On Peace Mode
The Maoists reshuffle their party organization to suit the needs of peace time
By A CORRESPONDENT
Eight months after the success of the People’s Movement, the central committee meeting of the Maoists has decided to reorganize their party organization to fine tune themselves in the peaceful environment.
Heavily dominated by military-like structures and underground operations, the Maoists needed to undergo a massive reshuffling and redistribution of roles and responsibilities in order to meet the challenges of peace time.
The central committee meeting of the Maoists held last week in Bhaktapur has decided to restructure party’s war-time organization into a civilian one.
The meeting has decided to restructure the central command, regional bureaus, fronts and departments and a central secretariat as per the recommendations made by a taskforce headed by Ram Bahadur Thapa aka Badal.
Addressing a press conference on Thursday (December 21), Maoist spokesperson Krishna Bahadur Mahara said the meeting assigned him to lead the party in the interim parliament and the interim government.
He said the party will make public the list of its interim parliament members once the interim constitution is promulgated. The party is also said to have included 40 percent women members.
According to the decision, an 11-member central secretariat headed by Prachanda has been formed with Mohan Baidya, Dr. Baburam Bhattarai, KB Mahara, Dev Gurung and heads of its foreign cell and five development regions as members. Mahara said Prachanda himself would head the party’s publicity department, Dr. Bhattarai will head the party’s parliamentary front, Mohan Baidya will head the training, publications and monitoring department.
Badal will be in charge of eastern development region, Barsha Man Pun of the central development region, Top Bahadur Rayamajhi of the western development region, Post Bahadur Bogati of the mid western development region, Netra Bikram Chand of the far western development region and CP Gajurel will head the foreign cell. Leading dailies report
The change in the party structure was materialized keeping in view the forthcoming constituent assembly elections. “The organization which was formed with the motive of launching people’s war needs some changes as the party has now entered political mainstream,” said CP Gajurel, a senior leader of the Maoists.
The central committee meeting started by welcoming Baidya aka Kiran and Gajurel aka Gaurav – who were recently released from incarceration by Indian authorities. Baidya, one of the senior most leaders, has been assigned an important job of monitoring and maintaining internal discipline while Gajurel has been reinstated to the post he previously held before he was arrested in India .
The meeting ended after passing a slightly amended political resolution proposed by chairman Prachanda.
The party has also approved a two-pronged strategy of mass movement and entering the government.
NEPALI ECONOMY SLOWS DOWN: WB
The growth of economic activity in 2006 is estimated to have slowed down in Nepal because of the intensified conflict, a weather-related decline in agricultural production and a decline in clothing, says World Bank.
As per the WB’s announcement this month for 2006, GDP growth as a whole in South Asia is estimated to have expanded at a very rapid pace of 8.2 percent in 2006, despite Nepal ’s slow growth. India has topped in GDP growth, which is estimated at 8.7 percent, backed by non-agricultural growth in excess of 10 percent, according to WB.
Similarly, output in Pakistan is estimated to have slowed from 7.8 percent to 6.6 percent, following a return to a more normal agricultural production in the wake of a bumper harvest in 2005.
Bangladesh fetched 6.7 percent growth while Sri Lanka attained 7 percent thanks to good harvest, and post tsunami recovery and reconstruction activity. Strong growth in South Asia region is fuelled by economic reforms that have promoted private sector-led growth, sound macro management and greater integration with the global economy, Shantayanan Devarajan, WB’s chief economist for South Asia was quoted as saying. “But the region faces several risks. Unless policymakers act early and decisively to control rising macro-economic imbalances, inflation out turns will be higher, current account deficits larger and subsequent slowdown more pronounced.”
