Oli-led Government-26

 Prime Minister Oli’s China Visit

Siddhi B Ranjitkar

On Monday, March 21, 2016, the Chinese government opened up the door for the Nepalese, and pointed to Kazakhstan, and Mongolia: the two nearest countries where Nepalese could go and do their businesses. That was the result of one of the so-called historic ten agreements Prime Minister KP Oli reached with his Chinese counterpart. Those agreements, letters of exchange (LoEs) and memorandum of understandings (MoUs) were nothing but the Lego set given to the Nepalese politicians in power for an intellectual game to play with. So, anybody could easily say with some certainty how much Nepal would benefit from these agreements, LoEs and MoUs. For me, signing off those LoEs, and MoUs, Chinese simply wanted to test the intellectual level or even the mental capacity of the Nepalese politicians in power.

On the second day of the arrival of Prime Minister KP Oli and his entourage at Beijing, both parties smartly signed off the agreements, LoEs and MoUs in Beijing. Thus, the objective of the visit had been achieved leaving Oli and his entourage free to hang out around and see whatever they liked for the rest of the days.

The first agreement Nepal and China signed off was “Agreement on Transit Transport between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal– signatory Hon. Mr. Kamal Thapa, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Nepal” published in myrepublica.com, and thehimalayantimes.com quoting the “Embassy of Nepal, Beijing, March 21, 2016.”

With this agreement everybody must have understood that China had opened up its territory for the Nepalese to pass through for traveling to other countries for business and pleasure travel. Thus Nepalese have another route for traveling to the countries of the world including India if they liked. This had been made possible thanks to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that had ventured to shut down the entries and exits on the border between India and Nepal for about six months causing tremendous sufferings to the thirty-million Nepalese.

Nepalese realized even belatedly that the sovereignty had been at stake with only one route Nepal had via India that India could arbitrarily shut down at any time. So, Nepalese turned to China, and asked the Chinese for a route to pass through following the international law. China said to Nepal. “If you had the rights to transit and travel then have it but nothing more.”

In fact, China said to Nepal that Nepal could buy petroleum products in Kazakhstan bring them down to Nepal through the Chinese territory whenever India shut down the border entries, and buy sheep in Mongolia, and flock them down to Nepal again through China for celebrating the Dashain festival when Nepalese massacred millions of innocent animals for nothing but meat to enjoy the festive dishes.

For Nepalese going to Kazakhstan, and Mongolia and bringing whatever Nepalese needed from there would be something like sending a human to the moon for some years to come. So, having a ‘transit and travel agreement’ with China had been for Nepalese to develop the mindset of that they had another route to the outer world if India were to abruptly shut down the border entries. It was nothing but an intellectual exercise for some time to come.

China was such a large country, Nepalese might get lost while traveling China to find out the exit to sea or ocean. Chinese seaports might be thousands of kilometers far away from Nepal. It was not just a few hundred kilometers travel to the Kolkata seaport in India from where Nepalese could travel to other destinations. So, it was not just to cross the Kerung or Tatopani entries then Nepalese reached China and they had everything and they could go everywhere. Unlike in India Chinese custom officials would check the Nepalese at every entry and exit point. Thus, China had opened up the door for the Nepalese to the puzzled territory.

One main concern for the Nepalese had been the fossil fuel that India loved to play with and arbitrarily cut down the supplies and even stopped as did during the undeclared blockade for about six months. However, the ten agreements published in the Nepalese Internet media had nothing about the fossil fuel China everybody hoped to supply Nepal but it included the fifth agreement  “Letters of Exchange on Project Initiation for the Feasibility Study on Chinese Assistance to Nepal for Exploration of Oil and Gas Resources- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.” It was the vague agreement on what China would do in Nepal for exploring oil and gas.

Again it was an intellectual game China would play with the Nepalese. I could easily visualize if the Nepalese southern territory had a little chance of bearing oil and gas then Indian experts would surely jumped to their feet to drill in the Indian territory next to the Nepalese territory for pumping out the hidden black gold lying in the earth’s womb. I had heard that a foreign company had already drilled for oil in Biratnagar without success in the past.

Would China discover oil for Nepal? Oh! The letters of exchange was only on the Project Initiation for the Feasibility Study on Chinese Assistance to Nepal for Exploration of Oil and Gas Resource. Take a look at the one word after another such as Project Initiation, feasibility study, and Chinese assistance. First, Nepal or China had to initiate a project, then to conduct the feasibility study on the Chinese assistance before coming to the exploration of oil and gas in Nepal. It looked to me a long intellectual exercise. Certainly, it would energize the brain of the Nepalese politicians that had been filled up with nothing but sacred cow dung. So, they could think nothing but how to amass a huge asset and then use it for keeping a cadre working for them.

Not reaching the understanding on petroleum products, I could safely conclude that China for some time to come not interested in selling the fossil fuel to Nepal but it would allow Nepal to bring oil and gas from Kazakhstan or any other country. However, the Nepal Radio in its seven o’clock morning news aired the clippings of the radio report on Deputy Prime Minister holding the portfolio of ministry of foreign affairs Kamal Thapa telling the reporters that Nepal had in fact reached an understanding with China on petroleum products, too. The question was why the Nepalese embassy in Beijing was so shy to publish it along with its ten agreements, Loes, and MoUs.

