Kathmandu, March 25 Balendra Shah 'Balen', a senior leader of the Rastriya Swatantra Party, is likely to be sworn in as Nepal's youngest prime minister on Friday, an RSP leader said on Wednesday.
Shah, who is popularly known as 'Balen', who was projected by the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) as the prime ministerial candidate during the campaign ahead of the March 5 general election, will also be the first person from the Madhes region to hold the top executive post in the country.
Balen, 35, will be sworn in as a member of the House of Representatives (HoR) on Thursday by 78-year-old Arjun Narsing KC, the eldest among the newly elected members of the HoR, and then on Friday, he will be given the oath as the prime minister by President Ramchandra Paudel.
On Thursday, the RSP will hold its central committee meeting, which will form the Parliamentary Party.
The Parliamentary Party meeting will then elect Balen as its leader, formally qualifying him for the top executive post of the country, according to Shanker Shrestha, secretary of the RSP's central organisation committee.
The central secretariat will then finalise the names of the ministers to be inducted in the new council of ministers on Thursday itself, he added.
Earlier on Wednesday, as per the tradition, President Paudel administered the oath of office and secrecy to KC, elected to the Lower House under the proportionate voting system representing the Nepali Congress party.
On Thursday, KC will administer oaths to all the newly elected members of the HoR, including Balen, as the Parliament is yet to elect its Speaker, sources said.
The president will then initiate the process of forming the government by making a formal call by Thursday evening, according to sources at the President's office.
As the RSP secured 182 seats out of a total of 275 seats in the HoR, it is eligible to form a majority government under Article 76 (1) of the Constitution.
According to sources at the President's Office, Balen, 35, will be sworn in as the prime minister during a special ceremony at the President's Office, Sheetal Niwas, on Friday, March 27.
Sources close to Balen's secretariat said he is likely to form a small cabinet with the number ranging between 15 to 18.
Earlier in the month, Nepal chose fresher Balen and his RSP to form the next government, decimating the traditional parties in the first general elections since last year's violent Gen Z protests that sought generational change and a corruption-free regime.
Rapper-turned-politician Balen defeated four-time prime minister K P Sharma Oli, the chair of Nepal's legacy party, the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist–Leninist), by a huge margin in Jhapa-5 constituency, the latter's stronghold for decades.