A meeting of the task force of the ruling five-party alliance to finalise seat-sharing arrangements for the upcoming federal and provincial polls is near agreement on a four-point criteria.

The meeting on Monday worked out four criteria for sharing seats among the five partners and started evaluating the votes secured by each in the last two elections—the 2017 elections and this year’s local elections, according to leaders.

The four criteria are FPTP seats won in the 2017 elections, PR seats won in the 2017 elections, performance in last May’s local elections, and priority to top leaders of the parties.

“As per the evaluation of votes received by each party in the federal and provincial elections under the first-past-the-post and proportional representation systems in 2017, the results of the recently held local elections and the need to set aside seats for top leaders of the coalition parties, we have fixed four criteria for sharing seats,” Barsha Man Pun, a member in the task force from the CPN (Maoist Centre), told the Post.

There, however, are differences of opinion and some dissatisfaction among some leaders of the coalition parties over the criteria, according to task force members.

While the Nepali Congress is still insisting on dividing seats on the basis of past electoral performance of the parties, the CPN (Maoist Centre) has been arguing that election performance alone should not be the criterion for sharing seats and a way should be forged to ensure wins for top leaders.

Three other parties were unable to give clear suggestions for the criteria.

“There is still a confusion, and discussions are ongoing, so we have yet to decide what formula would be appropriate for seat-sharing,” said Beduram Bhusal, general secretary of the CPN (Unified Socialist).

The task force has been given until Thursday to work out the seat-sharing criteria.

“If we are unable to agree on a formula soon, then it will be difficult for us to meet the Thursday deadline. If we need some more time, we will get it.”

The 11-member task force was formed on August 5, a day after the government announced federal and provincial elections for November 20.

Congress leader Krishna Prasad Sitaula is the convener of the task force.

After evaluating the votes received by each party in the past elections including the share of the CPN (Unified Socialist) in the UML votes, the task force will make recommendations to the coalition leadership, probably after Wednesday’s meeting, said party leaders.

Since the CPN (Unified Socialist) was formed in August last year, special consideration will be given to the party while allocating seats, said Gyanendra Bahadur Karki, a task force member from the Nepali Congress.

If the parties agree to share seats on the basis of the four criteria, Nepali Congress is likely to get 75 plus FPTP seats out of the total 165, according to another member of the task force.

“Although no member of the task force has spelt out how many seats they want for their parties, we have tentatively figured out the number of seats each party will get based on their past electoral performances,” said the member.

Since the Nepali Congress is under pressure not to accept less than 100 FPTP seats, the party’s members in the task force are still not happy with the four-point criteria, said a Congress member.

Nepali Congress has three members in the task force—Sitaula, Karki and Gagan Thapa.

If the parties agree on the four criteria, then the Maoist Centre will get 55 plus seats and the Unified Socialist will get 15-20 seats, the member surmised.

Similarly, the Janata Samajbadi Party is expected to get 12-15 seats and the Rastriya Janamorcha 1-2 seats.

In the 2017 elections, the Nepali Congress had won 23 and 40 seats under the FPTP and proportional representation categories, respectively.

The Maoist Centre, which had partnered with the CPN-UML, had won 36 and 17 seats under the FPTP and proportional representation systems, respectively.

Similarly, when Madhav Nepal and his supporters split from the CPN-UML, they brought 23 lawmakers with them and launched the CPN (Unified Socialist).

The present Janata Samajbadi Party contested the 2017 elections under the banner of the Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum and won 10 and 6 seats under the FPTP and proportional representation categories, respectively.

Janata Samajbadi currently has 17 lawmakers after two—Baburam Bhattarai and Mahindra Rai Yadav—split just last month and launched the Nepal Samajbadi Party. The Rastriya Janamorcha had won only one FPTP seat in the 2017 elections.

Similarly, another criteria for seats allocation is the individual performance of coalition parties in the local elections of last May.

In the May elections, Nepali Congress secured the highest 34.25 percent votes followed by 33.03 percent by the UML. The Maoist Centre received 13.03 percent and Janata Samajbadi Party got 5 percent votes.

The Unified Socialist received 3.66 percent votes and the Rastriya Janamorcha received 0.35 percent votes.

Another tough job for the task force is to work out the basis for allocating seats for the top leaders, another member of the task force from the Maoist Centre said.

“Altogether 12-15 seats will be set aside for the top leaders of the ruling parties,” the member said.

Maoist Centre’s Pun said the same criteria will be applied to share seats for both the federal and provincial elections.

For the seven provincial assemblies, 330 seats are up for grabs under the FPTP system and 220 under the proportional representation category.

Dev Gurung, a Maoist member in the task force, expressed his dissatisfaction over the delay, which he blamed on Congress, in finalising seats.

“Discussions are ongoing but the problem is the party representatives are not opening up about the exact number of seats they want,” Gurung told the Post. “We need more discussions… also at the leadership level.”

Meanwhile, the Congress is under pressure to bargain for more seats for itself from the rival camp within the party led by Shekhar Koirala.

Even leaders close to Sher Bahadur Deuba, the party president and prime minister, say coalition partners are demanding too much.

“Since many of our leaders will have to compromise or surrender their electoral constituencies in the name of the alliance, definitely we need to drive a hard bargain,” said a Congress leader close to Deuba. “We were looking for a 60:40 arrangement…60 percent of the 165 FPTP seats for us and the rest for the coalition partners. That way there will be 99 seats for us.”

According to the leader, if that doesn’t happen, there could be rebel candidates against the party's official candidates.

“Our bottom line is we should stick to the demand for 99 FPTP seats,” the leader told the Post.

Monday’s was the third meeting of the task force. The task force members will consult their respective party leaders on Tuesday and early Wednesday before meeting again later on Wednesday, according to Bhusal, the CPN (Unified Socialist) leader.

Karki said the task force is trying its best to thrash out a seat-sharing formula within the Wednesday deadline.

“We have tentatively fixed the criteria for seat-sharing,” he said. “We are trying our best to ready our recommendations by Wednesday.”