By Our Reporter
The Gen Z revolt shook Nepal’s politics in ways that few revolutions have. The protests did not just topple the UML-Nepali Congress coalition government, they dissolved the lower house and shook public faith in the very existence of traditional parties. But despite all this seismic shaking, the response of the country’s ruling political forces has been mostly stay clueless.
To reforms The Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) are slow to implement the sweeping reforms demanded by the protests, a stand that jeopardizes their futures in serious terms. Calls for top-level changes and organizational overhauls, made most forcefully by young and second-rung leadership, have largely been rebuffed by party leaders who are fixated in their job “Do reforms until changes happen.”
Party leaders such as Gagan Thapa have called for self-reflection and early conventions, but plans to drastically overhaul the party are being opposed by entrenched loyalists around Sher Bahadur Deuba. In the UML, the survival of KP Sharma Oli and his public utterances hint at a continuation of the emphasis on safeguarding entrenched leadership at the expense of the grievances that led to the revolt. The Maoist Centre is caught between Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s reluctant assent to eventual transition and impatient demands from deputy leaders like Janardan Sharma for immediate change.
This reticence is important as the political climate is at a different point where public tolerance is weak. The Gen Z protests highlighted universal outrage against corruption, poor governance, and cronyism. The Karki government has a narrow window of opportunity to redress these demands: probing corrupt activities and holding accountable party leadership figures, some of whom have been accused of impropriety for decades. Inertia on the part of the incumbent parties to reform will not only attract electoral punishment in the March 2026 elections but accelerate their political obsolescence.
Their long decades of tradition and heritage stand in opposition to aspirations in the population. Not only politicized youth but even the common man is demanding transparency, meritocratic leadership, and efficient governance. Ritualistic assemblies or superficial overhauls cannot be sufficient; either the old guard must change or become irrelevant.
But entrenched power dynamics in these parties guarantee that reform is not on the cards. Dominant leaders of decades are not often willing to give up their authority. Loyalists take care to shield them from within, and reformist voices get isolated. So even if youthful leaders are calling for change, the machinery in the party is predisposed toward holding on to the status quo.
This disequilibrium risks making old parties obsolete while opening up opportunities for newer political actors that more closely match the aspirations of citizens. In default, Nepal’s old parties’ sheer existence is a matter of balancing powerfully entrenched leadership against public pressure for accountability and institutional renewal. The next few months will reveal if these parties can learn or be ostracized forever. Electoral outcomes will be a gauge of performance and reward for inaction. The Gen Z protests were a shift in the political generation, and traditional parties must know if they will heed this change or cling to old norms. Without substantive reforms, their own long-time dominance increasingly becomes doubtful, and the political future of Nepal may be determined less by familiar names and more by emergent forces capable of imposing the changes the citizenry now demands.
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