Kathmandu, July13

The ruling Nepali Congress today called a meeting of Province 2 in Kathmandu on July 20 to formulate poll strategy for the upcoming local level elections.

The third phase of local level elections is scheduled to be held on September 18 in 127 local levels of eight districts of Province 2.

The party’s Central Office Chief Secretary Krishna Prasad Paudel said the party’s district secretaries, central working committee members, lawmakers, regional secretaries and chiefs of sister organizations of Province 2 were invited.

“We have called the meeting to discuss the contemporary political situation and the upcoming local level elections,” said Paudel. He said the party would seek suggestions from local leaders on local level elections, Madhes issue and constitution amendment, among other issues.

The party will formulate a poll strategy as per the suggestions of the meeting, according to Paudel. The principal opposition CPN-UML won majority of top posts in the first and second phase of elections held both in the hills and Tarai region. It was said that the districts of the Tarai region were the NC’s stronghold, but the party did not fare well in the polls.

“We will discuss contemporary politics and Madhes issues in the meeting,” said NC Treasurer Sita Devi Yadav. She said her party would bring programmes to address the concerns of Madhesi people.

NC lawmaker Ganesh Kumar Mandal said the meeting was needed to review the results of the first and second phase local level polls and formulate a new strategy for the third phase.

“Despite our efforts our party could not get the expected results in the first and second phase of elections,” said Mandal. He said the party would review the poll results and work on a future strategy.

According to Mandal, despite the leadership’s maximum effort, it failed to forge consensus on constitution amendment and address other genuine issues of Madhes. He said the government should fulfil other demands raised by the Madhesi people.

‘We could go to the Madhesi people with high morale, had we fulfilled their genuine demands, including amendment of the statue,” Mandal added.  The NC leader asked the Madhesi people to understand the party’s obligations.