All Politics Is External

With Egypt having given Nepal some diplomatic wriggle room, Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal can now grapple with the country’s priorities as he steps across the southern border next month. Since China is only an observer at the Non-Aligned Movement, Nepal could hold a session with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the Sharm El Sheikh summit without any Chinese official higher than vice-foreign minister available to sniff around. This circumstance must have satisfied New Delhi’s us-first credo of hospitality.
Having burned its fingers with the Maoists, New Delhi has carefully desisted from putting its full faith and credit in the Nepal government. By portraying the Unified Marxist-Leninist (UML) leader as our first prime minister of Indian heritage, New Delhi took out an early insurance policy. The Indian media has done much injustice to Nepal the man – and to accuracy – by playing up that story line. But, then, Nepal knows better than to complain, even if Girija Prasad Koirala and Krishna Prasad Bhattarai have gotten a pass.
Oddly enough, India’s official and unofficial near-term policies on Nepal seem to be converging. New Delhi’s wants to allow political events in to take their course. As the facilitator of the 12-point agreement between the mainstream parties and the Maoists – and by extension the peace process – India is understandably vexed at the prospect of the crucial constitutional deadline being missed.
Far too many players have arrived in Nepal since April 2006 to spoil the game, but New Delhi retains the ability to come up with creative ways to nudge the process forward. Should all that fail, the possibility of reversing gear persists. Revival of the 1990 constitution – and all that entails – has certainly not entered the realm of impossibility.
What about China? Beijing refused to bail out Nepal in 1814-16 and between 1832-1842 despite clear treaty obligations. King Birendra and Gyanendra personally recognized the limits of Chinese friendship. (Their father, Mahendra, was shrewder in that he roped in the Soviets at the first stirrings of the Moscow-Beijing rupture.) The Maoists had come to inherit a dismal legacy. The Indians initially did not read too much into Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s northern tilt.
But the Chinese as well as the Maoists proved far too unreadable. As former Indian ambassador K.V. Rajan conceded recently, the Indians weren’t worried by the Maoists’ assiduous cuddle of the Chinese. It was Beijing’s embrace of the former rebels that was too stifling for New Delhi. Regardless of whether Beijing actually egged on Dahal to fire Army chief Gen. Rookmangad Katuwal – as the Indians alleged – our former rebels appeared to ready to profit from that perception. Dahal’s protestations that all those Chinese delegations came uninvited came too late. But, then, he couldn’t really have made such a declaration while in power, could he?
The Peace and Friendship Treaty now looks like a dud. But how many of us really saw that coming? The Chinese draft continues to cast a long shadow on that extradition treaty with India. The Koshi High Dam or any other water-resources project – among the bedrock Indian interests in Nepal – would have to overcome China’s own river diversification projects.
Against great odds, they built the Qinghai-Tibet train over permafrost. Diverting precious liquid would seem far more urgent. And perhaps easier, too, when you consider how the Chinese publicize scientific gains on a strictly need-to-know basis.
Nepal’s talks in New Delhi on the peace process, therefore, can be expected to transcend your usual internal-external categorization. Judging by the last minute breakthroughs our peace process has been able to score, the constitution may yet come out in time. But it is more likely to be, in UML chairman Jhal Nath Khanal’s recent revealing words, a compromise document. More attuned to the needs of external stakeholders than our own, he might have added.

