KATHMANDU, JUNE 18
Four political parties - the Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led CPN-Maoist Centre, Madhav Kumar Nepal-led CPN-Unified Socialist, Upendra Yadav-led Janata Samajwadi Party-Nepal and Netra Bikram Chand-led Communist Party of Nepal have agreed to create a socialist front.
Leaders of the four parties also prepared a 15-point commitment paper, which the Socialist Front will make public tomorrow.
This new development comes in the backdrop of these constituents' failed efforts to merge their outfits. CPN-MC and CPN(US) had held some rounds of negotiation to merge their outfits, but to no avail. Similarly, the CPN (US) and JSP-N had also held merger talks, but that too did not materialise. CPN-MC Chair and Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal had also held some meetings with splinter groups of the Maoist party, including with Chand-led CPN.
With the formation of the Socialist Front, the four constituent parties can now bridge the gap on political and strategic issues and eventually unify their outfits.
CPN-MC General Secretary Dev Prasad Gurung said the constituent parties agreed to create Socialist Front because they shared similar views on strategic issues. "If we can eliminate the differences in the future, we may even unify our outfits. Like-minded political parties always want to unify and expand their political base," Gurung said and added that creation of the Socialist Front had nothing to do with day-today affairs of the ruling alliance.
"Running the government is a day-to-day business - a tactical issue for which parties can build a coalition with any party," Gurung added. According to him, the Socialist Front was created with the aim of forging long-term partnership for achieving the goals of socialism.
JSP-N leader Rajendra Prasad Shrestha, who took part in the four-party meeting held at Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal's official residence in Baluwatar, said the socialist front was created on the basis of ideological congruence among the constituents to achieve the goals of socialism.
"All the past alliances were created to suit the constituent parties' own political interests. However, this is different because it has been created on the basis of ideological similarities," Shrestha said and added that they were committed to achieving the goals of socialism under the current democratic republican and federal political system. The CPN-MC, CPN-(US) and JSP-N were in an alliance after then prime minister KP Sharma Oli dissolved the House of Representatives twice, but this alliance is different as the previous alliance was not based on ideological similarities. "Our front is not against the Nepali Congress of the ruling coalition. We had asked the NC to join the Front, but the NC did not want to be part of it. So we decided to form the Socialist Front," Shrestha said and added that the NC, being a partner in the IPA, could also join the alliance.
"Indian National Congress leads the United Progressive alliance in India and there is no harm if the NC becomes a partner in this progressive alliance," Shrestha said. He said there were three forces in Nepal - statusquoists, reactionary and progressive - and it was natural for the progressive forces to create their own alliance.
Nepali Congress leader Minendra Rijal said he would love to see these parties becoming a single unified party. "Everybody wants to know why these parties could not unify, what prevented their unification, and why they decided to create a front without waiting for the results of their unification talks. I do not have answer to any of these questions," Rijal said and added that it was yet to be seen how this new development would impact their relations with the Nepali Congress.
The front is expected to increase the constituent parties' bargaining power in political affairs. CPN-UML Chair KP Sharma Oli had rebuked the constituents of Socialist Front saying they did not need such an alliance as they were already collaborating with each other.
A version of this article appears in the print on June 19, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.
