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Sowing Seeds of Another Revolution
Siddhi B Ranjitkar
It looked from the recent media activities that the two-thirds-majority political parties had been just following the so-called anti-federalism and anti-any-forward-moving articles in a new constitution certainly sowing the seeds of discontent among the people and of course of the next people’s movement. Some provisions made in a new draft constitution had been clearly against the federalism, against the power sharing with the people particularly the ethnic, Madheshis, women, and the disadvantaged ones. We have seen how former king Tribhuvan sowed the seeds of the demise of the monarchy in 1950s, then his son Mahendra nurtured it in 1960s, and ultimately, his grandson Gyanendra matured it and killed the monarchy. The two-thirds-majority might not be doing similar things but it had tended to create an environment conducive to the disintegration of the country.
The Nepalese media had reported that the majority of the opinions received for a new constituent stated no need of ‘federalism’ and ‘secularism’. It sounds like a conspiracy to end the ‘federalism’ and ‘secularism’ in Nepal with the powerful hands of the two-thirds majority in the constituent assembly. No doubt about that they could do it but at what cost to the nation and to the people they needed to coolly think about it.
No need of ‘federalism’ had been the slogans of some political parties and certainly of some leaders of the NC and CPN-UML, too. To have the majority of the opinions of no need for ‘federalism’ reported in the Nepalese media, was fishy and it must be an open conspiracy to end the federalism, and to wipe out the gains made by the people’s movements, and to put the clock back to the unitary system in which the ruling class could enjoy every luxury of rights leaving the majority of the people high and dry.
The national statistics indicated that more than eighty percent Nepalese were Hindus but if we seriously thought about the non-Hindu ethnic people, Muslims, Buddhists, Christians and so on; fifty percent Hindus might be the likely accurate statistics. How could we keep the other fifty percent non-Hindus happy declaring Nepal a Hindu State?
Chairman of CPN-UML KP Oli questioned why we needed to make Nepal a secular state. If a leader of Mr. Oli’s stature questioned why the need for the secular state he surely did not understand why Nepal needed to be a secular state. For the information of Mr. Oli, Nepal needed secularism to keep Nepal intact in one piece forever. I did not know how much Mr. Oli would understand declaring Nepal a Hindu state would mean the sowing of a seed of the country to disintegrate given his academic qualification of honorary PhD mentioned in his CV, and the real education he had up to the grade eighth as his rival Madhav Kumar Nepal once told publicly.
We could not say anything about the Kamal Thapa’s party and his movement against the secular state if Mr. Oli were not sure for the secularism in Nepal. Kamal Thapa did not need to keep Nepal in one piece; he needed a position of a minister in the cabinet of his majesty or for that matter any other majesties. His slogan, and his activities were only the cover-ups for his personal gains. Some voters not exactly knowing the implications of making Nepal a Hindu state voted for the ‘cow’ symbol of the Kamal Thapa’s party. As a result, he had 24 slots in the current constituent assembly-cum-parliament. He thought it was almost the two-thirds majority, and with that number, he could change everything in the draft constitution to his liking disregarding the thirty million Nepalese.
The provision made for leaving the delineating and the naming of the provinces to the provincial parliaments in the preliminary draft constitution would surely invite infighting and chaos at the provinces. For any logical thinking person, it might look nice and democratic one, too. If somebody were to think seriously about it then the provision was made for surely creating chaos and confusion. Every province would fight for a larger area, and try to expand its territory by any means. We could anticipate nothing but the infighting or open fighting among the provinces. Chairman of CPN-UML continued to insist on having a new constitution without borders and names of provinces.
See http://thehimalayantimes.com/kathmandu/oli-for-naming-pradeshes-after-statute-promulgation/
Then, the provincial parliamentarians would have a great chance of fighting for the names they would like to have for their provinces. Again the provincial parliamentarians would not be able to make a final decision on naming the provinces. Another chaos would prevail in the eight provinces not being able to name the provinces. That would just prove that the federalism was a failure in Nepal, as once former king Mahendra had proudly said that democracy was not fitting to the soils of Nepal. That was a deadly mistake of Mahendra that led the monarchy to the death.
