I n d e p t h    A n a l y s i s
Break the stalemate!

Kathmandu: The political crisis mounts as agitating political parties blow hot and cold over the Royal action of October 4. The parties have announced their third phase where they seek to call the dissolved parliament on the streets and threaten tough action against uncooperative cadre who have now become increasingly vocal against their leadership.

It is in this threat that real politics is ingrained. The fact is that the parties are threatened by major cadre revolt. An uncooperative public is reining in mass participation and ridiculing grass root workers without whose cooperation enthusiasm in the agitating program dwindles. Both the congress and the UML face desertions stalled only by the virtual lack of alternatives. Indeed, it is for this that government is much to blame. If the King’s action has obviously halted the downward spiral of state that every body knows was at the hands of the currently agitating political parties, the people have yet to be given the options they seek in politics as alternative to these very political parties who continue to monopolize organized politics with little competition from anywhere else.

By and large over the past eight months of the Lokendra Bahadur Chand government, the absence of options have created King direct. It should have been the Chand government that cushioned this effect. This has not happened. No seemingly spontaneous public response to the party actions and charges has been initiated. While the King’s response directly in the media was very willingly welcomed by the eager public, government appears limited to speechifying in the media and convincing organized response on part of government is overly due.

This explains the public frustration at both the political parties and government and the unease that prevails contributes as much to the current sense of instability as it does to lack of a forward looking alternative to the current stalemate.

In this sense again, a change in the current situation is very much predictable. The stalemate must be broken for the King’s daring October action to carry any meaning. It is for this that the public welcomed the action and continues to resist the shenanigans of the organized politicians.

Pakistan sees the need for a "New Security Architecture" for SA

-Ambassador Akram

Kathmandu: The Republic of Pakistan, a very powerful member of the SAARC regional body and concurrently also a Central Asian personality as claimed by Pakistan’s Ambassador Zamir Akram on Monday here, has once again proposed for the need for the establishment of a "New Security Architecture in South Asia".

According to Ambassador Akram, the Pakistani foreign secretary, Monsieur Riaz Khokhar on 22 May, 3003 presented a draft proposal in Geneva for the establishment of such a structure meant for South Asia, which possess six elements in all.

The first element contained in the Pak draft proposal states "Foreswearance of the use or the threat of force in settling disputes; the second reiterates " Full respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all States of the region; the third talks of the institutionalization of a "Permanent mechanism for bilateral dialogue and consultations for dispute settlement; the fourth suggests the "Initiation of result oriented talks for devising mutually acceptable confidence building measures in the nuclear field; the fifth sees the need to the "Stabilization of conventional forces at levels consonant with the legitimate security needs of the States of the region and the sixth element demands "Renewed commitment to jointly combat the true enemy of South Asia that is poverty, hunger, illiteracy and disease.

Ambassador Akram made these observations Monday afternoon at a program organized by the Embassy itself on the topic "Recent International and Regional Developments" which was participated in by a number of noted Nepali academicians and media men.

During the lecture program, the Pakistani diplomat touched upon his country’s foreign policy determinants; global and regional issues and on Pakistan’s policies regarding weapons of mass destruction or otherwise the WMD.

Talking on Pakistan’s foreign policy determinants, Ambassador Akram opined that these were guided by domestic priorities which demanded a vibrant national economy and that in turn demanded peace within and without.

" Pakistan is not only a South Asian personality but also concurrently a central Asian personality for Pakistan is at the cross roads of South and central Asia and that our borders touch China as well and are placed geo-strategically close to the Gulf region/the Middle East.

"But this doesn’t mean that we are inclined much towards in claiming ourselves as a central Asian personality for our attachment with South Asia goes back to centuries and that we have so many things in common with the prevailing South Asian cultures and traditions", clarified the Ambassador.

He however admitted that after the collapse of the then Soviet Union, Pakistan got an excellent opportunity to expand her ties with the Central Asian republics. By way of reference, the Pak diplomat also hinted that his country could act like a bridge in between the South and the Central Asian countries if the countries of this region so desired.

