I n d e p t h    A n a l y s i s
Real constitutional crisis comes!

Kathmandu: Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba's trip is followed by Army Chief Pyar Jung Thapa's well-published pilgrimage there. Dates have yet to come public on the much publicized and expectant Royal tour to Delhi.

At the home front, Prime Minister Deuba's confident assertion that he will go ahead with elections unless the Maoists come for talks within the Nepali month of Poush (December-January) have been rejected by the Maoists.

Equally meaningful is the furor deliberately raised in the UML regarding participation in the Deuba cabinet.

The four party agitation clamoring for the restoration of the dissolved parliament led by the Nepali Congress has once more taken to the streets.

The RPPs Surya Bahadur Thapa who prior to his appointment under Article 127 as Prime Minister alleged that his predecessor L.B.Chand had taken the job as the King's "tiller", has distanced himself from the RPP, set up separate office with the intent to open a new party after a "democratic convention".

Politics is definitely set for a new stage.

One possible scenario is that Deuba's exercise in a "national government" will fail because of UML withdrawal. What after becomes the key question.

The UML continuing to review government performance and that of its ministers may either withdraw from government completely or send a new team on the pretense of a new exercise at achieving targets, or support Deuba from outside of government in the pretense of backing declared programs.

The mainstream RPP appears intent backing Deuba. The official RPP line is that it will back any government formed by the majority of the dissolved parliament.

Deuba detractors claim that his mission has failed two ways:

The Maoists have refused talks and

The elections cannot take place.

Furthermore, UML non-participation will mean that the pretense of a "majority" government will now elude him.

The real constitutional crisis will now take place.

His Majesty's use of article 127 may have been debated on partisan lines within the country. However, genuine constitutionalists particularly in the international community are aware that in case of such contingencies the King as protector of the constitution can merely urge the constitutional actors to forge the necessary unity to combat the threat to constitution and democracy. Two years ago in October, the King denied PM Deuba's claim that he continue in office on plea of election postponement and put two Prime Ministers in office with the evident concurrence of the major parliamentary parties who were later opposed by these parties. Deuba is in office once again after it was made publicly evident that there was no concurrence still among the major parties regarding who would be in government as prime Minister. The constitutional reasons behind his reinstatement after the King's public call for claims to office went unheeded because of continued strife among the parties has been made more than evident.

This is particularly clear to the international community who has been saying from the very outset that there is need for the King and parties to come together. The international community is very much aware that this constitutional need has been repeatedly unheeded by political parties.

The international community is also very much aware of the utility of elections in strife torn regions for allowing a semblance of constitutionality and democracy through elections.

In our neighborhood particularly in Kashmir, in Pakistan and in strife torn areas such as Iraq, have been generally welcomed when constitutionalism has been disrupted.

The preference internationally would surely be here.

Particularly because political organizations represented in the dissolved parliament have been active contributors to the current constitutional mess in Nepal and have moreover failed to recognize the constitutional need for an all party government but instead repeatedly sabotaged it the call for the reinstatement of the dissolved parliament is at best lukewarm in the international community.

An attempt to revive the legal legitimacy or the constitutionality of the demand for the reinstitution of the dissolved parliament is already under way. But both the Supreme Court and those advocating the scratching of the dissolution admit that the King will have to make a "political decision" for this purpose.

If the King must make a political decision, the question asked is whether he should do so merely to appease political organizations who appear to be contributors indeed, instigators of the current constitutional mess or whether he should make a political decision that can actually solve the mounting Nepali Problems?

Article-88: an antidote?

Kathmandu: To every predicament, there is and should be a suitable solution.

Constitutional experts say that there is a constitutional course through the effective use of which the current constitutional jumble could be amicably and legally sorted out in the larger interest of the people and the nation.

However, what is needed is that the all-powerful authority that could do so should exhibit its desire and sincerity towards bringing out the country from the existing mess.

If His Majesty the King is allowed to unknot the constitutional mess through the use of the controversial article 127 of the constitution, so does the Supreme Court enjoy unparallel power and rights to undo the crisis brought about by the article 127, if any, as claimed by a larger section of the society including some political forces.

The Article 88 of the 1990 constitution empowers or better say fully authorizes the Supreme Court to intrude in such moments of chaos and crisis when the country is trapped in such a crisis and that the apex court possesses the right to intervene into the matter and is empowered to issue directives to end the debate.

