Fear Of Prime Minister Oli

Fear Of Prime Minister Oli

Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

After two years of taking office, Prime Minister KP Oli suddenly woke up with the fear of somebody conspiring against him. Where from such fear had come to prime minister that had been never tired of boasting his super majority in the parliament? Obviously, challenges to the prime minister had come from the rivals in his own political party, then the opposition party in the parliament, the third the most important challenges had come from the public, the media including the social media that had been so vocal against the activities of the current government, and from the ministers that had been so actively misinforming the public, and finally the international challenges Prime Minister Oli had felt not only from the neighbors but also the distant country: America.

After two years in office, Prime Minister Oli felt unsafe because the constitutional provision made for the immunity from the vote of no confidence against prime minister for two years had been expired. So, anybody could put forward a vote of no confidence against Prime Minister Oli in the parliament but not the opposition party but the rivals in his own Nepal Communist Party (NCP) could do so. He had been narrowing down his circle of supporters. He felt that his rivals had been getting ground and becoming stronger and stronger making him to sense unsafe in office.

For example, Prime Minister Oli could not muzzle Bhim Rawal who had been sincerely speaking up against the unsatisfactory activities of the ministers including the prime minister. Then, he could not stopped Dr. Shivamaya Tumbahamphay resisting to resign from the Deputy Speaker for opening the way to elect a new speaker after former Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara was implicated in the rape case and put behind bars. Oli had to negotiate with Dr. Tumbahamphay, and then he had to give the position of the speaker to Agni Sapkota despite his opposition. Then, Oli had to surrender the position of Vice-chair of NCP to Bamdev Gautam.

If we were to take a brief look at the history of the parliamentary system in Nepal and in other countries then we would find that the newly elected Prime Minister Krishna Prasad Bhattarai had to quit under the pressure of the faction of Girija Prasad Koirala in the late 1990s. Then, Girija destroyed the faction of Bhattarai totally and he made his own faction very strong in the Nepali Congress party and he became dictatorial in his party, and he succeeded to head most of the cabinets thereafter. Then, we had seen how the former Prime Minister Theresa May had to quit office and give in her position to her once supporter later turned to her rival Boris Johnson in Britain. Similar state of affairs had happened in Australia, too. So, none of prime ministers was safe in the parliamentary system no matter what majority his or her party had in the parliament.

On February 15, 2020, while the state-run newspaper “gorkhapatra” ran thirty-two pages of the articles of different authors including the prime minister stating the unbelievable progress the Oli administration had made during the last two years, Oli’s colleague Prachanda speaking at Dhadingbeshi in the Dhading district said that they were talking about the railways and so on that would be materialized only after tens of years but the common folks wanted to see repair and maintenance of the roads in Kathmandu immediately, and the laws enacted recently did not bring any changes in the lives of the common folks. This statement was really a challenge to Prime Minister Oli.

The great challenges had come from the ministers who had been misinforming the public, who had been trying to push the country several years back.

The spokesman for the Oli’s cabinet put forward the media council bill that had been for totally curbing the freedom of expression. He did not care that it went against the constitution that had provided the freedom of expression. The public particularly the folks directly working on the media had been nervous and they strongly opposed the media council bill.

Then, the minister for land management, cooperatives and poverty alleviation put forward the Guthi Bill that had made provisions for seizing all the land belonging to the private, public and state Guthi, and then covertly distribute the land to the NCP cadres provoking a massive protest in the Kathmandu Valley. This public rebuke made Prime Minister Oli very uncomfortable and probably made him weak in his party. Some of the protestors on camera regretted that they had voted for the NCP in the last general elections.

The never-ending-rather-never-completing Melamchi Drinking Water Project had been the talk of the town since it was launched in 2005. After taking office, Prime Minister Oli had promised that the water from the Melamchi River would be available in Kathmandu in the Dashain: the great festival of Nepalis in autumn. The Oli administration missed the target so convincingly stated. The Melamchi Project had not only exposed the Oli cabinet but also became the symbol of the corruption, as it had become the milking cow for the folks in power.