Talking on the issues confronting the globe today, Ambassador Akram made no secret of his country’s displeasure with the lone super power, the United States which in his opinion had initiated a sort of "pre-emptive" war on Iraq which, added Ambassador, as "dangerous. This he said in an indirect fashion indeed.

"In essence, the world population had expected that the end of the Cold War would bring in a "new international order" to the benefit of the entire human kind but the irony has been that it instead paved the way for what the Ambassador preferred to call "disorder".

The fact of the matter is that he was hinting the supremacy of the lone super power-the United States in the absence of a bipolar world prior to the end of the cold war. Its corollary would be that the Pakistani envoy preferred the existence of a bipolar world. The significance of his message lies here.

The disorders that the end of the cold war brought were in the form of emergence of various ethnic conflicts and scores of regional disputes remaining unresolved, continued the Ambassador.

"Pakistan would wish to see the idea of collective security established under the aegis of the United Nations", remarked the Pak envoy.

On matters related to terrorism, the Ambassador stated that there had been two kinds of terrorism; the first being an act of terrorism initiated by non-state actors and the second being a terrorism wherein a State itself is involved. Where the Ambassador was hinting by saying so is any body’s guess.

" Now it was time that the world leaders distinguish between terrorism and legitimate struggle of people’s under foreign occupation", said the Ambassador.

Commenting on Pakistan’s policy towards the weapons of mass destruction, Ambassador Akram lamented that when his country was denied enough and credible security guarantees of the sorts of what has been provided to countries like Japan and Germany, his country was "forced to develop nuclear capability for defense and deterrence after Indian tests of 1974".

Commenting on WTO and new economic order, the Ambassador maintained that there should be a sort of "balance between benefits and costs to both developed and the developing countries, especially the LDCs.

Regarding the recent positive developments seen in Pakistan-India ties, the Ambassador hastened to add that it was wrong to preview that only Pakistan were interested in a constructive dialogue with India. He however, said that his country had disputes only with India amongst the crowd of many countries in the region.

On bilateral ties, the Pakistani envoy said that both the countries have been cooperating in political, "military", economic, trade’ education and cultural areas.

"But greater potential exists provided both the countries made efforts in finding alternative roots". Concluded the Ambassador.

Finance experts favor prevalence of a strong "corporate governance"

Kathmandu: Dr. Tilak Rawal, the Governor of the State owned Nepal Rastra Bank or otherwise the NRB, has said that his financial institution "feels that the prevalence of a strong corporate governance is necessary for the development of a vibrant and resilient financial market and is an effective tool to protect the interest(s) not only of the investors but those of the depositors as well.

Dr. Rawal made these remarks last week at a talk program organized by the Society for International Development, Nepal Chapter, at Hotel Malla.

Dwelling on the theme of "Corporate Governance and Financial Sector reforms in Nepal", Dr. Rawal, the Governor of the apex financial institution in the country opined that Nepal should take lessons from the 1997 ASEAN financial crisis and go deep into the factors that caused the almost collapse of the world renowned Companies like ENRON and Worldcom which definitely should have forced the financial leaders of the globe to turn their eyes towards the issue of Corporate Governance.

"Highly unsatisfactory performance of the two banks, Rastriya Banijya Bank and Nepal Bank Limited and reports of rampant irregularities at a number of other financial institutions have prompted NRB to initiate appropriate actions encouraging transparency and accountability", added the NRB Governor.

He however, did not mention that he too should be blamed for the inaction and irregularities in the two banks he mentioned though he himself occupied the Chair of one of the commercial banks for several years and invited criticisms, both healthy and unhealthy, from various sectors of the national life.

Easier said than done.

According to him, corporate governance encompasses the relationship and pattern of all those involved in an organization and that the ASEAN crisis has amply shown that good corporate governance is essential for sustainable growth of financial sector.

