Nepali Times
PRASHANT JHA
Plain Speaking
Blustering reality


PRASHANT JHA


KIRAN PANDAY

In the middle of 2007, there were murmurs from the Maoists that they would quit the interim government unless a republic was declared immediately and a full PR system adopted. No one believed them, but they did walk out. Last year, the city was abuzz with speculation about whether the Maoists would sack Katawal. For whatever reason, they went ahead with their threat.

Over the past ten months, the Maoists have fluctuated a lot but throughout, they have been consistent about three things – we will not cooperate with Madhav Nepal; the next government should be under our leadership; and we will hit the streets to achieve our goal. The present stalemate persists because the Maoists have not budged.

There is a simple lesson here – take Maoist rhetoric seriously. They do not operate using the same strategies and tactics as other 'normal' liberal democratic parties, and usually end up doing what they say they will.

The Maoists are now preparing for their biggest show of strength ever, in both Kathmandu and other urban centres. From Ramechhap to Saptari, village committee members have been told to collect food and be ready to come to the capital at a moment's notice. Some from within the party have been sent to the cantonments to receive basic military skills (something UNMIN should flag up if it has come to their notice). In internal training sessions, comrades have been told this is the 'decisive battle'. Even as the other parties are asking the Maoists to become a 'civilian' party, smaller party units have been reorganised on 'military' lines.

So what is the aim?

Those at the bottom of the pyramid do not quite know. They have been told it is time for 'janabidroh', a people's revolt, but are ignorant of the larger political game.

At the top, everyone agrees on the need for mass protests and that there is no question of 'surrendering'. But there are differences about what this entails.

Kiran and company seem to think mass mobilisation, infused with a semi-violent apparatus, can enable them to capture the state. But the pragmatists within have argued that for a janabidroh to succeed, four elements are necessary – popular mass upsurge; a militant party apparatus; a division within the state security forces, especially NA, with the lower levels refusing to shoot; and support of sections of the international community. At best, the Maoists have the first two. Even there, the popular support of the middle and lower middle class in Kathmandu cannot be guaranteed given their 'vacillating' nature. Moderates in NC and UML, one might argue, would also get pushed towards the right-wing, ruining existing achievements.

Prachanda is shrewd enough to recognise that a unilateral seizure of power is not possible. But he also knows that the sole basis for a lot of Maoist bluster is the claim that they have a solid organisational and popular base. This is the time to prove it. Maoists say they will get 400,000 people out on May 1, which is definitely an over-estimate. Many in government are probably underestimating Maoist strength when they think the turn-out will be less than 100,000. But as soon as we get into that range, who really knows how to count?

The Maoist premise is that the non-Maoist politicians will get cold feet, the security organs will not want to get into a confrontation, and India will then try to stitch together a deal rather than risk a conflict with unknown results. If they do arrive at an agreement, the calculated gamble will have paid off. But if the non-Maoist camp does not blink, given that many feel the Maoists are bluffing (since they need a CA extension the most), then this could well go over the brink.

Rationality, logic and objective conditions suggest that there will be protests, but then the netas will hammer out something that allows them to continue to loot the state. But common sense is not the hallmark of Nepali politics, making predictions a hazardous task. Either way, the next few weeks will be critical, with long-lasting consequences for the nature of the state and who will dominate it.

READ ALSO:
Gandhians without guns- FROM ISSUE #499 (23 APRIL 2010 - 29 APRIL 2010)
PLA integration in constitution writing - FROM ISSUE #499 (23 APRIL 2010 - 29 APRIL 2010)
Shadow-boxing - FROM ISSUE #499 (23 APRIL 2010 - 29 APRIL 2010)



1. Ram lal
Well, come on, you are going to say this, aren't you? After all, you've been training the Maoists on their media strategy, thereby seriously compromising your own independence, and making readers like me question your judgment.



2. kris
Thanks Ram lal letting know about this columnist. Hmm--Journalist trained Maoist leaders. Hope they train how to use media in support of Maoist and how to fool uneducated Nepalese people in favor of them. Nepalese journalism has been influencing by powerful leaders and parties. After death of Girija, Journalists have started to back Maoist supremo. Good luck Prashant. You will be the first victim when they seize the power.


3. KiranL
"You better believe the Maoists when they threaten to kill you because I have been training them in media relations."


4. Sunita Tiwari
The mindset of people like Ram lal (1) is that it is ok for any professional to be affiliated with any party but it is a sin for any professional to even see, listen or talk (except, of course, cursing) about the Maoist. After all, they were foolishly voted by the good-for-nothing ignorant and what not Jungali Nepalese who know nothing.

5. Arthur
Sunita Tiwari, yes it is a fascinating mindset.

Its interesting that this issue doesn't have the usual 3 or 4 articles against federalism and Kunda Dixit's "publisher's note" has an air of detached disconnection indicating he can no longer pretend to himself that what he says can actually influence events.

I get the impression of people knowing that they have been marginalized and just waiting to see what the new mainstream has in store for them.

Prashant Jha's reference to the anti-Maoist camp perhaps not blinking if they feel the Maoists are bluffing and really need an extension of the Constituent Assembly is odd too.

Its hard to imagine MKN blinking. He seems to be in a trance, just mouthing meaningless phrases, waiting to be carried off stage.

This could be a good time to actually publish the proposed Constitution to be adopted from the streets after May 28 so that these fearful middle class people can actually start thinking about their own place in the new Nepal that the "good-for-nothing ignorant and what not Jungali Nepalese who know nothing" are determined to establish.

At present they seem to only have their fears to think about. The sooner they can turn their attention to adapting to a known future rather than nameless fears, the quicker they will actually adapt.


6. K. K. Sharma

This article has nothing new. Since the begenning, the Maoists had quite frankly said that their's was "a protracted war of attrition", and after 2005 they had said this protracted war of attrition, was improved upon by what they had called, " war with other means"..... meaning using the useful idiots, tactical bargaining, and agreement ploys, and using the other parties tosupport and  further their agenda.
War of attrition is not for quick victory, but eventual victory after wearing out and making the enemy tired and demoralised. Now that  their enemy number one is out, time now is for taking on the enemy number two, three etc. 




7. Satyajeet Nepali
What else needs to happen before Nepali people realize that the so-called "peace process" is the greatest sham in the entire Nepali history! It was a Maoist gameplan/trap through and through, and one that our media (and parties) sold off to us as "peace"! Even the Panchayat never came up with such elusive propaganda. And let us note (at least those of us with a straight enough spine to be honest), that the king and Army had repeatedly warned the Nepali people, parties and our great heroes in media of the dangers of falling into the Maoist trap! We can only start hoping for peace when our information-enterpreneurs and opinion-makers are honest enough to acknowledge and publicly admit their mistakes. Unless that happens, you can count that they will continue to come up with new lies to cover up the old ones, and in so doing, continue to fool the Nepali populace to eternity!

8. Ram lal
Sunita Tiwari,

You are entitled to your opinion. Unethical amateurs can do whatever they want. Professionals have only one thing to guard: their reputation. One important aspect of safeguarding that reputation is avoiding all appearances of conflict of interest.

It's the writer's prerogative to disregard this, and do as he pleases. But risk of doing that is to be prepared to accept that most reasonable readers will stop believing a word he writes. 

For example, when he writes, as in above, "take Maoist rhetoric seriously" shortly after he's given the Maoists a media training (presumably he accepted money for providing such a training), most reasonable people have every right to put these two published facts together to raise eye-brows and judge him through coloured lens.      



9. rajbhanu

Well, this lawlessness and the "rulers of law" will continue to have a simbiotic relationship because of the uncountable benifits ! Every other non-maoist politician is blaming the maoists and bagging the gain. Infact they have always bagged the gain but together with the whisper of blame but now the blame can be thrown straight to the maoists ! What an opportunity ! "Laddu" on both hands !

"Maoists want a dictatorial constitution." This is what was heard from a congress leader. My question is when everything has to be accepted by a majority where does his statement stand ?? This would rather put them on the lime light of "against" the constitution drafting.

Lets buy their logic. Maoists are vile, vicious and unlawfull. The current situation of chaos and impunity is solely due to the maoists. If so why are the rest of the "good" parties and its "responsible" politicians not responsible enough to form a unity government as according to the proportion from the latest election ? Afterall that was the public's mandate. Nobody is interested in drafting the constitution atleast that is what can be perceived from their recent actions. Everyone is interested in holding on to a lavish chair and enjoy its amenities.

This chaos shall prevail and we the general public shall suffer. In the mean time everyone else shall prosper since this is how they wanted-to be the "rulers of law."



10. Sunita Tiwari
Ram laljee (8),
You can judge Prashant as a Maoist influenced writer as he provided some sort of training to Prachanda and Co. You may also think similarly about a doctor who examines him for money or a barber who cuts his hair and so on. You are your own boss and I respect your freedom of thought as I myself exercise this liberty. 

