Third force: The tightrope walk that awaits Prachanda, Nepal's new PM

On November 14, while campaigning in Nepal’s Lamjung district, Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) chief Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Prachanda, said he would never join hands with erstwhile coalition partner, K P Sharma Oli, who he said was a danger to democracy and had badly betrayed him. “He (Oli) had been trying to rule like Hitler,” Prachanda said.

On November 15, the personal staff of both Dahal and Oli said the two leaders had spoken to each other. Dahal’s personal secretary, Ramesh Malla, recounted the conversation to Online Khabar, Nepal’s best-known digital news platform.

“He (Oli) said ‘let’s work together’. But how that is going to happen wasn’t made clear,” Malla was quoted as saying.

On Christmas day, Dahal became prime minister of Nepal for the third time – with Oli’s assistance. The story of how he achieved this is a riveting one.

The outcome of the general election in Nepal, held in November, was largely along expected lines. It yielded a hung Parliament with neither the Nepali Congress led by Sher Bahadur Deuba (89 seats) nor Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) led by Oli (78) getting a majority. But because of a pre-election agreement, Deuba and Prachanda were thought to be hand in hand. Prachanda’s party had only 32 seats. But it quickly – and shrewdly – positioned itself as kingmaker.

Having a PM for half a term is no longer a taboo in Nepal. The question this time was: Who would head the government for the first 30 months: Deuba or Prachanda? And who would be the president of the country and speaker of the House? For, in Nepal, both positions enjoy extensive constitutional powers, especially when it comes to making and breaking governments.

Prachanda wanted the first tenure as PM. Deuba believed that with just 30-odd MPs, Prachanda could not set the terms. He did not know – or maybe didn’t care – that as soon as results began coming out, Prachanda had already begun reaching out to smaller parties and independents, offering them all kinds of deals. For instance, the leader of the Nagarik Unmukti Party, Resham Chaudhary, was in prison, convicted for an eight-year term for inciting a mob to kill policemen. Prachanda rang his family and told them that the first action of the Cabinet would be to pass an Ordinance that would get Chaudhary out of jail. Analysts in Nepal began to predict that his party might have only 32 seats, but Prachanda commanded control over 60. These included the Janamat Party, Nagarik Unmukti Party and several independents.

Oli saw the danger of being turfed out of the game altogether. With pragmatism, possibly overlaid by bitterness, Oli made Prachanda an offer he could not have refused: the prime ministership in the first round.

And so it was that a man with 32 MPs in a House of 275 became the prime minister of Nepal.

But what does this bizarre coalition – avowed anti-monarchists holding hands with the monarchist Rastriya Prajatantra Party, and bitter enemies Oli and Prachanda holding hands, to cite just two – mean for the country and the larger geopolitical picture? Seven parties have come together in a coalition with disparate ideologies and interests. There are the two main actors, the Prachanda-led Maoist Centre and the  Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist). And then there's the Rashtriya Swatantra Party, the Rastriya Prajatantra Party, the Janamat Party and the Nagarik Unmukti Party.

Despite the presence of Maoist and Marxist parties in the government, this is not a Left government: both Prachanda and Oli allowed (eventually) the entry of the American Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) into Nepal to improve its road and power networks with a $500 million grant. There are three deputy prime ministers in the government – one each from UML, Maoists and the third, a former TV anchor who has now become the home minister. It is hard to predict in which direction the coalition will pull.

But looming on the horizon are bigger challenges, such as managing issues of sovereignty and the border with India; and the Agnipath scheme that India is rolling out that will adversely affect recruitment from Nepal into the Indian Army, specifically the Gorkha regiment. Agnipath was not an issue in the elections, possibly because its full import was not understood in Nepal. The Maoists have objected to its youth joining foreign armies without considering the employment issue.

With Prachanda at the helm, India can expect balance with China. Prachanda knows India (he lived in Haryana in eight out of the ten years that he was underground). But Oli will leave no stone unturned to make Prachanda see things from his (and his party's) point of view. And in the past, Oli has proved to be no great friend of India's. So during his term, Prachanda could find he is fighting a three-front war: to placate constituents of his own government, New Delhi, and Beijing, as well.

There is an added dimension to this. For years, Nepal has been a place of refuge for Tibetans fleeing China. During the visit of Foreign Minister Wang Yi in March 2022, many “bhote” groups, as they are called, expected Nepal to cave in and sign an extradition treaty with China. That did not happen. But today they must be a worried lot. There are around 20,000 registered Tibetan refugees in Nepal. However, they have no identity in the country and can neither buy land nor work. Both India and the US have suggested Nepal should give them some sort of legal assurance. For obvious reasons, Nepal is deeply reluctant to go down that road.

The immediate problem the Prachanda-led coalition will face is to get its finances in order and address post-Covid livelihood issues. Managing internal government contradictions could be a bigger one.