The second agreement the Nepalese embassy in Beijing published was “Agreement between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal on the Construction, Management and Maintenance of the Xiarwa Boundary River Bridge, (Hilsa) Humla- signatory Hon. Mr. Kamal Thapa, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nepal.” What was it? To have a single bridge no matter how important it was and how large it was, Prime Minister Oli did not need to carry such a large entourage to China to sign it off. Foreign Minister Kamal Thapa alone could do it without any fanfare. Why did Nepalese need to spend so much time and energy at least at the intellectual level on such a trifle matter at least for me?

The third agreement was “Agreement on Economic and Technical Cooperation between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal to implement Pokhara Regional International Airport Project- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.” Okay, it was a large project for Nepal even though Nepalese themselves could do it provided the politicians in power had clean minds and they could do it without cheating the common folks.

Then, I took a look at the fourth agreement that was “Framework Agreement on the provision of Mixed Loan between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal to implement Pokhara Regional International Airport Project- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.” For the Nepalese like me that had been used to receive everything gratis, the mixed loan was a surprise. In fact, I could not understand what the mixed loan was. What was mixed with the loan if China were to provide Nepal with a loan to build the regional international airport in Pokhara?

Wait a minute; there was one more agreement on the regional international airport to be built in Pokhara that was the tenth “Concessional Loan Agreement on Pokhara Regional International Airport- signatory Mr. Baikunta Aryal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Finance.” So, Nepal would receive a loan for building the airport in Pokhara understandably at the lower interest rate when everywhere in the world banks had been charging a fee for the deposits. They called it a negative interest rate. If China were to deposit its surplus money in Switzerland or in Japan it had to pay a fee at a certain rate. Lending money to Nepal, China could enjoy a small interest on it.

Then, I wondered what the need for the third agreement on loan when the two agreements had already stated everything about the making of an airport in Pokhara. Thus, Nepal had three agreements on one project.

We had already talked about the fifth agreement that was “Letters of Exchange on Project Initiation for the Feasibility Study on Chinese Assistance to Nepal for Exploration of Oil and Gas Resources- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.”

The sixth agreement was “Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Population and Environment of Nepal and National Development and Reform Commission of the People’s Republic of China concerning the provision of goods for addressing climate change- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.” We needed to address the human-made climate change, no doubt about that but China had made only a provision for providing Nepal with the goods that the MoU did not specify. That was fine. Nepal might need such goods to prevent the wonderfully beautiful snow-capped mountains from shedding off the snow. Those mountains would keep the tourists including the rich Chinese coming to Nepal to enjoy the scenes of the unimaginably gorgeous mountains.

The seventh agreement was “Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Industry of Nepal and State Administration for Industry and Commerce of the People’s Republic of China to strengthen intellectual property system- signatory Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance.” This might be obviously for safeguarding the intellectual property. It was necessary to protect the intellectuals from losing their property to the thieves and unscrupulous people.

The eighth agreement was “Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China and the Ministry of Commerce of Nepal on Launching the Joint Feasibility Study of China-Nepal Free Trade Agreement- signatory Hon. Mr. Deepak Bohara Minister for Commerce, Nepal.” Then, the talk was about the free trade between Nepal and China. The agreement was only on the feasibility study on this matter but Nepal needed it immediately. SAARC had agreed on the free trade among its member countries to be effective in 2016 but none of the countries had done anything to this end so far. Agreement was one thing but enforcement of agreement was another but the most important thing was surely the enforcement.

The ninth agreement was “Memorandum of Understanding between China Banking Regulatory Commission and Nepal Rastra Bank- signatory Dr. Chiranjibi Nepal, Governor of Nepal Rastra Bank.” What for this MoU, it did not say anything but the speculation had been that it might be for opening Chinese banks in Nepal.

Now Prime Minister Oli apparently could not dare to talk to the Chinese about the Lipu Lekh: the Nepalese territory through which China and India agreed on doing business. Nepalese in general had raised voices against Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi signing off the agreement on doing business through Lipu Lekh with his Chinese counterpart when Modi visited China.

Prime Minister Oli also did not talk about opening the Tatopani (Khasa in China) entry to China. It had been almost a year since the devastating quake that damaged hills, roads and buildings on both sides of the border between Nepal and China. China experts said that the activities of “Free Tibet” had been widespread in the areas surrounding the entry causing the Chinese to keep the entry shutdown. The Nepalese locals had demanded to open the entry for business but neither Prime Minister Oli nor his Chinese counterpart listened to them. The government of Nepal had been losing billions of rupees worth of revenue collected at this entry when the business was as usual.

Construction of petroleum depots in three places in Nepal with the Chinese assistance had attracted wide publicity in the Nepalese media but Prime Minister Oli had nothing to say about it. If China was not sending oil to Nepal then what was the use of such depots in Nepal, no question about it?

