5: Case Study Nepal
5.3 The Intended Effects – a Discussion
The requirement of the Interim Constitution and the law that at least one-third of a party’s candidates had to be female was implemented by the procedures by allowing parties to add women to their PR lists in order to fulfil this requirement, which therefore did not increase the female representation in FPTP as intended.
5.3 The Intended Effects – a Discussion
5.3.2 How the Group Representation Worked
The following shows the composition of the elected part of the CA:
FPTP List PR Total PR Quota
Identities Percent Identities Percent Identities Percent Percent
Women 30 12.5 161 48.1 191 33.2 50.0
Madhesi 74 30.8 121 36.1 195 33.9 31.2
Dalit 7 2.9 44 13.1 51 8.9 13.0
Janajatis 77 32.1 118 35.2 195 33.9 37.8
Backward regions
12 5.0 10 3.0 22 3.8 4.0
Others 100 41.7 94 28.1 194 33.4 30.2
The identities add up to more than the number of seats since a person may have more than one identity, just as the quotas add up to more than 100 percent.
Madhesis and Janajatis got a fairly good representation in the FPTP race. The Madhesis were over-represented in the List PR race, mainly due to the waiver of quotas for short lists.
Women and Dalits came out with a low representation (even if it was better than in any previous elections) in FPTP, but their shares were considerably improved by the quotas in the List PR race.
The Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (NEFIN) claimed that there were 29 out of the 59 Janajati groups that did not receive a seat in the election, and they referred to the agreement with the governing parties to request that the 26 members that were appointed by the government should be used to compensate for this. This happened to a small degree.
Only four of the appointees, one from each of the groups Meche, Tajpururiya, Bramu/Baramu and Pahari represented groups without representation among the elected CA members.
It has often been said that within the broad groups defined in the quota rules, some castes or ethnic groups represented a ‘creamy layer’, picking up the seats on behalf of the whole group.
This is particularly the case within the Madhesi castes and Hill and Mountain Janajatis. Many groups within these broader categories were already adequately represented or even over-represented earlier and the wide definition of groups did not help the genuinely
underprivileged to win seats. The two groups which have traditionally been excluded are women and Dalits. The excluded castes within the Madhesi group and the marginalised Janajatis were helped only to a limited degree. This is discussed in detail by Vollan206. By checking which groups got adequately represented in the 1991, 1994, 1999 and the FPTP part
206 Vollan 2011.
of the 2008 elections, he suggests which of the one hundred groups of the 2001 census could be defined as excluded and which could be defined as included. His definition of excluded is that the group in the elections studied won less than ninety percent of their share of the population. This threshold is fairly high and led to groups representing 49.6 percent of the population being excluded. By decreasing the threshold to sixty percent, Magars, Tamangs, Tharus and Marwadis could be classified as ‘included’ and the total excluded comes down to 29.8 percent207. Thus the excluded Janajati Hill and Mountain groups become:
Chepang(Praja), Bramu/Baramu, Pahari, Thami, Sunuwar, Dura, Lepcha, Jirel, Raji, Hayu, Bote, Raute, Walung, Yakkha, Darai, Chhantel, Hyalmo (Yehylmo), Byangsi, Kusunda, Bhote, Gharti /Bhujel, Sherpa, Majhi, Danuwar and Kumal.
The groups which were adequately represented (or over-represented) were: Newar, Gurung, Limbu, Tamang, Magar, Rai and Thakali.
For the Madhesi castes the excluded groups are: Hajam/Thakur, Kurmi, Sonar, Lodha, Kahar, Rajbhar, Lohar, Kamar, Bing/Binda, Mallah, Nuniya, Dhunia, Kewat, Mali,
Bhediyar/Gaderi, Badhae, Nurang, Haluwai, Kalwar, Bangali, Kumhar, Barae, Teli, Kanu and Sudhi.
The over-represented or adequately represented Madhesi caste groups are: Brahman-Tarai, Yadav, Kayastha, Baniya, Rajput, Marwadi and Koiri.
The largest Madhesi/Terai Janajati group is the Tharu, which are 6.8 percent of the population. There are another twelve groups, which are very small (0.0 to 0.8 percent).
Tharus are classified as ‘included’, whereas the following groups are ‘excluded’:
Patharkata/Kuswadiya, Munda, Kisan, Jhangad, (Dhagar/Jhagar), Santhal/Satar, Dhanuk, Koche, Meche, Rajbansi, Gangai, Tajpuriya and Dhimal.
