Rule Of Order Not Rule Of Law Back

Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

Rule of order not rule of law has been back repeating the history. Jung Bahadur has incarnated in the ceremonial President. So, President Dr. Ram Baran Yadav has used his order to save the job of a high-ranking soldier overriding the decision of the Prime Minister on firing the soldier on May 4, 2009. Ironically, Jung Bahadur was the first Nepalese Prime Minister to introduce the ‘Civil Code’ in Nepal but he reserved the rights to use his command above the ‘Civil Code’. Similarly, the first President of the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal also has put himself above the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007. Ironically, the legislators have elected him as the ceremonial President for taking recommendations of the Prime Minister for anything to do concerning the state affairs so that he would not commit any mistake. However, the evil spirit of Jung Bahadur entered into the mind and body of the first President and became the Jung Bahadur of the twenty first century Nepal.

Former King Gyanendra had scrapped the then Constitution of Nepal of 1990 on February 1, 2005, and brought back the former Panchas and put them on the ministerial positions and ruled by his will rather than follow the rule of law.

President Dr. Yadav stepped on the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007 on May 4, 2009, and brought back some of the former Panchas and some others with similar characters back to the ministerial positions, and made Madhav Nepal rejected by voters in two constituencies the Prime Minister of Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal.

Dr. Yadav has been shamelessly saying in public that he has directly written a letter to the high-ranking soldiers on the urge of the leaders of the eighteen political parties. At that time, probably, Dr. Yadav must have lost his power of logical thinking and must have lost his sense of being the ceremonial President responsible for safeguarding the constitution not the interest of the leaders of the eighteen political parties. So, he served the interest of those leaders some of them are former Panchas most of them are neo-panchas having the strong characters of Panchas. Now, Dr. Yadav could not escape from his abuse of the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007, and he has violated the rule of law for which he is subject to punishment. He would not escape from the punishment simply shifting his wrong doings to the leaders of the eighteen political parties.

The President has been the incarnation of Jung Bahadur in the real sense if the President imposes a presidential rule and then dissolve the Constituent Assembly (CA) Nepalis have elected for writing a new constitution and for running an interim government, then, the President would be the most powerful man killing all sorts of democratic principles and values, as Jung Bahadur killed everybody that stood in his way and became the most powerful man of his time. Some leaders after visiting India and having sincere talks with the Indian leaders have confirmed that the Nepali Congress leaders have approached the Indian leaders for their approval of imposing a presidential rule in Nepal and then dissolve the CA, then set up a constitutional writing commission on writing a new letter, and rule by command rather than by the law.

The current government is not much different from the government led by the then Gyanendra in 2005, as most of the ministers are not elected and former Panchas and neo-panchas. So, most of the ministers are not much different from those ministers of the Gyanendra regime. Minister of State for Agriculture and Cooperative Karima Begam has earned reputation for having an iron hand slapping the Chief District Officer (CDO) of the Parsa district and breaking his glasses on November 10, 2009. The District Police have issued an arrest warrant in the name of the State Minister after the guard of the CDO registered a public offence case at the District Police Office. However, State Minister Begam appeared on the Nepalese TV called ABC and counter charged the CDO with holding of her hand by the CDO after she got the tip-offs from the Prime Minister and the Home Minister.

Another woman Defense Minister called Bidhya Bhandari has been impatient to use the army at her disposal at any opportune moment. So, she has been saying that she is not for following the Comprehensive Peace Agreement the Government of Nepal has signed with the Maoists and wants an amendment to it so that she could use the army as toys available at the disposal of a naught child to hit at any another child. Reportedly, she has alerted the army on the days when the Maoist cadres blocked the government secretariat called Singhadurbar in Kathmandu embarrassing the Home Minister responsible person for the law and order, as if he could not handle the situation. Interestingly, why this woman Defense Minister has not sent her troops to the southern frontiers to cope with the Indians encroaching on the Nepalese territory.

Minister for Information and Communications Shanker Pokharel has earned reputation for corruption and nepotism putting pressure on the management of the State-run telecommunication company to provide the Non-governmental Organization of his spouse with donations of a huge sum of money and several telephone lines free of cost. As any other corrupt ministers, he has also publicly denied doing any such wrong things.

Very smart Home Minister Bhim Rawal has made an especial security plan to curb the activities of the opposition to the current government. He has even dreamed of using reporters as the state intelligence for collecting information for his ministry if the association of the reporters has not strongly opposed it. Mr. Rawal has been really smart giving tip-offs to the Minister of State Karima Begam to make up a story to counter the public offence case filed by the guard of the CDO she has assaulted. Now, the smart lady has accused the CDO of holding her hands causing her embarrassment for which she could do nothing but hit the unruly CDO.

