KATHMANDU: Nepal’s President Bidhya Devi Bhandari held talks with the leaders of three main political parties on Monday to come up with a consensus candidate for prime minister, Reuters news service reported an aide to the president Bhesh Raj Adhikari as saying. The president called the meeting in an effort to end the revolving-door politics that had seen 23 governments in 26 years. Former prime minister K P Oli resigned on Sunday, facing defeat in a no-confidence vote in parliament brought by his allies, the former Maoist rebels, and opening the way for a political tussle to lead the country of 28 million people. President Bhandari had invited Oli, Maoist chief Prachanda and the leader of the Nepali Congress party, Sher Bahadur Deuba, to discuss a new government. Adhikari said, “The meeting is to tell them to move ahead united. The country has many problems and all major parties must unite to resolve them.” Nepal had been in a political crisis since September when a Constituent Assembly approved a new constitution amid a political row with minority Madhesis in the southern plains over the creation of federal states under the new system. Ethnic Madhesis, who have long complained of neglect by a ruling elite drawn from the hill region, said that the creation of the states would marginalise them by dividing their homeland. Maoist Chief Prachanda, who goes by just one name, said that the outgoing administration failed to address grievances of the plains people. He is considered the frontrunner to succeed Oli, with the support of the Nepali Congress. Oli’s communist UML party said that it would not support the Maoists’ bid for power after they had brought down Oli’s government. “There is no possibility of us joining,” senior UML official Pradip Gyawali said. “We’ll remain a strong opposition.” Political instability had played out against the backdrop of a contest for influence between the neighbors India and China. India had long considered the Himalayan nation its area of influence, and had often faced accusations of interference from Nepal. India rejected the allegations but had grown concerned about China’s involvement in Nepal’s infrastructure development. According to analysts, the prospects for stability remain dim, at least until elections scheduled for 2018. “Nepal’s leaders have once more demonstrated that they are obsessed with politics as usual at a time when they should be working to rescue the economy,” editor of the Nepali Times newspaper Kunda Dixit said. Nepal’s economy had also seen the effect of this turmoil as it showed growth of only 0.77 per cent in the year to July 15, the lowest rate since 2001/02.