Pre-election: Public opinion poll indicts the politician

As Nepal prepared for general elections in May, the results of a country-wide opinion poll created quite a stir when it was published in mid-April. The poll, seeking to find out how voters assess the country's politics, political parties and politicians, was the first of its kind and scope in Nepal. Conducted by the research group ORG-MARG Nepal in late February and early March for the media organisation Himal Association, some of the poll findings came as a total surprise. The survey presented a country-wide assessment of the way people are going to vote in the elections, the third since the restoration of democracy in 1990. It also made clear that these percentages should not be construed as translating into a proportionate number of parliamentary seats (as indicated by the 1994 elections, in which although the Nepali Congress secured 33.4 percent as against the Communist Party of Nepal-United Marxist-Leninist's 30.9 percent, the latter ended up as the largest party in Parliament). But despite this disclaimer that the poll did not attempt to predict the composition of the future parliament, it invited a fair amount of brickbats and bouquets from the country's highly partisan political press, which saw it to be precisely that.

This had mainly to do with the findings regarding the CPN (UML). Conventional wisdom had it that since a large faction of it had broken away to form the Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist) in early 1998 (which took away 40 MPs of the united party's 89 in the outgoing Parliament), the votes would also be divided with the Nepali Congress standing to benefit. The poll, however, indicated that an overwhelming proportion had stayed with the original party. It was the CPN (UML), with 31.9 percent of the respondents favouring it, and not the CPN (ML) with its 3.9 percent, that was likely to prove the main opponent of the Nepali Congress. The Nepali Congress, with 32.2 percent votes polled in its favour, also put up a strong showing. The deciding factor as far as the elections are concerned, however, appears to be the undecided 14.5 percent which may vote either for the NC or the UML in the general elections slated to take place in two phases on 3 and 17 May 1999.