scenario, “we must be cautious”.

In Karnali Province, there is discontent within the Maoist Centre over candidate selection. The ruling coalition is said to have formed election coordination committees in all seven provinces to keep the allies—Nepali Congress, Maoist Centre, Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP) and CPN (Unified Socialist), among others—united for the election.

Besides Lekhak, the convenor, other members of the committee are Barsha Man Pun, Manish Suman, Vijaya Poudel and Govinda Chaudhary. During the first meeting of the committee on Saturday, it was decided to form district committees as well.