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#411 1 - 7 August 2008 16 pages Rs 30 Weekly Internet Poll # 411 Q. How do you characterise the Maoist decision not to form the new government? Total votes: 5,398 Weekly Internet Poll # 412. To vote go to: www.nepalitimes.com Q. At this rate, can the new constitution be written in two years? ROBIN SAYAMI z Why not have Ram Bahadur nurturing one’s languages, culture Thapa as prime minister instead and self-esteem. of Prachanda or Baburam? He is Dhirendra Premarshi in Kantipur not tainted, we don’t know of him p5 visiting embassies, he is clean. Torn apart He is even good-looking. z How is Hindi a Nepali Interview with Madhab Nepal language when Pahadis use it to z Let’s face it, it’s not original z President Yadav’s attempt to p2 communicate in the Tarai, but is an anymore to fight just for the rights become a Nepali is admirable, but Indian language when Madhesis of one’s community. The way to many more Madhesis would z I do come from an area where use it to speak to each other or in build a new Nepal is for Pahadis prefer to be known as Nepalis for Maithali is used, my wife speaks public? to also champion the cause of the what they are rather than what Bhojpuri. What language do you Prashant Jha in Plain Speaking Madhesis and understand their they have to become to be think we use to communicate with p10 historical sense of injustice. recognised as such. each other? Editorial CK Lal in State of the State Interview with Paramananda Jha z “I feel that I was stopped from p2 p2 in Naya Patrika heading the new government and p5 participating in the Summit as it was feared that a new message z If taking an oath in Nepali was would be disseminated to the a problem, it should have been world through my address.” taken in the mother tongue. Interview with Pushpa Kamal National identity is not protected Dahal in Gorkhapatra with concrete border pillars but by p12 2 EDITORIAL 1 - 7 AUGUST 2008 #411 Published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, Editor: Kunda Dixit CEO: Ashutosh Tiwari Design: Kiran Maharjan Director Sales and Marketing: Sunaina Shah [email protected] Marketing Manager: Sambhu Guragain Asst Managers: Deepak Sangraula, Subhash Kumar, Tanka Sitaula Subscriptions: Nawaraj Guragain Tel: 5542535/5542525 Hatiban, Godavari Road, Lalitpur [email protected] GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu 5250333/845, Fax: 5251013 “They betrayed us” www.nepalitimes.com Printed at Jagadamba Press, Hatiban: 5250017-19 UML presidential candidate Madhab Kumar A MILLION MUTINIES Nepal speaks his mind about the Maoists in This past week of tyre-burning proved, if proof is still needed, just how volatile and unstable the political situation still is. The spark an interview with Nepali Times. of the vice-president’s ill-advised decision to take his oath in the official language of a neighbouring country lit the brush fire. The Nepali Times: Why do you parties. But the Maoists have a fate of mainstream politics? lingering political deadlock fanned it. think the Maoists ditched use-and-throw policy. They used It shouldn’t affect the peace It wasn’t supposed to be like this. The entire point about the you overnight? Gyanendra, and remember process. I will play a positive role political transition of the past two years was to install stability so Madhab Nepal: Pushpa Kamal Prachanda used to say royalists whether I am in or out of politics. that the constitution-making process could go ahead without Dahal accepted me as presidential are true nationalists? I have asked the Maoist leaders to pressure groups rampaging in the streets. Any grandstanding on candidate only a couple of days read the history of Peru and sensitive topics such as ethnicity-based federalism was ahead of the voting in the CA. At What now? Cambodia. Nepali communism is supposed to happen on the floor of the house, not on the 11PM we were told the agreement We have shifted to majority not extreme left, it can’t move asphalt outside. The lesson we haven’t learnt from past riots (Hrithik Roshan, would be signed the following politics from consensus politics. towards totalitarianism. September First) is that any political group that tries to morning. But they betrayed us. I The Maoists started it by breaking orchestrate race-based street unrest will itself be consumed by it. had told Prachanda the issue of off our agreement. There are no How difficult will it be to Nepal’s socio-economic and political undergrowth is too dry to president would be a test to permanent friends and foes in agree on a government? play with fire. improve relations between two