Balenndra Shah's RSP party, led by Nepal's incoming prime minister, has won the parliamentary elections in a landslide, nearly achieving an outright majority.
On 12 March 2026, Nepal's Election Commission announced the parliamentary election results, revealing that the Rashtriya Swatantra Party (RSP), a centrist party led by Balenndra Shah—a former rapper turned politician—secured 182 seats in the legislature, gaining a clear majority.
The election on 5 March was held to select 275 new members of the House of Representatives (lower house), with 165 seats filled through direct elections and 110 seats through proportional representation.
On Thursday, Election Commission spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai stated, "The counting of votes for the House of Representatives election has been completed."
In the direct election system, the RSP won 125 out of 165 seats and gained an additional 57 seats through proportional representation, falling just two seats short of a two-thirds supermajority.
The main opposition, the Nepali Congress party, which was the largest party in the previous parliament, secured only 38 seats, while the Marxist CPN-UML party led by former Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli won 25 seats, and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) obtained 7 seats.
Bhattarai added, "Today, letters were sent to the relevant political parties requesting them to select and submit candidate lists to the commission within three days."
This election marks Nepal's first since the September 2025 anti-corruption protests led by Gen Z youth, which escalated into violence and ultimately toppled the previous government.
For over two decades, Nepal's politics have been dominated by coalition governments rotating power, mainly controlled by three major parties, two of which are communist parties.
This election serves as a crucial test to see whether Gen Z voters can successfully persuade the country that it is time for a new generation—untried in governance—to shape the future, or if the veteran politicians who have held power for decades will maintain their seats.
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Source:cna