By Our Reporter
Nepali Congress is now mired in dispute after Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ became the new Prime Minister by deserting the NC-led coalition and joining hands with his arch-rival KP Sharma Oli at the last moment with most of the NC leaders and cadres blaming party president Sher Bahadur Deuba for throwing the party out of power.
It was not the first time that Prachanda had deceived the NC. Earlier, in 2017 he had forged an electoral alliance with the UML when his party CPN (Maoist Centre) was in the then coalition government led NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba. At that time, Deuba did not know that Prachanda was secretly holding meetings with the UML for a pre-poll alliance. Consequently, NC faced a humiliating defeat in the 2017 polls.
And this time too, Deuba failed strategically to retain Prachanda with his coalition after the elections. His childish demand to become the prime minister for the sixth time forgetting that Prachanda had helped him become the PM in a difficult situation in July 2021 culminated in the collapse of the coalition he was leading.
After Prachanda deserted the Deuba-led coalition, NC lost everything from the post of President and Prime Minister in the centre to Province Chiefs and Chief Ministers in all seven provinces.
Almost all Nepali Congress leaders, carders, supporters and well-wishers except for those who are in the coterie of Deuba and his wife Arzu Deuba have blamed Deuba for the failure.
When Nepali Congress emerged as the largest party in the House of Representatives winning 89 seats, and when Prachanda reiterated his commitment to giving continuity to the NC-led coalition, everyone was sure that NC would be leading the new government in the centre and four of the seven provinces. Deuba and his wife Arzu Rana and the members of his coterie were more ambitious and argued that NC should not give the post of the PM and President to the Maoist, while Prachanda was demanding the post of the PM and the CPN (Unified Socialist) of Madhav Nepal the post of the president.
In the meantime, CPN-UML chair KP Oli tricked telling Deuba and Arzu that his party would back the NC-led government, which the power-hungry couple believed and tried every measure to retain both posts with them. Irked by Deuba, Prachanda reached Oli’s home on December 25, and everything happened, Prachanda became PM, and Deuba was stripped of power within a few hours.
Now the rival faction led by Shekhar Koirala and a few of those who were with Deuba till Prachanda’s appointment as PM, have blamed Deuba and his men for the fiasco.
Party general secretary Gagan Kumar Thapa and Bishwa Prakash Sharma, leaders Shashank Koirala, Ram Chandra Paudel, Arjun Narasingh KC, Pradip Paudel, Gururaj Ghimire and others have accused Deuba of losing the power while Gyanendra Bahadur Karki, Ramesh Lekhak, Mohan Basnet, Prakash Sharan Mahan and Surendra Pande have defended Deuba. Surprisingly, party vice president Purna Bahadur Khadka who was with Deuba till the last moment has not made any public statement. Reports have it that he was humiliated by Prakash Sharan Mahat when he floated the idea of saving the coalition even by offering the post of the PM to Prachanda.
Meanwhile, the rival faction led by Koirala has invited a meeting of the leaders and district party chairs loyal to him on 21 while the central committee meeting is called for the 22.
The meeting of 21 is sure to ask Deuba to step down while the next day, Gagan Kumar Thapa, Koirala and others are sure to seek answers from Deuba for the failure in forming the government. Deuba will also face criticism for not consulting with the party office bearers while holding a meeting on power-sharing issues. The two general secretaries, vice president Dhan Raj Gurung and joint general secretaries were not consulted as the leaders like Mahat and Arzu did not like them.
Deuba is obviously in a difficult position although he enjoys a comfortable majority in the party central committee and parliamentary party. But when the public, media and popular leaders are against him, support from his close leaders will be meaningless, because what Deuba and his men have done will cause harm to the party in future elections.
His wrong strategies will be explored and asked why he forged a pre-election alliance when Koirala and Thapa had suggested he forge an alliance only after the poll. He will be asked why disciplinary actions are sought against those who did not vote for the Maoists.
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