politics, so things can change. But It is complicated. There is this Nepal’s ethnicities, caste groups, the marginalised and the Maoists squandered their trend of bargaining for key posts downtrodden all have pent-up grievances that need urgent opportunity, they lost the moral even if parties do not have a attention. Addressing the demand of one community invariably high ground. Today they are claim. I don’t know where the short-changes another. If it is not handled carefully, there can begging for the posts that they bargaining will take the country. be a million mutinies. This is all the more reason for all sides to were earlier offering to other There has to be political stability exhibit restraint and responsibility. parties. Still, we have to give them for two years. It is because the Restraint and responsibility were conspicuously absent on streets of the nation this week. Student unions directed a chance to form the government if Maoists were bad losers that the by their parent parties (some of which are in government) they can. If they form the process got complicated, they have were vandalising property. In their haste to capitalise on government, why not have Ram to learn to get used to defeats. the Hindi issue they failed to foresee equal and Bahadur Thapa as prime minister opposite reaction in the Tarai. instead of Prachanda or Baburam? Why did your party lose the Patriotism today means working for national He is not tainted, we don’t know CA election? unity, ethnic co-existence and racial harmony. The of him visiting embassies, he is First we were too tolerant towards protests died down as suddenly as they started: clean. He is even good-looking. the Maoists and wanted to prevent proof that it was all deliberate brinkmanship by them from walking out of the pseudo-nationalists and adverturists playing The Maoist want the NC- peace process. Second, we were identity politics. UML-MJF alliance too confident about our position. The damage has been done. Once more, the country has been taken to the edge of conflagration for short-term political dismantled. Third, we did not consider the gain. Nepal is surprisingly resilient, but it can’t take this kind Just face-saving rhetoric, it’s a Maoists as our opponents. Fourth, of abuse and uncertainty for much longer. bluff. They can’t wait to form the we didn’t think the Maoists Let’s face it, it’s not original anymore to fight just for the government. This alliance should would resort to violence and rights of one’s community. The way to build a new Nepal is continue and other parties should threat to the extent that they did for the Pahadis to also champion the cause of the Madhesis join in, the Maoists too. The and we were cowed down by their and to understand their historical sense of injustice.The alliance is not unnatural, it is the terror. people of the plains to understand the state’s neglect of the natural outcome of Maoist double- marginalised communities of the hills. Both Pahadis and crossing. Drafting the constitution Then why did you decide to Madhesis to make up for their past role in suppressing is now the goal of all parties, the flirt with the Maoists? the Tharus. Maoists should form the Out party was against the extreme We will know we are on the right track when Janjati groups speak not just for themselves, but for fellow-Nepalis who are government and we should move left and the status quo of the NC. downtrodden. When Bahun-Chhetri-Newars share positions of ahead with the constitution- We concluded that the left parties official privilege with the excluded not just out of tokenism, building process. should come together. Despite but because that is the only way to build a new their totalitarian thinking we tomorrow. With you and Koirala out of thought we could turn them the picture, what will be the around. But they betrayed us. SUBHAS RAI The disparate duo Yadav’s conformism and Jha’s deviance, we need them both ending a hearing in the Supreme to the nation now lies on you. All over Upendra Yadav has apparently chosen Gajendra Narayan Singh tried all his Court, Vice President Parmananda again, every Madhesi is a non-Nepali until to forget and forgive, but others remember life to establish Hindi as an alternate P Jha has clarified that when he chose he proves himself to be someone like Ram that the then secretary general of NC language in Nepal. He failed because few to take oath of office in Hindi, it was not Baran Yadav. Yadav was on the other side of the considered his agenda important enough to his intention to hurt anybody’s feelings. Other questions follow. “Wasn’t Jha a barricades throughout the Madhes resist.