Forget Kathmandu

by PRASHANT JHA

Most kangresis don't read. Ask why, and the joke goes there is no need because BP Koirala has read enough for all of them. But members of the Nepali Congress may want to pick up a booklet published recently by the Social Science Baha titled Views from the Field: Anthropological Perspectives on the CA elections.

The NC's challenge comes from a Maoist party that wants to ruthlessly consolidate. If anyone was entertaining illusions about hardline-softline divisions, they should look at Baburam Bhattarai's recent article which reiterates that the ultimate goal has not changed.

But this desire to expand and control is common across parties. The NC did it when it was in power, padding the Nepal Police with cadre, ensuring the bureaucrats would be loyalists, using the state apparatus to leverage support on the ground. The UML ensured the last local polls went their way when they had control of key ministries.
The Maoists are doing the same thing. What makes it different this time is that they are aided by a strong ideological belief, a coercive apparatus. And they just happen to be smarter than the rest.

Beneath all the complexity, there is a simple truth: if you don't like what the Maoists are doing, mount a political challenge. Don't do what you did during the war? run away and leave a political vacuum. During the insurgency, the valid reason was fear. There may be instances of intimidation now, but the political space has opened up.

NC leaders are not doing this, and they are now afraid that they will be completely marginalized. It is this insecurity that is driving much of the NC rhetoric on Maoist 'totalitarianism'. It is making the NC top rung suck up to India and the army yet again, hoping they would do the job for them by rallying against the Maoists. The army should be careful and not be employed when NC encourages it to go against the civilian chain of command.

At the root of the NC's problem lies its inability or unwillingness to face the election result head on. Yes, there was coercion but to over-estimate that element is intellectual laziness and politically suicidal. The polls were a lot more complex and until the NC sits down, honestly evaluates each seat and why they lost, there will be no revival.

The Baha has compiled three essays by academics who went back on Election Day last April to villages where they had been working for decades. The key lesson is: all politics is local.

David Holmberg visited Nuwakot to witness an election where for the first time parties had given tickets to local Tamangs. But in the constituency he covered, the Maoists had a Bahun candidate and NC had a Tamang face.

Judith Pettigrew was in Kaski and explores how a young local, Thagu, who despised the Maoists for harassing him in 2004 has suddenly become a party member. It was not force, but constant conversations with the Maoists that impressed Thagu and made him defect from the NC.

Mukta Tamang was in Kabhre where he saw how young voters tilted the balance in favour of the Maoists. The defining mood was a fusion of fear and hope.

In each VDC, there are political contradictions. If the NC wants, it can capitalise on it. But for that they have to be quick, proactive and strategic. Ranting in the capital will get them nowhere.

The Bardia OHCHR report depicts a humanitarian catastrophe where Tharu families were victimised relentlessly during the war. It happened under Sher Bahadur Deuba after he deployed the army.

Suppose Deuba went back to Bardia, reached out to affected Tharu families, explained that it was a dirty war and there were mistakes, and shared the pain. All they are looking for is an acknowledgement. The Maoists won all seats in Bardiya, Deuba's gesture would have opened up local space for the NC to at least build links with the community again.

Nepal's liberal democrats are their own worst enemy. They would rather forget how they needed the left even when fighting for democracy in 1990 and 2006, but not rediscover their socialist roots. They would rather live in the capital, in denial about the elections, but do nothing to overhaul the party structure. And they would rather rehabilitate crooks than look for new faces.

NC can recover, but for that, they have to first forget Kathmandu.

Courtesy of: Nepal Times, February 10, 2009

Maoist govt failed due to its deep ties with PLA: Koirala

Former Prime Minister and President of the main opposition party Nepali Congress (NC) Girija Prasad Koirala Saturday remarked that the current Maoist-led government has become ineffective due to failure to make its view clear on Nepal Army (NA).

The government is failure on its part because of its inability to ‘quit’ the Maoist combatants, also known as People’s Liberation Army (PLA), and ‘accept’ the national army.

Talking to journalists at his residence in Biratnagar today, the octogenarian leader said, “The law and order situation of the country has worsened as a result of the controversy over army integration. It’s not sensible to keep two legs in two separate boats at the same time; the government should either choose Maoist combatants or national army.” The top leader of the main opposition party accused the Maoists of making mistake by dragging the NA into controversy. He opined that there is no alternative to move ahead by working together with all the democratic forces.

Koirala remarked that the recent cabinet decision was a tactic to sustain the government.

Claiming that he deserves a special privilege, Koirala said, “The government has tried to tempt me with lollipop, but I won’t be lured into sweets.”