Unquestionably, currently the country is bogged down in a constitutional dispute whose end is not in sight.

The fact is that the Head of the State presumes that whatever he has done through the use of the article 127 was what he should have done or had been told to do so.

The other camp that considers that the King by using the article 127 has crossed his predetermined constitutional limits and hence has dubbed his constitutional acts as regression.

Both the camps have their followers and supporters, which is only but natural in a democratic society.

The politically luxurious tussle thus continues.

In such a situation, the Supreme Court's role becomes momentous.

Analysts question that if the court is empowered to intervene into the debate then why it is not doing so? An authority that has the power and whose elucidation would never be challenged any where should have understood the gravity of the situation and done the needful to bring the country back to the track.

The court appears least interested in sorting out the crisis for reasons unknown to the analysts.

Yet another section of the political analysts opine that since the Supreme Court has itself approved the dissolution of the parliament some two years ago, it can't reinterpret its previous decision and revive the dissolved parliament. This section maintains that if the court reversed its own previous decision would send wrong signals within and without.

However, the fact is that article 88 abundantly makes it clear that it should be the apex court that should jump into the scene to unfasten the constitutional knot that came into existence when the King wished to unknot the constitutional crisis created by the sacking of Prime Minister Deuba in October 2002.

A close look at the wordings of the article 88 does point out that this constitutional provision if effectively brought into practice by the summit court could become the antidote for the article 127.

It is up to the court to make a decision on how to proceed and reinterpret its own previous decision, which has already taken a form of legal precedence, speaking on legal terms

But then the fact is that article 88 allows the court to reinterpret its own verdict. How the court reinterprets its own judgment on the dissolution of the parliament should be left to the honorable justices at the court. Whether they endorse the dissolution of the parliament once again or prefer to revitalize the lower house of the representatives have got to be welcomed.

If it is so, analysts would very much wish to see that the apex court through the use of the article 88 works in this regard in order to end the constitutional crisis for good.

Moreover, the constitutional ruler too is empowered to seek suggestions from the apex court. Analysts say that since the King too understands the gravity of the state of affairs obtaining in the country with the Maoists intensifying their violent activities and the parties creating problems for the government from the streets and that, in addition, the constitutional crisis continues, it was time that the King acted fast and sought the suggestions from the Supreme Court and brought an end to the current constitutional stalemate.

After all, the monarch, as per the constitution, is the preserver and protector of the constitution now in force.

Former Chief Justice, Bishwa Nath Upadhyaya, too maintains that the SC can and should unknot the constitutional mess and that the court can do so through the use of the constitutional provisions as enshrined in the constitution itself.

UML: increasing wrangling?

Kathmandu: The party of the communists, the UML, has either gone fanatical or is on the verge of a vertical split becomes clear from the erratic utterances of some of its summit leaders on the current politics of the nation as it is obtaining today.

A party that demands strict discipline from its leaders as per its dogmatic theory has begun ventilating any thing under the sun contra to the party's established norms and general practices.

It appears that the UML has either become more democratic than Abraham Lincoln or were approaching an abyss wherefrom its return would be simply unthinkable.

Look how the UML leaders have been expressing their feelings of late.

To begin with let's take what Pradip Nepal has to say about the government that is partnered by its own stalwarts.

Mr. Nepal says that the UML should immediately quit the government as the Deuba's coalition set has neither been able to restore peace nor could bring the Maoists to negotiation table. He further sees the need for the revival of the parliament or that of going to the constituent assembly elections.

To recall, revival of the parliament is not in the agenda of the UML.

Now comes the firebrand Bam Dev Gautam. He says that the parliament should be restored and that the UML's men in the government should be sacked or replaced to save the party's sagging image among the population.

Mr. Gautam's expressions go contra to the party's stands and also is in contrast to his own colleagues, Mr. Madhav Nepal's' official line.

Then here we have yet another aggressive UML stalwart, K.P.Woli, who is known for his power-struggle with senior Nepal, the GS of the UML.

The UML leader bluntly endorses the government deadline offered to the Maoists and says that the establishment had no other options left and hence the deadline.

Mr. Woli says if the parliament can't be restored and the elections not being held, what the hell the government should do in such a precarious situation?

Woli clearly endorses Deuba's reiteration.