My question is: do you think similarly about professionals who are affiliated to Nepali Congress or  CPN UML for that matter? Do you judge articles by Dixits', Kul Chandra Gautam and the likes with colored lens as they are completely indoctrinated by Nepali Congress and royalist (constitutional!) ideology. Since they believe that Maoist are the one and the only problem the country is facing, do you raise eye-brows while reading their articles. 

If you do, we stand on the same line. If not, I simply beg to differ.


11. Slarti

Have you ever been surprised at a surprise party which you organized for your friends? 

No? Then tell me, why should every commentator, policy maker, politician, and agragami's in general, feign surprise at what the Maoists are doing now?

Perhaps a whole lot more importantly, why should anyone, at all, feel sympathy for any of these surprised and disappointed actors? Beats me!

The only option left for this clique of opportunists, who have never shown any love for their country, is to resign, throw away their Dhaka topi's and kiss the ground of every dead persons house, and with heads hanging in shame say, for once, just for once - "we are sorry, for trying to make a fool out of everybody. We knew this was coming, but our greed got the better of us."

That is not likely to happen; there would be another flurry of conciliatory statements. Friends and collaborators, who are for now enemies, will be friends again. They would be sitting at slightly different sides of the table, but they would still be saying broadly the same things. That is until the stage is all set for the final assault and the time is right for the final putsch.

Now imagine this - what if you really were surprised at your own surprise party? Fun that.



12. Surya Acharya
I think doing what one says, and achieving what one intends to are two different things. 

Maoists scored well on the former, but terribly failed on the later, if the post- CA election events are of any reference.  


13. rishav
I think everyone does take the Maoists seriously about what they say and plan to do. After all they planned and instigated an insurgency which cost the lives of 14,000+. The problem as you mentioned Prashantji is their ability to be negotiated with, their stubborn non-diplomatic stance and inability to budge which has cost them politically. At the end of the day the Maoist have proven to be extremely destructive but also self destructive as well.

They will carry out street protests but will they be of the same support of the last "Andolan," probably not. People are becoming more tired , wary of them and have also started to see them exactly like the other politicians just harsher in the ways that they express themselves.

In order to predict what they will do next you must first try to gauge their mindset. As proven in their negotiations with the other parties in the coalition government rather than budge on certain issues they will prefer to see the country burn and even help it in the process. It is their mentality to rather destroy something that's not controlled by them and then to recreate in the way they want. So if they can't get their way now they will go for the jugular of the nation eventually many people will die because in their twisted mind set they speak only for the people no one else, no discussion on that and therefore have the right to destroy the nation and recreate it in their image.

If middle class foreign(particularly from the west) communists who live in nice flourishing democrat states, reaping it's benefits, but in attempt to try sound a bit cooler compared to your peers fool yourselves into loving communism and decide to impart your twisted views on this site well where not buying it frankly. So please just stop and get on with your lives in your flurishing democratic states that supports and allows you to vent your hate towards it.


14. tomHank

I have no doubt that all those assumed 400,000 people going to be gathered in capital Kathmandu in May 1st will piket katuwal's house(Like Sarad Chandra Shah's house in 2046BS) and KP Oli house. Nepal can no more be ruled by the small clique of Kathmandu's elites- corrupts as hell and inepts as monkey. 

Prashant Jha is a talented star of Nepali journalists who has ability to potray the inner working of the thing with acute dissection- he just revealed it again, but you guys are still detesting to accept the reality.  



15. Arthur
Suraya Acharaya, because the anti-Maoist parties refused to do what they said, the coalition led by Maoists could not achieve as much as it intended. So completely unlike the parties that don't mean what they say, the Maoists resigned instead of pretending that they could achieve a new Nepal by staying in government with the old feudal army still refusing to be democratized.

Since then there has been almost a year of the old parties once again proving to everyone what both Panchayatis and Maoists knew about them since the 1990s.

Now pretty much everybody knows they are completely useless and incapable of either doing what they say or achieving what they intend (apart from a bit of personal looting).

Even a majority of MKN's own party wants him to resign.

It would be surprising if that is not what the Maoists intended to happen when they resigned. It is not just coincidence that the Maoists have grown stronger and their opponents weaker.

So it would be better to assume the Maoists are capable of achieving what they intend.

Whether it will be done be peacefully or not is still unfortunately up to the other parties and the Army.

They will be faced with hundreds of thousands of people insisting on carrying through the goals of the second people's movement and a general shutdown of Nepal until that is achieved.

Such a crowd cannot be easily dispersed by police batons.

The people will be sufficiently armed and trained, even though only with sticks and knives, that the police would be stupid to attack.

So the demonstration and shutdown will be peaceful unless the Army attacks with firearms.

But even Slarti and rishav know that won't save the old Nepal. They succeeded in killing more than 10,000 last time but it didn't save the monarchy. Killing another 100,000 won't save the parties that had to promise a new Nepal from having to accept it actually happening in reality instead of just words.

So we can assume the present government will have to admit its complete failure and let the people proceed with building a new Nepal.

Slarti and rishav can be upset about that. But there isn't much they can do about it, and they know it.


16. Avik

Stop bickering and whining you lot..all of you...use your intellect for a better cause...politicians and recently media have the habit of following the the river with the most spate..such is Nepal....

By the time you realise the true intent of the maobadis it will be too late...so wake the hell up....its not liberation..



17. Nirmal

If I were a Maoists' political adversary(not enemy as the Maoists love to term their opponents, the ones who wish to compete in multiparty political system but isn't totally happy) I would have let their movement, however they want and whatever they name, happens once for all, of course being myself within the frame of democratic legality. Can you imagine what a movement of 400000 persons implies to shake the environment? The maoists know this better than anyone else(Prashant seems not quite sure) that's why the maoists are here and there managing every kind of resource which included Prashant's and others journalistic lectures too to follow(this particular event sounds passionating!). No doubt they are the champion ones in bhidtantra right now. Well, the most easiest drive would be to again start extortion, kidnapping, murders, loots and it is not a hidden secret that they do think of all these possibilities to explore while gaining political space tactically.

 

 Thaksin of Bangkok can bear the expenses economically and politically within and outside, the Kirgish movement have neither any similarity nor such kind of background with the one Maoists are proposing. Prachanda can behave as crass as Hugo Chavez and Daniel Ortega but we are not in Venezuela and Nicaragua! I would recommend the Maoists to save their energy for coming elections if they have any real agenda for the country apart from their superficial way to touch everything in general, how is it said? Jack of all, master of none in politics, perhaps. My guess is that this movement given it creates chaos -a possible dream of the Maoists in pipeline- will adversely affect the Maoists' future. And morerover empirically, there is no guarantee that a govt toppled from the street can bring about political stability anywhere in the world. Is there any example to contrast it? There are orange, green, red, blue and so many revolution but with no successful career during last four or five decades. Today the real threat of counter- revolution comes from the Maoists itself ie from their military regulatory guidelines in large scale.

 

The clues of impertinence and ignorance

 

1. Recently a portrait of Lenin and Hitler playing chess was exhibited in a museum of London with the signatures of both personas and a lady teacher as a testimony to the fact. It could be that they were following nepali political spirit: no one is a permanent friend or enemy in politics, I guess. But why chessboard? mind blowing, na?


2.The chinese bureaucracy in an attempt to compile the documents from their cultural revolution found a diary of a girl who enjoyed a close and active relation with the red army during the chinese revolution, between thousands that the chinese are classifying to make public these days as a way to protect historical memories. The story was like this, the girl once saw that a pig was trapped badly because of immense excretion of the same pig farm. She remembered Mao and his high voice and rescued the pig. But when she came back to home with the smell, her mother told her that being a girl it was not a good idea to do so. She answered, "Mao says that it was of more worrisome that your ideas stain you than you are marked dirty." Her diary had several lines erased(censored)before making it public.


3. President Evo Morales from Bolivia disclosed his discovery in a conference on climate change recently, "Europeans are bald because their foods are consist mostly of transgenic products and If you eat chicken you have 100 percent possibility to be attracted by the same sex," claims the fervent indigenous leftist leader who also represents the new political alliance of Latin American spectrum. Some hundreds of masculine homosexuals from Chile staged a rally right after and the slogan was: Yo no como pollo Yo como polla( I don't eat chicken I eat penn..).


4.I remember the kathputali nach in festivals of Terai, those dedicated to children. A doll very often found at the bottom of the stage and said, "I'm away." Immediately afterwards, the same doll approached the stage and said: "Now I'm near." Occasionally he/she took a handful of candy and the phrase was: 'I have little candy. " But in the picture below is filled with sweets: "Now I have lots of candy." When you are small it is important to have much of any thing. So we were educated and we educate.

 

 

The question is: In the triumph of quantity, how would you assess the love?



