As the country marked the 19th anniversary of the Comprehensive Peace Accord on Friday, a section of conflict victims staged sit-ins separately in front of two transitional justice commissions, demanding the resignation of their office-bearers.

A group of victims from the Maoist insurgency have been rejecting the appointment of chairpersons and members of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Commission of the Investigation on Enforced Disappeared Persons. The erstwhile KP Sharma Oli government, on the recommendation of former chief justice Om Prakash Mishra-led panel, appointed 10 office bearers—five in each commission—despite the group’s reservations.

The dissident group has been refusing to cooperate with the commissions, claiming the office bearers’ appointment was politically motivated. It has been resorting to different protest programmes seeking their termination and the appointment of new teams adopting a transparent process.

“The successive governments have remained indifferent to the victims’ plight even 19 years after the peace deal was signed,” said Suman Adhikari, founding chair of the Conflict Victims’ Common Platform.

Issuing a press statement after the sit-in, the victims’ group said growing impunity, misgovernance, policy-level corruption, and misuse of public resources made them protest. Also, the Gen Z movement against nepotism and favouritism have made the victims’ community’s protest and disagreement over the commission formation process even more relevant and reaffirmed, it said.

The commission’s legitimacy and credibility have eroded due to the government’s insensitivity towards the pain and concerns of conflict victims and its actions that, instead of earning victims’ trust and cooperation, have engaged in inappropriate manoeuvring, spreading confusion, and using intermediaries against the victims themselves, it said.

“Considering the changed context, we would like to alert the commission officials who have been boycotted by the victims’ community to renounce their attachment to the positions and resign immediately,” reads the statement. “We draw serious attention of the government formed as a result of the Gen Z movement against political and policy-level corruption, nepotism, favouritism, and extreme politicisation of state institutions to immediately relieve the puppet commission, which lacks legitimacy and justification, in accordance with the victims’ demands, and to initiate a credible and transparent process.”