Civil Society Movement
A New Momentum In Nepal

By Mukti Rijal

CIVIL Society in Nepal is gaining new momentum. A rough calculation of the formally registered civil society organisations in Nepal puts them over fifty thousands averaging around eight hundred per districts in seventy five districts of the Kingdom of Nepal. This quantitative expansion of civil society organisations has not been accompanied by the quality and capacity needed for the role and responsibilities they are expected to accomplish. There may be several reasons for it. The most critical aspect is the lacking in institutionalisation of the organisation supported by professional growth and competence.

Roles

They are supposed to contribute to social well being and development by performing mainly three categories of roles. The complementary role of the civil society organisations pertains to engage constructively or work with state organisations. They should support them in promoting and executing activities that are meant to enlarging civic choices and opportunities for development. The non-state organisations have their role to contribute to reform the state and society as well. By performing the reformist role civil society organisation tend to fight the anti-social and anti-people anomalies and distortions arising out of state policies. This role of civil society shows as if they are the antagonists of the state action, tendencies and authoritarian values.

There is another more radical role expected from the non-governmental organisations that is revolutionary or transformative role. They should rally for bigger social transformation and stability through social conscientisation, and critical awareness building. Rajesh Tandon an internationally acclaimed leader of the Civil Society movement in India identifies three major contributions voluntary civil society organisations can make in the context of social democratisation and national development. They are innovations, empowerment and advocacy. They are the unique -selling -points (USPs) or the comparative advantages of the civil society organisations. Rajesh Tandon writes "If voluntary organisations become an extension of the government department, if they are unable to identify, document and give visibility to new emerging issues in society, and if they are not able to mobilise human creativity to evolve solution to the pressing and difficult problems of development of our times. They will add no value to this enormous task of national development".

The current situation of conflict and political degeneration in Nepal calls for soul- searching and introspection on the part of both civil and political society. Why civil society organisations have failed to perform as ardent champion of civic values and norms, confront with the refarious tendencies eating into the social vitals needs to be reflected upon. Though it could be argued that like the democratic experimentation, civil society organisations based on the Lockean conception are the nascent phenomenon in Nepal and expecting them to respond and act in a very strong and mature way is stretching too far. However, certain ambivalent trends and weaknesses have contributed to the problems of the independent sector (Voluntary sector) in Nepal.

Civil Society organisations especially NGOs are urban based and their activities have not in several cases touched the people at the core rural heart lands to the possible extent. They are in some cases captured by elites who can influence and make inroads into accessing donor assistances and resources. The 'hegemony of elites' exits in the civil society. They are generally donor dependent. The ingenious drive and propensity to make use of the local resources and capacity has almost been suppressed or inhibited. Without the donor crutches no non-governmental organisation has the propensity and willingness to move and work. The efforts to revive the voluntary spirit and work utilising the local resources are very limited. Civil Society organisations especially NGOs have come under sharp scrutiny and criticism because there is a yawning gap between the values they preach and practice. The donors often set the NGOs agenda in Nepal and they are accountable more to those who dole out funding to them than the communities they profess to serve.

NGOs are institutionally very weak. Neither are they good at following modern managerial practices nor do they adopt social relation based approach to boost links, networks and coordination with target communities. Coalition and networking among NGOs in Nepal is virtually lacking. However, there has been sufficient realisation both on the part of donors and NGO leaders that networking is really needed to produce impact. Information sharing and coalition building is being lately recognized as an important aspect of strengthening civil society.

Commendable

Despite the weaknesses mentioned above, civil society is emerging as a powerful actor in Nepal. The recent developments, especially the role played by civil society organisations to exert pressure on the government and Maoists to talk peace is commendable. It is time civil society played an enhanced role to claim and further its place as the major arbiter of social and civic destiny. It is this vigilant role that would give them more credence and legitimisation in the time to come.

Nasty, Brutish & Short Life Of Women

By Rasna Warah

KENYA'S capital city, Nairobi, hosts some of the most dense, unsanitary and insecure slums in the world. Slum dwellers constitute the majority of the city's population; an estimated 60 per cent of the city's population of roughly 2.5 million people live in slums or informal settlements.

Scant

Life in Nairobi's slums is not easy by any standards. As many as 1200 people live in one square hectare, mostly in mud and stick shacks no bigger than 10x10 feet. Provision of basic services is extremely scant or non-existent. Hundreds of people can end up sharing one toilet.

A recent enumeration exercise in a Nairobi slum showed that the toilet to person ratio was 1:500. The lack of water and sanitation has a significant impact on the quality of women's lives. Slum women spend a large part of their lives fetching or looking for water. Also, unlike men, they cannot use open spaces to relieve themselves, so the lack of toilet facilities is an enormous disadvantage.
Take the case of Mberita Katela, who arrived in Kibera, Nairobi's largest slum, from the impoverished Kitui Muingi district in 1980. Mberita left home, she says, to escape a bad marriage and to earn a living in the city. For the past 22 years, Mberita has lived and worked in Kibera's notorious Laini Saba section, the densest and poorest part of the slum, which houses approximately 35,000 people. She earns her living as a hawker, selling sukumawika (in Swahili, literally translated as "pushing the week"), a leafy green vegetable that is also the staple diet of Kenyans, and cigarettes to residents in Laini Saba. Her average income per day is US $ 0.70 or US $ 21 per month. The money is barely enough to feed her daughter and two grandchildren, who live with her in her tiny 10x12 feet shack.
Mberita's house, for which she pays $ 6 per month, is frugal, even by slum standards. Inside, there are two beds, separated by curtains, a small table, and four stools. These are her worldly possessions. Her daughter, who is in her late teens, sleeps on one of the beds with her two children, while Mberita sleeps on the other. Mberita's five other children, who are all adults, do not live with her. Her son, who is married with two children, lives in Kitui Maingi. But he is not doing very well. Every year, Mberita sends him $ 9 so he can pay school fees for his children.