18. Ram lal
Sunita Tiwari,

This article was written by PJ. Hence, my comments were about PJ's recent well-evidenced complicated extracurricular activity. 

The only thing I'm assuming is that he was paid for his efforts; and, if that is true, that further diminishes PJ's credibility as an 'independent' journalist. You are free to call him or anyone else a 'star journalist' or a 'moon reporter'. I could care less who's a star and who's a moon in a profession in which the average shelf life is a little longer than that of a cat-walking model. 

My sympathies if you are blind, but this article was not written by K Gautam or the Dixits. Therefore, there is no valid point in dragging Gautam or Dixits into this comment section. In the interest of fairness, comments on Gautam's or Dixits' articles can be placed underneath their articles. It's stupid to defend PJ by trying to bash up Gautam or the Dixits,

To me, the very fact that the Maoists took training from "non-Maoist" journalists indicated that their rhetoric is all bluster. The rest of us democrats can call their bluff, stare back at them, and make them blink. The Maoists are basically intellectual cowards who know how to use fear to get what they want.

On a meat-and-potatoes note, there is simply too much money (i.e. from the gullible UN agencies with absolutely clueless heads, from all sorts of business kickbacks and extortions, from real estate deals, etc) for the Maoists to lose if they do indeed act on their own threats. 

All said and done, listen to Prachanda's fury for entertainment . . . but follow the money trail to really understand the workings of this party which can be best understood (alert: the ensuing metaphor borrowed from another source) as a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of Nepal, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.



19. Kamal Kishor

In the Ten Years of "Liberation" (?) Struggle, the maoists did not feel shamed of maiming hundreds of thousands and killing 14000 Nepalese.For them it is the sacrifice Nepalese have to pay, if they want to be served by the Maoists. Let them go to streets and prove their muscle. I do think that they should do that. ut I believe that they will fail. However, it does not mean the government won or NC, UML or ruling parties won. No. Maoists fail won't mean NC, UML and Sadbhawana won. I will take it as a rebuf of people that is all.

However the danger is that they will resort to violence as soon as they feel the people's mood. They will do everything in their capacity to raise the temperature to boiling point and come to confrontation with the police and then with the military. That is their target and that is what they will try to do. So, there is going to be violence without doubt. Without violence and chaos and without blaming police and military for the present situation, the Maoists know that they can't succeed. The andolan has that hidden agenda and that is what they will try to acieve.

Some in the military would love to go out and show their strength in order to cater a political space for them. So we can be confident that the extreme right and left will try to go all out.

But I do think this will force a outlet. We can't go on like this. People gave the maoists, a majority in the CA. It is the people who have to slap them without participation. There is no alternate to it. Let us face it.

It is battle in which all have high stakes. NC and UML have more than other parties. Let us see what they do. It determines their future roles. Will they fight back? The maoists are going to hammer them mercilessly. Let us see. 



20. Sunita Tiwari
Ram laljee,

I got my answer, thank you very much. I specially liked the part "us democrat" interwined with self proclaimed "democratic opinions, :-)", which the entire comment is evidential. 

Had the Maoist just invited some sycophant to train themselves, they would have been dogmatic and narrow minded. They invited somewhat neutral observer like Prashant and their-rhetoric-is-all-bluster and what not. You represent, as I had guessed, a bunch of hypocrite who like to call thyself a democrat but don't have a pinch of a heart and an inch of a courage to tolerate opposite views and opinions. For me, this is intellectual cowardice. 

Your "money" analysis shows that Maoist shouldn't have entered the mainstream politics but remain underground as they could have loot on banks and boot on hands much more conveniently. But they did came out. Not everyone does MRP-Lauda-..... money oriented politics.



21. jange
Great article. Still trying to figure out- what is a "...semi-violent apparatus.." ?

Maybe it is something similar to a child bearing virgin?


22. Slarti

Arthur, your assiduous copying of propaganda technique that a lie, if audacious enough and repeated enough times, will be believed by about a thousand remaining independent people, like me, is despicable. 

No matter how hard you try; families which lived in Nepal and individuals who understood their environment will not dither. I do not seek an argument with you, because you, and those who are taken in by you, are already lost to an evil that eats your soul.

Instead I, and I am sure others, express ourselves here because we care about those who have accepted the evil ideology out of fear, have been cuckolded by the rhetoric, children who were stolen from their families to fight for the greed of those who seek power at the cost of the dead. I am deeply aware that the true motive and the character which drives Maoists is evil, nothing else. The ideology was always nonsense – its proponent is long dead and his followers have forsaken him at home.

I know why you keep insinuating motives such as civil war on people who are fighting here in the only forum where you cannot exercise full control. It is because you want to justify the war that the Maoists have been preparing for over the last four years. 

One of the stolen children in Nepal, back from a mission to kill could have said this:

"It was terrifying to see the writhing body of the person and to have taken part in doing that…..but I persuaded myself, explained to myself - I must not give in to pity, my comrades would know and I could be next. I convinced myself, we were realizing historical necessity. We were performing our revolutionary duty. We were fighting for socialist utopia. Our goal was triumph of prachandapath, and for the sake of that goal everything was permissible - to lie, to steal, to destroy hundreds of thousands and even millions of people... everyone who stood in the way".

Your communication strategy is simple, first, to deny reality (that people were murdered in cold blood, children were stolen, money looted from poor); second, to claim that Nepal will not be like any other communist ruled country like North Korea (which is easily claimed, since there is a shocking lack of information about the true implication of Maoist political and economic agenda); and, finally, when all else fails, to claim that I have no right to speak (e.g..you are a minority, you have no political knowledge, or you are a royalist, or the one you tried on me a week back). 

None of three ways address the issue: there is no answer to the challenges facing Nepal, a landlocked country, even as commies have failed miserably everywhere else where they had access:

-  to easy trade routes (North Korea),all of them really 

-  massive resources, ample food resources (everyone of them), 

-  being surrounded by prosperity (all of the Eastern Bloc before the revolution in early 90's)

-  Highly educated people (USSR, Eastern Bloc, East Germany, Cuba, North Korea)

You simply claim that you will do better than the bumbling incompetents in power now. 

I know you will copy this line too, I won't be surprised. It will only convince me even further that communists, whether Kuire or Bahun, suck.


23. Ram lal
Sunita Tiwari,

Yes. "We democrats".  

One can be a bona fide democrat in Nepal or anywhere in the world without tying oneself with UML or Congress or any of the other political parties. Being critical of Maoists does not ipso-facto imply that one is therefore a pucchar of other political parties, as you seem to suggest. For your kind information, not every Nepali with political views is aligned with some political party. The greatest weapon the Maoists have is the fear they see in ordinary Nepalis' eyes. The sooner we democrats get over this fear, the sooner this political party will implode from within. 


24. Surya Acharya
It is time for Maoists to hire a politically shrewd external consultant. I agree with Nirmal's comment above that the path they are taking now would eventually serve their adversaries' interest.Â

If Maoists follow the much tauted strategy of state capture, they will be damned if they fail, and damned if they succeed. Time to recall that Khmer Rouge was successful in capturing the sate.


25. King Arthur
I believe that Arthur is a paid member of the Maoist party. This is just a smart way to propagate their propaganda. Act like everyone else is a bloodsucking ass and that s/he represents the voice of all the oppressed and poverty stricken people of Nepal.  

26. Prithvi Raj

At least I am taking the ceaseless rantings of the Pushpa Dahal and his band of thugs and murderers seriously.  They mean what they say: look at the past in Eastern Europe, North Korea and elsewhere of which these neo-acolytes in Nepal are shamelessly in awe.  They want us to trust them that their reign will be different; they want to hoodwink us once again.  These thugs understand very well that in competitive politics they need money which they have been amassing and would continue to do by weakening the government.  They are betting on the total state capture.  Dev Gurung, one of the murderers in the Maoists cabinet of ministers, used to say that they have a forty-year plan for Nepal. Fo course they do! They want to experiment yet again with the lives of 29 million Nepalis to fulfill the utopic dreams of the gods in the Communist pantheon.  We cannot accept this and we will not accept this. 

What this imminent confrontation does, however, is to get to the real conflict once and for all.  There has been no pushing back of Maoists so far, but they are just like scores of other pusillanimous Nepalis around us.  They push when they know there won't be any resistance, but they will run with their tails between their legs once someone hits back. 

So it's time we support our armed forces and take sides in this "peace process" (read suspended conflict).  Let's hit back even at the risk of losing a few thousand lives.  It's better to save the remaining millions!



27. jange
Why can't Nepalis simply trust the Maoists? What have the Maoists done that they should not be trusted and given one more chance?




28. Arthur
Slarti #22,

I know why you keep insinuating motives such as civil war on people who are fighting here in the only forum where you cannot exercise full control. It is because you want to justify the war that the Maoists have been preparing for over the last four years.

