Nepal Gen Z Protests | Social Media Ban Sparks Unrest

Kathmandu | Nepal News Today – Nepal is experiencing a historic level of public wrath, with protests – largely youth led Gen Z protests, and including recent airstrikes in many of the major cities – erupting across the country since the recent government attempts to ban a widely used social media app, especially by young people in Nepal, also known as Gen Z’s main form of communication. Subsequently, these protests turned and transformed into violence, riots, vandalism, and political chaos, which has brought Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s government to the edge of collapse. Protests worsened after Prime Minister Oli subsequently lifted the ban on social media apps, in an attempt to calm the protests. But the Prime Minister’s undoing of the ban had little impact in cooling the outrage. Young demonstrators, many of whom are Gen Z, some also being young Kids! Campaigned for accountability and an end to corruption.

Attacks on the President’s & PM Residences

Protesters have turned their anger toward the homes of President Ram Chandra Poudel and Prime Minister Oli, which were both burned down. Videos were shared on Nepalese social media that featured mobs vandalising the President’s residence. Former Prime Ministers Pushpa Kamal Dahal (Prachanda) and Sher Bahadur Deuba, as well as Energy Minister Deepak Khadka’s private home, were also attacked.

In a dramatic turn of events, protesters broke into the Nepali Parliament and set fire to the building, sounding alarms for the future of democratic institutions in the country.”

Curfew Imposed in Kathmandu

As the protesters spread unrest in the country, the Nepali authorities placed a curfew in Kathmandu and some other towns. The streets that were the site of the protests turned into battlefields as protesters threw stones at police, and police defended themselves with rubber bullets as unrest continued for another day.

The protesters’ chants of “Stop the ban on social media, stop corruption, not social media” made it clear that generationally charged protests from the “Nepal Gen Zs” show protests against both digital censorship and rampant corruption, where the ages and tools of the protests are dialed in specifically for the millennial group.

Political Outcomes

The prime minister is being driven alone in the crisis and has already lost several ministers to resignations, distancing themselves from the government. Calls for Oli’s resignation are getting louder. The protest could be a once-in-a-lifetime generational event with a digitally well-connected, politically strong generation in evidence that could disrupt and reshape Nepali politics as it is experienced in the governance structures embedded in the very country.