The meeting turned tense as some lawmakers including Kiran Gurung, Pasang Sherpa and Dal Bahadur Rana Magar stood up abruptly from their seats when Khanal, who is also the parliamentary party leader, complained that the UML lawmakers´ support for the campaign for ethnic-based federalism had harmed the UML and given the upper hand to the UCPN(Maoist).[break]
A dozen security personnel and private secretaries attached to senior leaders including former prime ministers Madhav Kumar Nepal and Khanal and some others suddenly ran to the windows to see what was up inside the hall as the lawmakers made a big and sudden noise.
Party Chief Whip Bhim Acharya had to suggest to officials present inside the hall to remove all those looking in at the scene from outside after the leaders started quarrelling. A dozen lawmakers were shouting and pointing their fingers at the top leaders and banging the tables. The tense mood lasted over five minutes.
Lawmakers from ethnic communities reacted very aggressively when Khanal said that UML leaders found themselves in an awkward position during negotiations with the Maoists, with the latter arguing that UML leaders didn´t have command over their own lawmakers. "The Maoist leaders are using your signatures as bargaining chips against our stances at the negotiation table," said Khanal.
Altogether 320 lawmakers from ethnic, Madhesi and dalit communities and belonging to various political parties had submitted a memorandum to UCPN(Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal demanding that ethnic-based federalism be adopted in the new constitution. UML Politburo Member Prithivi Subba Gurung, who heads the caucus of lawmakers from ethnic communities, had led that campaign. Of them 51 lawmakers were from the UML alone. The third-largest party has 107 lawmakers in the 601-seat CA.
Their campaign favored the UCPN (Maoist) because the largest party is also lobbying for state restructuring according to an ethnicity-based model.
"Under no excuse can your move to sign onto the campaign be justified if you look at it from our party´s perspective. It is clearly against our party interests and only serves Maoist interest," Khanal said.
Khanal had hardly completed his sentence when Dal Bahadur Rana Magar, Sherpa and Gurung, among others, banged their tables and started shouting against their party leaders.
"Why couldn´t you become head of the dispute resolution subcommittee? It is not that we submitted our signatures to the Maoist chairman, we did so to the head of the dispute resolution subcommittee [under the Constitutional Committee of the CA]," shouted Magar.
Later, Chief Whip Acharya and some other leaders had a hard time calming down the infuriated lawmakers and bringing the situation back to normal.
Also earlier, former prime minister Nepal argued that many a time when they sat for inter-party talks on state restructuring the Maoist leaders would show their [UML lawmakers´] signatures and create pressure for accepting ethnicity-based federalism.
However, Kiran Gurung and other lawmakers, who also aired their views, said that party unity cannot remain intact if decisions and rulings from the top leaders are imposed. He urged leaders to listen seriously to their grievances and be ready to address their genuine concerns.
Gurung argued they had no intention at all of going against the party´s stated policy and official decisions but they were free to lobby for the cause of the communities they represent and other oppressed groups in society.
Despite hours-long heated debate, the meeting finally endorsed unanimously a two-point statement dispelling reports that UML lawmakers were divided over the issue of state restructuring and other major issues of constitution writing.
"Our party is united and will remain so in the CA and it will defeat all attempts to divide it," said the statement.
Also, the meeting decided that the party would put in all-out effort to promulgate a new constitution by Sunday, entrusting the transitional parliament with the responsibility of accomplishing the remaining tasks.
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