Presumably this is a response to my conclusion in #15:

So the demonstration and shutdown will be peaceful unless the Army attacks with firearms.

But even Slarti and rishav know that won't save the old Nepal. They succeeded in killing more than 10,000 last time but it didn't save the monarchy. Killing another 100,000 won't save the parties that had to promise a new Nepal from having to accept it actually happening in reality instead of just words.

So we can assume the present government will have to admit its complete failure and let the people proceed with building a new Nepal.

Slarti and rishav can be upset about that. But there isn't much they can do about it, and they know it.

So it's clear I said then, as I have said before that you and others like you know that the Army could not defeat the People's War last time and there is no reason to believe it could do any better in another civil war.

That is why you don't call on the "bumbling incompetents in power now" to open fire on the hundreds of thousands of demonstrators who will soon force them to stop pretending to govern Nepal.

As for your shouting about Maoist killings, there would be some point to it if this was a journal mainly read by foreigners. There are plenty of people outside Nepal who don't know that when people talk about more than 13,000 having been killed during the People's War they are talking about the "security forces" having killed more than 10,000 as "Maoists".

But I really don't understand why you bother in a journal mainly read by people who know who was responsible for the killing.

As for your claim that this is the only forum where Maoists do not exercise full control, or that anybody is trying to stop you speaking, I cannot even guess why you would say that.

Your preference for talking about North Korea etc rather than Nepal is much easier to understand. But it won't solve the problem that Nepalis don't want to live on less than $2 per day under the rule of people like you and they are no longer afraid of people like you.


29. rishav
Re : Slarti

I'm very much impressed by the way you analyze things and able to write so well in a thoughtful in depth manner.

These Maoists - only believe that their views are the only views for and of the people. Therefore, any other voices or views are attempted to be discredited "as not of the people," by them but what they fail to realize is that the Nepali people voted for a coalition Government with many voices, views and ideologies. The only expectation of most people for the leaders of the first coalition government was to take the initiative in sitting down and diplomatically come to negotiated middle ground agreements with everyone. However, what we got instead was a party thinking it had the voice, "people's mandate,"and power to dictate things. Well they didn't last long in Government and showed such political naivety on many occasions which lost them a lot of respect both domestically and internationally.

Until the Maoist start to respect other people with different views to their own only then will diplomacy and successful negotiations will occur. Unfortunately, respecting other people with differing views is not Maoist ideology and also doesn't sit well with the PLA guerillas who are still expecting their goodies for their work in the insurgency.


30. kris
Agree with Avik---

Hope Prashant will share his experience during training------

The Maoist movement is just for Prachanda whose ultimate goal is to seize the power. He is the same guy who can't see his competitor in his party. The blind supporters like Arthur can enjoy by supporting this dictator and his family. This movement won't be good for Maoist party and country too. When these people wake up, it will be late.


31. Sunita Tiwari
Ram laljee,
That exact "implosion" thing was what most people like you believed / expected / craved for before the CA election. Good luck for future fantasial  endeavor. 



32. Arthur
Prithvi Raj #26,

So it's time we support our armed forces and take sides in this "peace process" (read suspended conflict).  Let's hit back even at the risk of losing a few thousand lives.  It's better to save the remaining millions!

Just how many "few" thousand lives would you like to "risk"? And whose?

Not yours of course, but when you previously expressed your desire to "postpone" elections for a more "propitious" time I pointed out some of the difficulties in #20 here:

...cancelling elections would require many things, but you forgot to mention a few.

First no public relations campaign would convince anybody that you were merely putting elections off for a more propitious time.

Second, you would have to start off with a massive bloodbath in the cities. The people would not just fight in remote rural areas but where you live.

Third, "getting the international relations side of things right" would require rather more than India actively siding with the Nepal Army and the rest of the world continuing to aid a country determined to become a failed state.

India would have to actually occupy the Terai and Kathmandu Valley to ensure its arms supplies did not end up with the PLA as before. That would then make it a national war of liberation from India with many more joining the Maoists in resisting the invasion. India would eventually get tired of it as the Americans did in Vietnam, but Nepal would never surrender.

Since your "security forces" cannot even secretly smuggle arms from the Indian border to Kathmandu without getting caught and exposed you may as well as stop day-dreaming about a "well thought out plan" for anything.

You replied:

Skillful public relations will work; there is no question about it.  Some blood bath will indeed be necessary; after all, this is a war remember? Getting international relations right is necessary and that has happened in the past: we need to get our relations with India and China right.  The distant Western countries couldn't care less about Nepal and they will abdicate their interests to India, as they have done in the past.  And some of the representatives of these countries must be thrown out of Nepal, a failing state.  The snafu with the purported "smuggling" of arms is due to giving too much ground to the "rebels".  They could be reigned in if their mad leaders are neutralized; it's not that tall an order. Indian Army wouldn't have to do all those things you claim; our 90,000-strong NA will suffice.

Further discussion seemed pointless. Here's your problem. People like Slarti and Rishav (and jange) do think the same way you do. But they aren't so stupid as to actually say so, because they know (as the Nepal Army officers know), it simply wouldn't work and blurting out that you really want to kill a few thousand more and resume the civil war very quickly makes people sees through what really lies behind everything else you say.



33. Budabaaje

King Gyanendra's strategy for dealing with the Maoist problem was the best. He had almost succeeded too. For all his petty mistakes, Nepali people would have benefitted the most if they'd stuck with him for a year or two longer. Monarchy was unjustly and unthinkingly removed. The best way to teach these vicious Maoists, lying politicians, and deceptive media a lesson is to bring back the monarchy! Then this group of hoodlums will realize that they can't keep playing with the Nepali people all the time!!

Bring back the monarchy! Long live the King!



34. Prithvi Raj

Arthur or whoever you are! You've resorted to name-calling, a cheap and cowardly tactic of last resort for those who are puking up the Red Communist lies.  This is not surprising at all; rather it's well expected.  When all else fails, call people stupid or attach other monikers to discredit them.  However, this doesn't change the facts.  Your brethren in arms or your paymasters (I'm beginning to wonder now ), are hell-bent on taking our country further down the abyss.  I am prepared to take a stance and call a spade a spade. 

And go through our "discussion" again (considering that you seem to have a lot of time for this) and stop using excerpts as they suit your motives.  It isn't surprising at all that further discussion may have sounded pointless to you; after all, Maoists are the same way! Their mantra seems to be, "If you don't agree with us, we will finish you!" Or "If the Murderer-in-Chief (read Prachanda) does not become prime minister, we will finish you!" Or "Abdicate and we shall negotiate!"

Let me state again unequivocably: it's time we Nepalis take a stand and push back.  If the thugs and murderers want confrontation, why deny them? It seems to be the only language they can understand, so let's get it done once and for all.  The path to true democracy and prosperity can be messy and it may lead to a few more deaths.  Why should we be surprised? And it's the Maoists who are resorting to violence means; look around us! Their looting and plundering goes unabated and they are supplementing the party coffers through the allowance they are sucking from the exchequer for their cadres in the cantonments.  They are for total state capture.  Denying this simple fact and parroting your lies, doesn't change the ground reality. 

War it is unless the murderers step back!!



35. Nav
".. it's time we Nepalis take a stand and push back." Which Nepalis you are talking about, Sir? All you need is a mirror.


36. Pragatibadi
Good luck to the Maoists. The constitution is being written in the street!


37. Arthur
Prithvi Raj #34,

At first I thought your complaint about "name calling" was just another example of a common practice I have noted that anti-Maoists simply mechanically accuse Maoists of everything that they do themselves.

But on looking at my #32 more closely I notice that I did say:

"People like Slarti and Rishav (and jange) do think the same way you do. But they aren't so stupid as to actually say so, because they know (as the Nepal Army officers know), it simply wouldn't work and blurting out that you really want to kill a few thousand more and resume the civil war very quickly makes people sees through what really lies behind everything else you say."

Now I guess that to a person of your noble lineage and social status, such words are a deep personal affront, whereas your routine use of "ranting", "band of thugs and murderers", "pusillanimous" etc in #26 is not "name calling" at all from your perspective but merely the customary language a superior adopts towards uppity social inferiors.

So let me try to put it more politely in a way more suitable for addressing a courtier:

Your excellence is more straight forward, principled and honest than others who think as you do, like Slarti, rishav (and jange) by frankly calling for killing a few thousand more and resuming the civil war. But there may be a certain wisdom in their more indirect approach which is closer to the tone adopted by his majesty himself.


38. Arthur
BTW it seems the UML has already "blinked".

So much for Prithvi Raj's:

"War it is unless the murderers step back"

What puzzles me is why people like Prashant Jha and Kunda Dixit are so concerned about "danger from the right".

