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#348 11 - 17 May 2007 16 pages Rs 30 The long lines at Weekly Internet Poll # 348 gas stations are a Q. What is the best option for King Gyanendra? sure sign this Total votes: 5,779 Bankrupt country is broke DAMBAR K SHRESTHA resume imports. cutting back on supplies by 30 differential. In the short-term Weekly Internet Poll # 349. To vote go to: www.nepalitimes.com “We’ve always sold low and percent in past months to prod there doesn’t seem to be any Q. Do you think there will be talks he long queues at gas bought high, and that’s no way to the NOC to clear its dues. alternative but to raise gas prices, between the MJF and the eight-party stations in the capital this run a business,” says NOC The Petroleum Dealers’ but this is a hot potato no government? T week mean only one thing: spokesman Ichchha B Thapa, Association says private pumps politician wants to touch. this country is bankrupt. “either the government allows us have not got supplies since In the long term, given The latest crisis has been to raise fuel prices or it pays Tuesday. “We’ll keep having these Nepal’s heavy dependence on sparked off by Nepal Oil Indian Oil. There is no other shortages until the government imported oil and air pollution Corporation (NOC) not having the solution to this.” pays the Indians,” says Sharad problems, there must be a move money to pay for this month’s Street protests last August Bhandari of the dealers’ towards electric vehicles, says JA import of oil from India. It has forced the government to association. “And for that, the Goff at the renewable energy stocks to last just two more days. backtrack on a price hike. Ever eight parties need to take a quick group Eco-Visions in Thursday’s eight-party since, NOC has amassed nearly decision.” There are long queues Kathmandu. “It would be meeting is being held to decide Rs 6 billion in debt. Now, Indian at government gas stations, and prudent for the government of on a date for the postponed Oil has refused to ship more oil private pumps have run out of Nepal to eliminate all import constituent assembly elections. unless it receives Rs 150 million a fuel. duties and taxes on electric But the politicians should first month. Indian Oil has been NOC’s losses total Rs 250 vehicles like it did with Safa figure out a way to million a month and there is tempos,” he says. pay India to rampant smuggling of petrol back For example, Japan has no tax into India because of a Rs 7 per on electric cars and instead offers litre price a $2,500 rebate per electric car, which the country fully recoups in saved fuel bills and pollution reduction. Editorial p2 Peace train KIRAN PANDAY 2 EDITORIAL 11 - 17 MAY 2007 #348 Published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, Editor: Kunda Dixit Executive Editor: Anagha Neelakantan Design: Kiran Maharjan Web: Rupendra Kayastha Director Sales and Marketing: Sunaina Shah [email protected] Circulation Manager: Samir Maharjan [email protected] Subscription: [email protected],5011628/29 Hatiban, Godavari Road, Lalitpur New country, old habits [email protected] GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu 5543333-6, Fax: 5521013 www.nepalitimes.com Printed at Jagadamba Press, Hatiban: 5547018 Listen to ‘the people’ while planning a new Nepal n Kathmandu last week, I a constitution which, at its core, communities? EACE TRAIN met friends from the human respects ‘people’s power’. In a Nepal has to face up to the P Irights community in Nepal legalistic sense the alternate to a crucial challenge of its It was clear from the very outset that mainstreaming the Maoists coming out of a class on unitary constitution obviously is democratic struggle and related wasn’t going to be an easy task: for the Maoists as well as for the federalism. Over a decade ago, ‘federalist’. reforms. It still has large rest of the country. Post-independence India and unresolved issues related to land Every conflict leaves a legacy of bad blood and scores are when I was an election observer settled. The Northern Ireland peace process took more than a decade here, I, like other activists, was Sri Lanka have seen violence and reform and has to engage in a to get over entrenched hostilities and finally agree on power sharing delighted to see the emergence of blood-shed as communities and public discourse regarding the this week. Sri Lanka has slipped back into war after three years of a robust human rights and nationalities struggled for equal rights of women and girl ceasefire. democratic activism in Nepal. As equality. I am in favour of children. It has to find the best Often in the past year’s rollercoaster peace process we in Nepal part of the international rights federalism in Sri Lanka—where mechanism to facilitate equal have been pushed to the