Yelling with officials and covert operations against corrupt bureaucrats helped Nepalese TV presenter Rabi Lamichhane capitalize on widespread discontent with an older, back-scratching political leadership.

The bombastic journalist is one of several young upstarts who will be running in Sunday’s elections in the Himalayan republic against the familiar faces who have stalked the corridors of power for decades.

An elite club of parliament veterans taking turns in leadership at a time when the economy is faltering has created a perception that the government has lost touch with Nepal’s problems.

“People say, ‘We’ve been cheated, there’s discrimination, we have to pay bribes, we don’t have access to drinking water, we don’t have jobs,'” Lamichhane told AFP during a campaign pit stop.

A cheering crowd lined the roadside to greet the strongman and garland him with flowers while his entourage paraded the streets of Padampur, a small town about a six-hour drive from the capital, Kathmandu.

“I’ve helped people solve some of these problems even though I wasn’t in a position of power,” he said. “So that we can keep our promises.”

Lamichhane, with telegenic charisma and a winning smile, is no stranger to drawing audiences as one of Nepal’s most famous and talkative television personalities.

He once held the Guinness World Record for the longest talk show, a 62-hour marathon of celebrity interviews and talkback calls on the origins of the Buddha.

He later started the muckrakish news show “Straight Talk with the People,” which revolved around salacious interviews with political leaders and hidden tabloid-style camera stabs that shamed authorities who demanded bribes for routine government services.

His work resonated with the Nepalese, who have been dismayed at the widespread bribery that has regularly sparked open scandals, such as when members of the government’s integrity agency were forced to resign after being accused of corruption themselves.

The TV presenter is the most prominent of a group of young candidates – almost all in their early to mid-30s – running for the first time.

Lamichhane, 48, is practically a senior compared to his peers in this loose coalition for change in Nepal, where the median age is an even younger 25.

Yet he is still a generation younger than the leaders who have ruled Nepal since the end of Civil War, a decades-long Maoist insurgency that killed more than 17,000 people.

The conflict ended in 2006 with a peace deal that brought the rebels into power. Since then, power has alternated between the former guerrillas and the political elites of the pre-war period.

Political instability has been a recurring feature of the Nepalese parliament ever since, and no prime minister served a full term after the war ended.

The current prime minister, 76-year-old Sher Bahadur Deuba, is in office for the fifth time.

Deuba has formed an electoral alliance with former Maoist guerrilla leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal, 67, against 70-year-old Sharma Oli CP, who heads another communist party. Dahal and Oli have each served as Prime Minister twice.

“Young voters have now become a dominant force. While it used to be the parents or grandparents who decided who to vote for in the family, now it’s their children who do so,” political analyst Hari Sharma told AFP.

“Established political parties and their leaders have not been able to speak the language of these young voters,” he added. “These voters think their leaders have failed.”

Public discontent has intensified as the economy still finds itself in the doldrums of the coronavirus pandemic, which has ravaged the vital tourism industry and dried up remittances from the large numbers of Nepalese working abroad.

Inflation is rising and the government has banned imports of several goods, including foreign liquor and televisions, to shore up its dwindling foreign exchange reserves.

The mood for change among ordinary Nepalese is palpable. An anonymous Facebook campaign group calling itself “No, Not Again” gained 43,000 followers in just weeks by urging the public to reject “the same old names and faces” in Sunday’s poll.

“I had voted for other political parties in the past and they did nothing,” Radha Tamang, 56, told AFP.

Tamang survives on money from her son, who has found work abroad in Malaysia, but hopes a generational shift can help create jobs in Nepal and enable him to earn a living back home.

“My son told me to vote for Rabi Lamichhane. He will hear our voices,” she said. “I’ll vote for him this time.”