At the heart of the current stalemate is Maoists’ People’s Liberation Army (PLA). On the one hand, the parties in the ruling coalition, mainly the NC and UML, fear that so long as the PLA remains in the cantonments it will only entrench the psychological terror among the masses. On the other hand, PLA’s presence does not only embolden the Maoists but it also takes off pressure from them to democratize and to accept peaceful, plural politics.
The PLA is now so much at the center of the conflict that the deadlock cannot be broken unless there is an agreement to sort out the PLA issue. Conversely, a deal on PLA management will significantly lessen the fear of the ruling coalition, will signal the willingness and intent of the Maoist leadership to accept peaceful, competitive politics, and increase mutual trust between the two sides. An agreement on the PLA will indeed become the real game-changer.
Both the sides must therefore start sorting out the PLA issue in earnest. There are three key issues related to PLA integration/management:
1. Should the PLA be integrated into the Nepali Army? 2. If the answer to the first question is yes, how many should join the army? 3. Finally, whether they should be integrated on unit-wise basis or as individuals?
A deal on PLA management will significantly lessen the fear of the ruling coalition, will signal the willingness and intent of the Maoist leadership to accept peaceful, competitive politics, and increase mutual trust between the two sides.
There are many – not a majority though – who argue that PLA shouldn’t be integrated into the national army since the ‘indoctrinated’ combatants will jeopardize the professional character of the national army. Are they right?
The issue should be judged on the basis of international practices and what has been agreed upon in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), the governing document of the peace process.
Take any recent armed conflicts where the state and non-state armies fought a bloody war but eventually signed a peace deal – Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia, Angola, Burundi, Uganda, Mali, South Africa, Cambodia, and Mindanao in Philippines. In all these cases, agreements were signed to integrate the rebel forces in the national army. Not that integration was successful in each of these cases but that’s entirely another issue.
It’s understandable when Surya Bahadur Thapa or Defense Minister Bidya Devi Bhandari say ‘indoctrinated’ PLA cannot be integrated into the national army. They can be forgiven for their lack of knowledge and experience but it’s utterly disappointing when it comes from some top Generals—current and former. Nepali Army has served in so many peacekeeping operations abroad, and I will be surprised if in any of these countries the peace agreement didn’t include integration of the rebel forces.
In a war-context, rebel forces do become ‘indoctrinated’ in one way or another – along ideological line, along ethnic line, along secessionist line. Otherwise, there would be no war at all.
Article 4.4 of the CPA clearly says: “The interim council of ministers shall constitute a special committee to supervise, integrate and rehabilitate the Maoist combatants.” The CPA doesn’t say it clearly where to integrate but the spirit of the agreement was that some of them will be integrated into the security forces, including the national army.
This takes us to the second and perhaps the most contentious issue in the integration process: How many of the PLA combatants should join the security forces and how many of them should be rehabilitated in the society?
Before we discuss this number, we must also look into another, often forgotten, Clause 4.7 of the CPA. It says, “...The Interim Council of Ministers shall prepare and implement the detailed action plan of democratization of the Nepali Army by taking suggestions from the concerned committee of the Interim Parliament. This shall include tasks such as determining the right number of the Nepali Army, preparing the democratic structure reflecting the national and inclusive character and training them as per the democratic principles and values of the human rights.”
So, perhaps the most important question in the integration process is what is the right size of the National Army after the integration? I personally don’t know the parameters or the national security needs based on which the number of national army should be decided. But I’m gravitated towards one simple but a logical proposal: Reduce the size of the national army to a pre-war level, that is, about 45,000.
How can we get that number?
We can follow a Cambodian model of integration where 70 percent of the armed forces belonging to each of the four warring factions – the state of Cambodia, and factions headed by Som Saan, Prince Norodm Ranariddh and Khem Rouge – were required to disarm and rehabilitate back into the society, while the rest 30 percent would be combined to form a new national army. A caveat: The integration model didn’t work in Cambodia as Ranariddh and Saan ran a parallel government before Saan eventually deposed Ranaridh and also because Khem Rouge refused to disarm its combatants.
But the Cambodian model may work for us. If 60 percent of the Nepal Army personnel are given retirement over a period of time and 60 percent of the PLA combatants are rehabilitated back into the society, we will be left with about 38,000 (40 percent of 95,000) Nepal Army personnel and 7840 (40 percent of 19604) PLA combatants.
Of the 7840 PLA combatants, half of them (close to 4,000) can easily be integrated into the Nepal Army and the other half can be accommodated into other security agencies.
Such an integration model will also have an element of parity for both the armies since 60 percent of the personnel from each side will be rehabilitated back in the society. This will also be relatively an easy sell for the political leadership on both sides of the conflict.
On face value, it may appear that so many armed personnel from the Nepal Army and PLA may not be ready for rehabilitation/retirement but that’s basically a question of the attractiveness of the rehabilitation/retirement package. Take the case of two African countries – Mozambique and Mali. The civilian package (rehabilitation package) offered in both of these countries was so attractive that the government didn’t get enough number of armed personnel (from both sides) to form a new national army in Mozambique. And in Mali only 2000 opted to join the national army while 9000 took the civilian package.
Finally, coming to the issue of unit-wise vs individual recruitment, unit-wise recruitment doesn’t radically impact the make-up of the Nepal Army, nor is it true that such small PLA battalions can wage a coup in the military. However, there is another side to it: To have PLA in the cantonment or to have separate PLA battalions in the national army will have the same psychological impact on the public – people will always remain under fear that Maoists have weapons and they can use them if they so choose. And perhaps it may also hinder Maoists’ transformation into a fully civilian, democratic party and PLA’s transformation into a professional army.
ameetdhakal@gmail.com
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