After months of exercise, the parties reached an ´informal understanding´ to go for a roundtable conference last week, giving some light to the otherwise gloomy political scenario.
The parties in the High Level Political Committee and CPN-Maoist-led 33-party alliance agreed in principle to hold the roundtable which many believed was a breakthrough as the latter had been insisting on doing so to find a workable solution to the present crisis. But the parties turned out to be ill-prepared to guarantee that. [break]
While parties in the HLPC thought that the CPN-Maoist-led alliance has agreed to go for November polls under the current government after sorting out their differences through the roundtable, the alliance took it differently. The much-hyped ´understanding´ barely matured when the alliance came up with a rigid stance just after two days, on Saturday, throwing the negotiation process in confusion.
Unlike what the HLPC leaders had understood, the Mohan Baidya-led alliance came out with a five-point demand which made it loud and clear that Baidya is not in favor of going to the polls.
The agitating side demanded an all powerful roundtable conference to resolve all political differences, decide new election date, form a new government, and arrive at consensus on the contents of the new constitution and modality of promulgating the new constitution and even conclude the remaining tasks of the peace process through the roundtable.
Baidya-led alliance´s stance has been read and interpreted as a ploy to thwart the upcoming election by the parties in the HLPC. There is no doubt that Baidya´s rigid stance has come at a time when the country is geared up for the polls and the party leaders in the HLPC have been shouting out loud that the election in November will take place - even without Baidya´s participation.
Here, the parties are making the mistake again. They made a mistake in April when the HLPC failed to take Baidya-led parties into confidence before forming the current government. Even Madhav Kumar Nepal, one of the key players in Nepali politics and the negotiations, clearly said that they should have recognized Baidya-led CPN-Maoist as the fourth major force. That too was understatement as Baidya had formed CPN-Maoist following a vertical split in the UCPN (Maoist) with more than 90 seats in the erstwhile parliament, which not even Nepal´s CPN-UML command at present, after CPN-UML vice-chairman Ashok Rai split to form his own Federal Socialist Party with almost 20 parliamentarians.
Nepal´s rhetoric is absolutely right. Excluding the Baidya-led alliance from the present electoral process would be yet another mistake, although a majority of the constituent parties in the alliance had no sizeable presence. UCPN (Maoist) leaders understand that Baidya´s CPN-Maoist has a parallel organization at the village level and it actually commands the support of dedicated cadres.
Even as the strength of a party can be judged only through the number of parliamentarians it had in the erstwhile CA, all the parties lost their legitimacy after its dissolution on May 28 last year. That is the reason why the country needs new elections to decide the fate of these parties.
The situation has changed since the last election in April 2008. Not only the UCPN (Maoist) and CPN-UML have split, people have now lost count of how many Madhesi parties have been formed after splits in major parties represented in the last CA. Thus, seeking a fresh mandate is the only way out to propagate any party´s agenda, and Baidya-led CPN-Maoist cannot be an exception.
Baidya´s proposal to hold an all powerful roundtable conference to resolve all political differences, including the consensus in the new constitution, is not acceptable to the people, as one cannot think of depriving the people of their right to choose their representatives through elections.
Baidya and his radical leaders have always vowed to promulgate the "People´s Constitution" to ensure the rights of the marginalized and minority communities and devolution of power through a federal system. But how could one draft the "People´s Constitution" without even taking the mandate of the people themselves.
The last CA made the mistake - of not involving the people in the constitution-making process. And, the people cannot allow a similar mistake again - of resolving all contentious issues through the roundtable. The roundtable can be held only to provide a platform to all the political forces in the country to work out their differences, build trust among them and create an environment for polls.
The parties in the HLPC should understand that holding the elections by keeping Baidya out would not be practical. Instead of guaranteeing the November elections without Baidya, just for public consumption, they should work toward gaining his confidence and guarantee people free and fair elections.
And Baidya should also understand that the people are not in a mood to defer the elections and accept his party´s radical agenda just by creating a fear of intimidation. Joining the ongoing electoral process is the only way out at present for Baidya to prove his party´s mettle on the ground.
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