“The Maoist chairman has said the real strength of the PLA is 4,000 and not the verified 20,000, so we demand that the verification be conducted again,” the party’s Dr Prakash Sharan Mahat told the media at the end of the NC’s parliamentary party meeting at Singha Durbar, Sunday. “The integration of the PLA should be done on the basis of 4,000 PLA fighters,” he said.
Maoist chairman, in the video of January 2, 2008, had claimed that the real PLA number was between 7 and 8 thousand.
Dr Mahat said that the NC will raise the issue at the next meeting of the Army Integration Special Committee (AISC) that oversees the issues related to the future of PLA combatants. The AISC has eight members from the four largest parties in the Constituent Assembly – the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), NC, Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) and Madhesi People’s Rights Forum.
The NC leader also alleged that the Maoists have been misusing state funds, by going beyond the budgetary provisions. “This must be stopped immediately and we ask the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee to look into this misappropriation of funds.” Reports of the Maoist government, reduced to caretaker status, taking decisions including using huge amounts from the state coffers, have surfaced. The Maoists are yet to deny the charge. The Finance Ministry is headed by a Maoist minister, Dr Baburam Bhattarai.
Dr Mahat said most MPs of the parties said that the party should draw the attention of the international community and UNMIN toward the Maoist chairman’s remarks of buying truckload of weapons.
“The members also suggested garnering support for President Dr Rama Baran Yadav who acted after the 18 political parties requested him to protect the constitution,” Mahat said.
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