Nepal Maoists lose 'presidential vote'
Tuesday, 22 July 2008
KATHMANDU, July 21 (AFP): Lawmakers in Nepal Monday voted in the country's first post-royal president, Ram Baran Yadav, rejecting a candidate backed by the Maoists, state television said.
Yadav, who was backed by the centrist Nepali Congress party, won 308 out of 590 votes cast in Nepal's constitutional assembly.
Die-hard republican Ramraja Prasad Singh, the candidate backed by the former rebels, won 282 votes, state television said.
Although the presidency is a largely ceremonial position, the development could delay efforts by the Maoists-who hold the most assembly seats but not a majority-to form Nepal's first republican government.
The selection of a president, who can accept the resignation of caretaker prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala, is seen as a vital step to ending weeks of political deadlock after the assembly ousted unpopular King Gyanendra and ended the 240-year-old monarchy in May.
But the Maoists had threatened to refuse to form a government if their choice for the presidency was not elected, a move that would plunge the new Himalayan republic into more political turmoil.
The former rebels say that with a hostile president, they will have little chance of implementing key platform pledges like land reform and and will face constant risk of being toppled by rivals.
Yadav, who was backed by the centrist Nepali Congress party, won 308 out of 590 votes cast in Nepal's constitutional assembly.
Die-hard republican Ramraja Prasad Singh, the candidate backed by the former rebels, won 282 votes, state television said.
Although the presidency is a largely ceremonial position, the development could delay efforts by the Maoists-who hold the most assembly seats but not a majority-to form Nepal's first republican government.
The selection of a president, who can accept the resignation of caretaker prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala, is seen as a vital step to ending weeks of political deadlock after the assembly ousted unpopular King Gyanendra and ended the 240-year-old monarchy in May.
But the Maoists had threatened to refuse to form a government if their choice for the presidency was not elected, a move that would plunge the new Himalayan republic into more political turmoil.
The former rebels say that with a hostile president, they will have little chance of implementing key platform pledges like land reform and and will face constant risk of being toppled by rivals.