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Nepal: Koirala invites Prachanda to form Govt.

	May 26, 2008

As the parliament secretariat in Kathmandu makes preparations to host the first session of the Constituent Assembly on May 28 and formally declare Nepal a republic, Prime Minister Koirala has bowed to the Maoist leader Prachanda’s demand to form a Government. At a meeting of the Maoists, the Nepali Congress and the CPN[UML] at the residence of Koirala on May 24, the Prime Minister invited Prachanda to take the initiative to form the new “consensus Government” in accordance with the constitutional provisions.



At a time when the Maoist leader was urging Koirala to step down immediately and pave the way for the new government under his leadsership, Koirala hinted that he was ready to hand over power to the Maoists at the v first meeting of the constituent assembly on May 28. The Communist Party of Nepal [Maoists] won 220 seats in the April 10 elections to emerge the largest party in the 575-member constrituent assembly. The parties are set to declare abolition of monarchy and declare Neal a federal democratic republic on May 28.





So far, the three major parties – Nepali Congress, Communist Party of Nepal [CPN[UML]] and the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum [MJF] – were opposed to the handover of power to the Maoists without amending the interim Constitution which currently provides that only a two-thirds majority can remove the Prime Minister. The three are clearly for a non-Maoist party member being the Constitutional President with emergency powers and control of the Army.



At a meeting on May 21, the three parties reached an agreement to amend a provision in the interim Constitution that said the Prime Minister could be removed only when there was a two-thirds negative vote. They prefer a simple majority instead. The Maoists had earlier refused to amend the stated provision. The three parties also discussed the idea of electing a ceremonial President and an Executive Prime Minister in the next government. However, they could not reach an agreement.



The April 10 Constituent Assembly elections had thrown up a fractured verdict with the Maoists emerging as the single largest party but short of a majority to form a government on their own. Although the NC chief and Prime Minister G.P. Koirala said he favoured formation of a coalition Government to break the political deadlock, the NC and the CPN[UML] hardened their stand on aligning with the Maoists and accused them of using intimidation and propagating a culture of violence through their army and youth wing.





At meetings of the NC and UML Central Committees held last week, an overwhelming majority of leaders spoke against joining a Maoist-led Government. Out of the 61 Central Committee members of the NC, all but one opposed joining a Maoist Government. Likewise, in the UML, only five of the 58 members favoured their party joining the Maoist-led Government.



The NC and the UML even set conditions for supporting the Maoist Government. They wanted an amendment in the interim Constitution to allow removal of the Prime Minister by a simple majority as against the current two-thirds majority, dissolution of the Maoist People’s courts, army and local governments, management of the weapons of Maoist combatants in cantonments; return of property seized by the Maoists; and changing the militant structure of the Maoist youth wing, Young Communist League, into a volunteer political organisation. The Maoists said they could meet these conditions.



Besides these, there were big questions on power-sharing. The UML officially passed a resolution calling for sharing of the three posts – those of President, Prime Minister and Chairman of the Constituent Assembly –among the major parties. Maoist leader Prachanda said such an arrangement would create “parallel centres” and destabilize the transition.





Rejecting outright pre-conditions put forward by the three parties such as disbanding of the guerilla army for joining the Government, Prachanda declared that he would be at the helm by June 2. The 53-year-old former school teacher who led a ten-year long Maoist insurgency before joining the political mainstream, termed their pre-conditions “ridiculous” , calling them bargaining tactics. He rejected the demand for disbanding the Maoist People’s Liberation Army [PLA] and the controversial Young Communist League. In an interview on CNN-IBN’s “Devil’s Advocate” programme, he told Karan Thapar [May 18], a Maoist-led Government would be formed on June 1 or 2, after the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly scheduled for May 28. On the UML’s demand that key posts he shared, Prachanda said he is ready to share power with other parties but not the posts of President and Prime Minister. He said, his party wanted him to be Nepal’s first executive President but he would be ready to accept the post of Prime Minister with the responsibility of the Head of State like Prime Minister Koirala’s current position, if it took a long time to make such a provision in the Constitution. He said, Koirala should have resigned as Prime Minister as soon as results of the elections came out, to give way to a new government which will get the status of a caretaker Government.



In another TV interview, Prachanda said, his party was not against capitalism. He said, private business and property will get protection, but royal assets will be nationalized. Prachanda who has been maintaining that Mao’s model of a people’s republic cannot fulfil modern needs, said his party favoured capitalism in the country and will encourage businessmen and industrialists to set up their businesses in Nepal to generate more employment and create new infrastructure.



As for the King, he said, all the royal properties would be nationalized. He told interviewer Karan Thapar that he will guarantee the beleaguered monarch’s safety only if he quits the palace “peacefully”, respecting the verdict of the people. “But, if he would not quit voluntarily, then I cannot predict”, he said. He, however, said he would not force the King to leave the palace before the May 28 Constituent Assembly meeting, adding that he had the right to stay before that. He also said he did not favour any move by King Gyanendra to take shelter in India. He promised that there would be no witch-hunting against the King.



