Kathmandu, Nepal: It is likely that the main opposition party CPN UML would emerge again as the largest party even in the second phases of elections held at 334units in 35 districts of province no. 1, 5 and 7 on June 28.
As of the votes counted in 246 local level units till Monday evening, CPN-UML is leading the count with 104 positions of the municipalities and rural municipalities respectively.
The limitation of the Nepali Congress in the second position with significant margin with the main opposition party CPN UML is taken it is astonishingly not only among the cadres and well-wishers of the party but also from different sectors.
Being the largest party in the parliament and the oldest Democratic Party in the country, the poor performance of the Nepali Congress in both the first and send phase of local level elections is taken as a shameful matter among the cadres and well-wishers of the party.
The limitation of the Nepali Congress in the second position with significant margin is being defined on their own in the society. Though different people have different arguments for the poor position of the Nepali Congress, however, various factors have played for the poor performance of the party in the local level election.
The long being rooted internal factionalism, weak leadership, deviant electoral alliance with the CPN Maoist Center and populist electoral strategy adopted by the UML in the pretext of the nationalism are established as the causes behind the shameful defeat of the Nepali Congress.
Even though the party had formed electoral alliance in many local units with the third largest party CPN Maoist Center in many local units, it would have benefited to the Nepali Congress’s candidates in very few local units but smashed up not only the image of the party but also resulted a loss even in the votes in most of the local units.
The independent people, who always prefer to the Nepali Congress during the elections, did not voted to the Nepali Congress, due to their frustration with the CPN Maoist Center, as they were mostly targeted by the Maoist during the decade long insurgency.
The vote of the independent people, which has been remaining crucial to the Nepali Congress to win the elections, has been divided due to the unholy and unnatural alliance with the UCPN Maoist.
As the long failed to curb the long being prevailing factionalism, non-cooperation to the candidates in the elections was also remained another major reason behind the loss even though the party leadership do not agree easily. The party should have adopted a policy of finalizing the candidates from the local levels but chose from the centers on the basis of share among the leadership.
As the sold the nationalist stand of the party adopted during and after the Indian economic blockade and the party’s stand against of the idea to split the province number five during the elections, it had helped the UML to escalate in the position.
