Hinting at hurdles in the ongoing party unification process, CPN (Maoist Centre) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal on Saturday claimed that various forces were both cajoling and threatening major leaders with an aim to foil his party’s merger with the CPN-UML.

Addressing a mass meeting in Mahottari district, Dahal said domestic and foreign forces were conspiring against the two-party unity. “National and international reactionaries are active against left unity and Nepali people’s dream of development and prosperity,” Dahal said. After the alliance garnered a near two-thirds majority in the elections, the forces were using both tactics to derail the alliance, he charged, alerting his party, its leaders and cadres against such plots.

When everything seemed to be sailing smoothly, the unification bid hit a snag with UML members on the Party Unification Coordination Committee (PUCC) and senior leader Madhav Kumar Nepal flatly refusing to discuss Maoism as a guiding principle of the unified party.

But some leaders claimed that power-sharing between the two parties and managing other leaders were the major issues that actually stalled progress, not the ideological row that has been blamed.

On Friday, Maoist Chairman Dahal said that his party would join the Oli-led government only after a package deal on sharing ministerial portfolios, constitutional posts and political appointments, besides arrangements for leaders in the new party.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli met Maoist chief Dahal at the former’s residence in Balkot on Saturday and discussed party unity and Cabinet expansion.

Maoist sources claimed that Oli urged Dahal to name ministers but Dahal was for sorting unification issues first. The two leaders agreed to hold a meeting of the PUCC on Sunday.

“We are working to complete the party merger process at the earliest. Discussions are moving in a positive direction,” Dahal told reporters after the meeting.