HETAUDA, FEBRUARY 26

CPN-UML politburo member Gokul Baskota has accused ruling coalition leaders Madhav Kumar Nepal and Pushpa Kamal Dahal of being unpredictable.

"If the CPN (Unified Socialist) and CPN-MC chairpersons are good at anything at all, it's to change their colours, just like the lizard, and I bet there is no one who can run rings around them in this regard," said the UML leader.

He was speaking at the inauguration of CPN-UML-affiliated Nepal Sports Federation's Bagmati Province conference today.

"Apparently, the parties in the so-called coalition don't concur on MCC and are showing double standard," said the former minister, asking what moral grounds coalition partners had to whip up street protests against an agenda tabled by their own government? Further, the former minister denied that his party viewed the MCC project as a bargaining chip for its inclusion in the government and added that his party had a clear stance on the MCC project and would take a final decision at the opportune time.

"In fact, whether to put the American grant project through the Parliament or not is in the hands of the coalition, but it's unbecoming that they adopted double standard while tabling the project for ratification and also launching protests in the street at the same time," he observed. Baskota also predicted that the coalition would fall apart soon.

Bagmati Province former chief minister and UML leader Dormani Poudel claimed the UML was the only party capable of ensuring development in the country.

A version of this article appears in the print on February 27, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.