Muslims won 2.5 percent of the seats in the 2008 FPTP race and had 4.3 percent of the population. One may either define them as a separate group or include them in the Madhesi caste (or Madhesi ‘other’) group, together with the Jains and Punjabis/Sikhs.
5.3.3 Summary
The following table shows a summary of the included and excluded groups based upon the sixty percent threshold.
207 Magars and Tamangs represent border-line cases if the threshold is set to sixty percent.
Group 1991 1994 1999 2008 FPTP
Share of the population according to the census 2001 in percent Excluded groups:
Madhesi Dalits 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.4 3.9
Madhesi/Terai Janajatis, excluded only
0.5 0.0 0.5 1.7 2.0
Madhesi castes, excluded only
3.4 2.4 5.4 6.7 12.4
Hill Dalits 0.5 0.0 0.0 2.5 8.0
Hill and Mountain Janajatis, excluded only
1.0 1.0 1.0 0.4 3.5
Total excluded groups 5.4 3.4 6.8 11.7 29.8
Included groups:
Madhesi/Terai Janajatis, included only
8.3 6.8 3.9 5.4 6.8
Madhesi castes, included only
8.3 10.2 10.7 16.4 6.9
Hill caste 53.7 62.4 58.0 41.7 31.2
Hill and Mountain Janajatis, included only
24.4 17.1 20.5 24.6 25.3
Total included groups 94.6 96.6 93.2 88.3 70.2
The excluded groups’ share of the population208 could form a basis for future minimum quotas if one should decide to move towards a system of inclusiveness rather than proportional representation of groups.
5.3.4 The Gender Rule
The one-third requirement for women running in the two races combined was implemented by allowing parties to add women to the lists beyond the 50 percent required. This was a practical solution that did not really add to the women’s possibility of being elected. If, in the future, one would retain FPTP elections, requirements for that part of the elections could be implemented in the constituency race only (rather than by allowing women candidates to be
208 These criteria are based upon parliamentary election results only and other socio-economic indicators may also be added in the future. Broadly, the groups seem to be intuitively accepted by stakeholders but with some comments to the details. The groups defined in the 2001 census are not generally accepted in all details and new classifications may affect the numbers but not the general principles.
added in the other race). This would mean that the returning officers would not be able to approve candidates before the Election Commission has made an overall review of the parties’ nation-wide compliance with quota requirements.
5.3.5 Some Practical Issues
The system described above was successfully implemented for the 2008 election. The biggest challenge to the voters compared to previous elections was to understand the significance of two ballots and two races. The number of invalid votes reached 5.2 percent in the FPTP race.
One reason for invalid votes was that voters put more than one mark on the same ballot, which in turn might have been because they knew they were to give two votes and were unaware that they would be given a second ballot for the other race. The FPTP ballot was given before the List PR ballot, and the rate of invalid votes dropped to 3.7 percent for the List PR ballot.
The challenge for the parties was clearly to understand and to adhere to the complex quota rules for the candidate lists. In particular, the nomination was demanding for the parties that decided to file long lists. However, with assistance from the Election Commission
administration and software made for helping the parties, those wanting to file lists managed to meet the quotas in the end.
The most complicated part of the rules came from the fact that the quotas did not add up to one hundred percent, but to 116.2 percent. Four percent of the difference was due to the overlap between the backward regions and the rest; 12.2 percent was because of an overlap between the Madhesi group and the two groups known as the Dalits and Janajatis. The latter overlap came directly from the regulations in the law, but it represented a challenge for the parties to understand the rule. However, the parties did their utmost to implement the rules in good faith and they were able to meet the criteria both for the candidate lists and for the results.
In the end, eleven parties filed long lists (101 candidates or more) and therefore had to meet all quota requirements. These parties won 277 seats out of the total of 335.
One complication with any ethnically- or caste-based quota system is to get an accurate identification of the candidates. A person’s own feeling of identity need not coincide with the anthropological classification and, because of intermarriages, the identity may not be unique.
In such cases, it is generally accepted that the person’s subjective identity (within reason) counts. Another problem is that some subgroups do not have a unique classification within the broader groups used in the law. For example, the Tharus were classified as Madhesi Janajatis when the quotas were made, but it is far from agreed whether this Janajati group should belong to the Madhesis or not. The last problem is that mistakes can easily be made.
It is practically impossible to review in detail the classification made by the parties of the 6,000 candidates on the lists.
5.4 Some Side Effects of the 2008 System