Nepal's Koirala to meet key ally over cabinet expansion

Nepalese Prime Minister Sushil Koirala will meet leaders of alliance partner CPN-UML tomorrow to resolve differences with it over the distribution of key portfolios like the home ministry.
Koirala could not expand his two-member cabinet for the past one week after CPN-UML decided not to provide the list of its nominees for the council of ministers after the prime minister rejected its demand for Home portfolio.
Koirala's Nepali Congress said it would retain the portfolios of Home and Finance.
"We cannot provide Home and Finance portfolios to the CPN-UML, as there was no such agreement reached with the UML," Nepali Congress general secretary Prakash Man Singh said today.

"We are expecting that the CPN-UML will give name list of its ministers by Wednesday, so that the government would be expanded soon," he said.
Ram Sharan Mahat, minister without portfolio, is the sole member of the cabinet headed by Koirala.

Meanwhile, CPN-UML candidate Subash Nembang is set to become the chairman of Nepal's Constituent Assembly that would draft the country's new constitution.
Nemwang is the lone candidate for the post.
Nepali Congress has already extended its support to the candidacy of Nemwang, who had also served four year term as the chairman of the first Constituent Assembly, which was dissolved one and a half years ago.

Koirala, president of Nepal's biggest political party, was elected as Prime Minister on February 11 with 405 votes in favour in the 601-member Constituent Assembly, ending months of political crisis in the country.