Girija Prasad Koirala has perfected the fine art of putting Pushpa Kamal Dahal in his place. Taming the Maoists he considers his main achievement. He likes to think that the international community would never have accepted the participation of the Maoists in the interim government without his personal guarantee.

Dahal, for his part, likes to point out to his senior partner in realpolitik that it was the Maoists that gave the mainstream parties an opportunity to wash away their past sins. Dahal is often impatient with Koirala's obduracy. He ridicules the prime minister's infirmity and supposed senility. He keeps threatening to look for an alternative to Koirala. That is unlikely to happen anytime soon.

Even with the support of all other leftwing parties in the interim parliament, the Maoists do not have the numbers to oust NC from government. Whether they like it or not, Koirala and Dahal are cursed to swim or sink together. What they need to do is to devise a strategy for mutual survival and save the country from further ruin.

Koirala must convince right-wingers in his party that the days of constitutional monarchy are coming to an end and the declaration of a republic isn't tantamount to a Maoist takeover. The Maoists are terrified of the outcome of elections. All the more reason not to give them any excuse to run away from the ballot.

The Fierce One has by now realised the futility of insisting upon a fully proportional election system but has to harp on it to keep ethnic pressure groups within his party in good humour. Jimmy Carter has offered a face-saving formula. Dahal needs to sell it to radicals in his party.

The hawks will resist the lure of electoral politics, and he has to show he is a leader and not a follower, and overrule them. The UML has an important role in keeping the seven parties together. Madhab Nepal tries to balance the boat by sitting sometimes on the left and sometimes on the right. He should actually keep himself tied to the oars. The seven parties need a common secretariat in Balkhu and not Baluwatar. Only the UML can keep the communication channels open between the NC and the Maoists.

Together, the three principal political parties must immediately stop making excuses to postpone elections. That alone will help ease the troubles in the tarai, lawlessness in Kathmandu and hopelessness in the hills. The parties need to do it not just for us, but for their own survival.

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