KATHMANDU, May 29: Nepal Communist Party (NCP) on Monday submitted signatures of its central committee members and copies of their citizenship certificates as part of preparations to register the newly-formed party following the merger of two communist parties—CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Center)—into one.
A group of NCP leaders led by Subas Nembang and Dev Gurung reached to Kantipath-based Election Commission headquarters to submit the documents required for party registration. As per the electoral law, any new party needs to submit the signatures of its central committee members, their citizenship certificates and minutes of parties that existed before the unification.
“We have submitted some documents. Since the party registration process is still underway, we will have to submit additional documents,” said leader Gurung, adding, “The remaining documents will be completed soon.”
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Immediately after the two parties decided to merge their parties into one on May 18, leaders of the unified party had registered an application at the EC demanding that their party be registered with the election body.
The party, however, is yet to include one-third women in its central committee as per the provision of the Political Party Registration Act. A list of CC members made public by the party reveals that women make up merely 16 percent of the party's most powerful committee, while a staggering 84 percent (368 members) are men.
Although the election body is yet to take the final decision about registering the party, a section of election commissioners have warned of denying party registration for not making the party's central structure inclusive in accordance with electoral law.
The poor representation of women has not gone down well with the female leaders who said that the domination of men in the central committee had exposed the patriarchal mindset of the party leadership. Senior female leaders are unhappy over the lack of women's representation in the party's central committee.
The low representation of women has also raised questions over the party's commitment to ensuring 33 percent representation of women in parliament. Before the merger, the erstwhile UML had made it mandatory to ensure one-fourth representation of women in party committees.
