KATHMANDU – The standing committee meeting of the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) has started at the Prime Minister’s official residence Baluwatar.
However, Prime Minister and Chairman of the NCP KP Sharma Oli remains absent from the meeting.
Earlier before the meeting, Prime Minister Oli and NCP executive chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ had held a meeting at the Prime Minister’s residence Baluwatar.
The standing committee meeting is expected to see a heated discussion on the recent ordinance to amend the act related to the Constitutional Council introduced by the government.
Earlier on Tuesday, the government had issued the ordinance making it easier to hold the meeting of the Constitutional Council even if available majority members are present in the meeting of the six-member council.
The decision of Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli to introduce the ordinance has not only further irked the rival faction in the party led by Prachanda and senior leader Madhav Kumar Nepal, but also worsened the intra-party disputes.
The rival faction is preparing to criticize the move and demand an immediate repeal of the ordinance that Prime Minister Oli unilaterally decided to introduce.
However, the Oli faction had made efforts to postpone the standing committee meeting amid widening intra-party rifts. Earlier on Wednesday morning, Shankar Pokharel, the Chief Minister of Lumbini and a standing committee member close to Prime Minister Oli, had also met Prachanda and urged him to put off the standing committee meeting.