The all-powerful UML leader who in the recent past has traveled to several European countries plus been to the United States for a month or so rejects the government's assertion that if the Maoists did not attend to the talks within the stated timeframe, going to the elections will be the only option left.

"If the elections are held without the restoration of peace would mean inviting a bloody war", is what senior UML leader Madhav Nepal said the other day.

This is not the end of it all.

The deputy Prime Minister, Bharat Mohan Adhikari, one more influential member of the UML party, signaled the Maoists that this deadline were the last offer from the government side and that if the other camp did not respond positively to the government's offer would be very expensive for the insurgents.

A threat loaded statement indeed which the finance minister should have avoided in order to keep the rebels in good humor. But he did not do so for unexplained reasons.

Let's see what the ministers from the UML quota have to say.

The UML ministers in Deuba's coalition appear less interested in poking their nose in the political issues but instead have managed themselves to remain engaged in matters that benefited them materially. But then yet as they are a part of the government thus they appear to have sided with what the government has said in the recent days vis-à-vis the Maoists.

This means that the ministers more or less differ with their own party leaders who oppose Deuba and flay the offer of the talks to the Maoists.

This clearly makes the analysts to conclude that there is already a rift in between and among the UML leaders whether they are in government or in the party.

The increasing internal rivalry in the UML in between and among its own leaders does clearly indicate that all is not well inside the UML and that an earthquake of higher scale is about to shake the party soon.

Its inference would be that the UML under Madhav Nepal is already in a grave crisis and that senior Nepal's leadership is being questioned by his own party men to the extent that Pradip Nepal, once Madhav's chum, has begun questioning the raison d etre of the UML continuing in government as against Madhav's preference to continue in government.

Prachanda not averse to talks

Kathmandu: It appears that the constitutional monarch demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba when the latter invited the monarch for a "quiet dinner" at his official residence some two weeks ago.

Presumably, a flabbergasted Prime Minister appealed for a "grace period" for the resignation as demanded by the King.

What emerges from this presumption, could be a wild one, is that the King granted a definite timeframe for Deuba to materialize what the King had instructed to Deuba at time of his appointment as the nation's prime minister some four months back.

Coincidently, after receiving a grace period of apparently three months, Deuba too set a deadline for the Maoists to attend to the talks with his government. Could have some connections to his own deadline what he presumably received from the monarch.

Now that Deuba has set a deadline for the Maoists to come to talks or else the government can't wait for the talks to happen for an indefinite period. The offer of talks made by Deuba also hints that if the other side rejected the offer of the talks, the government would have no option left other than to go for the polls.

As was expected, Maoists Supremo rejected the talk-offer stating that the offer itself was not only "abstract" but a threat loaded one as well.

Prachanda describes the offer as a sort of conspiracy.

Nevertheless, Comrade Prachanda in his fresh statement implies that his party was not "against" the talks and could come to the table provided the other side heeded to their minimum demands, more specifically that of holding of the elections to the constituent assembly.

Prachanda has also hinted that talks could be initiated with the government should some "recognized" international mediator who could be trusted comes to the scene.

While saying so Prachanda appears to have dumped the idea of having the UN good offices at time of the talks with the government. If not the UN then, Prachanda, will be more than happy if some reputed international agencies mediated at time of the talks. A grand departure from the previous stance indeed.

The statement issued by Prachanda summarily rejects the Indian mediation. ( See KP dated November 13, 2004). This explains that the Maoists are still angry with the India for obvious political reasons.

To sum up, Prachanda favors talks. He needs an impartial international mediator. He will not settle for less than elections to the constituent assembly.

How the government would react to Prachanda's fresh political mood will have to be watched.

BOOK OF THE WEEK

Title: Bird's World
Author: Dadi Ram Sapkota
Edited by: Binod Dhungel
Publisher: Rajendra Adhikari, Bird Education Society
Price: Rs.300
Cover Design: Basu Kshitij
Art: Michael Bori, FRANCE & Hiralal Dangol, NEPAL

The author is basically a journalist possessing a special inclination towards the world of the birds. The author in this book has highlighted the inter-relation in between the world of the birds and the environment.

The book is perhaps a first venture of its own kind written and published by Nepali citizens.

The author is currently based in PARIS and is associated with Centre D'Information sur L'environnement, France.

The book hopefully will arouse interest even among the laymen. Worth reading! Kudos to the writer and the publisher.- Editor

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