The irony of the date was, perhaps, missed, when a new chapter in Nepal's turbulent history was inked, on April 1, 2007, with a 22-memberinterim cabinet led by Prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala taking the oath of office. The Communist Party of Nepal--Maoist(CPN-Maoist), which presided over a ten-year "peoples' war", in which at least 13,000 lives were lost, joined theinterim government with the agenda of setting up a republic under multiparty democracy in thekingdom. After long and hard bargaining, the Maoists managed to bag five ministerial berths in theinterim cabinet: Krishna Bahadur Mahara, minister for information and communications; Dev PrasadGurung, minister for local development; Matrika Prasad Yadav, minister for forest andsoil conservation; Khadga Bahadur Biswokarma, minister for women, children and socialwelfare; and Hisila Yami, minister for works and physical planning. Earlier, the Maoists were demanding the post ofDeputy Prime Minister, but due to a lack of consensus between the parties, the postwas abolished altogether. After the oath-taking ceremony, Maoist Chairman Prachanda declared,"It is a historic day for Nepal. A new process of making a new Nepal has begun now and our responsibility has increased. So we have come prepared to shoulder responsibilities for the sake of thenation."
Prime minister Koirala reiterated Prachanda's sentiments, speaking of "a newphase" in Nepal's history, but, without naming the Maoists, urged the 'nominatedmembers' not to disrupt the Parliamentary process. "If you, recently-entered MPs, do not obstruct the parliamentary process we can achieve ourgoals," he said. The meeting of the Eight-party leaders approved, among others, the Common Minimum Programme(CMP)--which lays down policies, programmes and priorities for the interim cabinet. Apart from the CMP, the Maoists have agreed to return all seized properties--private or public--within 15 days; help return displaced persons respectfully; and stop the public display of weapons. If any weapon that is not registered with the United Nations (UN) is found, it will be seized by thegovernment. At the District level, all-party units will be formed to monitor the return of seized properties.
The inclusion of the Maoists in the interim government, however, is yet to settle a number of critical questions, including the conduct of the insurgents. In the past, the Maoists have arrogantly violated the letter and spirit of the agreements they have signed with thegovernment and continued with their subversive agenda even after signing the pact with the Seven Party Alliance (SPA) on November 7, 2006. The successive agreements between thegovernment and the Maoists have certainly brought an end to the killings by the Maoists, but the'peace' remains deeply tainted, since the Maoists continue to indulge in looting, extortion and interference in the day to day lives of the people and activities of local administrations.
At the time of writing, the Maoists continue with their coercive 'tax collection' from the people and from foreign tourists visiting Nepal. Reports indicate, for instance, a collection of NR 100 from each tourist visiting the Annapurna region. NR 85 is charged for each bus, NR 90 for a truck, NR 65 for a tractor, NR 105 for an oil tanker and NR 35 for a jeep operating in this area. In the Siraha District, the Maoists have been collecting NR 50 per tractor of sand as'extraction fee' from Gagan, Ghurmi, Mainabakti and Kamala rivers, and NR 10 per vehicle as'road tax'. In Bara District, they have placed obstructions on roads at Nijgadh, Simra, Jitpur, Gandak Chowk and Kalaiya, and are collecting'road tax', 'scrap tax', 'herbs tax' and 'forest products tax' since September 1, 2006. They have been collecting money at Kabeli, Ranke and other places, demanding NR 1,000 each from drivers of buses, trucks and other heavy vehicles, and NR 500 from each taxi driver.
The Maoists have also obstructed the establishment of Police Posts throughout the country as these could hinder their subversive and extortion activities. The Maoists threw away goods and articles from the Police Posts and pressurised Police personnel to turn back from the village in different parts of the country. They have also obstructed re-establishment of displaced Police Posts in different parts of the Bhairahawa, Bardiya, Kaski, Sindhupalchowk, Kavrepalanchowk, Sankhuwasabha, Rupandehi and Nawalparasi, Rukum and Humla Districts. Similar campaigns were also reported from far-western districts such as Doti, Kanchanpur and Achham. The Police say that the task of re-establishing the Police Posts had been initiated as per the directive of the Home Ministry after thegovernment and the Maoists signed the Comprehensive National Peace Treaty. But the Maoists say that they would not allow the re-establishment of Police posts until local bodies have been formed.
The Maoists have interfered in the process of the management of their arms and armed cadres, forcing the authorities to include underage children in their'army'. Further, the number of weapons registered with the UN has raised eyebrows and there are widespread suspicions that the Maoists have hidden a bulk of their weapons. The United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN), on February 23, revealed that a total of 30,852People's Liberation Army (PLA) cadres were registered at the seven main and 21 sub-cantonments across the country, while just 3,428 weapons had been registered in the first phase of the verification process. The UNMIN also said that the number of weapons registered falls short even of the number believed to have been looted by the Maoists from the security forces.
Defending the low weapons count, Prachanda refuted allegation that the Maoists had concealed their weapons, arguing,"Since a large number of our weapons were grenades and home-made bombs, which the UN did not register as weapons, the total number of arms was felt to be fewer compared with the number ofcombatants." Interestingly, he added that many of their weapons were destroyed by fire when the Royal Nepalese Army attacked houses in villages, and were swept away in rivers when they were transporting weapons across rivers, during the course of the conflict.
The Maoists have also not spared the citizenship distribution process and have frequently interfered in the preparation of thevoters' list across the country. For instance, the citizenship certificate distribution team deployed in the Siddharthanagar municipality of Rupandehidistrict halted their work following interference by the Maoists on February 12. The Maoists decamped with thevoters' lists and other documents from the Kavre Village Development Committee (VDC) area of Dolakhadistrict on February 9 and, on the same day, they seized all voters' list documents from the Salyantar VDC area of Dhadingdistrict, protesting that they had not been included in the tasks of the collection and compilation of the lists.
On March 9, Nepal's Chief Election Commissioner Bhoj Raj Pokhrel stated that the planned Constituent Assembly (CA) polls might be delayed, as the parties had been indifferent to the preparations needed for the process. Prachanda promptly threatened that the nation could fall into a'big disaster' if the CA election was not held on time. The Maoists had also ominously warned that there would be a Jana Andolan(People's Movement) III if the interim government was not formed by March 30, and the Maoist spokesperson, Krishna Bahadur Mahara, had declared that there was a possibility that theparty might decide to participate in the CA elections without joining the interimgovernment. He had threatened, on March 25, that if there was further delay in the formation of theinterim cabinet, or if the CA elections were not held on time, the Maoists could decide to stay away and support thegovernment from outside. Within a few days, however, the Maoists dramatically shifted their position to join theinterim government, which is dominated by the Nepali Congress, and successfully negotiated their fiveministerial berths in the 22-member cabinet.
Given their combination of threats, evasions and large scale subversion, it is unlikely that the Maoists, by merely being a part of theinterim government, would engage in a good-faith process to ensure long-term peace in Nepal. Thegovernment remains unable to contain or tackle the Maoists by any use of force, and fears that the rebels may revert to the insurgency at any stage. If the present state of affairs continues till the elections, which are presently scheduled to be held on June 20, 2007, a free and fair poll for the Constituent Assembly can hardly be expected. What prevails in Nepal today is, at best, an uneasy peace. Though the Maoists have joined theinterim government and have allowed a proportion of their weapons to be locked away, they have demonstrated little serious interest in reining in their cadres and ending the coercive activities associated with the decade-long insurgency.
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Prasanta Kumar Pradhan is Research Assistant, Institute for Conflict Management.Courtesy, the South Asia Intelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism Portal
