Ideological differences in CPN-UML

Kathmandu, March 29. The CPN- UML ’s political report drafting committee is lost in a debate, with conflicting views surfacing from the party rank and file over key theoretical issues and interpretation of contemporary Nepali politics.

Leaders on the drafting committee said interpretation of the People’s Movement (2006) has emerged as a major cause of disagreement. While some leaders including party Chairman Jhala Nath Khanal and Secretary Shankar Pokharel argue that the uprising was a political revolution, another group terms it as social revolution.

The Ghanashyam Bhusal-led group argues that the 2006 movement was a social revolution as it abolished monarchy and paved the way for the country’s socio-economic transformation. With the abolition of monarchy, it says, there remains no feudalism.

Additionally, the nature of Nepali society, the main contradiction, and different takes on the party’s guiding principles—People’s Multi-party Democracy (PMPD)—propounded by the late Madan Bhandari have emerged as major sources of difference in the political report drafting process.

A group of leaders say that there should be no changes in the party’s guiding principles, calling them an excellent policy for the party, in contrast to the Bhusal-led team’s stance of making them timely. This group believes that the Nepali society has already entered a capitalistic era and that maximum economic development is necessary to transform the “comprador-dominated society” into a communism model. As the debate rages, the Khanal-headed 33-member panel mandated to prepare a political report by March-end has yet to begin its work. “Discussions are ongoing and we have not yet started drafting the document,” said Pradeep Gyawali, a member of committee.

On the nature of society, UML leaders are divided in terming it semi-feudal or semi-colonial. Till date, the party calls it semi-feudal and semi-colonial as “imperialist forces are controlling the nation economically”.

“People may not notice the physical presence of semi-colonialism but domination of super-power can be felt as economic influence,” said Gyawali.

Bhusal’s group differs on the logic of semi-colonialism in Nepal. They argue that feudalism ended in Nepal with the abolition of monarchy in 2008 and the debate on semi-colonial is futile as Nepal has been an independent and sovereign nation from the very beginning of state formation. “When we were never colonised, why are people forcefully terming Nepal as a semi-colonial state?” said Bhusal.

Before the abolition of monarchy in 2008, UML termed it and other regressive forces as its “principal enemy”. In the changed context, said Gyawali, “We are not in favour of naming a particular party or force as the principal enemy.”