KATHMANDU: The Nepali Congress has officially described the Gen-Z-led protests of September 8 and 9 as a rebellion, rejecting the CPN-UML’s claim that the movement was driven by domestic and foreign conspiracies.
The definition has been included in the political proposal presented by General Secretary Gagan Thapa at the party’s ongoing Second Special Convention.
While the UML, which was leading the government at the time, had labelled the youth-led street demonstrations as part of a coordinated conspiracy, the Nepali Congress has taken a sharply different position, framing the protests as a genuine public uprising against political failure and institutional decay.
“The rebellion was an explosion of public anger against the continued repetition of a leadership that has already proven itself a failure, the erosion of trust in public institutions, and the distortions of misgovernance and corruption,” the political report states.
The document says the Gen-Z movement reflected deep frustration among young people and wider society over the country’s political direction and the lack of accountability in governance.
Thapa’s proposal further states that the original spirit of the Gen-Z rebellion has been distorted over time, and that the Special Convention must now internalise its message while charting the party’s future political course.
“The convention must recognize the meaning of the Gen-Z rebellion and use its message to define the party’s path forward,” the report notes.
By formally calling the protests a rebellion, the Nepali Congress has positioned itself closer to the sentiments expressed by young protesters, while also signaling a break from the UML’s narrative that portrayed the movement as a destabilizing plot rather than a political expression of public anger.
Comment