Ruling Nepal Communist Party chairs KP Sharma Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal have resumed talks after a hiatus of six days, as they attempt to save the party from a split in the wake of growing differences between the two factions led by them.
“The two chairs have resumed discussions,” said Bishnu Sapkota, press advisor to Dahal.
The last time Oli and Dahal held one-on-one talks was on Wednesday.
After the Dahal faction, backed by senior leaders Madhav Kumar Nepal and Jhalanath Khanal, started piling pressure on Oli to step down both as prime minister and party chair, the Standing Committee meeting, which started on June 24, was postponed to allow the two leaders to iron out differences.
On Friday, the Standing Committee meeting was postponed, for the fifth time in a row, for a week, citing floods and landslides across the country.
Until then, Oli and Dahal had held at least six meetings.
On Friday itself, Dahal headed for Chitwan, where on Saturday and Sunday, he told party members that there is a need to save the party unity, in statements that came as his conciliatory approach.
Leaders say they believe the two chairs would be able to hammer out a deal so as to keep the party unity intact.
The party had come quite close to a split after Oli suddenly prorogued the House on July 2.
Thereafter, the meetings between Oli and Dahal focused on whether to follow the May 2018 gentlemen's agreement or November 2019 understanding.
Dahal was for upholding the May 2018 gentlemen's agreement which says the two leaders would run the government in turns. But Oli tried to persuade Dahal to go by the November 2019 understanding, as per which the former would lead the government for the full five-year term and the latter would run the party as “executive chair”.
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