La Marx International

On September 8, 2025, a revolution broke out in Nepal, overthrowing the capitalist government of Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli, known as KP Sharma Oli, and the Maoist Unified Communist Party of Nepal (UNCPN-UML). First of all, we must clarify that although the government calls itself "Communist or Marxist-Leninist," the one that fell was a bourgeois government that defends capitalism in Nepal, just as is the case in countries like China, Cuba, Vietnam, or North Korea, where so-called "communist" governments exist but defend capitalism and the interests of the bourgeois ruling classes.

The revolution has its clear vanguard among the youth, the so-called "Generation Z," thousands of young Nepalese between the ages of 15 and 28 who have used social media as their main channel for organizing and criticizing the government. When the government of KP Sharma Oli announced the blocking of several social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and X, thousands of activists took to the streets to protest the ban in the New Baneshwar area, where demonstrators tore down police barricades that prevented them from marching toward the Parliament building. The revolution spread to Kathmandu, and then to other cities such as Lalitpur and Bhaktapur.

The protesters, carrying banners condemning corruption, then attacked and burned the homes of several Nepalese political leaders, including Oli's private residence in the town of Balkot. They then attacked the home of Maoist leader and former Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal and stoned the home of Information and Communications Minister Prithvi Subba Gurung. Police responded with water cannons, tear gas, and live ammunition to disperse the crowd. Authorities later imposed a curfew in the capital, but the repression only fueled the protests. Hundreds then entered Parliament grounds and set fire to the main building, according to government spokesman Ekram Giri. The protests and armed protesters then headed toward Kathmandu airport, which had to be partially closed.

A revolution in the heart of Southeast Asia

Previously, as many as five ministers in Oli's government had resigned within 24 hours, although the government had attempted to calm the protests by lifting the ban on social media platforms. Among them were the resignations of Water Supply Minister Pradeep Yadav, Home Minister Ramesh Lekhak, and Agriculture Minister Ramnath Adhikari. Nepal's Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel was chased and forced to flee across a river, while Rajyalaxmi Chitrakar, wife of former Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal, was killed after being burned alive in her own home, while groups of officials fled in helicopters.

The revolution that has erupted in Nepal is a February revolution, as defined by Nahuel Moreno, as part of the systematization and updating of the theory of permanent revolution that we have carried forward from orthodox Trotskyism. The Nepalese revolution is part of the revolutionary wave sweeping the world, with mass mobilizations in Greece, Serbia, Turkey, South Korea, Georgia, Indonesia, the Palestinian resistance in the Third Intifada, and the military triumphs of the Ukrainian National Liberation Army in the Donbas, among others. The revolutionary process in Nepal is part of the revolution sweeping Southeast Asia, which has had as milestones the revolution in Sri Lanka, the general strike in India, the struggle of the people of Kashmir, the revolution in Bangladesh that liquidated the dictatorial regime of Sheikh Hasina Wazed and the Awami League, and the revolution in Indonesia.

In turn, the revolution in Nepal takes on the characteristics of 21st-century revolutions with mass mobilizations, armed clashes in the streets, self-organization and self-determination, the emergence of a Front Line against the repression that characterized the revolutions in Hong Kong, Chile, Colombia, the United States with Black Lives Matter, and Ukraine in the Plaza de la Dignidad uprising, among others. The background of the revolution is the hatred of the people accumulated by years of oppression, repression, and crude inequality typical of all capitalist countries, which is suffered by the weakest and most vulnerable layers of the population, such as, in this case, the youth.

In the demonstrations, young people carry banners with hashtags like "#NepoKid" and "#NepoBabies ," denouncing the nepotism of public officials, whose children flaunt luxury items and wealth favored by both family and friends in access to public positions and jobs, allowing them to access opportunities that thousands of young people cannot access. They are a reflection of the cruel inequality of capitalist Nepal, where thousands of young people are forced to leave the country in search of work in Burma, India, or other countries in the region. In fact, one of the largest sources of income for families in Nepal is the remittances sent back to the country from abroad by the thousands of young people who emigrate in search of work, in a capitalist country where unemployment rates, especially among the youngest, are among the highest in the region.

A recurring February, a step forward for the people

The revolution in Nepal brings to the fore the decomposition and crisis of the Stalinist parties, called "communist" , which climbed to power in several countries and transformed into oligarchies of capitalist ruling classes, into millionaires who disgustingly oppress their people, calling themselves "Marxists" or "Leninists". Maoism is a variant of Stalinism, which adopted Stalin's strategies, embellishing Stalinist revisionism with its own crazy conceptualizations. Nepal was governed by the monarchy of King Gyanendra since 1951, but in February 1996 Maoist groups launched a guerrilla war that would last for 10 years .

The Maoist Communist Party of Nepal labeled government forces as "feudal forces ," including the monarchy and major political parties under this accusation. True to their theory of a phased revolution, they fought to develop a "capitalist Nepal" against the feudal forces, but in 2002 the king decided to abolish the puppet government he ruled and directly assumed all state powers under the guise of the "war on terror ." The United States, the European Union, India, and other nations provided military and economic aid to the Kingdom of Nepal, and with this support, King Gyanendra reinstated the absolute monarchy in February 2005.

Gyanendra's absolute monarchy imposed provocative bans, persecuted opponents as "terrorists," imprisoned journalists, and shut down newspapers, interspersing periods of fierce armed conflict with periods of negotiations between the government and the insurgents. Eventually, armed militias came to dominate 80% of Nepal's territory, establishing local and regional governments in several districts with more than 30,000 fighters, nearly 40% of whom were women. The unrest began in 2004 when the militias announced a blockade of the capital, and in 2006, the Nepalese Communist Party announced the end of the conflict on November 21, 2006, as a result of an agreement by which the guerrillas would take part in the new government in exchange for surrendering their weapons to the UN. On December 24, 2007, the Nepalese Parliament decided to establish a republic.

Long live the Revolution in Nepal! Long live the struggle of the peoples of Southeast Asia!

From then on, the Nepalese Communist Party governed in various coalitions with bourgeois parties, and even with elements of the monarchist parties. The last Prime Minister, Khadga Prasad Oli, was the fifth since the end of the monarchy, in a succession of Maoist governments that consolidated an unjust and cruel structure of capitalism in Nepal and ended, like many former guerrilla leaders, by transforming themselves into millionaire oligarchs working for capitalism.

At the Marx International, we support the demands of the people of Nepal, we support the revolution and its slogans. The struggle must continue until an emergency government of the workers and the people is established, serving the interests of workers, peasants, the urban poor, and youth. Together, we make our own the demand: Long live the revolution in Nepal! Down with the Maoist government of the Communist Party! Trial and punishment for those responsible for the repression! The triumph of the Nepal revolution is a step forward in the battle for socialism in Southeast Asia and for global socialism.