Highlighting the measures he is taking to correct the economic aberrations in the country, Dr. Rawal said that the NRB had of late been "withdrawing public sector involvement from the financial sector, developing sound legal frameworks, strengthening the central bank, strengthening accounting and auditing practices and finally enhancing competition among the actors of financial sector are some of the measures initiated to develop a vibrant and resilient financial system in Nepal".

Welcoming the attending participants, Professor. Dr. Bishwa Keshar Maskay, the President of the SID, Nepal Chapter, said that though the country opted to go in for a vigorous reform process to revitalize the dwindling Nepali economy as back as in 1990, however, "in spite of the seriousness of the purpose, the reform process thus initiated has neither been sustained along a steady momentum nor has its effects as yet been clearly and widely felt because of the political instability created by successive fragile and transient governments and other domestic uncertainties".

In his opinion, the stress on the reform process has been mainly on account of piecemeal approach adapted in subsequent periods of time.

"The vital need is to sustain progress to complete the tasks at hand and that an efficient and robust financial sector is the foundation for delivering sustainable economic growth. To accomplish those goals, Dr. Maskay prescribes "better financial intermediation" which according to Dr. Maskay "enhances the efficiency of the allocation of resources by eliminating distortions in the cost of capital and facilitating efficient payment mechanisms amongst various actors within the economy.

Nepal’s impotent civil society merely an onlooker of sad events

Kathmandu: Nepal’s "impotent" civil society has remained a mere onlooker of the dangerous political events that have been unfolding in the recent days and weeks.

A politically biased civil society appears reluctant to act in a manner it is demanded of it for varied understandable reasons.

The members of the so-called Civil Society in the process appear to have forgotten the fact that if the nation takes a further political slide, it is this society which too will be badly affected.

The fact is that the civil society is silent over the political situation as it is obtaining today.

God bless Nepal’s so-called deaf and dumb namesake civil society.

Be that as it may, the country, for good or bad, is heading towards a situation wherein a sort of fierce political confrontation seems to be imminent in the days ahead.

Obviously, the clash or say the confrontation is in beiween the King and the major parliamentary parties who have entered into their what they call the "third phase" of movement against the Monarch’s October 4 moves which they claim to have exceeded the constitutional limits provided to the Nepali monarch in the 1990 constitution.

The King appears resolute in not listening to the agitators’ demands, which clearly hints that the King will not yield under small a pressure of the sort now being adopted by the agitationists.

The five major parliamentary parties say that they will ultimately compel the King to correct his past constitutional blunders and that to achieve their political goals they would continue to shake the streets ad infinitum. In the process, the big-5 have through their affiliated students’ organizations been creating troubles to the government and the process of harassing the incumbent government appears to continue with more ferocity.

The lay men have several things to listen, in the meantime, apart from the news of the agitation waged by the major political parties. They are listening to the actions now being initiated by the CIAA against the alleged corrupt leaders; they are equally interested in listening to the convening of the third round of talks of the Maoists with the government; they also have been listening to the 50th anniversary celebrations of the ascent on the Mount Everest currently being observed in the country in the presence of Sir Edmund Hillary; the lay men also appear interested in Deuba-Koirala secret talks which talk about the possibility of a unification of the Koirala Congress with the congress chaired by Sher Bahadur Deuba; the people also get a political message in the news which hints that Khum Bahadur Khadka, one of the stalwarts of the Deuba congress is shortly joining Koirala congress; the lay men also find it interesting to note that a good number of UML senior activists have quit the party for good which in itself is a devastating news for the mainstream UML under Madhav Nepal and the likes.

All put together, what becomes clear is that the lay men have not only been concentrating their attention to the big-5 activities but have also to take stock of other equally important events. This means that the agitation is albeit there but which is yet to attract the attention and the sympathies of the majority of the population—the real catalyst for any political change in any country.