Prime Minister Koirala has compared himself to Emperor Ashoka who, after seeing destruction and death in a war that he waged, embraced Buddhism and vowed not to lift the sword again. Opening a peace meet in Lumbini town, the birthplace of Lord Buddha, on May 20, he said, “After viewing the site that spread peace worldwide, I too feel like announcing like Emperor Ashoka that there is no further need for arms”.



In Kathmandu, security is being tightened around the Royal Palace in the wake of the Maoists’ plan to gather half a million cadres from across Nepal on May 28 when the Constituent Assembly declares the country a Republic. Five security rings are being installed around the Narayanhity Royal Palace to prevent any untoward incident that might cause harm to the physical structure of the Palace, according to a Nepali daily.



Meanwhile, a global pro-Hindu organisation threatened to organize a massive protest at the site of the key Constituent Assembly meeting on May 28 to step up pressure on the political parties to hold a referendum on the abolition of the 240-year-old monarchy. The World Hindu Federation [WHF] has demanded a referendum before the abolition of the monarchy and asked the parties to restore Nepal as a Hindu State failing which it has threatened to stage a sit-in.



Protests over businessman’s murder

There have been anti-Maoist protests almost daily near the venue of the coming Constituent Assembly session in Kathmandu by protesters demanding punishment to members of the People’s Liberation Army [PLA] of Maoists who were responsible for the kidnapping and death of a businessman, Ramhari Shreshta, inside their camp. It is alleged that three soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army forcibly took Shreshta to their cantonment in Chitwan district where he was beaten to death. His wife has also started a campaign demanding punishment for the killers of her husband and his body which the PLA soldiers are believed to have thrown into a river. “Punish the killers, Hang them” and other such slogans reverberated through Kathmandu on May 21 as enraged crowds waved red banners and fought with riot police to enforce a strike called by the relatives and neighbours of Shreshta. The Kathmandu Valley remained shut on Wednesday to protest the killing of Shreshta. Vehicles stayed off the road, businesses remained shut and educational institutions were closed. Bowing to pressure, Maoist chairman Prachanda asked the Government to form a probe commission. In a statement, Prachanda said though the Maoists were morally responsible for the murder of Shreshta, it was committed by criminal elements who had infiltrated the party. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has asked the Koirala Government to probe all the crimes committed by the youth wing of the former rebels and punish them. The NHRC listed ten complaints it received recently against the Maoists that included charges of abduction, torture, killing and threatening of people and cutting a drinking water pipeline for not voting for the former rebels in Constituent Assembly elections.



Prachanda demand to scrap Friendship Treaty with India

With the Maoists about to assume power in Nepal, the dynamics of India-Nepal relations will be affected. Pushpa Kamal Dahal, better known as Prachanda, has in recent interviews stressed the need for good relations with India but indicated that he is in favour of reviewing all existing agreements, including the crucial India-Nepal Treaty of 1950. In his latest interview with Karan Thapar for CNN-IBN’s “Devil’s Advocate”, he said, reviewing the 1950 Treaty will not “sabotage” ties with New Delhi but help develop close relationship on the basis of a “new” understanding. “We want a new relationship with India which means better relations, better understanding and better cooperation”, he said. He said, he wanted “each and every” provision of the treaty to be reviewed in the “new changing context” for better relationship between the two countries.



New Delhi has expressed its readiness to have a re-look at the 58-year-old treaty after the Maoists voiced the demand following their triumph in the April 10 Constituent Assembly poll. Prachanda, however, favoured “equidistance” from both New Delhi and Beijing at the political level. “At the political level, we will never side with one country against other. We will try to maintain equidistance between Delhi and Beijing in political sense but not in practical sense and in matters of cooperation”, he said.



Prachanda believes, as do those in Nepal who perceive India as less than a friendly neighbour, that the 1950 Treaty is weighed against Kathmandu’s interests. This is, of course, not true, but, political observers say, when propaganda overtakes reason, it is difficult to argue against ill-founded claims and baseless allegations.



While there is reason to doubt the Maoists’ true intentions when they seek a review of the 1950 Treaty, the fact remains that in the past six decades, a lot has changed to merit a review of this agreement. Given the new dynamics of South Asia and the rapid emergence of China as what the ECONOMIST has described as “a new colonizer” seeking to expand its theatre of influence, it would be equally in India’s interest to review and if necessary suitably amend the 1950 Treaty, especially those portions dealing with trade and allied issues. A bilateral arrangement after all is good only till such time both sides abide by its terms. Most important, it makes better strategic sense for India to be pro-active and engage Nepal’s new dispensation in purposeful dialogue on New Delhi’s terms rather than look for ways and means of delaying talks and thus allow resentment to build up in Kathmandu. Having totally miscalculated its response to events and political developments in Nepal –first by dumping King Gyanendra when he needed India the most and then by propping up the decrepit Koirala Government, whose indecisiveness and pusillanimity helped the Maoists score an electoral victory of sorts – New Delhi cannot afford to get it wrong all over again.