Nepali Congress’ Collective Leadership Cloak

Nepali Congress spokesperson Arjun Narsingh K.C. maintains that his party will now adhere to a system of collective leadership. It looks like the nation’s self-proclaimed premier democratic organization is in for further democratization. K.C.’s assertion comes days after Dr. Narayan Khadka, another third-generation party luminary, made a similar insistence. Khadka’s language, though, made the idea sound more like a supplication than a stricture.
On the surface, the reasoning responds to the tight personal grip party president Girija Prasad Koirala has long been accused of exercising over an ostensibly open organization. By foisting daughter Sujata as leader of the party’s contingent in Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal’s cabinet over the objections of leading colleagues, Koirala has exposed himself to increasingly strident charges of nepotism. But the patriarch knows all this counts for little.
The Nepali Congress has tried its best to purge itself of “Koiralacracy” only to bring out the worst in it. Oddly enough, a Koirala led the first organized effort against family domination. Upset by the way half-brother B.P. was promoting his siblings Keshav, Tarini and Girija during the anti-Rana movement, Matrika Prasad raised the banner and almost immediately faltered.
The Panchayat-era wilderness forced the Nepali Congress to mount a united front (not counting the almost ceaseless defections to the partyless order.) But the deep resentment with which Koirala women were alleged to have bought bagfuls of saris with the Royal Nepal Airlines hijack booty was never really concealed. Rumors that Girija Koirala was about to bolt to the Panchayat side may or may not have originated at Chaksibari or Kupondole, but those two rival centers certainly whipped them up.
The restoration of multiparty democracy was bound to widen these rifts in full public glare. The platform of anti-Koiralaism was all too enticing and predictable. The theatrics at the Kalbalgudi convention was culmination of decades of bitterness. Ultimately, though, Ganesh Man Singh and – years later – Krishna Prasad Bhattarai were driven out of the party.
As the fuel of dissidence, anti-Koiralaism reached its peak in 2002 when Sher Bahadur Deuba succeeded in walking out with several former Girija Prasad loyalists to form his breakaway party. By failing to do anything beyond that, Deuba underscored the limits of that particular form of energy. After his vicissitudes, Deuba seems to have tied his fate – at least for now – with that of the Koiralas, thereby backing Sujata’s anointment. Koirala expressed his appreciation in public by finally visiting Deuba’s residence at Baluwatar.
For those who believe the Nepali Congress cannot survive without a Koirala at the helm, the choice has mercifully narrowed down to Sujata and Shekhar. Clearly, the daughter has the edge over the nephew, helped in no small part by circumstances outside the party. When a man defeated from both of his constituencies becomes prime minister and appoints another loser as his defense minister, critics cannot avoid squirming at the idea of singling out the foreign minister.
With Ram Chandra Poudel now elected leader of the parliamentary party and Deuba angling for the party presidency, internal NC dynamics may be on the verge of some steadiness. But a lot of things still need to be worked out before the octogenarian walks into the sunset.
Poudel would still probably need the good graces of fellow Tanahunan Govinda Raj Joshi to energize his constituent base. How better off would he be as prime minister than the incumbent? Deuba would require a giant leap of faith to avoid another allegation of ineptitude, which, coming from the people this time, would certainly seem more wrathful.
If Sujata could straddle between the military and the Maoists with the dexterity she has, there surely must be a way she might be able to gain the premiership by letting Poudel keep his position in the parliamentary party, regardless of whether Deuba gets the party presidency. The other movers and shakers – or at least those who think they are – are already contending for influence.
That’s where the concept of collective leadership becomes attractive. A Back-To-Village-National Campaign-style six-monthly stint by turns among the heavyweights may prove unwieldy amid the number of claimants. The Liberal Democratic Party’s model in Japan offers the façade to let factional bosses do their dark-room deals. But since the intent is to smooth the succession, the Soviet and Chinese models of the immediate post-Stalin and post-Mao years may be more relevant.
Come to think of it, the Nepali Congress need look no farther than the triumvirate mechanism B.P. Koirala put in place once he recognized he would not be around too long. How long one among the many would take to edge out his or her rivals would depend on a variety of factors. What can be said with reasonable certainty is that the next round of the nepotism and favoritism fireworks will fly faster and farther.

Principles Of Contradiction

The refrain is getter wackier by the moment. Senior Maoist leaders warn us with ever-increasing stridency of a “soft coup”. In the same breath, they insist on the inevitability of a Maoist-led government sooner rather than later. Dr. Baburam Bhattarai and Mohan Baidya, in particular, are relishing taking turns explaining this contradiction.
“We have credible information that attempts are being made to dissolve the assembly, sack Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and impose presidential rule with the backing of the army,” Dr. Bhattarai said the other day at a function in Tanahun district. The qualifier “credible” has underpinned almost every creepy Maoist accusation of the past, only to succumb the fastest to the next bizarreness.
Toward the fag end of their rule and immediately after stepping down, Maoist leaders warned of a restoration of the monarchy in some form. Not that the government hasn’t been giving them some ground by, for instance, relocating the proposed Republic Monument from the former palace premises to Ratna Park.
Yet the former rebels have largely desisted from personal attacks on the former king. Instead, they have chosen to zero in on the presidential-rule bogey. At the same time, the Maoists have been predicting their return to power as the logical conclusion of a peace process supposedly being subverted.
The universality, absoluteness, particularity and relativity of contradiction, as well as the distinction between the principal contradiction and the non-principal ones, are part of the core teachings Dr. Bhattarai and his associates have been raised on. The distinction between the principal and non-principal aspects of a contradiction may have long ceased to spin the heads of our former people’s warriors. The Great Helmsman’s celebrated essay on the subject perhaps remains required reading in certain circles. But in the average mind, questions keep swirling.
Is this rhetorical rigmarole a Maoist bargaining chip? Or a sinister ploy to delay the constitution to the point where their terms reign supreme? Or perhaps part of a nefarious design to precipitate a political “accident” and thereby position themselves to consummate their revolution without undermining the permanence of the struggle? Just as the country began staring those questions in the face, the Maoists clinched the support of the royalist wing of the Kollywood celebrity circle. Is a real Cultural Revolution in the offing or has a united front between communists and nationalists inched closer to fruition?
For now, Dr. Bhattarai claims Prime Minister Nepal and senior Unified Marxist-Leninist leader Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli are working on instructions from foreign elements to reverse the peace process. In other words, the prime minister is complicit in his own putative overthrow.
The former finance minister urged the people to be ready for another mass movement – which he christened a “people’s revolt” – to foil such designs. Yet he wondered in the same speech why the Maoists were still being criticized for not renouncing violence even after they signed the peace accord.
Of course, Dr. Bhattarai has the additional burden of assuaging his one-time Indian soulmates, who denounced the Nepali revolutionaries for having betrayed the revolution. So when the Maoists accuse other political forces of trying to push them back to war, they are addressing multiple audiences. Anyone want to try sifting through the principal and non-principal contradictions?

