Defeating his contestant Ramraja Prasad Singh with 26 votes, Dr. Ram Baran Yadav has been elected as the first president of republican Nepal.Constituent Assembly (CA) chairman K.B Gurung announced in the CA meeting Monday evening that Yadav had been elected president by winning a simple majority. Dr. Yadav has accumulated 308 votes against his contestant Singh’s 282 votes.
The CA had re-polled to elect the president as none of the candidates bagged clear majority in their support constitutionally required to become the winner. 298 votes were mandatory to win the race.
Dr. Yadav was proposed as a common presidential candidate by Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and Madheshi People’s Rights Forum (MPRF) after the CPN-Maoist, the largest party, proposed Ramraja Prasad Singh for presidential candidacy which was ‘a betrayal for UML’ in its term.
Though MPRF was in support to the Maoist-proposed candidate Ramraja Prasad Singh, it turned away accusing Maoist of neglecting MPRF while proposing name of vice president.
Maoist had proposed Shanta Shrestha for the candidacy of the vice president who has already been defeated by MPRF’s leader and coalition candidate Paramananda Jha through Saturday’s elections.
MFJ leader Jha had bagged 305 votes out of 578 limiting his closest contestant Shrestha of CPN-Maoist in 243 votes.
RPP, RJM, RJP, Chure Bhabar, Loktantrik Samajbadi Dal and 2 independents among other were in support of Dr. Yadav’s coalition while TMLP, Sadvawana, People’s Front among a few others had supported Singh’s coalition.