Kathmandu: Nepal’s Rashtriya Swatantra Party has decided to pull out of the newly formed government led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ and ministers have resigned as the rift within the ruling coalition widens. The fourth largest party, the RSP, held a meeting on Sunday to quit the government and decided to walk out, party president Rabi Lamichhane announced.
Lamichhane said, “The ministers will also submit their resignations to the Prime Minister today itself.
Lamichhane was also the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister at the time the court delivered the verdict. After being removed from the post, Lamichhane held several rounds of meetings with PM Prachanda demanding his reinstatement and threatened to walk out if the demands were not met.
The Lamichhane-led RSP had created a storm in the November 2022 general elections by emerging as an alternative force and the hope of the people. But recently, it got embroiled in power games and politics as authorities are probing former home minister Lamichhane in a passport forgery case.
Lamichhane was found to be using an American and Nepalese passport at the same time. The matter is under investigation. On 27 January, Nepal’s Supreme Court stripped Rabi Lamichhane, president of the RSP, of his legislative post, saying that the citizenship certificate he had presented to contest the parliamentary elections was invalid.
The revocation of his citizenship certificate also cost him the posts of home minister and party president, the Kathmandu Post reported. The Supreme Court ruling clearly stated that Lamichhane had lost his Nepali citizenship after becoming a US citizen.
However, according to the Kathmandu Post, in practice, he used his legally terminated citizenship to obtain a Nepali passport and contest the election to the lower house. RSP was heading the portfolio of Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, Ministry of Education, Science and Technology. It also had its MPs as Minister of State for the Ministry of Health and Population.