KATHMANDU: Chairman of the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) Pushpa Kamal Dahal “Prachanda” has hinted at the possibility of endorsing the widely-talked-about Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) from the parliament.
Responding to a query about the fate of the MCC on a television interview, Chairman Dahal said, “There is, in fact, a negligible section within the party rejecting MCC outright, and there is another negligible group advocating MCC’s endorsement.”
“We are very much clear that the NCP will make a unanimous decision on MCC,” he said in the interview adding that the party will take up the issue at the central committee to decide its fate.
On another issue, Prachanda dismissed claims and speculations that he was supplicating for rights or privileges with Prime Minister KP Oli.
“Let me clarify to the people that my discussions with PM Oli are basically focused on national issues, party affairs, and above all, people’s interests rather than my personal concerns,” Prachanda said while raising concern over what he said “wrong message” that has been trickled down to the people.
On the issue of power-sharing, he said that the leadership would now focus on party consolidation until the party’s general convention.
“The focus is to lead the party to a new height,” he said refuting reports that he was hell-bent on becoming the Prime Minister.
He, however, hinted at the possibility of the cabinet reshuffle on the basis of consensus within the party leadership.
Prachanda, who led the decade-long Maoist insurgency and signed the historic Comprehensive Peace Accord, also was candid in his articulation that the former Maoist leaders, including Dr Babu Ram Bhattarai, Netra Bikram Chand “Biplav” and Kiran Baidhya, who have left the party (will) or have realized that it is high time that they all came together once again for the common cause that they had aspired when they were waging “People’s War” to overthrow the institution of monarchy.
“To tell you the truth, our dreams and aspirations have not been fulfilled yet. We have yet to realize our objectives,” he said adding, “This is not what we had wished for.”
He said “sooner or later, we all (including Dr Bhattarai, Biplav and Baidhya) need to come to a single platform since we all belong to the same school of thought.”
Prachanda said they have a long way to go since the decade-long insurgency ended in an agreement then. “We wanted to capture the state power, which we could not do because of various reasons, including national, regional and international circumstances,” he said.
Comment