NC parliamentary board election on Saturday

After much dilly dally Nepali Congress parliamentary board election has been finally scheduled to take place on Saturday.

The election to the parliamentary board will take place from 2 pm to 4 pm Saturday, according to NC PP election committee. Earlier, the election scheduled for Sunday was postponed due to the death of NC leader Shailaja Acharya.

NC parliamentary board has been without an elected leader for the last fourteen months since the elections of the Constituent Assembly.

NC sources have said, Sher Bahadur Deuba, Ram Chandra Poudel and Kul Bahadur Gurung are likely to contest for parliamentary board leader. According to parliamentary board statute, a candidate has to obtain more than 50 % of the votes to be elected the leader. If no candidate obtains more than 50 % of the votes, top two candidates will compete again in the second round of elections.

It is not certain if party president Girija Prasad Koirala will contest the elections. Although Poudel and Gurung are likely to withdraw if Koirala files his candidacy, Deuba has made up his mind to contest the election, sources say.

Meanwhile, NC president Koirala has told his close aides he is contemplating taking a retirement from politics soon. Some leaders had been criticising Koirala and boycotting his meetings after he decided to send NC to the government under his daughter Sujata Koirala’s leadership.

“They stopped coming to my place. They boycotted me at this age,” Koirala lamented, according to Annapurna Post daily. “Shailaja’s death has shocked me and I need nothing more now.” nepalnews.com Jun 16 09