What could be the formula?
I don't see the Congress and the UML suddenly seeing light. What will happen instead is they will continue to talk nonsense, their Madhesis and Janajatis will break away from them to form the Janajati party. The two will see major infighting among the leftover factions. And both will be reduced to Praja Parishad sizes after the next election.
The point being turning the Federalist Alliance into an electoral alliance is a task whose time will come soon enough. So might as well prepare.
The Maoist party gets to keep all constituencies it won in the last election minus those whose winners are now in the breakaway party. This includes much of the hills as well as the western Terai.
Whether or not the Madhesi parties succeed in unifying is a big if. That would change things fundamentally. That unified Madhesi party would get every seat won by any Madhesi party in the last election. And if they can't unify they get to keep the seats they won minus the seats of people who broke away.
So each party keeps the constituency that it won minus the people who broke away. Even where people broke away, the party gets to keep about half the seats.
For the leftover seats the Janajati Party is given priority in the hills. And so in all those other constituencies in the hills it is a three way race between the Congress, the UML and the Janajati Party.
In all those constituencies in the eastern and the central Terai that neither the Madhesi parties nor the Maoists won the last time the constituencies are divided 2:1 with two going to the Madhesi parties and one to the Maoists such that it is a three way race between the Congress, the UML and someone from the Federalist Alliance.
How many votes a party won in the last election has to be taken into account while allocating tickets. Because there are some small parties that won no direct seats but sizable votes.
Even if the Congress and the UML end up doing a similar thing and end up not contesting against each other anywhere that helps the Federalist Alliance. It is like when Yahoo and Microsoft team up on Search, Google's share of the search market expands even more.
With this you end up with the Federalist Alliance securing at least a two thirds majority in the next constituent assembly. That is what is needed to not put up Congress-UML nonsense. Baburam Bhattarai should continue as Prime Minister.
And the Federalist Alliance should rally behind Prachanda when it is time to elect an executive President, which could happen within a year of the assembly elections. A non Maoist should be made Vice President, a Madhesi or a Dalit or a Mahila or a Janajati. I'd love to see a Dalit there.
The Act Of A Potential President
The alliance must continue all the way to state and local elections so as to smoothen the institutionalization of federalism in the country. The Janajati and Maoist parties get to do well in the hills and in western Terai. The Madhesi parties get to do well in eastern and central Terai.
Of course the whole task becomes so much the easier should all Madhesi party merge and become one party.
How To Build A Unified Madhesi Party