brink. Maoist negotiators used the threat of community, we nurtured these the monarchy was kicked out by representation of all minorities a return to war as an effective bargaining tool in negotiations. The colonial powers—because country was sometimes held hostage and Nepalis paid a ransom for forces, which we also saw as in the governing process and find peace. supporting the aspirations of political power-sharing is the modalities to combat But, such was our desire to see an end to conflict, that we went SAARC citizens. only way to resolve its raging discriminatory practices, whether along with it. Hope hinged on three factors: Indian facilitation, UN ethnic conflict. The struggle for traditional or recent. monitoring and the watchdog role of civil society. And all this had to federalism together with the right It is of course an exciting GUEST COLUMN be carefully sequenced so that neither the Maoist fighters nor the to self-determination suggest experience to deal with the Nimalka Fernando army generals felt it was a surrender. homelands, distinct languages, notion of power sharing Pushpa Kamal Dahal has had to do a precarious high-wire act: territories, and cultural balancing the frustrations of former fighters with the need to appear immediately after a victory of like a mature mainstream politician. Of all the leaders in the Group of What we did not expect to see identities. this nature. But we must not Eight, he has the toughest job. was these trends deteriorating But this might not be forget the soul of this struggle. As the Eight meet this week, they should be reminding slowly as political struggles took appropriate for Nepal. Nepal The strength of this resistance to themselves that this is not about just the mechanics of conducting hold. What happened? Did the today is at the threshold of giving monarchy and caste-based elections anymore. It is about how to address the ethnic progressives became so state-ist birth to the diversity of its domination was drawn from fragmentation threatening us in the aftermath of the insurgency. that they removed themselves people, rather than making ‘one those who risked their lives for a Despite YCL guerrillas-in-civvies roughing up someone or nation’. Can its political future, criminalised comrades attacking a police post we must remember from the ‘people’ in order to democratic and just Nepal. The Dahal is the moderate in this process. We need to help him keep his sustain the regime? This the aspirations of its minority cause for free and independent hotheads in check and try to understand it when he completely situation begs another question communities, janajatis, dalits, Nepal was nurtured by ‘the contradicts himself from one day to the next. of the Nepali polity: who is and other caste groups be people’. Last week in Dang, Baburam Bhattarai was heckled by his own setting the agenda now? Who is enshrined in an effective and The formation of a New Nepal party members who wanted to hang on to confiscated property. Now charting new territory, and what representative manner in a calls for a high level of there are grumblings within the Maoists about the Dahal-Bhattarai does it look like? federalist project? representation of the people at all stewardship of the process. Those who rejoice at an impending All constitutional pundits implosion in the Maoist party have only to see what happened when Nepal is going through an decision making levels in the tarai factions splintered off. intense process of constitution- offer all countries coming out of governance. And there’s no way The casualties of Dahal’s balancing act have been the two sharp making. The crucial issue of armed struggle federalist options, to facilitate this representation if censures against the Maoists last week from OHCHR and UNMIN. dealing with the monarchy might and perhaps they are compelled we can’t even agree on a state By laying preconditions for the second round of verification and for have been resolved in the call for by constitutional law to offer model. continued violence and intimidation, the federalism as a structure And before state structures are Maoists crossed a threshold. This could for power-sharing. But formed, there has to be broad- have serious repercussions for the one needs to begin from comrades and for the peace process. based dialogue as to how unity As usual when beset with internal the fundamentals. What can be forged within and among dissent, the Maoists look for an external are the core concerns of its numerous communities. enemy. So it is this time with the ultimatum the Nepali people? Where Representation and participatory on republic and the reinstatement of the in a federal structure democracy are crucial issues for ‘expansionist power’ label on India.

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