Nepal - Prepare to take up arms: CPN-M

BIRGUNJ: CPN-Maoist General Secretary Ram Bahadur Thapa today directed the party’s rank and file to be mentally prepared to even take up weapons, should the need arise, to disrupt the November 19 CA election. Speaking at his party’s programme in Birgunj, Thapa said, “The government and major political parties are planning to deploy Nepali Army personnel to hold Constituent Assembly poll. So, you have to be ready even to carry arms.”
He further said his party would supply weapons to its cadres in every village to foil the election at any cost. Recounting the past, Thapa said Maoists had entered the city from villages after former king Gyanendra Shah tried to suppress the ex-combatants with arms. On the current political deadlock, Thapa said his party was in favour of resolving the quagmire through talks. He also directed party cadres and leaders to initiate discussion on nationalism and democracy with the public and other political parties too. “The weapon of ideology is the strongest one in the world. So, make your ideology revolutionary,” Thapa added.
Offering a solution to the current crisis, the CPN-M general secretary held that dissolution of the interim government, formation of a consensus government and election under such a government alone would be able to extricate the country from the prevailing crisis. Flaying the current political system, Thapa argued that a dispensation dictated by the foreign forces could not be called democracy. “The ongoing planning for the November CA election is a foreign design.”
Coming down heavily on the UCPN-M, Thapa said the party would hand over the nation to a foreign power if it got two-third majority in the CA poll. Hinting at UCPN-Maoist chief Pushpa Kamal Dahal, Thapa said, “It is useless for the so-called great leader of a great party to shed crocodile tears.