Chinese Horse Sense On Mustang

After high-profile visits to Mustang by a few other top foreign envoys, Chinese ambassador Quo Guohang landed in the district to thank the local people for helping to stop anti-Beijing activities. In an open gesture of goodwill, the ambassador assured residents that China would soon introduce a development package for the Upper Mustang region.
The amity did not stop at that. Guohang said he had requested Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal to spend the bulk of Chinese financial support in remote areas like Mustang. (Finally, the Chinese seem to have recognized the strategic merits of attaching strings to their foreign aid commitments.)
Behind the sentimentality, it is clear Beijing is worried about a resurgence of the “splittist” activities of the “Dalai clique” from the district that abuts into the Tibet plateau. The Free Tibet movement has become a more powerful vehicle combining its traditional glitzy global reach with an increasing recognition of the limits of nonviolence. Celebrities of all shapes are intent on saving one of the world’s last quaint and pristine regions even if takes some destructiveness in the process. A new offensive, advocates believe, is overdue, especially with the Dalai Lama advancing in age.
Like Taiwan, Tibet is a perennial sore China’s foes believe they must keep festering in order to pummel Beijing’s heart and soul. Nepalis are too busy with their own present to care too much about the geopolitical maneuverings of the past and the future. Instinctively, however, most Nepalis worry that a free Tibet would obliterate the country’s border with China, thereby leaving the field wide open for India.
Admittedly, the Chinese know the limits of western backing for the Free Tibet movement. With the Barack Hussein Obama administration’s Project Socialism predicated on Chinese purchases of American treasury bills, there is little incentive in Washington to tilt the applecart too steep. Should Wal-Mart suddenly lose all those cheap Chinese imports, who is to say how the American public would revisit the word “change”?
Beijing also recognizes that the American political class has to demonstrate displeasure with China periodically for domestic reasons. Throw in a couple of millions a year to a revitalized anti-Beijing rebellion and many of Obama’s congressional on the right would be quite happy.
Yet the Chinese are pragmatic enough to see the real threat. It is the internal security challenge – rather than Tibet’s outright detachment from the motherland – across the less-developed western hinterland that worries the one-time governor of Tibet, President Hu Jintao.
Indeed, a lot has changed since King Birendra ordered the Royal Nepalese Army to flush out the remnants of the fading Tibetan rebellion in 1974. Still, a little more light on history would be in order. President Richard M. Nixon’s opening to China may have convinced the Central Intelligence Agency to terminate its support to Tibetan rebels. But the impending end was visible long before that.
Mustang, in the eyes of the external sponsors, was supposed to be a transit point of the rebels. The Tibetans were expected to establish bases inside Tibet. Rebel leaders insisted they could not do so without arms. Weapons were airdropped, with the Americans keeping a close eye on developments inside Tibet. As the back and forth continued between the CIA and the Tibetan rebel leaders, the Chinese consolidated control along the Nepali border.
To be sure, sophisticated arms and improvements in aircraft payload capabilities would help overcome key weaknesses of the earlier rebellion faced. Improved communication, moreover, would facilitate movement and cut down the time between the acquisition of actionable intelligence and the mapping of operation plans.
As far as the regional biases that marred the earlier phase are concerned, however, not much can be said with certainty. Resistance leaders came from the same tribe or region and they chose for CIA training fighters mostly along the same ethnic and geographical lines. The majority of the trainees were from southeastern Kham (“Khampas”) and a few from adjoining areas.
A few Amdos and a handful of Goloks were also trained. The traditional rivalries and suspicions this fed weakened the rebellion from the outset. In the end, the operation could be suppressed when one key leader betrayed another.
A revitalized rebellion would, as then, depend on the Indians. Just as the Indians know that the Chinese won’t risk their bilateral partnership over Nepal, Beijing recognizes Delhi’s reluctance to gamble away ties over Tibet. But, then, there is the flipside.
If the Indians and the Americans could work together on Tibet during the height of the Cold War, when they were on opposing blocs, could the convergence under a Washington-New Delhi strategic alliance be anything short of compelling?

