The Pushpa Kamal Dahal-Madhav Kumar Nepal-led faction of the Nepal Communist Party on Tuesday reached the Election Commission to claim legitimacy of the party.

The faction’s chairs Dahal and Nepal, along with senior leader Jhala Nath Khanal and leaders Barshaman Pun, Ghanashyam Bhusal and Rajendra Pande, among others, reached the commission at around 9:45 on Tuesday morning.

“An application from the Dahal-Nepal faction seeking legitimacy of the party has been registered and the commission will move ahead with the process after reviewing the application,” said Raj Kumar Shrestha, spokesperson for the commission.

Senior leader Khanal, following the registration of the application, said that the faction has presented its claim to become the legitimate party along with the facts, evidence and support of 70 percent of the 441 Central Committee members.

“The party with Dahal and Nepal as chairs is the official Nepal Communist Party,” said Khanal.

He also said that the commission cannot hold the midterm elections unless the Nepal Communist Party legitimacy dispute is resolved.

“In a multiparty parliamentary system, an election cannot be held until party disputes are resolved, '' said Khanal. “The parties are the main players in the polls and elections cannot be held by sidelining them.”

A meeting of the Central Committee of the faction held on Monday had decided to claim the legitimacy of the party.

Two days after Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli dissolved the House of Representatives, Dahal and Nepal broke away with Oli on December 22. Since then, both factions are staking claim to the Nepal Communist Party, which was born out of a merger between then CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) in May 2018, as their own. Both factions are vying for the sun as their election symbol.

Earlier on December 25, the Dahal-Nepal faction had registered an application at the Election Commission claiming that it is the legitimate ruling party.

Meanwhile, the Oli-led faction on December 22 had submitted a list of members of the enlarged Central Committee to the commission in an effort to get recognition for the faction as the legitimate party.

However, the Election Commission on January 24 refused to give legitimacy to either of the factions of the Nepal Communist Party saying that both factions failed to follow the Political Parties Act-2017 and the party statute.

The commission says it still recognises the Nepal Communist Party that was registered in May 2018 and Oli and Dahal as its chairs, which effectively means the party may have split politically, legally it continues to remain one.