Concerned over intensified feuding in the party, the youth leaders met party office-bearers on Friday to exert pressure on Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, Senior Vice-chairman Mohan Baidya and Vice-chairman Dr Babu Ram Bhattarai.
The youth leaders, who have formed an informal alliance for party unity, asked the party leaders not to make public speeches contradicting the party line and to work to bridge the rifts among them. [break]
"We asked them not to form parallel committees and demanded that they maintain financial transparency," said Ramdeep Acharya, a former student leader who is member of an informal pressure group representing party wings, martyr families, disappeared families and youth leaders of the rival factions.
According to Acharya, the youth leaders also urged the top party leadership to create a conducive environment in the party so that all differing views, even those in a minority, would be respected. In addition, they also pressed the leaders to chalk out plans to implement the party line in practice, for completing the ´revolution´.
At the meeting, Dahal sought the help of the youth leaders to forge unity in the party.
"We are engaged in discussions for forging unity in the party. Please wait till the next meeting of the Standing Committee; we will bring programs to complete the revolution," lawmaker Parsuram Ramtel quoted Dahal as saying at the meeting.
Senior Vice-chairman Baidya was of the view that non-implementation of the party´s plans has invited the problems facing the party. He said that though the Palungtar plenum had chalked out the party´s future course, no programs have yet been set out to pursue that course.
"The party will unite automatically if its plan of action is implemented," Acharya quoted Baidya as saying. He added that the main problem was non-implementation.
Vice-chairman Bhattarai, who has been accused by the Dahal faction of trying to split the party, said the problems facing the party are inter-linked and have become complex.
"The problems have become complex and we may lack the capacity to solve them," former chairman of the Maoist students wing Lekhanath Neupane quoted Bhattarai as saying to the youth leaders.
"There is a need for unity with transformation to resolve these problems," Bhattarai further said, assuring the youth leaders that he will not split the party from his side.
General Secretary Ram Bahadur Thapa accused external forces of trying to split the Maoist party. Thapa expressed the view that only an alliance of nationalist and revolutionary forces would resolve the present problems in the party, while stressing the need for programs to implement the party´s tactical line.
"The problems will be solved only through class struggle, not through internal struggles in the party," a participant quoted Thapa as saying.
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