The Political Parties Act-2017, which was nullified through an ordinance three years ago, has not been replaced, creating a legal void over the registration of new political parties.

The Act has a provision that defines criteria under which dissidents of a political party can split the organisation and form a new outfit if they can prove the support of a certain number of central committee members and lawmakers of the mother party.

In August 2021, the then Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government issued an ordinance to ease party split. It changed the provision, paving the way for 20 percent of the party’s central committee members and 20 percent lawmakers to form a new party. Earlier, any dissident group had to prove support of 40 percent central committee members and 40 percent lawmakers to register a new organisation.

The law was tweaked to help the then CPN-UML leader Madhav Kumar Nepal and Janata Samajbadi Party Nepal’s Mahantha Thakur launch their own parties. Nepal at the time had supported the agitation led by Congress and Maoist Centre against UML chair KP Sharma Oli, who as the prime minister had dissolved the House of Representatives.

The Article 114 (2) of the constitution states that an ordinance shall be tabled at the session of both Houses of the Federal Parliament held after the promulgation, and if not passed by both Houses, it shall ipso facto cease to be effective at the expiration of 60 days from the day on which a meeting of both Houses is held.

Amid the legal confusion, the Election Commission registered the Ashok Rai-led Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP) in May. A dissident group led by Rai split the Janata Samajbadi Party-Nepal (JSP-Nepal) led by Upendra Yadav.

The Election Commission then recognised the Rai-led party based on the Political Parties Act 2017 and registered it with the commission as per the Act’s Section 33 and Rule 5 of the Regulations on Political Parties 2017.

However, three years ago, the Act’s provision was scrapped through an ordinance.

Soon after the party split, Upendra Yadav moved the Supreme Court, challenging the Election Commission’s decision to recognise its splinter group as a new party.

In his petition, Yadav claimed the commission registered the party despite failing to fulfil the required 40 percent support of central members for a split.

While splitting the party, Rai had the support of seven of 12 lawmakers in the House of Representatives. However, he only had the support of 35 central committee members. According to the Election Commission, the party had 406 central committee members registered with the commission before its split to form the Janata Samajbadi Party.

Thus the Rai-led group, even though it had the support of over 40 percent of the party’s lawmakers, didn’t have support of 40 percent of the central committee members.

The case is sub judice in the Supreme Court for the past five months, and the next hearing is scheduled for November 21.

Likewise, the Rai-led Janata Samajbadi Party, despite being in the government since the party split, has failed to engage in party’s organisation building activities even five months after its formation.

“There have been some hurdles to carrying out party activities due to the court case,” Sushila Shrestha, a lawmaker of the Rai-led party, told the Post. “Despite the difficulties, we have been engaged in party formation activities, though not as proactively as we would like to.”

Shrestha accused the big parties in the government of not doing enough to remove the legal void.

Manish Kumar Suman, spokesperson of the JSP-Nepal, blames the government for the void. He stressed the need for reinstating the provision of requiring 40 percent of central committee members and 40 percent of lawmakers to split a party.

“Our party has moved beyond party split, and we are currently engaged in party building activities,” Suman told the Post. “But should the government bring a new law related to political parties, it should require the support of 40 percent of lawmakers and 40 percent of central committee members to approve a party split.”

Minister for Communication and Information Technology Prithvi Subba Gurung, who is also the government spokesperson, blames frequent government changes for the long legal void.

“Earlier, the provision related to the split of political parties was made easy through an ordinance with the intent of splitting the UML. But after the goal was achieved, the then government didn’t bother to introduce a new bill to replace the ordinance [which automatically lapsed],” Gurung told the Post. Gurung, the government spokesperson, said he is unaware of any attempt by the present government to reintroduce the provision.

Gurung argued that the matter is under the purview of the law ministry.

Minister for Law, Justice, and Parliamentary Affairs, Ajay Kumar Chaurasiya, says the legal void won’t last long, even as the current government is not considering introducing new law related to political parties.

“There has been no discussion on introducing the provision related to political parties,” Minister Chaurasiya told the Post.

While the government is yet to remove the legal void created at the time of formation of the CPN (Unified Socialist), some dissident leaders from the same three-year-old party have reportedly urged Prime Minister and CPN-UML chair KP Sharma Oli to bring the law as they want to split the same party, the Unified Socialist.

“But owing to the reluctance of Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba, Prime Minister Oli has been hesitant to introduce such an ordinance,” a Unified Socialist leader told the Post, asking not to be named for fear of reprisal.

Some lawmakers and central committee members of the Unified Socialist are waiting for an opportune moment to split the party and join the UML. If a group of Unified Socialist lawmakers rejoins the UML, the Oli-led communist party, the second-largest in the House of Representatives, may then become the largest.

At present, the Congress is the largest in the House of Representatives with 88 seats while the UML has 79 lawmakers.

The Madhav Nepal-led party has witnessed serious factional feud following the election of office bearers and politburo members in August. Although the party concluded its general convention on July 5, the election of office bearers and politburo members was conducted later, only to create new rifts within the party.

Some leaders even submitted a two-point memorandum to Unified Socialist chair Madhav Kumar Nepal on October 7, seeking to prevent a potential split in the party and warning of a growing threat of leaders and cadres defecting to the UML.

“Many of our leaders would have defected had there been a clear legal provision on party split,” a Unified Socialist leader told the Post.