Madhesi party merges with former Nepal PM's party to form new political outfit

Deputy Prime Minister Upendra Yadav-led Madhesi party has merged with former prime minister Baburam Bhattarai-led Naya Shakti Party to form a new political outfit Samajwadi Party-Nepal.

The new party, which was formed Monday, will be an alternative to both the Nepali Congress (NC)and the Nepal Communist Party (NCP), and would be based in the Terai-Madhes region in the southern plains, Bhattarai said.

Announcing the merger of the Naya Shakti Party-Nepal with the Federal Socialist Front-Nepal on Tuesday, he said they were not only unifying two parties, but the entire country.

According to the agreement of merger, Bhattarai will chair the Samajwadi Party-Nepal's federal council, while Yadav, who is also the Health Minister, chair the central committee. Rajendra Shrestha will be the co-chairperson. Apart from them, there would be eight vice-chairpersons.

The new party will institutionalise federal democratic republic and its political ideology is would be "Prosperous Federal Socialism' an enhanced version of socialism and federalism in the changed political context of Nepal.

The unified party has also proposed directly-elected executive president and fully proportionally represented Parliament.

Apart from these, the new outift would amend the constitution to create 11 provinces as recommended by the High-Level Recommendation Commission on State Restructuring.

Explaining the rationale for the merger, Bhattarai said they were presenting the new party as an alternative to both the capitalists led by the Nepali Congress and the communists led by the Nepal Communist Party.

"Both these political ideologies are on the verge of collapse globally, so we present an alternative in the form of Prosperous Federal Socialism," he said.

Stating that "regressive force"s' ruling the country were trying to sabotage political achievements, such as federalism, Bhattarai warned of launching a decisive movement soon if the government failed to amend the constitution to make it acceptable to all sections of society.

On the occasion, Yadav said both the NC and the NCP had become irrelevant. Accusing the ruling NCP of corruption, he said the NC was yet to leave behind its ideology of constitutional monarchy and multi-party democracy'.