Kathmandu, Nepal, November 30, 2021: The main opposition party CPN UML is going to select its executive body including party chair, office bearer and central committee through the election on Tuesday (today). As the last ditch attempts made by immediate past chair KP Oli to make consensus on unopposed candidates failed to yield any results, election is scheduled to hold for 2:00 AM on Tuesday to elect the party’s new leadership including party chair.
According to Bijay Subba, head the party’s central election commission, voting will start at 2:00 AM and end at 8:00 AM on Tuesday. Revealing about the election Subba said expressing his optimism that it won’t take much time for the results. Though, he did not mention even the tentative time to publish the final results of the elections, it is believed that election results would come today only if the election was begun at the scheduled time.
The ongoing 10th national general convention of the UML, which was initially scheduled to end on Sunday, entered on fourth day on Monday due to the foil attempt to elect a new leadership sans voting. Though Oli had attempted most to select unopposed party leadership including him in the post of party chairperson for the next five years, he failed to do so due to the protest from the dissident leaders.
The dissident leaders namely Bhim Rawal, Ghanashyam Bhusal, Bhim Acharya and Tanka Karki have opposed Oli’s ‘consensus’ proposal on the selection of 19 office bearer posts. Likewise, Oli’s effort to become an unopposed party chair was failed by Rawal. Altogether, 333 candidates that include 23 for the post of office-bearers and 310 for central members are vying in the elections.
Rawal has not only filed his candidacy against Oli but protested the plan to select party leadership without mentioning democratic process. Though Oli was trusted to select unopposed leadership from the meeting, he failed to pick unopposed candidates even in the Central Committee and the office bearer posts except in five positions of the 19 office bearers’ posts.
As of the propose and wish of Oli, only his five trusted lieutenants became unopposed candidates including Ishwar Pokhrel in the post of senior vice chairperson and Shankar Pokhrel in the post of General Secretary. Similarly, three deputy general secretary posts have also gone to Oli’s loyalists- Prithvi Subba Gurung, Bishnu Rimal and Pradeep Gyawali sans voting.
Earlier, Subas Nembang and Bishnu Poudel had claimed the posts of senior vice chair and General Secretary respectively. However, they yielded to Oli and agreed for the post of vice chair. Apart from Nembang and Poudel, Oli had proposed for Asta Laxmi Shakya, Yubaraj Gyawali, Surendra Pandey and Ram Bahadur Thapa as the vice-chair of the party. However, the posts of vice chair are going to be determined through the voting after Ghanashyam Bhusal filed his nomination for the post.
In the seven secretary posts, Oli had proposed to Gokarna Bista, Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, Yogesh Bhattarai, Raghubir Mahaseth, Lekhraj Bhatta, Chhabilal Bishwakarma and Padma Aryal. However, they failed to become unopposed after Bhim Acharya and Tanka Karki filed their nominations for the secretary posts.
Office bearers of the Central Discipline Commission and Accounts Commission of the UML, however, were elected unanimously. Keshav Prasad Badal, Netra Prasad Panthi and Bharat Raj Pahadi were unanimously elected chair, vice-chair, and secretary of the Discipline Commission, respectively.
Likewise, Pushparaj Kandel, Bishnu Panthi, and Shiv Adhikari were unanimously elected as chair, vice-chair and secretary of the Accounts Commission, respectively.
