Former chief justice Karki named Nepal’s first female leader after unrest

Sushila Karki, a former chief justice, will become the first woman to lead Nepal, to be sworn in as interim leader later on Friday after violent anti-graft protests forced Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli to resign, the president’s office said.

President Ramchandra Paudel’s office announced Karki’s appointment following negotiations between Paudel, army chief Ashok Raj Sigdel and the protesters who led Nepal’s worst upheaval in years.

Fifty-one people were killed and more than 1,300 injured this week in the anti-graft protests by the ‘Gen Z’ movement, named for the age of its mainly young supporters.

The protest was sparked by a social media ban that has since been rolled back. The violence subsided only after Oli resigned on Tuesday.

Karki, 73, would take the oath of office at 9:15 p.m. local time (1530 GMT), said Archana Khadka Adhikari, information officer at the president’s office. Two other ministers would also be sworn in along with her, local TV channels reported.

The only woman to have served as chief justice, Karki was the preferred choice of the protesters who cite her reputation for honesty and integrity and a stance against corruption.

She held the top judicial post for about a year until mid-2017.

RESTORATION OF NORMALCY

Nepal has grappled with political and economic instability since the abolition of its monarchy in 2008, while a lack of jobs drives millions to seek work in other countries and send money home.

As the country of 30 million people inched back to normality on Friday - with shops reopened, cars back on roads, and police replacing the guns they wielded earlier this week with batons - families reclaimed bodies of those killed in the protests.

Some roads were still blocked, although streets were patrolled by fewer soldiers than before.

“While his friends backed off (from the protests), he decided to go ahead,” Karuna Budhathoki said of her 23-year-old nephew, as she waited to collect his body at Kathmandu’s Teaching Hospital.

“We were told he was brought dead to the hospital.”

Another protester who died, Ashab Alam Thakurai, 24, had been married only a month earlier, his relatives said.

“The last we spoke to him ... he said he was stuck with the protest. After that we could not contact him ... eventually we found him in the morgue,” said his uncle, Zulfikar Alam.

Source: Reuters

- Agencies