Chandra Bhandari: Divided Congress will reunite over time, government should run full five years

Nepali Congress vice-president Dr Chandra Bhandari has said the currently divided Congress will reunite over time. Speaking at a program organized by Congress Rupandehi Constituency No. 2 in Butwal on Saturday, he urged leaders and cadres not to abuse one another, since both factions would eventually come together. Noting that he has known party president Gagan Thapa since their student days, he claimed Thapa would unite the party.

Bhandari claimed that the present situation arose because the then government did not send the chief administrative officer that Prime Minister Balendra Shah had requested while he was mayor of Kathmandu Metropolitan City. He said he had raised this with KP Sharma Oli, Sher Bahadur Deuba and officials from the chief secretary down to secretaries at the time, but no one agreed to it because of their own ambitions. He argued that had that demand been fulfilled, Balen would have stood for mayor again for a second term, and said it was this that led to the Gen Z uprising.

Bhandari said a government with a majority should work in the people's interest rather than waste time on unnecessary disputes. He said a government cannot run merely by boosting its following on social media and must win public opinion through actual work. He urged that if anyone has erred, action should be taken through legal process, but there should be no mutual blame game that affects the government's work.

Other Congress leaders speaking at the event accused the government's actions of going against rule of law, democracy and press freedom, saying pro-democracy parties need to come together.