In the meanwhile, President Koirala’s anger against the King has seemingly acquired an inimical dimension. Analysts opine that during a month of his sponsored agitation against the monarch, he might have used all the possible undiplomatic and erratic languages against the King giving an impression to the majority of the population that it is he who only can cow-down the image of the constitutional monarch and that he would continue to malign the prestige of the monarch come what may.

The King presumably listening to his virulent remarks and making no comments to neutralize Koirala’s outbursts being made against his personality.

Not all is bad from the UML quarters for the monarch.

Madhav Nepal the other day expressed his and his colleagues possibility of meeting the monarch should the initiation came from the other camp.

This does hint that Madhav and his colleagues would not mind in having collective parley with the King if the offer came to them. Its corollary would be that Madhav and his colleagues too appear tired of waging the ongoing movement for "unknown" reasons and would not mind to settle their differences with the monarch in the larger interest of the nation and the people.

But would Koirala agree to Madhav’s proposal given that the former has been hitting hard the monarch and if such a meeting were forthcoming, wouldn’t it presumably create a sort of uneasiness at time Koirala faced the King inside the Palace?

Politics is a discipline wherein one has to adapt and accommodate at every such awkward possible occurrences.

Much will depend on how the Wednesday’s event takes place. The idea is to convene the now dissolved parliament today. How the government and the King react to this funny event will have to be watched.

NEFAS Seminar:
Intellectuals wish to see UN mediation in Nepal’s Conflict Resolution

Kathmandu: The Nepal Foundation for Advanced Studies, NEFAS, organized recently a discussion among scholars and experts from various fields on conflict resolution in Nepal to provide a scholarly perspective to the prevailing conflict situation and the efforts aimed towards alleviating it.

About 66 participants indulged themselves in the discussions, which was divided into five sessions that went on for two days.

The first session introduced the theme of the discussions to the participants while the remaining four were working sessions where experts made their presentations and opinions of the participants solicited. The seminar began on May 17 and ended on 18. The programme was a product of NEFAS-Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) cooperation.

The first session was the inaugural where Prof. Ananda Srestha, the NEFAS executive director, introduced the theme of the discussions to the participants. He asked the participants to seek the reasons that had kept the Nepali society a peaceful one for a long time before the peace was broken.

"Searching for a solution in the rich Nepali traditions may produce a solution to the rising conflicts", he said.

Mr. Yadav Kant Silwal, who had taken the chair of the inaugural session, said that conflict resolution could be a very twisting process in Nepal. He pointed to the Sri Lankan experience and said that in spite of the efforts put in from both international and domestic quarters, the insurgency there is still continuing. Silwal, who is also a former South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Secretary General, and an acclaimed diplomat said a United Nations mediation would have produced a better outcome in the Nepalese crisis scene. The reasons he gave for such a belief were: a) because the UN had offered it, it had a high credibility, its vested interests were limited to the development of this country and Nepal had participated in its peacekeeping operations since the fifties, hence, a good candidate, and b) a UN role would allay many apprehensions about Nepal going the Sikkim way.

On the ongoing peace talks between the government and the CPN (Maoist), Silwal showed dissatisfaction over the inability of the two sides to take up the economic and social agenda, thus far, which have been touted as the root cause of all conflicts in Nepal. "It is this that is going to make the talks a long and tortuous process," he said. The working sessions followed the inaugural.

Associate Prof. Dev Raj Dahal presented his paper in the first session titled "Conflict Resolution: A Note on Contending Issues" wherein he explored the theoretical aspects of conflict in general with references of Nepal and other countries.

Those who commented in his paper were among others, Prof. Guna Nidhi Sharma, Shrish rana, K. R. Jha, and Lal Babu Yadav.

The session was chaired by Mr. Ananda Aditya. Excerpts from the floor discussions are given below.

The first session of the second day saw the presentation by Dr. Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan on "Sociological Perspectives on Internal Conflict Resolution/Management in Nepal". In it he dwelt on the injustices meted out to ethnic groups of Nepal by state policies. Prof. Gunanidhi Sharma chaired the session. ( Excerpts only)

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