Why ‘transfer’ votes?

By voting a certain way people can make their dislike for unnatural coalitions known.

The fear among members of the ruling as well as the main opposition alliance that traditional votes for one party may not naturally translate into votes for another is a legitimate one. This time, fighting as an alliance are five ruling parties: the Nepali Congress, the CPN (Maoist Centre), the CPN (Unified Socialist), the Loktantrik Samajbadi Party, and the Rastriya Janamorcha. Opposite them is an alliance of the CPN-UML, the Janata Samajbadi Party, the Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) and the RPP-Nepal. While the ruling alliance is jointly fighting the federal and provincial elections all across the country, the UML-led alliance is doing so only in select constituencies. The concern over transfer of votes is genuine as the alliances are marriages of convenience for the constituent parties. In fact, on many important issues, these parties hold diametrically opposite views: For instance, while the other four parties in the ruling alliance are advocates of federalism, the Janamorcha is a vehement opponent. Likewise, while the first two parties in the UML-led alliance are supporters of the post-2006 changes, the two RPP’s would like to take the country back to the old unitary set-up under a hereditary Hindu monarch.