Is unity between two Maoist parties possible?

Yuba Nath Lamsal
Despite communists being in majority in Nepal, they have not been able to have their own strong government due to sharp division and fragmentation. In Nepal there are more than a dozen communist parties, with all claiming to be the genuine revolutionary party to represent the poor and working class people while discrediting the others as being the revisionist, reformist and rightist renegades. In the last general election, communist parties secured close to 60 per cent votes. However, the party that got less than 30 per cent popular votes is now heading the government. What can be greater irony than this?

The reactionary and rightist parties have been able to keep the communist parties divided in Nepal, as a result of which communists have not been in the decisive role in politics. Although all communist parties talk loud about communist unity, they do not seem to be prepared to make the communist unity a reality.

At present there are two main communist trends in Nepal one being the parliamentary or reformist trend and the other revolutionary and radical road. UCPN-Maoist and the CPN-Maoist represent the radical revolutionary trend while the CPN-UML leads the parliamentary road. The other several fringe communist parties are also divided and revolve around these two main tendencies.

Despite claiming to have been representing the sentiments of the working class people, these communist parties do not seem to have really felt the pulse of the people. Given their division, it appears as though they are deliberately weakening the communist movements at the behest of domestic as well as external reactionaries, imperialists and capitalist.

The communist movement is directly linked with Nepal’s national liberation movement. The communists are the ones that have clearly defined and analyzed Nepal’s objective situation and its international relations. Right from the beginning since its founding, the Communist Party of Nepal has been consistently defining Nepal’s objective situation as being the semi-colonial and semi feudal. But only last year during its eights national congress, the UCPN-Maoist officially came up with the changed and different version which stated that Nepal was no longer a semi-feudal condition but in transition from semi-feudal status to capitalism. Although some individuals had expressed this view earlier, too, it was the UCPN-Maoist that proposed this version officially for the first time in Nepal’s history  Since then, other communist parties including the CPN-UML, too, have started debate on this issue. Currently, the CPN-UML is preparing for its ninth national congress and the party’s rank and file seems to be divided on this issue with one section claiming that Nepal is still in the semi-feudal status and the other opposing it.

Based on the nature of relationship with India conditioned by different unequal treaties, communist parties still claim Nepal’s status as being the semi-colonial status and demanding abrogation of all unequal treaties. Similarly, the communist are the ones that have been protesting against all forms of regional hegemony, expansionist tendencies and imperialist exploitation and oppression in Nepal. Communists are viewed and regarded as being the nationalist and patriotic forces in Nepal, which is one reason why they have strong support among the mass. The imperialists and expansionist elements along with their lackeys at home often try to underestimate and weaken communists in Nepal. The reactionaries and imperialists elements often infiltrated into communist party/parties under different guises and split the communist movement with the objective of weakening patriotic forces and patriotic movement in Nepal. This is one reason why communist parties were divided and fragmented.

Communist Party of Nepal was formed in 1949 as the youngest communist party in Asia. Late Pushpa Lal Shrestha took the initiative to form the communist party in Nepal and is, thus, regarded as the father of Nepal’s communist movement. The initial objective of the Communist Party of Nepal was to establish democracy in the country by overthrowing the century-old Rana family oligarchy and liberate people from all forms of exploitation and discrimination. The other clear objective was to liberate Nepal from external hegemony and intervention.
After the advent of democracy in 1951, differing views started surfacing in the communist party. This heightened when late King Mahendra trampled multi-party democracy, dissolved popularly elected parliament, banned all political parties and political activities and imposed partyless Panchayat system in the country. A faction led by Pushpa Lal opposed the Royal takeover and split the already small and yet to be fully organised communist party. And this polemics sowed the seed of division in Nepal’s communist movement, in which external infiltration and personality cult played bigger role than the ideological differences. Leaders gave ideological color to their personal differences.

Efforts were made in the past for the unification of communist movement in Nepal. But those efforts hardly materialized. Even if some groups merged into one, their unity lasted only for few months. A major development regarding the unity among communist parties took place in 1989, when seven communist parties formed United Left Front to launch mass movement against Panchayat regime along with the Nepali Congress. The honeymoon among the seven leftist groups ended immediately after the restoration of democracy. However, two largest groups—Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist) and Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist)—merged in 1990 to form Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) or CPN-UML. This party emerged as the largest communist party in Nepal and mainstream of Nepal’s communist movement. A

Nepalese communists took part in the mass movement for the restoration of democracy in 1990. This heralded new chapter in Nepalese politics. It is the first time that Nepalese communists, who believed in violence to capture power, joined electoral politics and democratic mainstream. All leftist groups that were in existence in 1991 took part in general election and won more than 80 seats in 205-member House of Representatives, Lower House of parliament.
Regrouping and reorganization took place in the communist parties in three year’s period following the first general election in 1991. In this period a few leftist groups united and again split. CPN-UML continued to be the largest party.

Another important step to unify different radical communist group took place and Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) was created, which immediately launched armed insurgency. At the same time, CPN-UML was divided. A faction led by Bam Dev Gautam broke away from the mother party citing ideological differences and formed CPN-ML, although power struggle was the key factor. The breakaway faction gave nationalist and radical slogans in order to attract diehard cadres and patriotic forces. But it failed miserably in the third general election, as it could not bag even a single seat in parliament. In the history of Nepalese communist movement, the breakaway faction always became the mainstream as it gave radical and revolutionary programmes. CPN-ML is the only exception as despite giving radical slogans it failed to have appeal on general mass and this faction again merged with the CPN-UML.
Maoist insurgency continued to grow. Its popular slogans had a strong appeal among the poverty-stricken population of the country on the one hand, while misgovernance, failure to deliver goods on the part of government and political instability gave rise to Maoist insurgency on the other. It is the product of several other social, political, economic and cultural problems. After a decade long armed insurgency, the Maoist party joined the peace process after signing a peace accord. In the election held in 2008 to Constituent Assembly, the Maoist party emerged as the largest political force in Nepal. The Maoist party suffered a serious jolt two years ago when it split with a section led by Mohan Vaidya broke its relation with UCPN-M and formed the CPN-Maoist. Now the two Maoist factions are again talking about party unity. But their unity should not remain merely a pipe dream but should be translated into reality. Nepal’s revolution cannot be complete without the unity of these two parties and their unity would also strengthen Nepal’s patriotic movement. It is not only between the two Maoist parties, but a meaningful unity or a united front is highly necessary among all communist parties to create a single communist center for which UCPN-M, CPN-M and CPN-UML need to take initiative and adopt accommodative approach. But this remains to be seen whether it remains as a mere pipedream or gets translated into reality.