Mberita's day begins at 5 a.m. when she takes the matatu (public minibus) to the market, where she buys her daily supply of sukumawiki. Almost half her monthy income ($ 0.30) goes towards paying transport costs to and from the market. At 7.30 a.m, she returns home to cook a breakfast of tea and porridge for her grandchildren, both of whom do not attend school. At 8 a.m., she is open for business. She sets up her sukumawiki stall near her house and waits for customers.
In the afternoon, Mberita leaves her daughter in charge of the stall and returns home to clean the house and wash clothes. But it is not so easy. Everyday, she has to walk about 300 metres to the water tank installed by Maji na Ufanisi, a local NGO, where she buys water for Kshs. 2 for a 20-litre jerrican. There is no water tap in or near her house, nor is there any electricity. And although the pit latrine that Mberita and her family use is only a few steps outside her front door, it is shared by about 100 people. The stench of raw sewage not only permeates her house, but the entire neighbourhood.
At 5 p.m., when a large proportion of Kibera's working residents return home, Mberita begins her cigarette-selling rounds outside the pubs and restaurants in the vicinity. Then, at around 7.30 p.m., she returns home to prepare supper.

Recently, Mberita added another activity to her day: as a member of the Water Committee of Ushirika na Usafi, a Laini Saba community cooperative supported by Maji na Ufanisi, she now spends some of her mornings attending Committee meetings. Mberita is part of a self-sustaining cooperative that sells water to Laini Saba residents, and uses the profits to start other community projects.

Wish

When I met Mberita in her shack in March last year, her only wish was to leave the slum and live on a plot of land she can call her own. Mberita hopes that the cooperative will one day save enough funds for a piece of land outside Nairobi, where she and other members will live.

Habitat Debate

(Warah is Editor of Habitat Debate)

Mysterious Homeopath

By Shreedhar Khanal Anantayatri

NO one knows whether he was a genuine homeopath or a quack. He came from Ram Nagar, India about three decades ago and opened a homeo clinic at Battisputali. Neither he approached the Medical Council for registration nor the Council bothered to examine has certificate. He treated the patients with homeopathic tincture that, he said, he prepared himself. Mostly the poor who could not afford to buy costly allopathic medicines visited him. A few patients who had faith in homeopathy also came to him. Some of them said they were cured and some complained that he was unable to cure them. But they regarded him as a genuine homeopathic therapist. Dr. Khanal, the homeopath, all of a sudden, shifted his clinic from Battisputali to New Banewhwor and started free treatment for diabetic patients. When I asked him why he was treating the diabetic patients with generosity, he said that he was going to cure diabetes which other physicians say has no cure.

I frequently went to see him and ask how much progress he had made so far. One day he said he had not only cured diabetics but also those who were born deaf and dumb. He requested me to send born deaf and dumb persons to him so that he could cure them and make them able to speak as well as hear.

I sent a born deaf and dumb to him for treatment and waited for a few months in vain. The young man could neither hear nor speak a word. Then I met some diabetics whom I had referred to him for their treatment. I asked them how well they were being treated. Most of them said, "No, he is a quack. Our disease increased with his treatment. We have stopped seeing him. Now we are under allopathic therapy," I, myself a diabetic had not accepted his medicine as I had controlled my disease with low-fat diet. I thanked God that He had saved me from the quack's alluring treatment.
Among my friends and acquaintances, there were some who were suffering from arthritis, gout or rheumatism. They were all treated by the homeopath, I met them one by one and equired about their diseases. All of them told me that they were cured. Hearing them I was confused. I could not decide whether Dr. Khanal was a quack or a genuine homeopath. He failed in his generous treatment of diabetics as well as deaf and dumbs. But he was successful in the treatment of patients with whom he took money. How a physician who could cure arthritis, gout and rheumatism but could not control diabetes? Being puzzled, I went to see him in his clinic. His nameplate had been removed and some other signboard had replaced it. There was also a newspaper cutting stuck on the signboard. It was printed in a local daily that Dr. Khanal was a quack with fake certificate and he had cheated many diabetics with false assurance that they would be cured. He had taken many lump sum payments in advance with some patients. But some of them forced him to return the amount which made the quack flee.

There are many diabetics in Kathmandu who claim that the so called homeopath was a quack. And there are many persons who say they were cured of arthritis, rheumatism and gout by the genuine homeopath. They feel sorry that a physician of high caliber like Dr. Khanal was made to flee the country by some powerful vested interests. They are prepared to undergo his treatment if he appears again in Kathmandu.