Extended meetings  of the two top leaders and the Party Unity Coordination Committee of the left alliance on Wednesday reached close to finalize all major issues of the party unity.

Leaders of the CPN-UML and CPN Maoist Centre that contested polls jointly forming the electoral alliance said a task force would be formed to finalize remaining issues including - organisational setting, party statute and political line of the unified entity.

Following the hours long meeting of the Party Unification Coordination Committee (PUCC) at Manbhawan late Wednesday evening, UML senior vice-chairman Bamdev Gautam said 95 per cent of the unification work was completed and they would sit again to complete the deal.

“Some 95 per cent of the work for party unity is over now,” Gautam said emerging from more than four-hour long meeting of the PUCC. Maoist Centre leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha also claimed they had reached close to a final deal, but due to time constraint the meeting would continue on Thursday as well. “We have reached close to a deal,” he said, but refused to disclose details.

In a bid to finalise the modality of the party unification, the two top leaders discussed one-on-one in the morning. This was followed by separate internal party meetings during which both the chairmen briefed their party leaders about the developments. Maoist Centre held its party headquarters meeting at Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s Khumaltar based residence while UML standing committee meeting was held at Manbhawan-based mansion of a pro-Maoist businessman Sharada Prasad Adhikary.

Following the internal meetings, the two top leaders again met briefly at Manbhawan which was followed by the meeting of PUCC.  Leader Jhala Nath Khanal said the PUCC dealt more on theoretical issues today and would finalise all issues on Thursday.

The two parties have agreed on joint leadership of Oli and Dahal as co-chairpersons, but were yet to decide who would chair the meetings first as both of them would have equal status.