The NC President said Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal behaved as if he did not understand his saying when he tried to make him realise his responsibility towards the nation.

Disregarding the intense protest from the opposition parties and even the coalition parter CPN-UML, the government on Thursday decided to bring in three more ordinances relating to disappeared persons, inclusive government service and voters’ list for the upcoming by-election.

In recent days, the government has come under fire from various quarters over its decision to promulgate ordinances.

Likewise, there is growing cynicism between the Nepal Army and Maoist People’s Liberation after Defense Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa told Nepal Army to stop fresh recruitment, claiming that the new recruitment in army was against the peace pact.

Courtesy of: Kantipur: February 7, 2009

Don't attend PLA function: Prez tells PM, Defense Ministe

President Dr Ram Baran Yadav, who has decided not to attend the upcoming Maoist People’s Liberation Army (PLA) anniversary, has advised the prime minister and the defense Minister to also follow his example and shun the event. Rajendra Dahal, press advisor to the president, told Kantipur Daily Saturday that the president is of the advice that if the prime minister and the defense minister, who are in the command structure of the country’s top security agency, the Nepal Army, attend a programme of another military or paramilitary forces then it will not send a good signal.

It must be noted that Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal is also the chairman of the Unified CPN (Maoist) and Defense Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa is its senior leader. Shital Niwas, the Office of the President, had received the invitation to PLA Day set for February 12. Dahal said that Shital Niwas has already sent a reply informing that Dr Yadav’s will be unable to attend the programme.

Courtesy of: Nepal News, February 8, 2009

China needs a new way

By John Lee
TWELVE months ago, a well-known bear on the Chinese economy revealed to me that a China-sceptic such as himself was treated by his colleagues as a bit of a crackpot, an angry old man, or sometimes, more patronisingly, as somewhat of a curiosity. Arguing that the Chinese model was seriously flawed was almost like denying that global warming was occurring, he said wryly.

Only unreformed socialists were on his side, he quipped. But in the first two weeks of 2009 he has been invited to speak at more conferences and approached to write more articles in prominent publications than during the entire previous year.

The American model of free markets may be on trial, but so is the Chinese model of authoritarian capitalism. Yesterday was officially Chinese new year. It ushered in the year of the ox, symbolising prosperity through fortitude and hard work. But prosperity is increasingly hard to come by. The Shanghai Exchange has seen its index
decline by two-thirds. The Chinese export sector, responsible for 40 percent of Chinese growth over the past decade, is tanking. Some estimate that 20 per cent of factories in the Pearl River delta area have already closed and half will be gone by the end of the year. Overall economic growth is likely to dip below the 8 per cent mark, the point at which unemployment (and therefore unrest) begins to rise dramatically. If we look at informal but probably more accurate indicators, such as power consumption, the Chinese economy is close to stagnating and even contracting. Power use in China fell 9.4 per cent in November 2008.

December figures have not been released. This is despite the trillions of dollars - in addition to the $US586 billion stimulus package - that its state-owned banks regularly but inefficiently pump into state-controlled businesses to maintain the growth levels enjoyed up to now. Domestic investment (from bank loans) was responsible for around half of Chinese GDP growth. Even before the onset of the financial crisis, there was an estimated $1trillion worth of bad loans in the Chinese financial system as a result of this flawed investment strategy. A new and massive spate of bad loans is inevitably around the corner for Chinese banks.

Even before the global financial crisis, those in absolute poverty (earning less than $1 a day) doubled in China during the past decade. More than 400 million had seen their net incomes decline during the same period despite record GDP growth. It is no wonder that domestic consumption growth has been slow and will not be able to take up the slack as the export sector suffers. Instead China must rely on state-led fixed investment to keep growth at 8 per cent, despite acknowledging that this strategy is becoming more inefficient and wasteful, and therefore increasingly unsustainable. The general economic outlook is so dire that the Chinese President, Hu Jintao, has increasingly issued warnings about the possibility of political and social collapse.

The persistent idea that the Chinese economy was decoupling from the West and would provide a buffer for Asia now seems absurd. The Chinese model is clearly not as sound and resilient as many believed. But the amazing thing is not that China is suffering; the facts and figures always suggested that it would in the event of an American and European slowdown. The amazing thing is that so few experts saw it coming; and those that did were dismissed or ridiculed.

In a 2005 essay on why intellectuals tend to get the big questions of their day wrong rather than right, Owen Harries argued that intellectuals are slaves of fashion and that they essentially think in herds. So, too, do economists and policy wonks, it seems. The question, as far as the hype behind the China model is concerned, is who led the
herd? I would hazard a guess and say that there are three distinct groups.

