New leftist party registered at EC

Kathmandu, August 19

The Election Commission today registered new CPN-UML party, chaired by Sandhya Tiwari, a permanent resident of Morang district. With this, total number of registered parties at the EC has reached 132.

The General Secretary of the party is Manish Kumar Upadhyay, a permanent resident of Dhanusha district. According to an official of the EC, the new UML was granted the election symbol of rising sun in the Himalayas.

The EC source said since the KP Sharma Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal led Nepal Communist Party (NCP) had the Sun as its election symbol, the new CPN-UML office bearers chose rising Sun in the Himalayas as their election symbol. EC Spokesperson Raj Kumar Shrestha said the polls panel decided to register the new party after it met all the requirements.

There are 23 office bearers in the party with all new faces. Tiwari, who is considered to be close to PM Oli, had applied for registration at the EC on June 26, rattling the nerves of the NCP leader. PM Oli was the Chairperson of the erstwhile CPN-UML, before the party merged with Dahal led CPN-MC to create NCP. Both Oli and Dahal are co-chairpersons of the ruling NCP.

NCP Vice-chair Bamdev Gautam had raised the matter in the Standing Committee meeting saying that the process to register new CPN-UML was initiated at the behest of Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli. Following Gautama’s accusation, other leaders of the party, including co-chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal had also criticised the PM for ‘attempting to split the party.’

PM Oli had also brought an ordinance in April to amend the Political Party Act, allowing 40 per cent members of either the Central Committee or the Parliamentary Party to split their parties, which the President later rescinded on recommendation of the Prime Minister after his own party leaders and opposition parties slammed the PM ‘for trying to create political instability.’

Currently the party dissidents need 40 per cent support both in the Central Committee and Parliamentary Party to split their parties.

---

A version of this article appears in e-paper on August 20, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.

The post New leftist party registered at EC appeared first on The Himalayan Times.