Certainly the continued existence of an unreformed Nepal Army means some sufficiently stupid generals could return Nepal to civil war again. That is why it is so essential to settle that issue, even at the cost of another year's delay before the measures essential for a new Nepal can really be implemented. That is why Prachanda resigned, the PLA stays on alert, and the YCL prepares for all contingencies.

But this genuine fear of it seems rather overblown. Given what we see of the right in these comments and that most of them cannot even bring themselves to openly call for a resumption of the killings, what reason is there to believe the army top brass are really that stupid?

Slarti's estimate that there are only about a thousand people who think like he does (and that they are losing) seems far more realistic (ignoring the paranoia that anybody cares enough to try to shut him up).

Are there more than a few hundred like Prithvi Raj, and do they actually have armed forces reliably under their command with which to launch their "war it is"?



39. pitbiv
I 'd say either lebel all the maoists terrorist and kill them or give them chance to run the country for some time....why the fuss..

40. Battisputali
"Every tyrant in history has said that he wants power to good to his fellows. The necessary thing is to check and stop people having power... Man's existence, in so far as he achieves anything is to resist power, to minimize power, to devise systems of society in which power is the least exerted."

--Malcolm Muggeride (British Satirist, Quoted from The Trap)

Also, so much bad blood in this discussion. Discussion is always good but the sheer animosity and disgust present within this discourse isn't. I'm not trying to dumb down the discussion but i beleive some lightness is necessitated.


41. Sargam
How excited to the hilt! This Arthur stuff is still bitching around!! His diehard panoply of chronicles are such a blast because it testifies how rabid and active commie he is. He for sure wants to demolish both wrought and edifice of our 'drab' democracy where some civilized people search always a sort of consensus to remain on the right side of  people's consideration and thought so that majority of people could taste what is to be a democrat in a democratic country. Anyway, folks you are already warned so that you wouldn't be caught awares between the vain spat of recalcitrant zombie of dead communism and newly freed but o how fresh and curious inhabitants of Nepal.

42. Prithvi Raj

"Your excellence is more straight forward, principled and honest than others who think as you do, like Slarti, rishav (and jange) by frankly calling for killing a few thousand more and resuming the civil war. But there may be a certain wisdom in their more indirect approach which is closer to the tone adopted by his majesty himself."

 

Very impressive indeed, Arthur.  For a "proponent" of the proletariat you sound more like a courtier (may be you missed your true calling)!  I don't deserve such sycophancy, as I neither belong to the Royal lineage nor the nobility you are trying to attach me to. 

 

As for your seeing wisdom in a more "indirect" approach, that is precisely what has gone wrong in the past.  All this indirectness, beating-around-the-bush, political correctness, and politics of compromise have got us where we are at the moment.  While one side has been steadfast in its beliefs and convictions, however wrong and evil they may be; the other side has been wavering and floundering.  While one side has systematically weakened the state, the other has been a silent observer.  It's time the other side became more direct, and as pushy as the Maoists.  We need a real confrontation, once and for all.

 

"Certainly the continued existence of an unreformed Nepal Army means some sufficiently stupid generals could return Nepal to civil war again. That is why it is so essential to settle that issue, even at the cost of another year's delay before the measures essential for a new Nepal can really be implemented. That is why Prachanda resigned, the PLA stays on alert, and the YCL prepares for all contingencies."

The fear in the likes of Kunda Dixit and Prashant and indeed in Nepalis at large comes from the past actions of the Maoists.  They have been in the government while enjoying all the benefits of being in the opposition.  Now that they are in the opposition, they are ruing the resignation of Prachanda (Murderer-in-Chief).  They realize now that they were enjoying the best of both worlds, but have been reduced to a nattering but armed and dangerous opposition.  Prachanda resigned not because the "generals could return Nepal to civil war again", but because he realized the mindless arm-twisting by his guerilla minister, Badal, didn't succeed in ousting the army chief.  He realized that the army is the one of the very few functioning and professional institutions in the country.  He was shamed into resigning due to his party's ill-intentions.  We should thank the "stupid" generals for having saved the Nepali democracy, however dithering it may be.  The band of thugs and murderers, on the other hand, was all set to hijack it for good!  The fear is real, not overblown.

 

Furthermore, PLA has always been on alert and the YCL is not preparing for all contingencies--this is their modus operandi.  They threaten, loot, plunder and murder, if need be.  And this has been the core problem of the Maoists pretending to be democratic but employing the politics of terror to retain their hold on power.  They do not want lasting peace in Nepal; that will make them redundant.  They do not want a new constitution because then they would have to put down their arms (the source of their power remember?) and they would be neutered.  They do not have a plan for the country besides the tried-tested-and-failed 40-year plans which have eerie resemblances to the regimes of North Korea, Khmer Rouge etc.

 



43. qwerty
All this fancy talk doesn't really make a difference, does it? Mass Protests have been planned for May Day anyway, several hundred lathis and grenades have been confiscated and god knows what is on its way.
The "smart people" write articles in this paper read by the insignificant English Speaking minority,an educated lot with progress as their agenda.
The "smarter people" get vocal (in NEPALI), get to the grassroots and mobilise the crowds (in NEPALI again) and get what they want, do what they want and couldn't give a rat's a$$ provided they fulfill their own selfish agenda.
Has anyone assessed the cost of the Maoist insurgency (or People's War, that's what they love to call it, innit?). Economic Costs, Opportunity costs, Development Costs, Brain Drain, Mental Trauma, Cost of Violence being ingrained in our society, Lives lost-What could be and what is?
We, Neps, are the gullible fools sitting, discussing and contemplating while the cycle repeats itself!
Damn, I'm just a young man...sick and tired!
C'est la vie!


44. Slarti

Thank you Arthur, if it was not for your presence here I would never have the motivation to stay and do the only thing I can do, speaking out.

First and foremost, I don't shout about Maoist killings, I scream about the murders committed to satisfy the greed of a few privileged individuals who sought to justify these killings in the name of ideology. 

I will keep screaming about the murder of over 16000 who were killed during the war and after, each one of them dying because of a Maoists who used the excuse of ideology to start a war which would do no one any good and has not done anyone any good. I will also scream and throw a fit as long as I am permitted to, to ask each one of these fools, what for? 

I will keep asking these questions for the parents and children of all those Army and Police men who died defending people like me.

Who are people like me? 

People like are those who worked hard to fight their way out of poverty, blessed by families who, even in difficult circumstances, imbibed the right values in us. We learn to live within the boundaries of laws and rules; we understand our environment and learn to live in it with integrity. 

I am one of those few thousand who feed others, pay the bills, pay the taxes, and pay the extortion money that helps people like you to then murder in turn. Labeling me as the ruling class is not going to take you anywhere.

To then go ahead and suggest that people in this country were afraid of people like me, is to lift from the Maoist propaganda book and try and gain some pats from your reputedly large group of friends. Don't think for a moment that I would not take a tortuous journey through your propaganda book. 

People like me work, have family, feed the hungry not out of pity, but as a duty that every householder has. I am not a few thousand, I am one of the millions who keep ungrateful like you alive.

Contrast me with those who have had the opportunity to study in the elite universities and how they squandered their opportunities and the value that they could have created for their compatriots by doing something. 

Instead, they turned into monsters, simply because they felt guilty about having the opportunity that people like me never had, because we had to take care of our own. They simply missed the point of life, it is about the living.

Finally, I am the one who lived on $2, but what made my life better was the fact that I could wake up early in the morning to pick flowers for dasian, because I could listen to wonderful stories and look forward to a life where if I worked hard like millions of my countrymen, I could live a good life. 

A life which included a reasonable assurance of safety, a reasonable lack of uncertainty, a life in a society which did not depend on the government to provide dole, but a society which would do its best to enable me to get my life going. It would be a limited life if I did not turn out to have the skills that I have, but it would be a life filled with all the colour's of dasain and of tihar.

What gets me going is the rage that comes from the destruction of this life which I wanted to live. It makes me want to scream, even as I know that I would not make any difference. 

It is the rage over your motive which makes you lecture me on what choices I and others in my society should make, is what gets to my nerves. It is the rage of knowing that not I but those who were squandering their lives playing cards and being good for nothing are leading a murder campaign and calling it a revolution that gets me all worked up.

Even as you waste your time here, someone died from your ilk. He was the ruling class. You know why I don't gloat over his murder?



45. jange
Kamred Arthur- You have started to believe your own propaganda.

I fear there is no hope of redemption for you.


46. Sargam
Well, let us come to the facts. It's proved that Maoist intransigence is all full of  hollow shamming. There is nothing consistent but a  demontration of their lame power grabbing issues to impress the gallary. As we know they are proclaimed to be the zombies waiting for some ill-minded but consentient  victims to crock them straight away, there is left nothing in their vain promises to entice the mainstream bulk of citizens. As such, those people who have faith in Democracy must stand between the surely imposed yoke of Maoism and Democracy we always dreamed of for Nepal. If need be, we are ready to sacrifice ourselves to eliminate these vermins of the societies that suck the innocent lot of people everytime they get an opportunity. We stand for eradicating once for all those parasites that paralyse a country like Nepal which has every possibility and potential to go ahead by taking its fate in control. And the victimes shall be surely those who have deliberately tried to mislead the populace by interposing and at the same time promising myriad  that exist nowhere but  in fairy tales. 

