On Indian support for Baburam Bhattarai’s faction
There are approximately 150 Nepali Maoist leaders including the real number two, CP Gajurel, being held as prisoners in India. Given the rationale for India to align the Maoists and the SPA, the compulsion to keep selective Maoists as Indian prisoners (while Red Corner nominees like Bhattarai were chauffeured around Delhi) seems out of synch.
It has been apparent for quite some time that India has gone to great lengths to selectively imprison only the Nationalist faction members of the Maoists. By doing this, India has ensured that the pro-Indian faction under Baburam remains a relevant force within the Maoists.
Be that as it may, for negotiations with the Maoists to be fruitful, discussions must be had in the presence of the main ideologues of the Maoist movement. Trying to substitute CP Gajurl and Mohan Baidya with Baburam Bhattarai and Hisila Yami is like swapping Ian Martin with Sushil Pyakurel (or Devendra Raj Pandey) to guarantee human rights in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A half way gesture full of good intent but with little in the way of tangible results.
Brining the imprisoned Maoists home is a job for the Home Minister Krishna Prasad Shitoula. The Home Minister (no pun intended) is well positioned to leverage his Panchayat contacts from his days in the National Sports Council and his contacts through his wife (in India’s legal Left) to cut a deal and bring the nationalists back to Nepal. What good is a face and a name when the people who “wrote the book” aren’t by Prachanda’s side to argue their points?
(More) On the law and order situation in Nepal
With the Maoist decision to recommend the continuation of their “people’s court” at the village and district levels, Nepal could become the safest country in the world. Most countries have a single legal system; Nepal will soon have two. One at the national level run by the SPA government and another at the local level, run by the Maoists.
In reality, this set-up makes a lot of sense, that is, non-sense. Even the UN has acceded that the SPA government has no hold over the countryside so in essence, the only functional legal system is that which is operated by the Maoists.
Let’s face it, a legal system that sanctions accused elements being thrown off of cliffs for “defying the party line” is one hell of deterrent! It’s just too damn bad for the SPA that there no laws in the Maoist rule-book that say that “SPA members should be allowed to return to their districts to campaign for upcoming elections” and “any Maoist found guilty defying this people’s provision, will be punished by extreme tickling till tears are dropped!”
Fortunately for the Maoists, all legal provisions at the national level (that previously prohibited their armed activities in urban centers) have been nullified. In fact, lately, when criminal activities go up, the government of Nepal politely asks the Maoists to check the rise in crime.
In response, it is rumored that the armed Maoists instruct their unarmed cadre to stop extortions and start donation drives instead. Crime takes a plunge, the Maoist coffers fill up, the Home Minster looks good and the Maoists look even better.
On the UN’s deployment of “assets” to help further Nepal’s peace process
Ian Martin did such a spectacular job of turning around the human rights situation in Nepal that his temporary posting to East Timor prompted rumors of an imminent collapse in Nepal’s peace process.
Apparently, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan agreed on Mr. Martin’s indispensability to Nepal’s peace process and sent him back to Nepal as the Secretary General’s Special Envoy.
Recognizing the vast potential for an amicable outcome from the upcoming peace talks, the UN has broken with tradition and sent a whopping two (that’s right, as in the number that comes after one) experts to shore up Ian Martin’s mission. One is a electoral process expert and the other, a military expert.
The electoral process expert will probably advise the government that an interim constitution will take at least another 18 months to draft and that constituent assembly elections won’t realistically materialize for another 24 months.
The military expert will probably consult with present and former Nepalese military officers (who have actually performed the role the expert is supposed to conduct in Nepal), to determine how best to contain the Nepalese military.
The expert (being who he is), will quickly realize that his job of “containing” the Nepalese Army, is practically done. Nepalese Army personnel are content earning a living without having to fight. The military expert will likely also realize that containing the Maoist fighters is going to be a little more challenging because they are interchangeable between civilians, party workers and Maoist militia, based on time and circumstance.
Cantoning civilians is probably going to be against human rights norms. Demobilizing Maoist party workers is going to be against the spirit of a democratic setup. The 100,000 strong Maoist militia is supposedly going to join forces with the Police and oversee elections – no point in keeping these people under watch. The UN’s military expert will experience a first hand ‘walk” in the shoes of the Nepalese military as the expert comes to terms with what he’s up against.
Naturally, the most logical conclusion that both experts are likely to arrive at is this: If the UN is to have a meaningful impact on the peace process, Nepal is probably short of 27 experts now, 297 experts in 3 months and probably 497 experts when the time comes to actually manage arms.
Funding for all these expertise might be an issue but hey, Nepal will take what she can get. Especially when someone else is footing the bill! Plus, we are talking about “expert” opinions here, from the United Nations and if these experts indicate the need for more experts to impart expert advice that result in exceptional outcomes, who’s to argue?
On the Maoist leaders’ expert opinions on budgetary matters
As with most practical matters of market economics, in the mind of Maoist leader Dina Nath Sharma, the Nepal Oil Corporation’s indebtedness is a ploy by the country’s feudal elite to suppress the progressive aspirations of the proletariat masses. According to Mr. Sharma, he is not ready to agree to any uplifts in the price of fuel, till his people have had a chance to personally examine the finances of the NOC.
Apparently, Mr. Sharma’s people have access to complex crude oil price projection models that have a 90% rate of accuracy in forecasting future fluctuations and their impacts on Nepal’s current account deficit. Incidentally, the same models also have the capabilities to formulate dynamic hedging strategies that assign weights to an evolving portfolio of foreign and domestic debt and equity instruments, straddles, currency exchange and interest rate swaps. Somewhere in this immensely complicated formula, the price of the aphrodisiac yarcha gumba is also factored in.
Either this or Pushpa’s prediction of a 300,000 strong militia that can go head to head with even India is an alternative to raising oil prices in Nepal. Perhaps the plan to is deploy a fraction of Nepal’s future militia to relieve American troops from Iraq in payment in oil. One never knows, Nepal’s Maoists are quite the mastermind strategists.
On the topic of Pushpa Dahal, his “inspection” of the cable cars that operate in Manakamana resulted in the most fascinating observation. Not long ago, this same cable car operations had to shut down owing to threats from the Maoists who at the time were on national infrastructure destruction spree. Surprisingly, yesterday, after having “inspected” the cable car system, the wise Mr. Dahal suggested that similar projects should be started in other parts of the country too.
The plan here is that once Mr. Dahal and his clan come to power, foreign investor confidence will be sky high. What’s more, according to Maoist forecasts, the world price of yarcha gumba is also expected to exceed the price of crude by 2009. Combined, there should be no difficulty in realizing Mr. Dahal’s goal to expand cable cars all over Nepal. No problem at all.
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