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VOL. 27, NO. 46, August 01 , 2008 (Shrawan 17 2065 B.S.)
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Sour Grapes?
As a new government still looks elusive Maoists look for the villain of the piece
By SUSHIL SHARMA
He had drafted a statement to be delivered at the Colombo SAARC summit. But what he did not deliver was his passport size photographs (for the summit pass) to the Sri Lankan embassy in Kathmandu.
The Maoist supremo Prachanda told the Sri Lankan envoy “it is not clear if a Maoist government would be formed.”
He has been proved right. There was no sign of a Maoist government four days from the August 2-3 summit.
Prachanda says, he knew in advance “the game” to deny him a rare opportunity to rub shoulders with the South Asian leaders.
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Prachanda: Grapes are sour |
“It is true that a big game and a conspiracy are on to stop a Maoist-led government from attending the summit because,” he told the state-owned Gorkhapatra daily in an extensive interview, “the Maoists would have given a new pro-people message to South Asia and the whole world.”
As the summit approached, the caretaker prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala made it sure that the ‘prime minister-in-waiting’ would not represent Nepal in the two-yearly regional forum. And that he himself would go to Colombo to rub shoulders with, among others, the prime minister Man Mohan Singh
Prachanda has decried Koirala over his decision to go to Colombo.
But he has put the blame elsewhere. The delay in the government formation hence the denial to him a chance to participate in the SAARC summit, according to the Maoist chief, has more to do with “the machinations of foreign hand” than the role of Koirala.
“I don’t think that the issue of the Maoists going to power has lingered because of the Nepali Congress alone. Nor because of the UML alone.”
Prachanda further went on to add that the move to make Girija Prasad Koirala or Madhav Kumar Nepal president does also not seem to be the idea of the Nepali Congress and the UML.
He stopped short of naming what he saw as the villain of the piece, “I don’t want to say either that it is because of India alone.”
But the former rebel signatory of the 12-point agreement with seven mainline parties including the NC and the UML, in Delhi, “the Indians suspect that the Nepalese Maoists would go their own way.”
Prachanda’s outbursts follow the new “unholy” alliance of the NC, UML and the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum to deny the Maoists the presidency, and, possibly, the prime minister ship.
He sees Indian hand behind the alliance. But, said an analyst, “the Maoist chief was conspicuously silent when ambassador Rakesh Sood courted controversy – and criticism – over his recent open support to a national unity government led by the Maoists.”
Prachanda did not see the “Indian maneuvering” when Sitaram Yechuri, DP Tripathi and the company called for a Maoist-led government. The Nepali Congress saw the Indian leaders’ statement as “interference” in Nepal’s affairs, but the Maoists did not.
An observer wondered, “if the Maoist chief’s flip-flop is a case of ‘grapes are sour’”
