CPN (Unified Socialist) Chairman Madhav Kumar Nepal, who commands a strong majority in the party’s central committee, has also got a majority of office bearers elected from among his loyals.

The party held an election for the office bearers on Tuesday, and a majority of those elected are close to Nepal. He has a strong grip on the party’s newly formed central committee as well.

On Monday, the Unified Socialist announced a two-day election schedule. On Tuesday, central committee members cast their votes to elect 18 office bearers and 105 politburo members.

The party’s 344 central committee members were the voters.

Among the four vice-chairs elected in the open category, Gangalal Tuladhar, Jagannath Khatiwada, and Prakash Jwala are from the Nepal camp while Bhanubhakta Joshi is from the camp led by General Secretary Ghanashyam Bhusal.

Another vice-chair from the Bhusal faction is Dharmanath Prasad Sah, who got elected vice-chair under the Madhesi category, defeating Ram Chandra Jha of the Nepal side.

Nepal camp won vice-chair of the women’s category with Jayanti Rai beating Ram Kumari Jhakri of the Bhusal faction.

Birodh Khatiwada, Lalit Bahadur Chhetri, Urbadatta Panta, Shadhya Bahadur Bhandari, Bijay Paudel, Keshav Lal Shrestha and Balaram Banskota lost the vice-chair race.

For the four positions of deputy general secretary, the Nepal camp fielded Rajendra Kumar Rai, Laxman KC, Ram Chandra Yadav and Rajkumar Bhattarai. Of them, Rai and Bhattarai were elected from the same camp. Also, Metmani Chaudhary and Garima Shah won the same positions without the camp’s backing.

Sabitra Bhusal, Srinath Baral, Som Prasad Pandey, Sher Bahadur Kunwar, and Ganesh BK got elected as secretaries from the Nepal side. Chandra Bahadur Shahi and Baldev Chaudhary, who were not in Nepal’s panel, won secretary positions.

Some leaders accused party chair Nepal of mobilising his faction to help leaders loyal to him win. According to the leaders, the Nepal faction had prepared a list of candidates and circulated it among the central committee members and asked them to vote only for them, despite his pledge to form committees based on consensus among top leaders.

“After being elected the party chair unanimously, Madhav Kumar Nepal had promised to pick other office bearers through consensus,” a party leader, requesting anonymity, told the Post. “He later managed to nominate his loyalists to the central committee. When he has a majority in the committee, it is obvious that leaders close to him are elected office bearers.”

Rajendra Pandey, who was elected senior vice-chair unopposed, is close to the party chairman.

The Nepal faction had circulated a list among the members asking them to vote for Gangalal Tuladhar, Prakash Jwala, Jagannath Khatiwada, Keshav Lal Shrestha in the vice-chair race.

Though the general convention hall had mandated appointing 299 central committee members when forming the committee, the party increased the number of central committee to 344, says a party leader.

A list of 93 central committee members was announced at the party's general convention, held from June 30 to July 5 in Kathmandu, with the rest to be elected later. The general convention elected Nepal the party chair, Bhusal the general secretary and Jhala Nath Khanal the senior leader unopposed.

A task force comprising Chairman Nepal, senior leader Khanal, and General Secretary Bhusal had finalised the names of the central committee members. As per the task force's recommendation, the party announced 251 central committee members on August 2.

The election body that conducted polling on Tuesday was counting votes cast for politburo members until late Wednesday evening. “The final result of politburo members will come out by Wednesday midnight,” said party leaders.

The Unified Socialist, formed after a faction split from the CPN-UML in 2021, has 10 lawmakers in the 275-strong House of Representatives.