Nepalis had already celebrated three Dashain festivals after Oli became prime minister but the water did not flow in rather the shortage of water aggravated in the valley, and the roads dug for laying the pipes for the Melamchi water had been so broken as never had been before. The roads had been muddy during the wet reason and dirty during the dry season. The potholes on the roads made the vehicles to navigate as the boats in the storm. Nepalis had to enjoy either mud or dirt on the roads.

Publishing the white paper on the Melamchi, the minister for water declared that the water would flow from the Melamchi River to the valley at the end of the current fiscal year (which ends on July 15, 2020), the news published on “Artha Bazaar” of “gorkhapatra” on February 14, 2020 stated. The folks in the valley had been prepared to drive out all the communists from the valley if the water did not flow in as the minister had stated.

Finance Minister Dr. Yubraj Khatiwada supposed to be the development expert had recently reviewed the current budget (FY 2019), and the budget had been contracted by 10 percent but the finance minister claimed that the economic growth would be closer to the target, which was set at 8.5 percent. The notion of the finance minister went against the arithmetic of the economics. Spending less for achieving the high economic growth might go against the law of economics.

Nobody could believe that Nepal could achieve such an economic growth of 8.5 percent with such corruption endemic in the bureaucracy, and with the so slow movement of the paper work. International Monetary Fund projected the economic growth for Nepal for the fiscal year 2019 (2076) at 6 percent. Speaking at the “Annual Country Portfolio Review Meeting” on February 17, 2020, the regional director of Asian Development Bank said that building of the capacity of the state employees working on projects was necessary, the news published on the front page of “Artha Bazaar” of “gorkhapatra” on February 18, 2020 stated. Obviously, Finance Minister Dr. Khatiwada either did not know the capacity of the bureaucracy or just ignored to set the so high economic growth. Failure in achieving the economic growth would be another blow to the Oli administration.

The corruption case of the state-owned land at Lalita-nivas at Baluwatar in Kathmandu, Commission on Investigation into Abuse of Authority (CIAA) recently filed against 175 people including former Deputy Prime Minister Vijay Kumar Gacchedar at the Special Court had provoked the strong criticism of the Oli administration, as CIAA skipped the former two prime ministers incidentally happened to be the communists because their decisions were the policy ones; so they were beyond the jurisdiction of CIAA, and the son of General Secretary of NCP and the Supreme Court justice because they agreed to return the land they had received.

Folks believed that the Oli administration had tremendously influenced CIAA otherwise why the anti-corruption constitutional body had to miss out the former two prime ministers to indict but it included the deputy prime minister because he belonged to the opposition party. Then, why CIAA left out the son of the General Secretary of NCP and the Supreme Court justice stating they agreed to return the land illegally taken. Common folks asked whether CIAA could rescind other corruption cases CIAA had filed if those allegedly corrupt guys were ready to give back the money they had illegally taken or they had unlawfully amass the wealth. Some folks believed that it might be the moral bankruptcy of CIAA.

Prime Minister Oli boasted that his administration had enacted so many laws but he failed to say that the laws delegating authority to the provinces had not done, yet; and the most notorious Public Procurement Law had not been touched, yet. Provincial chief ministers even though six of them out of seven belonged to the Oli’s NCP they had been complaining that the federal government had been neglecting the turning over the power to the provinces.

Concerning the Public Procurement Act, speaking at the Eighth District Conference also the Tenth General Meeting of Sindhuli Construction Business People’ Association in Sindhuli on February 17, 2020, Chairman of Federation of Nepal Construction Business People’s Association Ravi Singh said that the Public Procurement Act had been for setting up the large construction companies cartel, and the State needed to award only three construction projects to any company at maximum, the news published on the last page of the “Artha Bazaar” of “gorkhapatra” on February 18, 2020 stated. Public Procurement Act must be made the development project friendly rather than favorable to the contractors.

No mater how many times, Prime Minister Oli would state that he had the zero tolerance of corruption and he himself would not involve in the corruption and he would not allow anybody involve in corruption, the corruption had been prevalent in the bureaucracy from the top to the bottom. Only the matter had been that either Prime Minister Oli did not see the prevailing corruption or he did not recognize it as the corruption, as he might have different definition of corruption otherwise he would have amended the Public Procurement Act immediately and he would have avoided so much waste of the state revenue resources that had been during the last two years of the Oli administration.