What were all the two-thirds-majority parties doing if they were not for creating an environment to say federalism was a failure? It proved that Prime Minister Sushil Koirala was no doubt a great conspirator. He worked from behind the screen in his party when he was a little known leader not more than a senior cadre of the party. He designed and planned to hijack the plan carrying a load of banknotes for the Nepal Bank in Biratnagar in 1960s. Now, his conspiracy to end the ‘federalism’ has been at work. It worked really well at the straightforward leaders of the UCPN-Maoist but not at the ethnic and Madheshi people so far.
The preliminary draft constitution clearly bypassed the ethnic people and Madheshis not mentioning the proportional representation of all people in the state businesses as the previous governments reached the agreements with. Nowhere in the preliminary draft had mentioned the proportional representation of the ethnic and Madheshi people in the state machinery. About 20,000 Nepalese had lost the lives fighting for the equal rights in their own country. The previous governments had reached one agreement after another with the ethnic people and the Madheshis to provide fundamental rights to all Nepalese for having a say in the state businesses. But the two-thirds-majority political parties had thrown all those agreements to a trashcan, and came out with the rule of the two-thirds power or the rule of thumb surely not the rule of law. With his shrewd conspiracy, Mr. Koirala sowed another seed of creating an environment conducive to the disintegration of the country.
Constitution Drafting Committee headed by NC leader Krishna Prasad Sitaula shamelessly deleted the certain rights given to the women in the interim constitution of 2007. He deleted the rights of the mothers to secure the citizenship certificates to their offspring. Another provisions made for the women in the draft constitution was that women had to wait for fifteen years to make their husbands eligible for Nepalese citizenships if they were to wed non-Nepalese men but non-Nepalese women could have citizenship certificates next day of the wedding if men wedded foreign women. What was logic in it Mr. Sitaula needed to explain? That was nothing but denying Nepalese women equal rights.
The next serious drawback in the draft constitution had been the lack of a directly elected prime minister or president. Direct elections to the president or prime minister means a candidate winning the office would need to secure at least thirty five percent of the total votes across the country considering forty or more percent voters would stay home, and fifty percent of the votes cast would be sufficient for winning the elections. In this case, any candidate aspiring to be the directly elected president or prime minister needed to persuade such a large number of the people to vote for him/her to get elected. But in the parliamentary system, every candidate would need also 35 percent of the total votes in his/her constituency but the actual number of votes s/he would need would be considerably small. Each constituent would form the majority of 15,000 to 25,000 voters not more to win the elections. So, each candidate could focus on such a small group of voters to get elected and then to the office of prime minister or ministers or even the president.
Another most dramatic negative aspect of the preliminary draft constitution was keeping intact the making of parliamentarians as the ministers not the persons outside of the parliament. Ministers would ignore their legislative responsibility and certainly they would not perform the legislative duty once they became ministers. After taking the office, their main focus had been and would be in the future too on making money for the next elections. That was the main culprit that made most of the ministers corrupt. Corruption had pushed the country backward, and kept the majority of the people deprive of the twenty-first-century development.
Had former king Tribhuvan held the constituent assembly elections to craft a new constituent in 1950s, the monarchy would have lasted forever. Then his son Mahendra mercilessly killed even a little democracy left and introduced his one-man-show called the panchayat system in 1960s creating an environment conducive to the death of the monarchy. Finally, his grandson Gyanendra introduced his authoritarian rule in 2005 sending the monarchy to the grave in 2008.
The two-thirds-majority political parties had been running the parallel episode not for the demise of their political parties but for the ultimate disintegration of the country. The political leaders having the two-thirds majority in the parliament thought that whatever they said and did was the right things fitting to the destiny of the Nepalese in general. They believed that they did not need to consider the ethnic people, Madheshis, and women for making decisions on the matter concerning their destiny, too.
