SCHEDULED MEET OF MAOIST STANDING COMMITTEE NOT HELD; OTHER DETAILS

Kathmandu, 24 Feb.: A scheduled meeting of Maoist standing committee to decide its official position on a secret and controversial agreement between UML Chairman Jhalanath Khanal,who is also prime minister, and his Maoist counterpart Prachanda wasn’t held Thursday.
The meeting was to adopt an official Maoist position on a seven-point agreement negotiated secretly by Khanal and Prachanda 3 February without UML party approval.
Khanal’s election as prime minister was secured by the secret.
The new government assured the home ministry to the Maoists now being opposed by top UML leaders.
Khanal’s government expansion plans have been obstructed as a result.
A meeting of the Big Three to expand government and NC participation was rejected by NC which has decided to remain in opposition.
The next tripartite meeting will be held Saturday.
The political atmosphere has been clouded with the seven-point agreement.
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AIRCRAFT COMES TO FLY PRESIDENT TO KUWAIT

Kathmandu, 24 Feb.: Kuwait sent a special aircraft Thursday to fly President Dr. Ram Baran Yadan to the emirate Friday begin a three-day visit.
The president is attending the 50th anniversary of the independence of the emirate.
The head of state leaves as the Gulf and North Africa are embroiled in a political crisis and internal political ncertainty.
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NEPAL KNOCKED OUT OF ACC T20 WOMEN’S CRICKET TOURNAMENT

Kathmandu, 24 Feb.: Hong Kong knocked out Nepal for the second time in the ACC T20 Women’s cricket tournament in Kuwait Thursday.
Nepal was bowled out on 16.5overs after Hpng Kong set a 97 run chase.
Nepal will play Thailand for third place Friday..
Thailand was defeated by China is the other Group A semi-final.
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OPINIONS

DEMOCRACY, DISCONTINUITY AND DECEIIT

Kathmandu, 24 Feb.: In the cacophony gripping the latest commemoration of our quintessential February ritualism, Dr. Baburam Bhattarai’s voice seemed to make the most sense. “With the country already having been declared a republic,” our national dissenter in chief observed, “celebrating Democracy Day is irrelevant.”, Maila Baje writes in Nepali Netbook.
Come to think of it, it’s far worse than irrelevant. If you pursue the vision of the votaries of New Nepal all the way through, it’s outright hypocritical. The prevailing storyline today is that the democracy that dawned on that February morning in 1951 was merely a restoration of an autocratic monarchy.
Every popular struggle since has been against successive monarchs’ refusal to announce elections to the constituent assembly – the cornerstone of the promise of the heady morn – according to the fable so assiduously constructed after the April Uprising. Today, if Nepalis finally find themselves saddled interminably with such an assembly, it is only after they had vanquished the monarchy.
But history, to paraphrase T.S. Eliot, has many cunning passages, corridors and issues, making sense of which involves a perception not only of the pastness of the past but of its presence.
If mere intentions were worthy of commemoration, Maila Baje feels going back to Padma Shamsher Rana’s still-born reformist constitution – a response to the contagious freedom movement of the times – might have been more sincere. Celebrating the National Movement of 1842, in which the army-backed nobility pushed King Rajendra to restrain Crown Prince Surendra, would have better illustrated the depths of the Nepali quest for change.
There were those who pronounced the Delhi Compromise – the heart of Democracy Day – a betrayal. These people included members of the Nepali Congress, which supposedly spearheaded the democracy movement. Together with the communists, these dissidents might have been able at least to mount a symbolic resistance aimed at redirecting history. But the dominant political class driving the preponderant party chose to memorialize its own version of history.
Even there, the scale with which compromise has prevailed over conviction has been striking. The Nepali Congress has always claimed how it brought back a king that had fled to Delhi. That assertion has not been able to hide its pain at having had to sign the dotted line in New Delhi and to serve under the very prime minister it purportedly overthrew.
The communists were locally too miniscule to challenge the Delhi Compromise. Their newly ascendant Chinese ideological soul mates might have stepped to help in. But, then, that was precisely what pressed the advocates of compromise. Amid the political and military pressure to maintain the Delhi Compromise, the communists’ torpor led them to produce some of the strongest royalist collaborators.
But why have the Maoists – hitherto the loudest advocates of collective national discontinuities – acceded to Democracy Day? They could have taken a stand against public observations. Better still, they might have energetically disrupted celebrations to bolster their credentials. Revolt or peace, after all, the vision of each Maoist camp is aimed at correcting the ills of traditional democracy.
But, then, who better knows the promise inherent in compromises? Didn’t Dr. Bhattarai, in the aftermath of the Narayahity carnage, write how Nepalis would always highly rate the contributions of King Birendra and all of his predecessors – all in an effort to isolate and illegitimize the new monarch? And more germane to our times, didn’t he advocate a cultural monarchy as King Gyanendra had pretty much made up his mind to pack his bags?
Nikita Khrushchev is a name Dr. Bhattarai would probably not want to hear, considering the parallels the late comrade has evoked within the Maoist party. But it would be instructive here to recall what Jawaharlal Nehru had once conveyed to the Soviet leader. Because, deep down, Dr. Bhattarai, like most current drivers of change, know that you don’t change the course of history by turning the faces of portraits to the wall.
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SLOPPY LOBBYING


Kathmandu, 24 feb.: She pleaded, pouted, patronized, fumed and fretted before giving in to her actual character. Lest you still do not recall her, it was Karin Landgren. She went to the extent of collecting gutter information to brief her boss Ban Ki-moon who does the church proud for his related roles, Trikal Vastavik writes in People’s Review.

