KATHMANDU: Federal lawmakers of Nepal Communist Party (NCP) gathered today to collect signatures in support of Prime Minister and party co-chair KP Sharma Oli.

House of Representatives (HoR) member Til Bahadur Mahat said, they met with the Prime Minister today at his official residence in Baluwatar and collected the signatures of party lawmakers who are on the Prime Minister's side.

"As the Prime Minister was appointed for a period five years, he should be allowed to continue working in the same capacity and we have gathered in his support," stated NCP (NCP) lawmaker Mahat.

Over 92 lawmakers from the HoR (Lower House) and National Assembly (Upper House) have signed in PM Oli's favour, he added.

Meanwhile, it has been learnt that the Dahal-Nepal faction too has started a signature drive, collecting lawmakers' signatures in their favour, in response to PM Oli's move.

Rife within the party had escalated with Oli-Cabinet endorsing the much controversial party-split ordinance along with another ordinance that further emboldened the power exercised by the prime minister.

The ordinances were first promulgated and then repealed within matter of days, the President's role was also questioned for which. Likewise, the PM, for long, had been holding back the meeting of the party secretariat, which wasn't exactly happy with his one-manship ever since he came to the helm.

The government's engrossment with petty power-games at a time of such crisis, when the entire world is calculating ways to deal with coronavirus epidemic, had come under fire.

To add to it, the 'kidnapping' allegations of the then Samajwadi Party MP only fueled the fiasco further, setting in motion an irreversible chain of events, all against PM Oli's favour.