47. Arthur
Prithvi Raj #42,

All this indirectness, beating-around-the-bush, political correctness, and politics of compromise have got us where we are at the moment.  While one side has been steadfast in its beliefs and convictions, however wrong and evil they may be; the other side has been wavering and floundering.  While one side has systematically weakened the state, the other has been a silent observer.  It's time the other side became more direct, and as pushy as the Maoists.  We need a real confrontation, once and for all.

Congratulations for taking my advice to leave out the explicit calls for a bloodbath and killing a few thousand more. With a little more effort in the same direction you could be almost as convincing an agitator for resuming the civil war as jange. You already sound less like a hysterical child throwing a temper tantrum than Slarti...

But even if you swung over completely to jange's style of just cynically highlighting the complete failure of the wavering and floundering to save the old Nepal you would still both be stuck with one central flaw in your analysis.

The politicians that abandoned their own beliefs and convictions and agreed to the terms of the comprehensive peace agreement and ran for election to the Constituent Assembly on a "politically correct" program of republic, federalism and adopting a constitution for building a new Nepal did so only AFTER they had already tried your policy of confrontation and had proved for all to see that they could not by civil war defeat those who genuinely believed in those things and were steadfast in their convictions.

Now they are stuck with the fact that the people still want those things which they pretended to agree to but cannot deliver themselves.

Slarti
#44,

"I will also scream and throw a fit as long as I am permitted to..."

"..
. even as I know that I would not make any difference."

That seems to me a good summary of your commentary. Let's leave it there, dangling in the breeze together with your lack of outrage at Prithvi Raj's calls for a bloodbath and killing a few thousand more, and ostentatious ignoring of the many short comments by Nepalis in this thread who have different views from you, and great enthusiasm for screaming hysterically against Maoists to a foreigner. Apparantly you already know that you cannot convince your fellow Nepalese, either in english or Nepali, so you don't bother to argue with them.


Qwerty #43,

"The "smart people" write articles in this paper read by the insignificant English Speaking minority,an educated lot with progress as their agenda.
The "smarter people" get vocal (in NEPALI), get to the grassroots and mobilise the crowds (in NEPALI again) ..."

Some real insight, despite your sympathy with the former and hostility to the latter!

But for those among both the readers and writers of this paper who really do have progress as their agenda, perhaps a little more respect is due to the people who have already demonstrated that they are at least "smarter" at how to mobilise the people at the grassroots.

Is progress really possible without mobilising people at the grassroots?

So many "smart" people have tried since 1950, with so little success. Isn't it time to see what the "smarter" people can build when actually allowed to proceed with building that relies on mobilizing people at the grassroots?

The costs of trying to keep the "smart" people in power and the "smarter" ones sidelined along with the grassroots have indeed been great. Time to cut the losses and move on.


48. AJ
@Arthur: I have been following you for quite some time...Followings can be implied from your comments:
1. You justify violence against the state apparatus
2. You blame liberal democratic parties for all the ills in the country
3. You are a Maoist foot soldier fully committed in establishing communist dictatorship modeled after North Korea

You have mentioned, since we make less than $2 a day, we don't have right to comment about North Korea and other countries....My question to you is that: Is it a crime for us to expect fully functioning democracy in the country? After all, we are the people we is gonna suffer under terror rule. Considering your writings, I suspect you are a communist mole, installed by some communist regime to do some research on Nepal political impasse. YOU would be better off finding some other countries for you ill-intend 'experiment'.....DON'T preach us on your garbage philosophy!!
  


49. Prithvi Raj

"Congratulations for taking my advice to leave out the explicit calls for a bloodbath and killing a few thousand more. With a little more effort in the same direction you could be almost as convincing an agitator for resuming the civil war as jange. You already sound less like a hysterical child throwing a temper tantrum than Slarti..."

 

Quite a self-congratulatory attitude this, Arthur.  Stop flattering yourself and please keep the unsolicited advice and a patronizing attitude to yourself.  When you fail to convince others of your agenda, you resort to these cheap tactics!  I'm not surprised though.

 

"The politicians that abandoned their own beliefs and convictions and agreed to the terms of the comprehensive peace agreement and ran for election to the Constituent Assembly on a "politically correct" program of republic, federalism and adopting a constitution for building a new Nepal did so only AFTER they had already tried your policy of confrontation and had proved for all to see that they could not by civil war defeat those who genuinely believed in those things and were steadfast in their convictions."

 

The comprehensive (read "incomprehensible") peace agreement was signed by the parties and the Maoists because it was a marriage of convenience to oust the king.  Both sides were looking to use each other as a crutch to regain power.  "New Nepal" was a catchy slogan with a lot of legs at that time, and people are now discovering that it is nothing but a hollow phrase.  I have traveled to the rural areas where people are openly decrying the prevalent mess and the false promises.  What is new about Nepal at the moment is that the law and order situation is worse (due to the setting of a wrong precedence of legitimizing a non-state armed group) and there is no sight of the new constitution, thanks to the Maoists.  They have their own constitution in their back pockets and have brazenly said that they'd announce the new constitution from the streets--so much for the elections and democratic practices. 

 

"Now they are stuck with the fact that the people still want those things which they pretended to agree to but cannot deliver themselves."

 

This is why the goons resigned last year.  When they realized they couldn't deliver the goods, they bolted out of the government making lame excuses.  They know all too well that it's easier to destroy than to build a nation.  The Maoists are adept at destroying as we have seen it all along; and this seems still to be the case as we see them brandishing khukuris across the country, toting grenades and smuggling sticks into the capital city!  They'd like this environment of uncertainty and the game of cat and mouse, musical chairs to go on while they hoodwink the Nepali people yet again and usurp total power. 



50. Patriot
Notwithstading what people say about Maoists, I think they are still the most progressive, inclusive and patriotic of all parties. The whole propoganda machine is against them - India, US, everyone. Yet they have been able to display fortitude and maturity. I wish them success in the coming days and wise sense should they lead a unity govt.

51. i am also patriotic
Notwithstanding what the Maoists claim, I think they are still the most violent, agressive and tyranny of all parties. The rhetoric of progressive, inclusive and patriotic is just their way to accomplish their propaganda. How is it said in nepali, bolneko kanikani bikne nabolneko chamal pani nibikne, haina? I wish people not buy their kanikas and wise sense prevail on them not the bloody blood sucker attitude.


52. rishav
Is this new bandh and mass mobilization called by the Maoist a sign of strength or weakness? The Maoist's have been quite clearly in the game of threat, terror and force for some time now which has also helped them during the insurgency, very much in style of the Nazis in early 1930's Germany, has radicalized certain sections of our populations believing in false dreams and a false utopia.

Their expectations from signing the 8 party CPA in new Delhi some time ago and what been happening now has probably left them very frustrated. Having being left out of the Coalition Government despite being the winners of CA election due to poor political decision making, poor leadership still pretty much in fear of their militarized cadres, inability to budge on diplomatic terms regarding the constitution despite being in a weakened position politically, ignoring strong advise both internally/externally, lack of credibility in their leader exposed publicly  has probably been the major reasons.

So is this mass assembly of goons to march in the capital a last attempt by the party who are experts in the technique of force and fear tactics throughout their existence in order to get their demands through. If unsuccessful forever become sidelined politically as a bit of a joke.

Predictions - Unless PM Nepal gets cold feet and surrenders to Maoist demands and resigns the following will happen.
1. Bandh mass mobilization of Maoist Cadres with arms concealed.
2. Attempts by the Maoist in certain sections to entice the security forces for confrontation with the use of arms. If the security force can refrain from taking extreme measures it will ultimately cause more frustration in the Maoist camp as they are hoping on and even expecting a confrontation with a new list of matyrs.
3. Prachanda in the mean time will badh while dancing with numerous females on the street.
4. If the badh continues for too long the local populace will start to get frustrated as it will effect their daily lives and businesses which could potentially cause a counter march.
5. Ultimately the mobilsation like many of their previous ones will most likely be uneventful and will expose the Maoists more as not being effective from the street which they so proclaim to be. 


53. Arthur
AJ #48

1. True, I support the right of revolution. All democratic states are established by violent overthrow of the previous state. Such violence against the state advanced Nepal in 1950, 1990 and 2006. In the UK it started a bit earlier, but most modern societies had democratic revolutions by the 19th Century. Only the least developed countries like Nepal are still stuck in the 21st Century with pre-modern societies in which the Army has political power through the threat of a military coup d'etat.

