#199 4 - 10 June 2004 20 pages Rs 25 Sher Bahadur Weekly Internet Poll # 139 Q. What role should King Gyanendra play? Deuba must prove that he is DEUBA III not just another Total votes:1,809 bahadur Weekly Internet Poll # 140. To vote go to: www.nepalitimes.com Q. Should the five parties have met the kings KUNDA DIXIT deadline for a common prime ministerial candidate? her Bahadur Deubas as the palace insisted. subject of reunification of the NC, program and whether to accept appointment this week as Deubas appointment was which Koirala did not reject outright Deubas invitation for support at a S prime minister for the third then hastened by the surprise because it would help him deal with central committee meeting on time is a chance to end a two-year announcement this week that the UML. Friday. But for now, the parties are political deadlock and make up for caretaker premier Thapa had, The UML itself has fallen out still adopting a hardline stance lost time in finding a peaceful without telling anyone, extended an with Koirala and is waiting for his because they do not want to resolution to the conflict. invitation to Indian foreign minister next move before deciding on a alienate radicalised students on It took nearly a month to get a K Natwar Singh to visit on 4 June. common minimum the streets who will need time successor to Surya Bahadur Thapa, A prime minister had to be found to cool down. l and the delay prompted speculation quickly before he came. of back channel talks between the King Gyanendra decided to Maoists and palace emissaries. It was eat his words and reinstate reportedly after those dialogues a prime minister he sacked failed that the five party alliance was 20 months ago for asked to come up with a common incompetence. The king candidate for premiership. But the risked being ridiculed by alliance fell apart over differences the parties, but hoped that between the NC and the UML on public opinion would favour whether or not to send a nominee. the move. Essentially, there was no Deuba thinks his procedural difference between reinstatement proves once and Deubas appointment and that of for all he was never incompetent. As Thapa and Lokendra Bahadur with his predecessors, the king gave Chand before him. But analysts say Deuba a three point agenda: get the where Deuba can make a difference parties on board, start a peace process is in showing that he can take with the Maoists and conduct the parties along. To do this, elections within the next 10 paradoxically, he has to prove to months. Given Deubas track them that he is not a palace pawn. record during his previous Minendra Rijal of the NC two tenures, analysts are not (Democratic) told us his party was hopeful that he can deliver. taking things step by step, adding: During his second We are determined to get all the term, Deuba made the parties on board. But NC fatal blunder of terminating spokesman Arjun Narsingh KC was local bodies, which left a less upbeat: It shows regression vacuum at the grassroots hasnt ended. Deuba may have that the Maoists filled. He been reinstated, but the peoples declared a state of emergency, sovereignty has not. dissolved parliament and Piecing together the sequence of announced elections he knew he events this week, it is clear that couldnt hold. He was also stained everyone except Sher Bahadur by the misdeeds of his cabinet. Deuba and Speaker Taranath This time, the fact that Ranabhat failed the royal interviews Deuba rushed to see Girija for the premiers post. At the last Koirala first thing on moment, Ranabhat put himself out Wednesday afternoon shows he Editorial p2 of the race on Tuesday morning by takes the kings instructions Square one refusing to resign his speakers post seriously. He even broached the SUBHAS RAI 2 EDITORIAL 4 - 10 JUNE 2004 #199 Published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, Chief Editor: Kunda Dixit Desk Editors: Trishna Gurung, Jemima Sherpa Design: Kiran Maharjan Web: Bhushan Shilpakar Advertising: Sunaina Shah [email protected] Subscription: Anil Karki, [email protected] Sanchaya Kosh Building, Block A-4th Floor, Lalitpur GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu, Nepal Tel: 01-5543333-6, Fax: 01-5521013 The error of terror [email protected], www.nepalitimes.com Printed at Jagadamba Press, Hatiban: 01-5547018 Terrorism is not going to get the Maoists anywhere SQUARE ONE he Maoist peoples war properly analysed and need to be s Sher Bahadur Deuba becomes prime minister for the third that began with the GUEST COLUMN seen in the correct perspective. time, it is difficult to say which square Nepal is back on. T A objective of political, social Samrat Rana The campaign of violence and Is it 1960? 