CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli is facing difficulty to forge consensus within his own close circle despite the closed session of the ongoing general convention authorizing him to pick the consensus list of 19 office-bearers, 301 central committee members and chairmen of different commissions.
The list that Oli was supposed to present to the closed session Sunday morning has yet to be prepared with his confidant Subash Chandra Nembang standing firm on his claim for senior vice-chair.
General Secretary Ishwar Pokharel is also staking claim for the second-ranked post in the party that many felt was kept in the statute in the statute general convention held in October to elevate him.
Oli has already assured Nembang that the party will make him president if there's an opportunity but he has stood firm in his stake for senior vice-chair and rejected the offer.
Leaders close to Nembang met him at the hotel where he is staying along with Oli and the core team Sunday morning. UML leaders and cadres from indigenous ethnicities have been telling him to not give up his claim.
"We have told him to not give up his claim. We want that our community should not be prohibited from reaching the second-ranked position in the party," a representative who came to meet Nembang told Setopati. "One cannot even point at inclusion in his context as he is a leader with national image. But he is also a leader our community takes a pride in."
Nembang himself has also made it clear that no one in the party apart from Oli is above him and given a message to Oli that there can be no consensus by keeping anyone else above him, according to a leader close to him.