2. I can blame liberal democratic parties like the US Republicans and Democrats or the UK Labour, Conservative and Lib-Dem parties for problems in those countries. But it would be absurd to blame liberal democratic parties for the mess made in Nepal by parties like Congress and the UMLs.

These parties are semi-feudal personal feifdoms with no resemblance to political parties in modern societies. Although there are lots of things wrong with liberal democratic parties, no such parties fail to insist on civilian supremacy over the military, let alone behave like Nepali parties.

In resigning rather than compromise on civilian supremacy over the military, the Maoists behaved much more like a liberal democratic party than any of their opponents.

3. North Korea urgently needs a revolution just as Nepal does.

The people gathering in the streets of Kathmandu to topple the present government are seeking a fully functioning democracy.

Since the Maoists are the largest party in Nepal, you will need to learn how to participate in actual democratic politics with them, whether they are in government or in opposition.

With so many Nepali speaking "communist moles" around, why not actually get to know what they think? When you stop regarding support for the largest party as criminal, even you might be ready for actual democratic politics.

Prithvi Raj #49,

"The comprehensive (read "incomprehensible") peace agreement was signed by the parties and the Maoists because it was a marriage of convenience to oust the king.  Both sides were looking to use each other as a crutch to regain power.  "New Nepal" was a catchy slogan with a lot of legs at that time, and people are now discovering that it is nothing but a hollow phrase.  I have traveled to the rural areas where people are openly decrying the prevalent mess and the false promises."

So, we seem to be agreed that the parties now governing had no intention of carrying out their promises, which were nothing but hollow phrases.

For you that is natural, and presumably "liberal democratic". Since you support the old Nepal, it can only be a good thing that promises to move forward turned out to merely be hollow phrases.

But the people forced to live on less than $2 per day really do want a new Nepal and will certainly adopt a constitution for it in the streets rather than accept just more hollow phrases.

If successful, the military rule you advocate would leave Nepal stuck at the same level as the countries listed in the table at that link. Notice how they are all at the similar abysmal levels of developent to the old Nepal under your beloved monarchy.

But what is completely absurd is that you already know it has no hope of being successful since the "incomprehensible" peace agreement resulted directly from military rule having already been tried and failed.



54. Slarti
Thank you Arthur, one of the reasons that I have never sought an argument with you, until I was forced to, is that I am used to the rejection you deploy as your defence.

But you never answer any questions, when you do it is not about what is being asked.  You deflect questions about North Korea and all other communist state, to allow everyone to know the true consequence of your ideology and its potential for evil.

How different is Laos from Nepal. Why should a country which has enjoyed 35 years of one party rule, which follows the exact same ideology as our own Maoists, not progress economically? Why should such a country, which enjoys a better location than Nepal, have 35% of its people below poverty line, why should 80% of its population be dependent on agriculture when unlike Nepal this country is surrounded by some of the most dynamic economies of the world?  How come it does not have viable infrastructure even as it is a member of ASEAN?

Perhaps most hilariously, why do most of its people have to live the way they do and still have to accept the tyranny of the party which does not allow them a choice? After 35 year of one party rule?

Why is it that for a country called "democratic" there is only one political party in DPR Laos? What Stalin did in Russia, Mao in China; none of that has been answered. Instead, you keep saying what others have said and jeering at them that they can't do a thing about it. I know I can't do a thing about it, didn't I say that, you don't really have to jump around and jeer at me, do you?  Little kids do that, you are not one, are you?



55. Prithvi Raj

"So, we seem to be agreed that the parties now governing had no intention of carrying out their promises, which were nothing but hollow phrases."

 

Yes the term "parties" you refer to here includes the Maoists.  The government before this was theirs, but they resigned due to their failure to follow democratic practices and govern.  They failed.

 

"For you that is natural, and presumably "liberal democratic". Since you support the old Nepal, it can only be a good thing that promises to move forward turned out to merely be hollow phrases.  But the people forced to live on less than $2 per day really do want a new Nepal and will certainly adopt a constitution for it in the streets rather than accept just more hollow phrases."

 

"Old Nepal" and "New Nepal" hold different meanings to different people.   A lot of the people making $2 per day you purport to be speaking for say that they are worse off today than they were before.  Thanks to the protracted and ongoing conflict the percentage of people living under $2 per day line in Nepal is higher now than in the countries in the region which have pretty much doubled or trebled their per capita income during the period. 

 

"If successful, the military rule you advocate would leave Nepal stuck at the same level as the countries listed in the table at that link. Notice how they are all at the similar abysmal levels of developent to the old Nepal under your beloved monarchy."

 

So you're quoting the Wikipedia now! By the way, Luttwak who is quoted in your source, was an advocate for war and proposed that ending a war prematurely can cause more damage in the longer run and doesn't really end a conflict.  And the list doesn't include countries like Singapore, Malaysia which have had military "roles" in their development.  It seems you have concluded Old Nepal=Monarchy, and New Nepal=Maoists.  How simplistic! Now I understand you better.  I do not advocate military rule, but a military "role" with a combination of interventions: political reform, development and military. 

 

"But what is completely absurd is that you already know it has no hope of being successful since the "incomprehensible" peace agreement resulted directly from military rule having already been tried and failed."

 

The combination I mentioned above will work.  The previous attempt failed because the political parties were sidelined.

 

"But what is completely absurd is that you already know…"

 

BTW, when are you going to stop telling others what they already know or think?



56. Prithvi Raj

"In resigning rather than compromise on civilian supremacy over the military, the Maoists behaved much more like a liberal democratic party than any of their opponents."

 

They resigned because they failed to govern and deliver.  And what would you call the Maoist party that continues to maintain a parallel army; patronizes a YCL that loots and plunders; draws allowances on behalf an inflated number of "soldiers" (as shamelessly and smugly confessed by Prachanda in a video-taped speech) further impoverishing the exchequer; and turns a blind eye on the cadres who are arrested trying to smuggle sticks and carrying arms including grenades around the country?  "Liberal democratic" I suppose.

 



57. jange
# 53 It will  be a case of hatti ayo hatti ayo, fussa.

People are already publicly complaining about being extorted by the Maoists.

Not a good sign of an efficient terror machine.


58. jange
# 53- Kamred Arthur must surely be disappointed that the Maoists are not actively championing for the right to revolution to be enshrined in the new  constitution.


59. Arthur
Slarti,

how undemocratic of me to "force" you to respond to me, even though you proclaimed (#17 in that thread) that I should not respond to you.

If only I was such a democratic personality as yourself I would have obeyed your command not to respond, and agreed to not discuss Nepal or the articles published here concerning events in Nepal but join you in discussions of your opinions concerning North Korea, Laos, Russia etc.

But I am opposed to the social-fascist one party regimes that called themselves "communist" in those countries. I welcomed the collapse of the Soviet Union as a huge step forward there.

One could be a "UML" and hold the opposite view. But the point of supporting "Maoism" is precisely in direct response to the failure of communism in those countries, not in defending their failures.

Nepal's Maoist party has made a big step forward in explicitly supporting multi-party competitive politics even in a country as abysmally unprepared for it as Nepal.

They have nothing to learn about multi-party competitive politics from the corrupt parties of the old system. The old parties could have learned something about it from the Maoists but seem intent on just collapsing in a heap instead. There will still be a need for other parties after the old parties have collapsed.

Eventually, even people like you will learn how to actually argue as equals instead of trying to force others to shut up and having to be forced to actually respond against your will.

Then you will no longer need to throw tantrums about having no influence on events and will realize that you can gain influence only by putting forward actual proposals for how to move forward and seeking support for those proposals among the majority instead of trying to exclude the majority from participation.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people are gathering in Kathmandu  to topple a failed government. That is multi-party democracy in action. It frightents you, but you'll get over that eventually.

Any new parties that wish to actually compete with the Maoists will need to learn how to rely on the people and organize the people as the Maoists did instead of relying on the state and begging favours from its security forces as the failed parties did.



60. Arthur
jange #58, I think you are already disappointed because the right to revolution is already championed in the very concept of a constitution and especially in an interim constitution.

I am pleased to see that the traditional revolutionary constitutional formula that the people must be armed to prevent counter-revolution has not merely been championed by advocating universal military training for the people, but is already being implemented.

#53 there are sayings in english about an "elephant in the room" and people who cannot see it.

Prithvi Raj #55,

As you are well aware the Maoists resigned from the coalition government they led because the other parties failed to carry out the peace agreement and prevented them from enforcing civilian supremacy over the military.

The other parties have now had a year in which to demonstrate that Nepal cannot be governed without the Maoists. All they succeeded in doing was to delay matters for a year. Soon things will resume moving forward again.

Luttwak is a well known advocate of military rule. Here again is the list of current regimes that came to power by military coup d'etat from the wikipedia link above.

