News just in: protesters in the Tarai are running out of petrol for their petrol bombs. Hurrah, the government strategy is working. Heard on the gas queue: the reason there is no petrol is because there is no diesel, the reason there is no diesel is because there is no government.
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It is a time-honoured Nepali tradition that whenever one political party wants to challenge another one, it goes to the people. And punishes them. Pretend I'm having an argument with you. Instead of hitting you I choose a passerby smaller than me and smack him on the nose. Seeing that, the chap I'm having an argument with also pulls a small kid out of the crowd and bashes him up.
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That is how our politicians have always behaved and that is how they are behaving now. Madhesi parties want their six demands fulfilled, so they declare a war on their own people and shut down the Tarai. Farmers aren't able to sell their produce, and Madhesis have suffered a lot more than anyone else. As long as it is poor Madhesis, leaders don't care.
Kathmandu also has a gas shortage, but that's not because of the Madhes. It's because we have such a bunch of bungling idiots running this country. Even an Ass would do a better job. Ass for president.
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Is it just the Ass or do many of you out there also notice the growing resemblance between our Eternal President, Prachanda Bonaparte, and Joseph (Uncle Joe) Stalin? But if Comrade Chairman would shave his moustache he would actually look like Great Leader Kim Il-Sung. Comrade Jit Bahadur is reportedly not pleased with the personality cult being built around President Lotus Flower, but can't say so in public.
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For those of you who are a bit behind on the fraternal relations between the DPRK and GONE, Maharababu went to the North Korean birthday bash and looked mighty uncomfortable when his host not just shook hands but entwined his fingers in those of our Honourable Informatics Minister and wouldn't let him go for most of the evening. This must be what they call the Juche Idea.
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The Ass mailbox is full of crackpot fans who send in unsolicited gossip, most of which is so libelous that it can't be published. But one of you has sent in a brainwave, which if implemented would solve our electricity crisis overnight. The only problem is: do we have the political will to implement it? 'How about,' writes the correspondent, 'giving every one of the 18,954 Maoists in the cantonments a stationary bicycle with a dynamo so that they can pedal away and generate some electricity?'
Wonder why the NEA hadn't thought of that one before. This way, the young comrades could get some exercise and shed some of that accumulating flab and the cantonments could be hooked up to the grid. The Ass' back of the envelope calculation shows at least 5 megawatts can be generated in this way, enough to light all the liquor billboards on Bagmati Bridge.
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The Maoist members of the Joint Monitoring Team get the UN's subsistence allowance of $300 a day, but apparently don't spend a cent of it during their inspection visits and lets UNMIN pick the hotel tab. Whether it goes to the party coffers or into the JMT member's own pocket is not clear, but one wonders where relatives are getting the dough to make the down payment to the manpower companies to go to Malaysia and attend computer classes. Also, the JMT comrades have now changed their revolutionary ringtones on their mobiles. Now they have the hit song from 'Dhoom' like the rest of us.
ass(at)nepalitimes.com