The first are those with economic interests in the continued hype surrounding the Chinese economic miracle: businesses and their strategic advisers who benefited from activity in China, investment banks who made a bundle from multibillion-dollar deals and consultants advising clients how to make it in this world of 1.3 billion people and unlimited possibilities. Even high-profile and very credible people who served in
presidential administrations got in on the act.

The second are national and NGO policymakers and wonks who have wisely dvocated engagement with China in order to encourage Beijing to rise peacefully. The reward of engagement for the Chinese was said to be prosperity for all and a more peaceful and contented China that would please the rest of the developed world. No need to focus on flaws in Beijing's model when much larger political objectives were at stake. The
third are made up of a diverse group of intellectuals (and a few malcontents) who were seeking an alternative to Western and American-style capitalism as the way to go. Most believed in the Chinese model of authoritarian capitalism in good faith and saw the Beijing consensus as an alternative that avoided chaos, corruption and
indecision when it came to developing countries. Unfortunately, the inconvenient truth is that chaos, corruption and indecision (in the form of a stalled reform process) are precisely the problems with the Chinese model that have been largely ignored until now.

The China story is far from finished. China will eventually still rise, but it will need a different model to to do so. Its authoritarian capitalist model has almost gone as far as it can go. Hu put a positive spin on 2008 by concluding that for the Chinese people, 2008 was a very extraordinary and uncommon year. For 2009, the omens are much more ominous.

John Lee is foreign policy fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies
in Sydney. His second edition of Will China Fail? is to be published
shortly.

Courtesy of: The Australian. January 27, 2009

Discordant wavelengths

By ARNAUD DE BORCHGRAVE

America's self-inflicted economic and financial wounds have triggered a reassessment of President Obama's foreign policy objectives by key policymakers abroad. A closer look at Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East. Conventional wisdom takes its lumps.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 (UPI) -- As key policymakers abroad survey the attempts to stop and reverse the self-inflicted crumbling of the world's largest economy, they have reached startling conclusions that are out of sync with President Obama's foreign policy objectives.

1. Pakistan. There is no military solution in Afghanistan, confided a top-ranking national security official in Islamabad, not for attribution. He explained the war will have to end with a political solution for a coalition government. This should include "moderate" Taliban fighters along with major Pashtun tribal leaders and President Hamid Karzai's "successor." He also confided security forces can barely cope with Taliban insurgents in the Swat Valley, in Pakistan proper, let alone with the Taliban's safe havens in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas. This makes the Afghan war unwinnable. The more U.S. unmanned Predators bomb FATA targets, the more Taliban jihadis cause mayhem inside Pakistan, one of the world's eight nuclear powers. The Afghan war is inflaming Pakistani public opinion. The creation of a modern state in Afghanistan is mission impossible. Pakistan, therefore, would feel more secure with reformed Taliban in charge in Kabul, Taliban who would formally renounce all ties with al-Qaida, as well as the more pernicious aspects of the medieval theocracy that banned the education of girls. Further military operations should be designed to put pressure on the Taliban to compromise and to eradicate their al-Qaida allies. U.S. forces in Afghanistan will double to 60,000 by summer -- at a cost of $70 billion a year -- bringing the total of allied forces to just fewer than 100,000 for a mountainous country the size of France.

2. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The three allied countries whose parliaments have authorized their troops in Afghanistan to be in harm's way against Taliban fighters -- Britain, Canada and the Netherlands -- want out by the end of 2011. U.S. military commanders believe the Britons "will stay with us, even if it takes several more years." London insiders are less sanguine. Lord West of Spithead, former First Sea Lord and now Prime Minister Gordon Brown's security minister, dropped a bombshell last week by declaring publicly Britain's intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan had fueled global radicalism against the United Kingdom. Foreign Secretary David Miliband urged we all drop the term "war on terror," which he said was deceptive and misleading.

3. Other NATO members. The alliance's head man, Netherlands' Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, who steps down at NATO's 60th anniversary summit in April, is urging the 26 member nations to contribute more troops to Afghanistan. So far no takers. Those with sizable numbers of troops on the ground are hamstrung by caveats against fighting -- notably, Germany, France, Spain, Italy -- and governments skeptical that a narco-state, where corruption from top to bottom is a world record, can be reformed. NATO defense ministers authorized their troops in Afghanistan to undertake "aggressive" counter-narcotics missions against the Taliban's chief source of revenue. There was no follow-through as national parliaments objected.

