Nepal goes to the polls; voters seek change after youth-led protests

Highlights:

• Election follows youth-led protests and PM's resignation last year
• Nepal faces political instability, economic issues and corruption
• Rastriya Swatantra Party's Balendra Shah gains youth support

Nearly six months after a wave of unprecedented youth-led protests and the deaths of 77 people forced Nepal's then prime minister to quit, people began voting on Thursday in a general election that will choose a new parliament in the Himalayan nation.

Perched between China and India, the country of 30 million people has been plagued for decades by political instability, crippling a largely agrarian economy and worsening unemployment - structural issues compounded by rampant corruption.

The long-festering, deep-seated malaise erupted into street demonstrations last September, triggered by a social media ban, that brought thousands on the streets, leading to clashes and fatalities that forced the resignation of Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli.

Oli, who leads the moderate Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist, UML), is once again in the fray on Thursday, along with more than 3,400 other candidates from 65 parties.

They include the country's oldest party, the Nepali Congress led by 49-year-old Gagan Thapa, and the Nepali Communist Party (NCP) comprising former Maoist insurgents who joined mainstream politics.

Together with UML, these parties have dominated Nepali politics for the last three decades, although the country has seen 32 government changes in the past 35 years.

But the frontrunner for these polls is the three-year-old Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP), which has fielded the charismatic rapper-turned-politician Balendra Shah as its prime ministerial candidate.

The 35-year-old former mayor of Nepal's capital Kathmandu is drawing large crowds, connecting with legions of young voters clamouring for change on the ground and online, even as he takes on Oli, 74, on his home turf along the Indian border.

"The election is critical to address the aspirations of the youths expressed during the Gen Z protests," said political analyst Puranjan Acharya.

"If the newly elected leaders are seen as unfit to do so, there is a risk of further trouble."

Decision for the future

Some 19 million voters are eligible to cast their ballot for 275 members of parliament through a mixed electoral system – 165 seats in direct first-past-the-post elections and 110 through proportional representation.

Voting started at 7 am local time (0115 GMT) and closes at 5 pm, with counting scheduled to start soon after, according to the country's election commission.

Early trends are likely to emerge by Friday but complete results could take a week or more as counting of proportional representation votes would take time, election commission officials said.

"Voting is not just about sending someone to victory," Interim Prime Minister Sushila Karki, who took over after Oli, said in a public broadcast this week.

"It's a decision you make about your future and that of your children."

Promises of jobs, reining in corruption and improving governance - all demands raised during the September protests - have dominated much of the election campaign, which officially ended on Monday ahead of a two-day cooling-off period.

In Kathmandu, many candidates, wearing marigold garlands and vermillion smeared on their forehead, walked the streets, rode on trucks and appeared from the sunroof of cars, to woo voters one last time before the polls.

But some voters are still on the fence.

"Old parties did nothing except corruption," said Ramkrishna Pandey, 50, discussing politics with half a dozen others at a newspaper kiosk on the outskirts of the capital.

"New ones don't seem any better. I have not decided who to support."