Kathmandu, October 31

Prime Minister and Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba today said his party’s victory in the upcoming elections was necessary for democratic stability and economic growth.

PM Deuba said only the NC could promote and protect national unity and dignity and economic growth, and maintain harmonious relation among the Tarai, hilly and mountainous regions.

“Like it or dislike it, the country needs the NC,” he said, making public the party’s manifesto for parliamentary and provincial polls.

Stating that anti-democratic forces had unified to introduce ‘communist autocracy’, Deuba warned that the general public could not even complain against injustice in a communist regime.

Senior NC leader Ramchandra Paudel said since the new constitution had now finalised the country’s political system after seven years and the country now needed economic prosperity. NC General Secretary Shashank Koirala termed the left alliance a ‘challenge’ to his party and appealed to all party leaders and cadres to unite to ensure NC’s victory in the elections.

In its manifesto, the NC said the communists just use democracy in their bid to introduce communism. Stating that the communists do not believe in investment and the private sector’s capacity, but use state power to control everything, the document said: “The communists do not support peace; they just create violence, murder and state terror. The communists do not accept multi-party system and pluralism, and support single-party autocratic communist regime.”

Terming the CPN-UML an ‘impediment’ to national unity and prosperity, the NC said in the manifesto that the UML has been caught in the trap of ‘extremism’ and ‘fake nationalism’. It also called the CPN-Maoist Centre an opportunist that seeks to benefit from unstable politics.

The NC has also stated in its manifesto that it is committed to effective management of federal governance system and it will do

so by coordinating with all the political parties, intellectuals, representatives of the general public and civil society and other social organisations.

Pursuing inclusive democracy, the party pledged giving impetus to national renaissance through higher, speedier, and sustainable economic growth, and by utilising the youths. It has also expressed commitment to attract 3.2 million tourists in the next 10 years and create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the tourism sector.

On the foreign relations front, the party has said it is committed to pursue friendly and respectable relations with India and China.