 DIWAKAR CHETTRI |
When they signed the five-point agreement to extend the Constituent Assembly just before dawn on 29 May, the leaders of the three main parties swore to use the three month extension to conclude the peace process and finish writing the constitution. In return, the prime minister promised to resign. The prime minister has resigned, but on the constitution and peace there hasn't only not been progress, things have regressed.
All three big parties have been too busy with their internal power struggles and preventing each other from leading the next government to think about peace.
The only thing we can say about the debilitating power struggle within the NC is that given a choice between Sher Bahadur Deuba and Ram Chandra Poudel, most Nepalis will say: "neither". Three-time PM Deuba has shown himself to be an opportunist of the lowest order, who has done more to dismantle democracy in the past 15 years than even the Maoists. Poudel is an aparatchik who lacks the charisma and team-building qualities.
The UML is now a seriously divided political entity that has no ideology or principles left to speak of. It commands and protects a nationwide network of criminals whom it can't prosecute because they replenish the party's war chest.
Of the Maoists, all we can say is that it is a party that wants to have the cake and eat it too. Its leader is either unwilling, or incapable (or both) of dismantling its fighting force. Every time he meets leaders of the other parties, with Kathmandu-based ambassadors or UN officials, Pushpa Kamal Dahal is still giving them spiel about how he can't push the hardliners too far. He has repeatedly tricked the other parties by making empty promises he had no intention of keeping. He has hoodwinked the international community once too often. Now that he sees a deadend, and perhaps stung by a stern warning from the UN this week, he has made yet another promise of an integration package to sugarcoat his party's bid to lead the government. How can we be sure he means it this time?
Yes, a consensus government would be desirable at this point if only to assure the Nepali people that our feckless rulers have now realised their folly and have decided to work together. Anything less than that (especially a Deuba-led sarkar) would be proof, if proof is still needed, that all our so-called leaders are losers.
But a much more urgent question than who gets to head the next government, whether the CA is extended and for how long, whether it is a consensus government or a majoritarian one, is that this country can't go on with one of the political parties still keeping men under arms, threatening to go back to war, and using trickery, lies and empty promises to keep its guns and guerrillas.
The bottom line should be that the Maoists demobilise their fighters and dismantle the camps not by charming some editors with yet another timetable, but with concrete action on the ground. Before any further negotiations on the constitution the Maoists must be required to transform themselves into a civilian party. You can't write a constitution with a gun to the head, especially a North Korea-style constitution the Maoists want.
What is most important in the next five days is not so much who leads what kind of government, or whether and under what conditions the CA is extended. More important is explicit, time-bound and verifiable proof from Pushpa Kamal Dahal that this time he really means what he says. He has many promises to keep.
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