4. Afghan National Army and Police. Underfunded and years behind schedule in their ability to replace Western forces with any credibility.

5. Middle East. Israel's leading newspaper, Haaretz, has published the equivalent of the Pentagon Papers of Vietnam War fame, information the Israeli state had been hiding for years on the covert expansion of settlements in the West Bank. These were clearly designed to make a Palestinian state in the occupied territories impossible. After reading the voluminous secret file, U.S. mediator George Mitchell may well conclude the endgame of a Palestinian state is unattainable. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Haaretz reported, "steadfastly refused to release the report" as "publication could endanger state security and harm Israel's foreign relations." An analysis of the data "reveals that in the vast majority of settlements -- 75 percent -- construction, sometimes on a large scale without the appropriate permits or contrary to the permits that were issued. In 30 major settlements extensive construction of buildings and infrastructure (roads, schools, synagogues, yeshivas and even police stations) has been carried out on private lands belonging to Palestinian West Bank residents." The database, Haaretz reported, does not conform to Israel's official position on the Foreign Ministry Web site, which states: "Israel's actions relating to the use and allocation of land under its administration are all taken with strict regard to the rules and norms of international law. Israel does not requisition private land for the establishment of settlements." It just takes it, says Haaretz.

According to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics, there are now 290,000 Jews who live in 120 official settlements and dozens of outposts established throughout the West Bank over the past 41 years. That's up 50,000 settlers in the West Bank since Gaza's 8,500 were forcibly removed by the Israeli police in 2005 to make room for a Palestinian authority and where elections were then held that sealed Hamas' victory over Fatah.

In realpolitik, Israel's leaders clearly have no intention of pulling 100,000 settlers out of what are now known to be illegal settlements, where Palestinian land was seized arbitrarily, to make a Palestinian state possible.

As far as anyone can peer over the geopolitical horizon, Obama's two principal foreign policy initiatives -- a win in Afghanistan for a democratic government and a final peace treaty between Israel and a Palestinian state -- are will-o'-the-wisp. Time Magazine's cover story this week is headlined "Afghanistan: Obama's Vietnam."

A more promising avenue holds the key to regional stability. Engaging Iran secretly at the highest level, much the way Henry Kissinger opened the way to Beijing's Forbidden City for President Nixon, would seem to be a more profitable avenue for George Mitchell's diplomatic dexterity. Iran's influence in the Middle East -- Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Maliki government in Baghdad, diplomatic clout in Oman, Qatar, Dubai -- is not negligible.

Author is Director, Transnational Threats at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)

Wait and Watch

By Prashant Jha, in NEW DELHI
India is getting increasingly concerned about the slide in Nepal, but doesn't think it warrants a policy shift just yet. Indian officials admit that they are unhappy with the Maoists: "They have not delivered on their promises,"

one official told us, "their commitment to democracy seems doubtful. They are warming up to China. Not good signs." But sources insist India continues to support the peace and constitution writing process and will not destabilise the present arrangement. "It will be good if non-Maoist actors add pressure on the Maoists. But we will not back any effort to topple the government right now," one senior official told Nepali Times.

Delhi's cautious approach is probably because any policy rethink will require a top level decision and politicians are in election mode. Neither the political leadership nor the senior bureaucratic establishment has time for Nepal. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is in hospital, the MEA is busy with Pakistan and keeping Richard Holbrooke's hands off Kashmir. The endgame in Sri Lanka is the other key regional issue.

"Nepal is not on the radar, do not expect any move till after our elections unless something drastic happens," a former diplomat said. Add to it the sense that domestic politics in Nepal has not played its course yet. "If we jump in, the Maoists will say they did not get a fair chance and blame us. Let them get more discredited and see how otherparties respond," said a security official.

PM Special Envoy Shyam Saran, who no longer handles Nepal, says India's classic dilemma in Nepal is to figure out when to get involved and when to withdraw. "The same people tell us come and help, and then they say give us space," Saran told us, "we have intervened earlier. But the present mood is to step back." India's options are limited, it feels the NC can't mount a credible challenge, the UML is too unreliable and the Madhesi parties are too fragmented. A major policy shift would also be an admission of failure of India's own policy.

This week, Minister Pranab Mukherjee boasted to Al Jazeera how India had "persuaded the Maoists to give up violence and participate in the mainstream national political activities". Even so, sections of the Indian establishment are telling the Maoists to behave, NC to clean up its mess, the army to resist the Maoists and are encouraging the anti-Maoist faction in the UML. What all this will add up to may be clear in a few months. Till then, India will wait and watch.