Relish The Redemption, Ram Chandraji

Just as Ram Chandra Poudel’s political fortunes seemed to have started plummeting, he has ended up atop the Nepali Congress. In the constituent assembly, at least. Well, technically.
Thrust into the dissident camp after party president Girija Prasad Koirala defiantly catapulted daughter Sujata to the cabinet, Poudel was exposed as a has-been. He made the perfunctory noises, together with new-found ally Sushil Koirala, but to little effect. At least Sushil has now found a valid reason to slip into retirement.
Poudel’s triumph at the parliamentary party elections reinforces the never-say-never adage, especially when it comes to horses cast in the darkest colors. Poudel got 61 votes, while his rival, Sher Bahadur Deuba, garnered 48 out of the total 109 cast in the second round of the long-awaited election. Contrast that with the first round, in which Deuba had won 45 votes, while Poudel secured 39, with the two other candidates – Kul Bahadur Gurung and Suprabha Ghimire – garnering a dozen each.
Professing his neutrality, Girija Koirala stayed away from the elections. Several other luminaries were absent for a variety of reasons ranging from the personal to – yes – the political. Going by their antecedents, Ghimire’s votes were probably going to go to Poudel. The surprise lay in the choice by Gurung’s supporters. His politics are certainly closer to Deuba’s in most respects. Something here simply doesn’t pass the smell test.
Granted, Deuba came nowhere near the 72-40 win he scored over Sushil Koirala after the Narayanhity carnage before regaining the premiership. Still, the twice-sacked premier’s performance this time was slightly better than his 2000 and early 2001 showing, when he unsuccessfully contested against Koirala. (Actually, the Deuba faction walked out of the polling venue in the latter instance when they discovered the balloting would not be secret.)
That was Old Nepal, for sure. But there was some expectation that things might still go Deuba’s way this time. First, the generals are on the ascendancy and aiming higher. Who can forget how Deuba, after the collapse of the royal regime, was still insisting that king retain control of the army in order to maintain the chain of command?
Then there was Deuba’s deafening silence during the thunder over Sujata’s nomination. True, the man probably hasn’t forgiven Poudel’s “betrayal” in the summer of 2002 when the former speaker had promised to accept the leadership of the breakaway Congress and had actually sent his supporters to the dissidents’ convention before throwing in his lot with Koirala.
Clearly, Deuba wasn’t entirely focused on payback, say, by denying Poudel the deputy premiership. If that were the case, what better way to batter Poudel than by letting him share power at a time when – so to speak – the ghosts are on their outrageously frequent snack breaks?
So the obvious question is, was there a Deuba quid pro quo with Koirala? Prakash Man Singh lamented that Koirala and Deuba had joined hands to send the controversial contingent for some unspecified purpose. Until the last moment, Deuba wanted Koirala to lead the parliamentary delegation. In the spirit of newness, Deuba could have forgotten the main plank of his challenge to Koirala at the party convention almost a decade ago: that the septuagenarian’s shoulders had become too frail to bear the entire burden. We certainly haven’t.
That’s why he’s the man to watch. As the results were being announced last week, Deuba was absent from the election venue. Eight years ago, Sushil had the decency to congratulate him and lock his arms in solidarity in a threesome with Girijababu. (Not that it really meant much.)
How events unfold in the days ahead would probably depend on what really happened. Was Deuba’s defeat a protest vote against Girija Koirala, especially since Sujata came out in open support of Deuba. Or, as is more likely, did our wily old man succeed in pitting those two perennially thorny leaders against each other to clear Sujata’s way over the long haul? Girija Koirala, we cannot fail to recall, was instrumental in Deuba’s ouster in 1996 and 2002. As for Poudel, the NC patriarch has already kept the new PP leader on a short leash by instructing him to keep the party intact.
All said, Deuba may start rooting for the rise of the fifth generation of Congress leaders – Gagan Thapa and younger. Or can we expect him to do something more immediate? Such as, say, start divulging the purported contents of the almost daily conversations Sujata supposedly has been having with Maoist chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal?
Relish the redemption, Ram Chandraji, as long as you can.