Nepal's attempts to elect its first president was put off
after Saturday's vote in the constituent assembly failed to produce a clear
winner, official media said.
Results gave Nepali Congress candidate Ram Baran Yadav 294 votes, just four
short of the majority needed to be elected president, Official Nepal Television
reported.
The Maoist backed candidate Ramraja Prasad Singh received 283 votes, the
television said.
A formal announcement was expected in the assembly meeting later Saturday
evening, which would also set the date for the run-off election.
Although the Nepalese assembly has 601 seats, there are currently only 598
members.
The assembly vote however elected Parmanand Jha of Madhesi People's Rights
Forum as the first vice president of the country.
Jha secured 305 votes, to defeat Maoist candidate Shanta Shrestha.
Election officials had earlier said that 578 of the 598 registered members in
the constituent assembly voted to choose the president in a three-way contest,
with 12 members from the two parties boycotting the poll.
The period leading up to the voting was marred by growing political differences
among the main ruling parties which has split the three-year-old alliance
between them.
A last minute pact between the Nepal Congress, the Communist Party of Nepal -
Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML) and the Madhesi People's Rights Forum
thwarted what till Friday evening had looked like a certain Maoist victory for
presidential post.
The three candidates contesting the election were all from the ethnic Madhesi
community, which has a strong representation in southern Nepal.
Maoist-backed Singh led a brief armed uprising against monarchy, carrying out
bomb attacks in several locations in Kathmandu, including the royal palace, 23
years ago.
He was sentenced to death in absentia by a court but was never captured and
lived in exile in India. Nepali Congress' Ram Baran Yadav is the party's
general secretary and has been at the forefront of the party's struggle for
democracy.
The election marks Nepal's dramatic moves towards peace
following the end of a Maoist insurgency nearly two and half years ago, dpa reported.
...