Nepal forms a new party, accusing Oli of leaving no space for him in party

By Our Reporter The main opposition CPN-UMLhas formally split with the leaders of the rival faction led by its senior leader Madhav Kumar Nepal submitting an application to the Election Commission Nepal for registering a new political party.  Following the issuance of the ordinance related to political parties on Wednesday last week, leaders close to Madhav Kumar Nepal rushed to the EC to register the new political party, CPN-UML (Socialist), along the Marxist-Leninist ideological lines. However, as the EC denied registering the name-bearing UML, he later renamed it CPN Unified (Socialist). Nepal is backed by 32 federal lawmakers from both the Houses and 58 central members of the 203-member central committee of the UML to register the new party.  Jhala Nath Khanal is the senior leader of the new party, and they had already formed a 95-member central committee. However, nine-second-generation leaders who instigated leader Nepal against Oli since December 20, 2020 to oust Oli from the UML has dramatically deceived Nepal and surrendered to Oli at the last moment on the pretext that the latter would implement the 10-point agreement prepared by a task force formed including representatives of both Oli and Nepal. But surprisingly, all representatives of leader Nepal included in the task force has decided to be with Oli.  The governmen thad issued the ordinance paving way for the Nepal-led faction to split the UML.  The ordinance allows leaders of a political party to split the party if they have 20 per cent support either in the central committee or in the parliamentary party.  According to the new provision, having 41 central members in his support was enough for leader Nepal to register the new party. Earlier, the act required the support of 40 per cent in both the parliamentary party and the central committee to split any political party.  Meanwhile, chairman of the proposed CPN (Unified Socialist) Madhav Kumar Nepal has said that CPN-UML chairman KP Sharma Oli compelled them to form a new party after he closed all the doors for them.  Talking to media persons in Chandragiri on Tuesday, he said they had no choice but to register a new party after Oli expelled 14 lawmakers, including him from the party.  Nepal and all leaders close to him had reached Chandragiri on Monday to finalising the statute and manifesto of the new party.  “Now that KP Oli is in a position to occupy the party alone, and the door for us to return to the party has been closed,” he said. “After being expelled, we had only two options: Either to kneel down and sit quietly on the streets or to form another revolutionary party. We have taken a new step by beholding the history of Nepali politics and the communist movement, where only rebellions have succeeded to defeat right-wing opportunism. And, we have registered a party named Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist),” he said.  Nepal claimed that they have more than 20 per cent of central committee members and parliamentarians to split the party and form a new one.  Mentioning that he had separated himself from UML, Nepal said he was ready to coordinate with other leftist parties in the coming days. In his political document, chairman Nepal had made 10 serious allegations against UML chair Oli.  He had accused Oli of using the unity between the CPN-UML and the CPN (MC) as a tool to strengthen his faction. He also accused Oli of infiltrating religion into politics and holding anti-republican views, being the most corrupt prime minister in history. UML decides to form a task force to implement a 10-point agreement The CPN-UML has decided to form a task force to prepare a modality and timetable for the implementation of the 10-point agreement prepared by the unity task force, resolve the intra-party disputes and complete the party departments.   A meeting of the UML Standing Committee held at Chyasal, Lalitpur, on Tuesday decided to form a task force comprising Ishwar Pokhrel, Bhim Rawal, Bishnu Poudel, Ghanshyam Bhushal, Lekhraj Bhatt and Surendra Pandey, said party Spokesperson Pradeep Kumar Gyawali. The meeting has also decided to issue directives to revive the party’s central, provincial, district, constituency, municipal and ward level committees as they were before May 16, 2018.