Nepal's ruling communist party executive chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' on Monday said efforts were going on to resolve the intra-party differences and ruled out an early general convention of the party as proposed by embattled Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli.
The former prime minister made the remarks during his meeting with the Standing Committee members representing the former Maoist party. As many as 15 members from the 45-member powerful Standing Committee of the Nepal Communist Party (NCP) attended the meeting, the Kathmandu Post reported.
The meeting came on the eve of the conclave of the Standing Committee, which has been deferred seven times since June 24.
On Saturday, 68-year-old Oli proposed to convene an early general convention of the party in order to resolve the intra-party rift.
"Going for the general convention is not a bad idea but without proper preparations, it is not possible as various issues including the party ideology also need to be sorted out," Matrika Yadav, a Standing Committee member, quoted Prachanda as saying at the meeting. Prachanda's remarks came amid reports that he had reached an understanding with Prime Minister Oli on holding the general convention by November/December and that Oli would back him as the party chair.
The Prachanda-led faction, backed by senior leaders Madhav Kumar Nepal and Jhalanath Khanal, until a few weeks ago had piled pressure on Oli to step down both as party chair and prime minister.
The Madhav Nepal group on Sunday sought clarification from Prachanda if he had reached a deal with Oli on an early general convention and if he indeed had, why he did so without consulting his allies, the paper said.
During Monday's meeting, Prachanda briefed his colleagues about the talks he had held with his co-chair, Prime Minister Oli and the secretariat of the chairmen-duo, the leaders of the former Maoist party said.
Citing sources, the Rising Nepal daily said that Home Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa ‘Badal' and Minister for Industry, Commerce and Supplies Lekh Raj Bhatta were not present during the meeting held by Prachanda.