The Best Option For The Five Parties
Paramendra Bhagat
October 6, 2002

What Deuba did six months back has been done. The parliament got dissolved. Likewise, the king has taken his step. There is no going back on either count.

The best option the five political parties, the UML, the Koirala Congress, the Deuba Congress, the RPP, and the Sadbhavana, have is to take the king on his offer, and return executive powers back to the Prime Minister's Office from the Royal Palace. The king has said he will not retain powers for more than five days. Don't let him.

The king has asked that each party submit two names. That puts the size of the cabinet at 10. And I think the UML, by virtue of being the largest party, ought to get the Prime Ministership. And a cabient of 11 members is large enough for a country the size of Nepal.

The king has said each such person should have "clean" images, and ought not be contesting the forthcoming elections. There is no going back there either. So the political parties should be able to present people who will pass the CIAA-test for cleanliness. The second condition is not that arbitrary either. These people could be nominated by the political parties into the upper house down the line.

So I say, take it. Take the offer.

If the political parties hesitate, the king is going to look beyond the five parties, perhaps to monarchists whose careers took roots in the heydays of the Panchayat, and that would be a bad sign. What if such an interim government is not able to hold elections? Then the possibility of the king taking total control, aka his villain father King Mahendra, will loom large.

At least, if the five parties take the offer, they keep the king away from executive powers. That is important.

And an interim government in which all five parties participate and which is headed by the UML will be the one in the best position to find a political solution to the Maoist problem. Once it bags the Prime Ministership, the UML will probably go back to its idea of offering a referendum to the Maoists. And if the Maoists don't take that offer - I feel they will - then they will create grounds for an all-out attempt at a military defeat by the police and the army.

A parallel here can be drawn with Sri Lanka. The Tamil Tigers started out wanting a separate country altogether, now they are willing to settle for a state.

The Maoists might have started out by wanting a communist dictatorship, but they might settle for a republic that continues to have a multi-party framework. Such options have to be kept at the table.

But much political skill is required to get the Maoists to come to the table. Deuba lacked them. His approach was to announce that the current constitution can not be changed, and the Maoists need to lay down their arms, and then talks might be possible. That did not sound like an invitation to dialogue. The UML is in a better position to understand where the Maoists are coming from.

Any other option sounds like a recipe for further instability because if the Maoists remain entrenched as they are, forget organzing peaceful elections also six months from now. And an UML-led government is less likely to harass the CIAA as it continues its commendable anti-corruption drive against the Congressias, the Panches, the corrupt among civil servants, and, possibly, the Darbariyas.

So, I say, take the offer, take it, and let the king go back to being a figurehead. The worst the five parties can do right now is to choose to not stay engaged.