KUMAR SHRESTHA |
There are worse places on Earth than KTM, believe it or not. Mogadishu, for instance, where they go 'dishu...dishu' on the streets day and night. Or Eastern Congo, where loony gun-toters need Nepali troops to stop them massacring each other. What's even more uncanny is how the
rest of the world follows our footsteps:
>Parts of Pakistan now have ten hours of load-shedding per day and they have added the element of surprise cuz you don't know when the lights go off.
>A Bolivian indigenous group that wants more autonomy for its resource- rich ethnically demarcated federal province has decided to announce an indefinite nationwide band. Tell me they didn't get that from us.
>Both Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales are sounding more and more like Chairman Superfluous when they threaten media critics with dire unspoken consequences.
>Britain is aping our coalition politics, and this could mean Westminster will start resembling BICC one of these days.
>Also in the UK, police have banned 500 Euro notes because (same reason we used to ban 500 and 1,000 Injun roops in Nepal) they found that 90 per cent of high denomination Euros were used by the underworld.
>And who would have thought the Thais of all people would begin tofollow our path towards urban chaos and republicanism? So, ahl iz well.
The late Girija Babu, before he started seeing Baddies as allies in the last year of his life, is remembered for having famously said that Maoists and Monarchists were one and the same. The trickle of Mandalays defecting to the Maobaddies is now becoming an exodus. Royalists and hindoo fundos have suddenly started accusing kingG of losing his nerves and crossing the floor to join hands with godless commies. Padam Dai, Tankababu have gone over and Loktantra Man has offered his home as a safehouse. And from the way Kamal Thapa is dishing it out on Mau Mau TV, it may only be a question of time before saffron meets red.
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While the Prachanda vs Baburam duet plays in the background, there are some comrades who are quietly projecting themselves as reasonable folks who can be trusted. Comrade Cloudy exudes the brooding confidence of a man who seems to have it all under control. Mahara Kamred has a couple of trump cards up his sleeves. Comrade CPG has gone a step further and hinted that maybe neither PKD nor BRB should be PM right now. CPji was in pretty confessional mode when he admitted to the party having been swindled by the folks at Unity Life. So it takes a pyramid scheme to bring out the greed in the baddies, and even extortionists can be extorted. But let it be known that the president, prime minister, various coalition ministers and secretaries have also graced various launchings organised by Unity's mastermind Kashi Prasad.
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The bush telegraph is throbbing as May 28 nears with news that Jhusil Koiralo went to meet El Capital at the Pistachio Palace the other day for a meeting that not even aides were let into. Then Comrades KPO and BRB burned up their hotline to come up with a solution. So, what's it going to be: an NC-led govt in which the baddies have a berth?
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Meanwhile, there is a roaring ongoing honeymoon between Cash Kumar Juicy and Comrade Awesome. FNCCI seems to have decided that if you can't fight 'em, join 'em and has started behaving like a political party. Juicy and Ferocious have been having lunches and dinners together to plan a mass rally at the behest of the baddies.
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Awful has ended up saying sorry to just about everyone he abused in his Munch speech, but not yet to the media. Is that why his cadre in the districts haven't stopped threatening and intimidating journos they think are too independent?
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