Prime Minister Oli delivered a nice speech to the House of Representatives on February 15, 2020, and he shared the dream of building the railroads and what not with the lawmakers. It was enjoyable to read the Oli speech published on the inner pages of “gorkhapatra” on February 16, 2020. Not knowing anything what had been really happening in Nepal, folks would surely believe what the prime minister had said in his speech. Unfortunately, what the prime minister had shared as he correctly said had been only his dream.

Oli did not like to refer to the election manifesto of his party published for the elections held in 2017 because he would find that nothing had happened what had said in the manifesto.

The manifesto had said that Nepal would be self-sufficient in the agricultural products within two years but Nepalis had to pay NPR 100 to NPR 300 per kilogram of onions because the onion crops had been failed in India, and then the Modi government stopped the export of onions. Before the Indian embargo on the export of onions, Nepalis had been buying onions at NPR 45 per kilogram. This is only one example but Nepalis had been importing almost everything from India including rice because the agriculture in Nepal had not been as it should have been following the budget amount allocated to it.

Finance Minister Dr. Khatiwada had set aside a sizable chunk of the total amount of the budget to the subsidies on agricultural. Precisely, nine billion rupees were allocated to the subsidy on fertilizers that was hardly available to the farmers at the subsidized rate during the plantation season. Probably, such subsidy amount went to the pockets of the folks working on the chain of purchasing, distributing and finally selling fertilizers at the grassroots level, as the farmers often complained that they had to buy fertilizers at the market price because the State-sponsored fertilizers were not available at the retail distributors but at the market.

Similarly, farmers again complained that most of the subsidy on agriculture had gone to the pockets of the local political cadres obviously the NCP cadres, as farmers without any political link and background could hardly enjoy the receipt of the subsidy the finance minister had so boldly stated in his budget speech to boost the agricultural productions.

So, on the one hand, the Oli administration had wasted billions of rupees on the agriculture that did not improve the agricultural production not to mention making Nepal self-sufficient in the agricultural products on the other hand Nepalis had to pay high prices for the imported agricultural products. Then, the question was whether the Oli administration had made any achievement in increasing the agricultural production during the last two years.

The manifesto stated that all Nepalese children would be in school within two years, all Nepalis would have an access to clean drinking water, electricity in every house, gas pipeline connected to every Nepalese kitchen Oli liked to state in his comedic speeches. Half of the admitted school kids hardly ever went back to schools in the not even remote areas. Concerning the availability of clean water, even the folks in the Kathmandu Valley had hardly an access to the clean drinking water, as the Melamchi Drinking Water had been so far only the dream of Oli to the common folks. Electricity and gas pipelines connecting every house were another dreams of Oli. Nepalis people wanted to make it a reality. Even the electricity regularly provided to the folks in Kathmandu thanks to CEO Kulman Ghising, tripped ten to twenty times a day. Sometimes, the outage lasted quite a time other times just returned back immediately simply turning off the electrical appliances. Computers, TVs and other appliances had to restart again and again several times a day.

Senior citizens had held the faith that the NCP would increase the monthly allowance from NPR 2,000 to NPR 5,000 as stated in the election manifesto. So, they voted en mass for the NCP candidates almost making the NCP two-thirds majority party but the poor senior citizens had to live with no increment for the first fiscal year then the finance minister made NPR 3,000 in the current fiscal year even then it had not met the commitment made in the manifesto. That was another challenge to Prime Minister Oli, as he could not keep his pledge made during the election campaign.

Prime Minister Oli could simply brushed off the opposition criticism in the parliament even the disruption of the parliamentary proceedings the opposition had made protesting against implicating Vijay Kumar Gacchedar in the Lalita-nivas land scam, as the opposition party had not been on the right track of seriously challenging the Oli administration.

The opposition would have been effective in disrupting the proceeding of the House of Representatives if it had done to bring the former two prime ministers involved in the Lalita-nivas land scam to justice, and to protest against CIAA illegally leaving out the two guys that had agreed to return the land they had again unlawfully gained. No thug could return what s/he had stolen and get out of the justice. That was what the legal experts said.

