Mukunda Raj Kattel

The ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) is at the crossroads of a political crisis. Co-chairs of the party are caught in a tug of war that operates in a system of political patronage underlain by personal ambitions. Instead of collective leadership, which the party had promised at its founding two years ago, the co-chairs appear to have reached the point they call ‘zugzwang’ in chess. It is a situation in which any next move leads to loss or even a disaster. The player will have no liberty of passing or skipping the move despite the result being a foregone conclusion.
The zugzwang facing the NCP leadership is, however, its own making. And, it is deliberate.
In May 2018, the then CPN - UML and the CPN- Maoist Centre announced their merger into the NCP as it is now. The merger followed an electoral alliance of the two and the resultant majority at the centre and six of seven provinces in the country. The merger was historic at least on two counts. First, it was a marker of the end of the governance paralysis that Nepal was subjected to since the mid-1990s. A party with almost a two-thirds majority in federal parliament would, one would expect, give a stable government and prevent corruption, horse-trading and other malpractices - the characteristics of a hung parliament.
Change agent
Second, it was an opportunity for the communists, so far unable to secure a majority, to deliver on their long-promised project of ‘people’s liberation,’ which, in the existing context, would mean liberation from poverty, exclusion, marginalisation, discrimination and inequality. The NCP could build on what the ex-UML chair late Man Mohan Adhikari’s minority government had initiated in 1994 – grassroots approach to development, anti-corruption drive within his administration, fight against nepotism and social security of those in need – and demonstrated that communists can be change agents that they often preach.
Just two years down the line, in April 2020, the expectations of the NCP met a jolt of shock. The public came to know the party leadership was not just internally divided but was also out of sync. Nowhere was it so evident as in the way the first chair and Prime Minister introduced, on April 20, two ordinances – amending acts related to the Constitutional Council and political parties – and rescinded them within five days, on April 24. The second chair and the majority of the leadership at the NCP Secretariat opposed the ordinances. The rank and file divided accordingly. Twenty members of the Standing Committee (SC), believed to be close to the second chair and his faction, demanded in writing a meeting of the SC, apparently to grill the PM about the intent and purpose of the ordinances. The acrimonious environment so emerged continues to deteriorate as of July 5, with mistrust deepening between the two factions, the rank and file engaged in mud-slinging of their co-chairs, the SC failing to convene to see through its business and PM Oli rumoured to skip the SC meeting aware of the hardening positing of the other faction. The NCP is now in a “serious crisis,” admits Narayan Kaji Shrestha, the party spokesperson.
At the heart of the crisis is the absence of intra-party democracy in the NCP. The first indicator of this is the delay, if not denial, in holding party meetings and, when meetings are held, implementing the resolutions with the sincerity they deserve. Regular meetings would firm up comradery among all members by serving them a forum to express themselves, contest and debate, argue and counterargue and, finally, contribute to informed and binding decisions. Such meetings would also help mend fences when the party and government were perceived to pursue an incompatible track. Unfortunately, such meetings have not been systematised.
The second indicator is the disdain for a system. In its inherent defect, a system binds everyone, including top leaders, and disciplines them. It does not allow anyone to build and maintain a network of personal loyalty. A system creates a level playing field for all and engages them in a merit-based competition, which is not to the liking of many for reasons obvious. The NCP leadership has been hostage to a system-aversion for long.
However, the blame for this state of affairs cannot be pinned only on one person. Everyone from co-chairs down to the Central Committee (CC), and even below, is responsible for this mess. I have not heard anyone who has sincerely spoken and stood for the system-based governance within the party. At times one or two persons appear to do so. Their voices are, however, seen more as a bargaining chip than as a genuine cry for reform. Coincidentally, some critical voices have reduced to silence after a certain concession has been made. The long and short of it is, every NCP leader has, directly or indirectly, contributed to the system of patronage and idolatry, which has crippled the party from within.

Way forward
The NCP has already suffered a vertical division psychologically. If there is any scope of unity, it is the ‘second-’ and ‘third-’generation leaders. It is high time that these leaders rose above their personal loyalties and created a middle ground for the co-chairs to discuss and sort out their differences, which are personal, and not ideological or strategic. There is no other immediate option to stop the party in free fall.
Then, the all-male and 60-plus Secretariat should either be reconstituted – to make it inclusive – or dismantled. Left as it is, it will only add to divisions and acrimonies, overburdened as it is with the legacies of the past. Finally, a time-table should immediately be worked out for the ‘unity congress’ to settle the gnawing questions vis-à-vis the party’s ideology, political direction and leadership in the spirit of the ‘five-point understanding’ on which the NCP was launched.
Unless the party develops a robust system of vertical and horizontal communications and merit-based leadership, it will continue to face crises even if the current one is averted. To make a move to that end requires the end of the loyalty-based factions within the party. Doing so is not easy. But the NCP does not have any other less-damaging options.

(A PhD on human rights and peace, Kattel is a human rights professional who writes on political and social issues.)