The Nepal Communist Party (NCP) took a step towards a formal split on Tuesday, with the Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’-led group withdrawing Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli from the presidency and promising to take punitive action against him.
The Central Committee unanimously nominated high-ranking lawmaker Madhav Kumar Nepal as the party’s second chairman in place of Oli. Prachanda is the party’s first chairman. Now Dahal and Nepal will chair the meetings in turn, as described in the party statue,” said Rekh Sharma, a member of the Central Committee.
Earlier in the day, Oli, one of the two chairmen of the ruling NCP, organized a separate meeting of the representatives of the Central Committee nearest to him at Baluwatar, the official residence of the Prime Minister.
The meeting took place three days after Oli got the President to dissolve Parliament, a contentious decision in the middle of a protracted fight for power between him and Prachanda.
At the meeting organised by the Prachanda party, it was agreed that the dissolution of Parliament was an act contrary to the spirit of the Constitution and the principles of democracy. The community then voted to oust Oli as leader of the party. “The government is dissolved but the party is untouched,” Prachanda said.