Elected representatives of the people are not necessarily the best guardians of public interest. The political vacuum in Nepal shows how irresponsible elected politicians can be towards the people’s aspirations. What the common people in Nepal want most is a stable government that will save the country from relapsing into violence and political chaos. But the elected members of the constituent assembly do not seem to be too bothered about the people’s concerns. Their failure to elect a new prime minister would suggest that they are interested only in monopolizing power. The rules of the assembly stipulate that a candidate for the prime minister’s post has to get the support of two-thirds of the members. But none of the three big parties — the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), the Nepali Congress and the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) — can have a prime minister elected only on its own strength. Also, each of them needs the support of some of the smaller parties to get the prime minister’s job. But Nepal’s politicians seem unable as yet to handle the compulsions of coalition politics.

The worst danger from this political vacuum is the growing threat to the country’s peace process. The term of the United Nations Mission in Nepal has been extended several times. But the UNMIN, as it is called, cannot take the peace process forward in the absence of a stable government. The Maoists obviously have the biggest role in saving Nepal’s fragile peace because their armed combatants remain the worst threat to it. More than a decade of the Maoist insurgency has not only ruined the country’s basic economic infrastructure but also sharply divided Nepalese society. The caretaker government of Madhav Kumar Nepal serves only to widen the gap between a non-functioning government and the people’s aspirations. The election of a new prime minister may not necessarily guarantee good governance, but it can end the drift, at least for some time.