1980? July 2001, his first tenure? October and economic upliftment, has now coercion has effectively destroyed Third 2002, the day before he was sacked? Or 7 May 2004, when Surya Bahadur Thapa resigned? veered off course. The use of terror economic fabric of the state. the states ability to achieve any When Deuba became prime minister the last time in July 2001, as a tactic is being applied There are fundamental progress or development. It has we wrote in this space that he should not expect a honeymoon period indiscriminately to undermine the questions about whether the also seriously damaged the very and must learn from his previous tenure. He didn’t, and went on to social political, administrative and current position and posture social foundation and harmony disband local bodies, dissolve parliament, surround himself with of the Maoist movement can of Nepals unified and crooks and announce elections he couldn’t be considered legitimate. heterogeneous society. hold. We have reproduced the editorial page Yet an organisation which Maoist subversion was cartoon from the edition of 27 July 2001, the has adopted terrorism as an developed and designed to lead week Deuba assumed office. It is eerily end in itself, continues to to the eventual collapse of the prescient today. Not much has really changed: be accepted and receive state machinery, infrastructure the war has become worse, 5,000 more Nepalis sympathy and and economic activities. In the were killed, the country is in a deeper crisis. And we have lost two valuable years as the consideration from absence of political resolve and palace and the parties squabbled responsible and effective policies to counter these unnecessarily for power. intelligent liberals and designs, there is an urgent need Then, the Maoists had greeted Deuba’s democrats. for a socio-political movement assumption of office by slaughtering 17 The answer against the inhuman methods policemen in Bajura before announcing a probably lies in the adopted by the rebels. Public truce. The ceasefire and talks lasted four months before the rebels attacked the Ghorahi barracks post-1990 political awareness, initiative at all levels, and dragged the Royal Nepali Army into the war, standoff. The commitment and concerted seriously escalating it. disillusionment of the action by civil society in King Gyanendra has swallowed his pride to people led to the particular is an absolute necessity. reinstate a prime minister he sacked two years Maoist insurgency There is a certain reluctance ago for incompetence. Deuba and the king gave each other a face-saving way out of a political wherein a micro- on the part of media to term deadlock that has paralysed the country for two political group Maoist activity as terrorism. years. The parties must now look beyond their wanting to draw These Kathmandu-based insistence on process and help Deuba tackle the attention to their journalists may be respected and nation’s larger crises. grievances resorted responsible, but they are far His challenge is much greater this time. If he to using terror as a removed from the daily reality of couldn’t resolve the Maoist crisis then, how is he going to do it now? If he had to postpone elections shortcut to power. rural Nepal where the people last time, how is he going to hold it within the 10- This path of grapple with terror every day. month royal deadline? How is he going to get the violence and One internationally-accepted government working? Restart development? Can he anarchy, which definition of terrorism is: The keep the crooks out this time? rests on a premeditated deliberate, Deuba has a few things going for him: he is well- meaning and down-to-earth. He has fought and foundation of systematic murder, mayhem and suffered for democracy, and this LSE fellow has a wife subversion and threatening of the innocent to who coaches him on development. He has also terrorism, has create fear and intimidation in served in the high-power committee set up by his attained order to gain political or tactical mentor, KP Bhattarai, in 2000 to solve the Maoist dangerous advantage, usually to influence crisis. dimensions in the absence an audience. This accurately But before he gets down to any of this, Deuba needs to build a minimum consensus among the of appropriate political describes the Maoist tactic of parliamentary parties so they are all rowing in the initiatives. The longterm fear, intimidation, threats and same direction. objectives of the Maoists and murders that is happening their methods have not been throughout Nepal today. L ETTERS BUS BOMB public transportion every day. Maoists were on the brink of want to live in the People’s thing by going to war to get rid of It was disgusting to see the The bombing by the victory, if they had been willing to Paradise.