Confrontation if govt goes ahead with polls: Leaders

Confrontation if govt goes ahead with polls: Leaders

KATHMANDU, JUL 01 -
A majority of CPN-Maoist leaders on Sunday suggested the party leadership remain prepared for a ‘confrontation’ if the government moves ahead with the Constituent Assembly (CA) election scheduled for November 19.
In the closely guarded indoor session of the party’s Central Committee (CC) meeting, which began in Pokhara on Saturday, around 52 CC and Politburo members also urged the party leadership to prepare for a ‘people’s revolt’. The leaders were commenting on five different internal documents that propose numerous agendas, including boycotting the polls under current circumstances and preparing for a fresh ‘people’s revolt’.
“If the party faces a confrontation while it tries to ruin the polls, the government will use force to suppress our campaign, making it all the more easier for us to go for a revolt,” one leader said in the meeting.
Party spokesperson Pampha Bhusal said almost all the speakers in the meeting supported the proposal of the party chairman and the general secretary to begin a ‘people’s revolt’. “Except for a few leaders who urged a slight modification in the documents, a majority of them supported the party’s future political course as proposed by Mohan Baidya and Ram Bahadur Thapa,” she said.Presenting his document on Saturday, party chairman Baidya proposed boycotting the polls under the preset circumstances, while Thapa had stressed on launching a fresh struggle.
Commenting on Baidya and Thapa’s documents on Sunday, party leaders were critical of the leadership for not being able to maintain the spirit with which the party was formed.
“Most of the members pressed the leadership to be firm on theoretical issues. They urged the leaders to settle unresolved issues and bring about uniformity in the party’s agenda and line from top to bottom,” a CC member told the Post from Pokhara.
The second day of the four-day-long meeting primarily focused on the party’s five different internal documents prepared by Baidya, Thapa, secretaries Netra Bikram Chand and Dev Prasad Gurung and vice-chairman CP Gajurel.
Chand’s document concerns the youths and their mobilisation, Gurung’s dwells on the party’s anti-election campaign, while Gajurel’s paper talks of the party’s foreign policy.
In his document, Chand proposes the party set up a paramilitary structure constituting the youths.
Although Chand’s document focuses mainly on the need to go for a revolution and fresh struggle, sources say that it is largely theoretical and does not have the details.
“These are just proposed documents. All of these will go through certain modifications based on the suggestions put forth by the around 200 participants,” a party leader said.
The meeting is expected to prepare the party’s policy on the polls and discuss the possibility of the party’s unification with the Matrika Yadav-led CPN (Maoist), Mani Thapa’s Communist Revolutionary Party and the CPN (United) led by Pari Thapa.