Libya, Oman, Equatorial Guinea, Burkina Faso, Tunisia, Sudan, Myanmar, The Gambia, Qatar, Central African Republic, Fiji, Mauritania, Guinea, Madagascar, Niger.

Inspiring isn't it?

Perhaps you really don't know that it won't work. But I was trying not to imply that you are stupid.

"The previous attempt failed because the political parties were sidelined."

Good luck for your next attempt with the hollow phrase mongers not sidelined!

I thought the only thing Gyanendra had going for him was the widespread enthusiasm about the political party phrase mongers having been sidelined.

It wasn't enough. Military rule with the MKNs et al would be even more comical.



61. Nirmal
Arthur just tell me where are you from? Banana republic?


62. Gangalal
Sorry panches, closet-panches, ranas and bahunbadis,----
The Right to revolt WILL be enshrined in the new constitution. It's called the RIGHT TO SELF DETERMINATION. Anything less is unacceptable.


63. Arthur
Nirmal, even the notorious banana republics of Latin America have got far beyond the days of "gorilla regimes" based on military rule.

Apart from Myanamar and Fiji, the countries I listed are all in Africa.

Most Nepalese still live at an African rather than south Asian standard of living. It would stay that way if the military were allowed to rule.



64. SS

if only people would stop replying to Kamred Arthur, then all of us will be spared from seeing evil maoist terrorist ideology propaganda.  why is everybody wasting their precious time reading Kamred Arthur's propaganda and responding to it?  he's far, perhaps in Kera Ganatantra, from realising Nepalese reality. 



65. Slarti

"If only I was such a democratic personality as yourself I would have obeyed your command not to respond, and agreed to not discuss Nepal or the articles published here concerning events in Nepal but join you in discussions of your opinions concerning North Korea, Laos, Russia etc."

If you were a half as democratic as me you would not be half as silly as yourself in your reply. You have no concern for Nepal, you are a communist fanatic, stationed to distort other people's expression, and to make sure that people cannot freely discuss what matters to their life and their country and, to make sure that they cannot express their opinion. The fact that you said what you did is ample evidence that you are scared of reading what I write and try and do your best to change the subject.

You represent an ideology which has been tried in all of these countries and it has failed, it was in the name of this ideology that you murdered and continue to murder thousands upon thousands of people. If you no longer believe in this totalitarian ideology why did you murder so many people? You cannot escape by deflection. Discussion of Laos is particularly valuable because it shares so many features of Nepal. Look at each and every one of your opinions and then realise how people can see that your presence here is not out of interest but a compulsion to speak for the terrorists. Then look at mine and rest assured that many would want to say that but don't bother because of your tactics.

"But I am opposed to the social-fascist one party regimes that called themselves "communist" in those countries. I welcomed the collapse of the Soviet Union as a huge step forward there."

Good for you!!

"One could be a "UML" and hold the opposite view. But the point of supporting "Maoism" is precisely in direct response to the failure of communism in those countries, not in defending their failures."

You killed people for an experiment?

"Nepal's Maoist party has made a big step forward in explicitly supporting multi-party competitive politics even in a country as abysmally unprepared for it as Nepal."

Sure, their actions speak volumes for their "democratic" nature. That has been the case for the past 14 years.

"They have nothing to learn about multi-party competitive politics from the corrupt parties of the old system. The old parties could have learned something about it from the Maoists but seem intent on just collapsing in a heap instead. There will still be a need for other parties after the old parties have collapsed."

Why should I care about any of the political parties?  I know that the Maoists do not care about multi-party democracy any more than any of the worlds' other "people's republics" and "we-will-hold-elections-soon" military dictatorships do? 

Why should I care about the "old parties" when I know that this situation came about because of them. I already know that my world is destroyed; I simply want to express my opinion here so that I can tell somewhere what I actually felt and if I really was alone.

"Eventually, even people like you will learn how to actually argue as equals instead of trying to force others to shut up and having to be forced to actually respond against your will."

Not in this life time and not in a thousand to come would I argue like you, hollow and repetitive. I have already taken my stand and I will not relent because I am the only person who has arrived at a conclusion that is contrary to the one that is against the majority view, exemplified by #62.

"Then you will no longer need to throw tantrums about having no influence on events and will realize that you can gain influence only by putting forward actual proposals for how to move forward and seeking support for those proposals among the majority instead of trying to exclude the majority from participation."

Read my comments, and then make smarter remarks. I don't care about the majority; I care about my view, arrived at by my reasoning, stated by me. Whether someone likes it or not is their business. Either way, they can say what they like, they can question as they like, they can explain their own stand as they like. But they cannot repeat the same mantra and misquote me as you like to, and then try and drive a different meaning the way you like to.

I will continue to throw tantrums because that is all I can do, I cannot change the course of history, but if I can convince one person to move away from this politics obsessed madness and try and make their own decision, by their own reasons, independently of the crowd and then to share that so I really know what they "really" think as individuals and not ideological robots, I would think I have done something valuable.

I never excluded the majority from participation; I excluded you from trying to abuse me and my writing. You try to exclude people by bullying them; that is your point of being here. Read the link again and try and find out what that was all about and then look at your comments.

"Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people are gathering in Kathmandu to topple a failed government. That is multi-party democracy in action. It frightens you, but you'll get over that eventually".

No, people coming with Khukuri's, bombs and sticks threatening to murder is not democracy in action. The inevitable does not frighten me. It is the madness which saddens me.

"Any new parties that wish to actually compete with the Maoists will need to learn how to rely on the people and organize the people as the Maoists did instead of relying on the state and begging favors from its security forces as the failed parties did."           

Nobody would be so shameless that they would encourage young children to become storm troopers instead of encouraging them to go to school. A whole lot of these kids, when they are older and saner, would know what people like me were talking about. But for now, that is all.



66. Arthur
Slarti,

next week's edition will be out soon. So that you do not feel "bullied" I will let you have the last word.

If in fact you are an independent thinker, who is not afraid to stand against the crowd, as you claim, that would be great. Such people will be needed in the new Nepal.

If so, then eventually you will actually put forward some positive vision as to what should be done to build the future, instead of simply bewailing the loss of your beloved past.


67. jange
It will be interesting to see what face saving formula Kamred P will find to get out of this hole that he has dug himself in.

Be sure, Kamred Arthur will not be there to rescue Kamred P.


68. Niel
Good to know that right revolution is enshrined in the constitution. So now once and if Maoists comes to power others will have right to revolt, pick up arms and over through them. And the cycle will go on.

69. CyberLekali
Arthur should be busted. DK aka Arthur aka MD is the hayena hiding under Sheeps skin. He recently got American citizenship by hook and crook as a refugee (calling himself victim of Maoists) and gave up his Nepali citizenship.  He is not the first and the last Maoist supporters who get US citizenship using Refugee status. He will certainly attack everyone who is not in his side. CyberLekali

70. rishav
My predictions in comment #52 has come true, which I made on the 28th of April...

"Predictions - Unless PM Nepal gets cold feet and surrenders to Maoist demands and resigns the following will happen.
1. Bandh mass mobilization of Maoist Cadres with arms concealed.
2. Attempts by the Maoist in certain sections to entice the security forces for confrontation with the use of arms. If the security force can refrain from taking extreme measures it will ultimately cause more frustration in the Maoist camp as they are hoping on and even expecting a confrontation with a new list of matyrs.
3. Prachanda in the mean time will badh while dancing with numerous females on the street.
4. If the badh continues for too long the local populace will start to get frustrated as it will effect their daily lives and businesses which could potentially cause a counter march.
5. Ultimately the mobilsation like many of their previous ones will most likely be uneventful and will expose the Maoists more as not being effective from the street which they so proclaim to be."


... I guess being a Nepali with a fairly balanced view gives one an understanding of the ground realities therefore able to make more accurate assessments and predictions as evidently done here compared to lets say our avid "whacky" European Maoist supporting commentators.

This is a victory and affirmation to all those commentators who have being trying to give insights to all the readers on what the Maoist's real intentions are and how they attempt to do so. There are certain foreign Maoist supporters who comment on these sites with extremely warped, misinformed and extreme views who have tried to belittle even our own commentators of whom have first hand experience in regard to the problems which are faced in our nation. This is yet again a victory to us commentators who have stood up and told these the foreign Maoists what is going on and what will happen. We turned out correct and saw the Maoists show their true colours recently with events of this week.

Well done guys and girls victory to us! Defeat to you in particular Foreign Maoist, may you stay ill informed with third hand dodgy information and warped in your views.

Shanti!

Jai Nepal!


71. Suman
Once again, he is proved correct. Just see the political developments and his analysis is the nearest to reality.

72. Nepali Chori
Arthur.. you really don't know what youre taling about. Doesn't sound like youre from Nepal... you've understood the theoritical aspect of the argument, but not the real politics...

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(11 JAN 2013 - 17 JAN 2013)


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