Secretariat member of the ruling Communist Party of Nepal (CPN) and Defense Minister Ishwore Pokharel has opposed the proposal of Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal to make leader Bam Dev Gautam House of Representatives (HoR) member by holding by-election in Kathmandu-7.
Dahal told the Monday's secretariat meeting that he, Gautam and elected lawmaker from the constituency Ram Bir Manandhar have already agreed to that regard. He read a consent letter by Manandhar agreeing to resign during the meeting, a secretariat member told Setopati.
But Pokharel opposed the proposal. "This will be wrong," the secretariat member quoted Pokharel as saying.
"Pokharel said this will not be a right decision and should not be done," the secretariat member added.
Prime Minister and another chairman of the party KP Sharma Oli said he will talk with Manandhar after Pokharel opposed Dahal's proposal.
A party source claimed that Gautam has been demanding he be brought to the HoR in almost all the secretariat meetings. Oli even joked 'There is no problem if Gautam comrade wants to come to the HoR. I will vacate my seat' in one of those meetings after Gautam's repeated demands, the secretariat member recalled.
There were efforts to get him elected from Dolpa earlier but cadres put pressure on the elected lawmaker Dhan Bahadur Buda to not resign. Gautam also did not insist stating that he does not even know leaders and cadres of Dolpa.
Gautam has been claiming that he was victim of betrayal from his own party. He had argued in a meeting of the then CPN-UML that the only reason behind his loss to a Nepali Congress (NC) candidate when UML had allied with CPN (Maoist Center) was betrayal. The party had then formed a probe committee.
Gautam had lost to Sanjay Kumar Gautam of NC by 753 votes in Bardiya-1.
Manandhar was elected with 18,102 votes from Kathmandu-7 in the last election. RPP's Bikram Thapa had received 10,079 votes with support of NC.
Manandhar is meeting leaders and cadres in his constituency after agreeing with Dahal and Gautam to resign.
Manandhar is popular in the constituency with dense Newar population. A Baluwatar source claimed that Manandhar has demanded with Dahal and Gautam that he should be elected to the National Assembly and made minister.
The source added that PM Oli also wants to talk about Manandhar's conditions.
