Naya Shakti Party Nepal and the Sanghiya Samajbadi Forum Nepal have said the second amendment to the constitution should be utilised as an opportunity to usher in an era of peace and prosperity by ensuring broader ownership of the charter among the marginalised communities.

Issuing a joint statement on Monday, Naya Shakti leader Baburam Bhattarai and SSFN Chairman Upendra Yadav said their attention was drawn to the constitution amendment proposal that the government is working on.

The first joint statement of the two parties, which comes amid back-channel negotiations to merge the two forces, has been taken meaningfully. Leaders said the statement sheds light on the agenda the two identity-based parties would push after merger.

In the statement, Bhattarai and Yadav have clarified that the proposed bill fails to address the concerns of the “excluded” communities. “The amendment should end discrimination based on class, caste, gender, culture, religion and region,” reads the statement.

While upholding the concerns of the regional parties affiliated to the Sanghiya Gathabandhan, Bhattarai and Yadav pushed forward some new demands. The two parties have once again raised issues including identity-based federalism with self-governed provinces, directly elected executive head, fully proportional representation system, and inclusive and proportionate representation of all the communities in the state bodies. The parties have also advocated federal judiciary, multilingualism and autonomous regions and special areas with self-rule.

“Although several issues mentioned in the statement are not the demands of the Gathabandhan, we included them as a possible indication that the fight won’t be over even after the second amendment. We will keep pushing these issues,” said an SSFN leader.

Naya Shakti leaders said the issues would be the shared agenda of the entities if the current efforts for unification are successful. Naya Shakti leaders privy to the developments said negotiations between the two parties are going on in the right direction.

“We are in the same boat when it comes to ideology. But there are some challenges on the issue of leadership and organisational structure,” said a source, adding that several options such as shared leadership and rotational leadership were being mulled.