The cabal of nine left parties and another alliance of four left parties (that makes a total of 13 left partiesinNepal-morecommunistpartiesper headthananyother country on earth) have called for a two-day ban on fossil fuels next week. All 13 parties deserve to be nominated collectively for the Right LivelihoodAward,alsoknown astheAlternativeNobel Prize. No other political party in the planetary system has shown the gonads to take such a progressive step to curb the emission of greenhouse gases as has the Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist-Titoist- Trotskyite-Liu Shaoqi-Chou Enlai-Deng Xiaoping-Kim Il Sung). By the way, what's it with our comrades that their role models are either hirsute unsmiling fellows from Central Europe, or follicular-challenged menfromManchuria?

Be that as it may, in the final analysis it is not who their mentors are, but what their actions amount to. And on this score our comrades have shown a commitmenttotheworld environmentthatgoesway beyond petty national interests. In the International Panel on Climate Change in Kyoto, the rich countries agreed to cut back greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels, but no country is going as far as Nepal is: banning fossilfuelsaltogether.Granted, this is still only a token two-day bandh, but it is a bold and courageous move and at the rate we are going the bans could be extended to weeks, and then months. In a few years' time, the idea is to shut this country down completely. Nothing will move, and we won't needtoimportanymore fuelfromanywhereever again.

The question now is, given our open border, how are we going to enforce this ban? Our 13 left parties need to think up creative new ways to sabotage the internal combustionengine.Hereare some quick do-able things we canimplement immediately to enforce a fossil fuel ban:

. Turn sparkplugs into cigarette lighters

. Adulterate petrol and diesel with "thirst-pee" mineral water

. Stick corks into the exhaust pipes of all four-wheelers, including ox carts

. Turn petrol pumps into dairy outlets

. Distribute easy-to-assemble kits to all Nepalis so they can convert motorcycles into hair dryers

. Cannibalise Pajeros to make sofa sets and garbage pick-ups

. Turnmicro-busesintosolar-poweredmicrowave ovens

Once wedothat,the CPN(MLSTTLCDK)willbe betterplaced tobuild a socialist paradise in Shangrila.