The opposition particularly the Nepali Congress could not cash in the weaknesses and failure of the Oli administration rather the NC had earned the charges of being disloyal to the public stopping the proceedings of the House of Representatives protesting against implicating its leader Gacchedar in the Lalita-nivas land scam. How could voters trust those lawmakers that had fought for saving the corrupt leader?

The print and digital media including the social networks had been challenging to the Oli administration because they had been exposing the Oli administration’s one action after another, and they had been successful to convince the common folks that the Oli administration had been nothing but for saving the corrupt folks including hundreds of construction contractors, and other companies and folks that had managed to get the State contracts on many development projects.

Implicating one antic-corruption activist in a murder case, and making a life-threatening attack on another, and muzzling the third anti-corruption singer had been great challenge to Prime Minister Oli. All these unwise actions of the Oli administration had rather weakened the position of the prime minister that loved to root for the zero toleration of corruption.

Common folks sensed that the Oli administration had been sinking in the corruption quicksand because the Oli administration had been fighting against the anti-corruption activists surely saving the corrupt ministers, bureaucrats including top bureaucrats who were awarded with the jobs at the diplomatic missions and surely the project chiefs, contractors and political cadres, who could do anything to make not only money but amass large wealth within a few years. This was another dreadful challenge to Prime Minister Oli.

Then, let us take up the widely discussed “Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)” among the intellectuals and in the media for and against it; and the US embassy in Kathmandu had been making clarification on it and asking to take it as soon as possible. The Oli administration including the foreign minister had been for grabbing the MCC no matter what would happen to the country in the future. They had their eyes on the US$ 500 million MMC would bring to Nepal.

Nobody had stated so far in the public discussion on MCC that the first victim of MCC would be the communist government, as none of the western capitalist or imperialist governments did want to see any communist governments flourishing anywhere in the world. However, knowingly or unknowingly, Prime Minister Oli had been so fond of the MCC because it would bring US$ 500 million which was not so great sum of money for a country but certainly a large amount for any individuals.

Another challenge had been the Indian map that included some Nepalese territory in the Indian Territory. It had been months since India unwisely published the map provoking spontaneous protests of the Nepalis elsewhere in Nepal but the Oli administration could not put forward any actions to resolve the problem of the border intrusion. The Oli administration had only stated that it had written an official letter to India concerning the map showing the Nepalese territory as the Indian.

On February 17, 2020, Deputy Prime Minister Ishwor Pokharel holding the portfolio of defense held an aerial inspection of the Kalapani area India had reportedly encroached on, according to the news published on the front page of “gorkhapatra” on February 18, 2020. He must have enjoyed the helicopter ride, as did former King Birendra in his hay days but such a ride did not bring anything to the common folks but the high cost. DPM Pokharel would have been really a hero if he had attempted on walking across the Nepalese territory India had allegedly encroached on.

Indians working on the occupied Nepalese land had stopped hiring Nepalis for any work after the Nepalis protested against the Indian encroachment on the Nepalese territory. Common folks asked why Prime Minister Oli in his first incarnation as the prime minister so boldly stood up to the Indian blockade on Nepal could not dare to ask his secretary to put him on the telephone with Indian counterpart Narendra Modi. Was it not a total surrender to India?

When Chinese President Xi Jinping dropped in in Nepal for a few hours on the way back home from India categorized Nepal as a third party that would come after India plus China stating two plus one but Prime Minister Oli did not say anything about it. However, Chairman of NCP Prachanda had immediately protested it.

All those failures and the misdeeds of the Oli administration must have surely caused Oli to worry about his future in the administration. Probably, he had gone too far to be able to correct his path and get back on the track of the smooth running of the administration without any challenges from any quarters must have been gone. Then, Oli must have an awful dream of somebody might have been conspiring against him. So, he must have woken up shivering. He did not know with whom to share his concern for staying stably in power. So, he shared it with the public while speaking to the folks in his home district Jhapa. However, Oli would remain in office for the remaining period of three years no matter what others had been saying and doing behind the curtains, as voters had meet the Oli’s desire for remaining in power for five years.

February 18, 2020