In Nepal, reactions to the chief of the now-dissolved United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN) were swift and stinging. The government and most political parties were sharp in their criticism of the Landgren brief that spoke of chances of presidential rule and army coup in Nepal.

Landgren was reduced to near tears to be packed off from Nepal where she led a lifestyle she dreamt of and basked in the limelight she was showered on by the news media, thanks mostly to the favors done to and favors sought from editors and broadcasters. NGO specialists and "political analysts", serving as consultants to UN units of various forms, regretted that UNMIN was not given yet another extension.

Some of these "voices of the people" write regularly for newspapers, pushing the agendas of the foreign hands that feed them. Quite a few leaders of civil society had their family members or those of their relatives serving as UNMIN staff. Much of that is now over. UNMIN in another incarnation, however, continues. The countries that have set up a basket of funds push a variety of interests and agendas that they want left nursed. So they use any means and pretext to continue with their overt and covert activity.

A number of writers contributing to some of the prominent newspapers in Kathmandu are known to have written frequently on the issues close to UNMIN's chest. Journalists who obtained special assignments were also keen to boost the UNMIN's cause whether the government of "ganatantrik, loktantrik" Nepal agreed with UNMIN's activities or not. It was their way of expressing thanks for the benefits they had personally procured or managed for their friends and relatives.

Some Maoist MPs were known to have been in regular contact with the desperate Landgren to discuss on the prospects of UNMIN's extension in Nepal. Officially, UNMIN was supposed to have been an agency invited by the government of Nepal. But it was for everyone to see that, once it pitched its camp here, the UN unit was reluctant to leave even after the hosts had made it loud and clear that the hospitality was over after mid-January.

In fact, prior to UNMIN's arrival in Nepal, there was a big debate as to whether it should be invited in the first place. Self-styled civil society leaders and party mouthpieces trumpeted the virtues of such an agency operating in Nepal for peace, stability and everything else. What actually happened was that the referee began to function like an extra player for one of the sides.

Nepali Congress and CPN (UML) had exhibited great enthusiasm in inviting UNMIN but by the second year of the UNMIN presence, the leaders of these two parties began expressing serious questioned about the way it functioned. By mid-2010, NC and UML leaders openly criticized UNMIN for tilting toward the Maoists.

Such criticism did not shake UNMIN bosses much, believing that the largest party in the Constituent Assembly and the main opposition in parliament, CPN (Maoist) would stand firmly on its side. Similarly, "civil society" members that it had patronized would come to its defense.

Editors of two prominent daily papers were once assuring Landgren that "in Nepal, miracles happen but at the last moment". Like a drowning woman, the UNMIN chief clung to such overestimated assurances. Toward the end, she stepped up the frequency of her meetings with Maoist leaders and MPs. Landgren's desperation was also indicated by her statement that decisions in Nepal were made "at the last moment".

When Landgren finally realized that the last embers of her hope had dried up and any semblance of government support to her cause had evaporated, she dropped hints that she was being "promoted" and posted to Burundi. She got publicized the "promotion". The way she sank after failing to have UNMIN's stay in Kathmandu, one would be extremely reluctant to read her as being happy to leave Nepal.

The UNMIN boss was haughty and began to believe that she and her unit were indispensable to Nepal and the Nepalis. She assessed herself as the No. 2 most important foreign face circulating in Kathmandu, next to Indian Ambassador Rakesh Sood. Coincidentally, both Landgren and Sood leave the capital of Pashupatinath far from happy.

In Burundi, however, Landgren's "promoted" status is not going to fetch her the comfort, ease and limelight she had for the asking in Nepal, which might be the reason why she expressed deep frustrations over her having to leave here. When individual likes and habits mix up with professional job, you get the type of the Landgren performance. Now, we understand better why a promoted Landgren was so sorry to say goodbye to Nepal.

Nepalis, however, have no regrets. The few who served UNMIN's or foreign governments that particularly provided funds to keep it afloat, find the going regrettable. Self-interest, it is said, is the best interest for such people who, predictably, are seen making prophesies of all kinds that the peace process is heading toward a failure.

This writer strongly feels that whether stability will return in Nepal or not in the near future will, either way, not be attributed to UNMIN's departure. UN bureaucrats are rarely known for top-level intelligence. Many experts from the countries that contribute to UN coffers the most have always held dim views of an average UN bureaucrat. They assert that the best of talents of the major powers in the West rarely join a UN job.

Moral of the lesson: Don't begin believing in what you are not. Inflated ego burst quickly and those who do not realize it on time suffer depression. For Sood, the Nepal assignment was a prized posting. For the Maoists, UNMIN was a friendly, supportive referee. For many journalists and civil society leaders, UNMIN was a source of regular income. For much of the world, UNMIN offered a valuable lesson at the expense of Nepal regarding the consequences of having a UN body drop in to have an extended and overbearing presence.
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