Both China and Nepal skipped the hydropower projects that would be the huge projects for developing energy for illuminating not only Nepal but also Tibetan areas of China, and the neighboring areas of India, too.

What about the railways the Nepalese media loved to endlessly talk about, and dreamed of seeing the railways from China through Nepal to India, surely Prime Minister Oli ignored it or the Chinese did not want to talk about it, as Nepalese leaders had not been serious enough to talk about the serious mega projects that cost billions of dollars that Nepal hardly could think of investing.

Prime Minister Oli repeated the political rote that he would firmly adhere to the one-China policy. One China means, Hong Kong, Tibet and Taiwan are the integral parts of the Mainland China. To this he added that he would not allow anybody in the Nepalese land to work against China. These few words were for making pleasant musical sound to the ears of the Chinese leaders.

Now I would talk about the integrity of Prime Minister Oli.

On March 20, 2016, Prime Minister KP Oli took a newly brought-in plane of the Himalaya airline to fly to Beijing, China for the State visit provoking the strong reactions from the media and individuals to the use of the private airline sidelining the State-run Nepal Airline breaking every possible State rules.

Naturally, everybody asked the question why Oli did so. One of the media report hinted at Oli had interest in the private airline called “Himalaya Airline,” so he wanted the private company to make some money that might find the way to the Oli’s pocket.

Any market economist would say that Oli had done a right thing using the private airline, as it would flourish the private company. Surely, Oli did not use the private airline for flourishing the private companies then we could conclude that Oli had some interest and benefit using the airline.

If Oli were for making private companies grow then another question arose why he did vacate the licenses of the private companies for importing and distributing the petroleum products. If it were done for the high prices the private company had charged for the petroleum products, the market economists would say the market would take care of it, as the private company would not stand for long selling the petrol at Rs 130 per liter while other petrol pumps fed by the State-run companies selling at Rs 99 per liter.

What the sovereign people needed was to raise the voice against the civil officials that had hired the private plane violating so many rules for Oli to visit China. We needed to demand the government take the administrative actions against the civil officials involved in hiring the private plane for Oli to visit China. I myself had experiences in the minister and even high State officials verbally asking the officials to do things that went against the rules and regulations. If we were to succeed to punish those State officials for abusing the authority and not following the rules and regulations but following the verbal order of ministers or prime minister then they would never dare to do such things and Prime Minister like Oli could never use the State machinery for his personal benefit as he did now.

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Commission on Investigation into Abuse of Authority (CIAA) needed to immediately take actions against those civil servants that had been responsible for purchasing the services of the private airline not following the norms and standards prescribed for such a purchase, and breaching the rules and regulations that said they needed to buy such services from the State-run airline.

Concerning Prime Minister Oli vacating the licenses given to the private companies for importing and distributing petroleum products, Katak Malla wrote in his facebook account, “What the free market supporters have to say about the Nepal government's decision canceling licenses issued to private companies? Nepal's Council of Minister repealed licenses (17 March, 2016) that were issued to private companies for importing petroleum. The Nepal Oil Corporation and the China National United Oil Corporation had signed a memorandum of understanding (28 October, 2015). It was reported that the October deal will end the monopoly of the Indian Oil Corporation in Nepal, not to mention de facto blocked by the Corporation against Nepal. After all, the Marxist-Leninists, Maoists and Royalists had been ruling Nepal, why they should care free competition between companies.”

March 22, 2016

Annex

The agreements signed between Nepal and China, are as follows.

1. Agreement on Transit Transport between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal–Hon. Mr. Kamal Thapa, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Nepal.

2. Agreement between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal on the Construction, Management and Maintenance of the Xiarwa Boundary River Bridge, (Hilsa) Humla-Hon. Mr. Kamal Thapa, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nepal.

3. Agreement on Economic and Technical Cooperation between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal to implement Pokhara Regional International Airport Project- Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.

4. Framework Agreement on the provision of Mixed Loan between the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Government of Nepal to implement Pokhara Regional International Airport Project- Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.

5. Letters of Exchange on Project Initiation for the Feasibility Study on Chinese Assistance to Nepal for Exploration of Oil and Gas Resources-Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.

6. Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Population and Environment of Nepal and National Development and Reform Commission of the People’s Republic of China concerning the provision of goods for addressing climate change-Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance, Nepal.

7. Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Industry of Nepal and State Administration for Industry and Commerce of the People’s Republic of China to strengthen intellectual property system-Hon. Mr. Bishnu Prasad Paudel, Minister for Finance.

8. Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China and the Ministry of Commerce of Nepal on Launching the Joint Feasibility Study of China-Nepal Free Trade Agreement- Hon. Mr. Deepak Bohara Minister for Commerce, Nepal.

9. Memorandum of Understanding between China Banking Regulatory Commission and Nepal Rastra Bank- Dr. Chiranjibi Nepal, Governor of Nepal Rastra Bank.

10. Concessional Loan Agreement on Pokhara Regional International Airport-Mr. Baikunta Aryal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Finance

http://thehimalayantimes.com/nepal/nepal-signs-trade-transit-treaty-china/