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VOL. 28, NO. 19, Jan 16, 2009 (Magh 03 2065 B.S.)
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Strong Left March
The Maoists unite with a smaller communist faction and rechristen their name. Even Prachandapath is dumped for the sake of left unity
By A CORRESPONDENT
After forging unification with a small radical leftist force, the leader of the ruling coalition CPN-Maoist has rechristened its name and dumped Prachandapath as its guiding ideology.
The CPN (Maoist) and CPN-Unity Center Masal have decided to unify the two parties on Monday (January 12).
The joint meeting of the central committees of the two parties decided to name the new party as Unified CPN-Maoist. The unified party has also decided to drop Prachandapath as its guiding principle.
They have decided to form a national general convention preparation committee, which will have maximum 175 members. Earlier, the CPN-Maoist had decided to enlarge the 35-member central committee to 106 members.
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Maoist Leaders : Divided we stand |
Over two dozen more members are likely to be nominated by Maoists. Central leaders of the two parties were busy in discussion throughout the day on Monday, trying to settle issues before the formal announcement of unification.
"We are dropping Prachandapath as guiding ideology for the time being. It will be left open for discussions till the new convention," said senior Maoist leader CP Gajurel.
At the joint meeting of the two parties, they approved the political report presented by Maoist chairman Prachanda and a party statute presented by Masal general secretary Narayan Kazi Shrestha 'Prakash.'
Patch-up With NC
Before it sealed its unification drive with Masal, the Maoists also reached a patch-up with the main opposition and liberal democratic party Nepali Congress (NC).
Speaking at the parliament on January 7, PM Dahal made a statement fulfilling demands of the opposition party.
He said that the government would return seized properties within three months.
"Private, public, or other properties would be returned to rightful owners starting immediately and within three months while the paramilitary nature of YCL will be ended within two to three weeks," he said.
PM Dahal said that necessary instructions have been given to district administration offices to carry out these orders.
PM Dahal also expressed his sadness over what he calls as 'misplaced priority.' He said that he felt that the parties were giving lesser priority to the major duty of constitution-making. "Sometimes I feel we are acting as if we live in a period where we have already written the constitution," he said.