Certainly, Prime Minister Madhav Nepal is the smartest of all ministers. He has outsmarted everybody becoming the Prime Minister even though the voters reject him not at one but two constituencies in the elections held for the CA. So, he has selected most of the candidates defeated in the elections for CA so that he could better work for themselves rather than for the people that have rejected them. However, Madhav Nepal is so smart that he has not stopped trumpeting that he is the elected Prime Minister. If the man has a little bit of sense of shame he would not have accepted the membership of the CA not to mention the position of Prime Minister without getting elected.

Prime Minister Madhav Nepal has been preparing for selling the state-owned Hetauda Textile Company and shelving the self-employment program. The Maoist government has initiated to resuscitate the company for producing fabrics for making the uniforms for the army and the police, and has introduced the self-employment project for creating jobs for the youths providing them with the credit of Rs 200,000 (about US$3,000) per person. This program would keep many job-seeking youths in country curbing the massive outflow of youths from the country for jobs in other countries.

Leaders of the eighteen political parties have successfully introduced the ‘rule of order’ through the ceremonial President pushing him to abuse the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007 claiming that in doing so they have saved the democracy: probably the sort of democracy they believe in is the ‘rule of order’ than the ‘rule of law’. In the past, Panchas also had parroting that they run the administration democratically using their authoritarian power to repress the people’ feelings. Currently, in the name of democracy, so-called democratic leaders mostly the neo-panchas are doing the same thing repressing the aspirations of the people for peace, political stability and rule of law.

Obviously, these leaders of the eighteen political parties want to use the state power in other words the army, police and administration to crush democracy. Defense Minister is impatiently waiting for using the army for repressing the people’s demand for the rule of law. Then, Home Minister is also to use his especial security plan to enforce the rule of order rather than the rule of law for continuing the rule of undemocratic people.

These guys know that real democracy means the people’s rule through the elected representatives. However, almost all the leaders of the eighteen political parties rejected by the people want to impose their democracy means the ‘rule of order’ rather than the rule of law. They are not for following the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007, so they want to hold elections for a new legislature as demanded by the Chairman of the Nepal Workers’ and Peasants’ Party. They also want to impose the presidential rule so that they can enjoy the power perpetually. They know that they cannot win the elections so the only alternative left to them is to use the ceremonial President as a scapegoat and rule the country by his order rather than follow the rule of law that is very hard to do for such unscrupulous leaders.

Jung Bahadur used his power to get the authority from the then weak head of state to rule the country by his order. He even secured the authority to transfer the power from the incumbent Prime Minister to the next brother on line making the head of state ceremonial in the real sense. Then the core group of the brothers concentrated the real power in their hands so that the brothers outside of the core group could not dream of reaching the most powerful position of Prime Minister through the hierarchy of brothers set by the incumbent Prime Minister. So, only a small core of the brothers held on to power for more than one hundred years.

Leaders of the eighteen political parties could not be the core group of brothers but they could be alliance of anti-democratic forces and put the democracy again in trouble. They want to repeat the history of the small group ruling the country. They want to use the President as the source of power and impose a presidential rule. So, they are not concerned with the legislature not working and not passing the budget and surely want to make the worst political situation for imposing the presidential rule. They believe that if they can achieve the goal of imposing the presidential rule then they would be able to rule the country at least for a few years without serious challenges from the people.

The most idiotic thing the President has been doing is he has been telling the public that he has been abiding by the law. He also has said that the current deadlock should be ended following the law and the constitution and he has been safeguarding the Interim Constitution of Nepal of 2007 for all Nepalis to follow obviously not for the President. If he has really followed the law and safeguard the constitution he would publicly apologize to the people for abusing the constitution and then revoking his actions if not resigning from the position. He has abused the constitution and caused the current political deadlock.

Probably, Nepalis have only two options at the current situation created by the corrupt leaders either to fight against them and finished them off peacefully or to back up the CA members to expedite the writing of a new constitution. So, Nepalis need to convince the Maoist legislators of the need for running the legislature smoothly and then putting pressure on all legislators to write a new constitution expeditiously or simply follow the Maoists’ movement against the current government.

Note: Panchas were the politicians of the Panchayat regime and had earned the reputation for being highly corrupted.

November 20, 2009.