New Nepal government signals action

Nepal’s new government hit the ground running with the arrests of former Prime Minister K P Oli and home Minister Ramesh Lekhak early Saturday morning. 

Their dramatic detentions followed an inquiry commission report recommending that Lekhak, Oli, and former Police chief Chandra Kuber Khapung be investigated and prosecuted for negligence in failing to stop the killing of 19 young protesters by security forces during the protests on 8 September. 

Interim PM Sushila Karki’s government faced considerable criticism from GenZ activists at the end of her 7-month tenure for failing to release the report and hold the previous UML-NC coalition to account. 

Karki had left any decision on the report’s findings to new RSP government, but her government released it after the content was leaked earlier this week, a day before Nepal’s newly elected lawmakers took their oath of office.

By making the arrests of Oli and Lekhak as its first order of business, the new government, and especially Home Minister Sudan Gurung and Prime Minister Balendra Shah, have tried to show that they are decisive and mean business. 

It has been hailed by many as signalling that Nepal’s new and young leadership will back up its pledges with action. However, others including the UML and some constitutional experts, say that the arrests have not followed legal procedures. The UML has mobilised its affiliated groups to start nationwide street protests. 

The main divide seems to be over the perception that the new government is only interested in justice for the perpetrators of the 8 September Parliament massacre, and not against those who organised arson and vandalism of government buildings, homes of politicians, businesses and the media the next day. 

While some celebrate what they see as the beginning of justice for the victims and survivors of the September violence, political analysts and legal experts express alarm over a lack of adherence to the rule of law. 

K P Oli has a lot of experience being behind bars. He was jailed a dozen times in 1970s by the Panchayat regime for his extreme left activism and then spent 14 years in prison between 1974-1988.

Critics argue that the former leaders were denied due process and label their arrest a “political vendetta."

RSP supporters had made similar arguments in October 2024 and April 2025 that the arrest of party chair Rabi Lamichhane over misappropriation of funds from numerous cooperatives were  politically motivated.

‘What is happening is unacceptable,’ wrote former minister and diplomat Nilamber Acharya wrote on Saturday morning. ‘Such acts of revenge and crackdowns do not bode well.’

In response to accusations of the arrests being partisan and politically-motivated, Home Minister Sudan Gurung took to social media, saying that the new government is fulfilling its promises: ‘No one is above the law,’ he wrote. ‘This is not revenge, it is the beginning of justice. I believe now that the nation will now take a new direction.’

There is also concern the new leadership has jumped the gun to implement the findings of the inquiry commission, which has itself been criticised in some quarters for concentrating on the events of 8 September rather than investigating the perpetrators of the anarchy on 9 September. 

The first meeting of the Council of Ministers made the immediate implementation of the GenZ Movement Inquiry Report its first priority.

But there are questions as to whether the execution of the report will be impartial. Home Minister Gurung will now dictate how the recommendations  will be conducted, since he is himself referenced in the report in connection with the unrest on 9 September. 

In fact, the report also outlines how supporters stormed Nakhu Prison on 9 September to organise Rabi Lamichhane’s jailbreak. Will Minister Gurung also go after his own party's leadership?  

With the UML already calling for nationwide protests against the detention of its leaders, there is concern that Nepal is plunging straight into turmoil instead of stability.

The UML leadership has been unrepentant about the 8 September events. Oli has defiantly blamed infiltration and outside forces for the killings, and unlike the Nepali Congress the UML has not managed its own leadership changeover. 

The NC under Gagan Thapa as well as the Nepali Communist Party of Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal have so far been silent about the detentions even though former Home Minister Ramesh Lekhak is from the NC.

Oli and Lekhak’s arrests will now be challenged in the courts. But their detention also signals to Nepal’s political old guard that the tables have turned: legacy leaders cannot be complacent and assume they will disappear from national consciousness for past deeds without being held accountable for what happened during their watch.

The RSP government under Prime Minister Balendra Shah seems determined not to let bygones be bygones. But while that is all and well, it remains to be see whether the party can deliver on the need of the electorate for tangible governance reform.

The danger is that the new rulers may be defined by the same tactics of political revenge as its predecessors in the name of meting out justice.