Denying rights to the ethnic people and Madheshis and women meant inviting the revolt against the establishment. The northern people and southern people, and of course the people in the mid hills would rise against the injustice done to them. In course of seeking justice and if they were not to receive timely justice then they might opt for independence for them. That was what the symptom already shown in the south. The northern people yet to rise as did the southern, and the mid hill people.
The international situation had been conducive to the uprising of the ethnic and Madheshi people. The international situation means the relationship between China and India. The China-India bilateral treaty on opening the Lepu-lekh pass had amply demonstrated that both China and India disregarded Nepal. Neither China nor India had any strategic interest in Nepal. Unlike in the past, China and India had developed mutual trust, and they could resolve their problems. They did not need to make Nepal a conduit.
In the worst-case scenario, both China and India could make uprisings of the ethnic people to the north and Madheshis to the south against the establishment, and ultimately demand the separation. So, the two-thirds-majority political parties might be unknowingly working as the puppets of both the northern and southern neighbors. That might be the reason why both China and India could ignore Nepal while reaching an agreement on the Lepu-lekh pass. In this case, none of the so-called saviors of democracy would come to rescue Nepal from disintegration, as they might think that Nepal had been the sphere of the influence of China and India not of theirs.
During the brief war, China fought against India in 1962, the Indian army made an outpost at the Lepu-lekh pass on the Nepalese territory where China, India and Nepal have the common borders. The Nepalese authority had informed the then king Mahendra of the situation in the Lepu-lekh pass. Mahendra did nothing for the fear of inviting the wrath of the Indian leaders particularly of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
Currently, the Nepalese intellectuals had been making loud voices against the Lepu-lekh agreement China and India reached but the Koirala government had been not much interested in doing anything seriously against. Foreign Minister Mahendra Bahadur Pandey said that the government would make a diplomatic approach to the Lepu-lekh pass agreement China and India had reached on. UCPN-Maoist, and CPN-Maoist had submitted the note of dissent on the agreement to the Chinese Embassy and the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu.
The people of Thabang rejected the preliminary draft constitution. They did not give any suggestions to the visiting members of the constituent assembly stating the draft was nothing more than the old wine in a new bottle. See the news item on it: http://www.ratopati.com/2015/07/19/218874.html. It was the beginning of the end if the concerns of all people were not addressed in a new constitution. India has even told Chairman of UCPN-Maoist Prachnada to include the concerns of Madheshis in a new constitution while he was in India during his visit starting on July 14, and ending on July 19, 2015. http://www.ratopati.com/2015/07/19/218769.html
People of the far western Nepal and other districts also complained that they had not received sufficient copies of the preliminary draft constitution. So, collection of suggestions from the common folks had been simply ritualistic. Common folks had blamed the secretaries to the Village Development Committees for not properly distributing the draft copies of a new constitution, and for not taking the drafts to the villages rather storing them at the district headquarters.
http://thehimalayantimes.com/latest/feedback-collection-just-a-formality-complain-far-west-folks/
http://myrepublica.com/politics/item/24861-draft-constitution-yet-to-reach-vdcs.html
http://myrepublica.com/politics/item/24816-vdc-secys-storing-constitution-draft-in-headquarters.html
Prime Minister Sushil Koirala said, “Constituent Assembly members have reached all the 75 districts to collect people's feedback on the draft. The CA has set Monday and Tuesday for collecting public feedback on the draft constitution.” - See more at: http://myrepublica.com/politics/item/24823-pm-renews-commitment-for-consensus-based-statute.html#sthash.7lkMlCZU.dpuf
The “Committee On Citizen Relations And Public Opinion Collection” of the constituent assembly published a notice in the state-run newspaper called ‘gorkhapatra’ in the Nepalese language calling on all Nepalese in country and abroad to give their suggestions to the members of the constituent Assembly visiting them on July 20 and 21, 2015 or send their opinions to the following addresses by July 21, 2015: www.can.gov.np or comt.cres@gmail.com or nparl.international@can.gov.np or fax: 977-1- 4200194 or 4200053 or 4200141, or write to P. O. Box 20099 Kathmandu or call toll free telephone: 1660122344.
July 18, 2015
