UML ATTEMPT TO EXPAND STALLED GOVT. EXPANSION

UML DIALOGUE TEAM TO EXPAND GOVT. AND SHARE MINISTRIES (UPDATED STORY)

Kathmandu, 17 March: UML, of which Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal is chairman, Thursday formed a five-member dialogue team to talk with other parties to expand government and share ministries to give the government ‘ a national character’, the party said.
Only UML and Maoists are in government and command a majority n parliament.
A five-member team was constituted by the party standing committee under former Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and asked it to report to the powerful standing committee in three days.
Besides Nepal, KP Sharma Oli. Vice-chairman Bandeb Gautam, General Secretary Ishwor Pokhrel and Ashok Rai are in the team,
Nepal and Oli are aligned against Khanal opposing Maoists; Gautam and Rai are close to Khanal while Pokhrel is independent in the party heading.
Only four members each from UML and Maoists are in government even after Khanal’s installation 3 February with Maoist support.
Without the government expansion, Khanal Thursday gave additional responsibilities to thee ministers of his party in government like Maoists did earlier to lighten burden on the prime minister and seven ministers.
UML and Maoists have agreed to send seven and 11 ministers respectively to government.
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3 DEAD, 15 INJURED

Kathmandu, 17 March: Three persons wer killed and atleast 15others were injured when a bus heading for th e capital fell 200feet off tehroad at Okharpauwa inneighbouring nUwakot Thursday.
Okharpauwa is the site fo umping the cpital’s garbage.
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JAPANESE FOOD ASSISTANCE

Kathmandu, 17 March: Japan, hit by the worst disaster after World War II, Thursday gave a grant of Rs 888 million to procure rice in the international market and distribute it to food deficit areas.
An agreement was signed Thursday between representatives if the two governments.
Nearly 3.4 million of the country’s 30 million are facing severe food scarcity amid increased food prices.
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STATUE OF KRISHNA PRASAD BHATTARAI AT SYAMBHUNATH

Kathmandu, 17March: A foundation stone of Krishna Prasad Bhattarai was laid at Bhagbanpau at Syambhu at the foot of Syambhunath Thursday by NC President Sushil Koirala.
Bhattarai, who died 14 days ago, inaugurated the first convention of the
Nepal Students’ Union at the site during the panchayat regime when parties were banned.
Sher Bahadur Deuba, the first chief of the union that battled the panchayat, was present.
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SUSHIL KOIRALA OPPOSES CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

Kathmandu, 17March: NC President Sushil Koirala Thursday opposed an agreement at a sub-committee with other parties on constitution drafting to establish a constitutional court at the center in a new judicial structure.
NC representatives earlier in the sub-committee chaired by Maoist Chairman Prachanda agreed to the proposal.
Koirala Thursday even threatened to launch a movement against any attempt to establish such a court with final power of judicial review.
Supreme court judges firstr opposed the proposal to establish such a court.
Koirala opposed the court at a public meet at Syambhunath Thursday.
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GRAHA DASHA OF LEGISLATORS PERFORMED

Kathmandu, 17March: A citizen pushing for the promulgation of a constitution by 28 March Thursday performed gaiha dasha or bad luck of 601 legislators at Open Air Theatre.
No lawmaker was present despite invitation.
Hem Bahadur Budathoki has vowed not to eat grains until a delayed basic law in promulgated.
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OPINION

HOMING IN ON MAOISTS?
Kathmandu, 17 March: Jasjeet Singh seems to have secured the home ministry for the Maoists. Prime Minister Jhal Nath Khanal and UCPN (Maoist) chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal both, in their own ways, have described the murder attempt on TV executive Yunus Ansari inside high-security Central Jail as an attack on Nepal, Maila Maje writes in Nepali Netbook..
The prime minister pledged to the legislators that he would hold a detailed inquiry into what happened and how. As the antecedents of the accused hit man revealed intriguing twists, there was, in Maila Baje’s view, a development that ranked much more than a related development. Bhim Acharya, the chief whip of the CPN-UML, publicly announced the Maoists would get the home ministry in the next cabinet expansion.
In the weeks since Khanal’s rise, the omnipresence of the prime minister has not been able to negate the absence of the home minister. From the outset, the premier could have kept the portfolio pending a resolution of the controversy, but he knew home affairs was a full-time responsibility. For that simple reason, all that talk about awarding the ministry to Bishnu Poudel, in addition to his defense portfolio, was probably a last-ditch ruse of the anti-Khanal faction in the UML.
The other major parties do not want to see the Maoists at the helm of the home ministry, for long obvious reasons. If anything, the escalation in the ex-rebels’ rhetoric since their ascension to power has bolstered their critics. Yet the Maoists themselves might not be that keen to designate the next home minister without properly vetting the credentials of the candidate.
Within each major party, former home ministers have carved a special place for themselves. The likes of Khum Bahadur Khadka, Govinda Raj Joshi and Krishna Prasad Sitaula continue to rattle the internal equations of the Nepali Congress. Deep down, Ram Chandra Poudel probably saw in his recent candidacy for the premiership less a lateral shadow of his stint as speaker than a vertical entitlement stemming from his home ministership.
In the UML, people like K.P. Sharma Oli and Bam Dev Gautam have used their terms as deputy premier and home minister – either clubbed together or during separate terms – to fortify themselves within the party and beyond. The former continues to hover around the constituent assembly, despite the fact that he lost the 2008 election. The latter, another defeated candidate, still cannot really be written off as a has-been.
The home hallmark is most conspicuous in the right. Kamal Thapa, King Gyanendra’s much-maligned home minister, is the chief of a party whose ideological consistency has of late drawn defections from former royalist organizations.
The Maoists appear anxious to want someone with little propensity to create his or her own fiefdom. A quadrangular factional contest may help Dahal, Mohan Baidya and Baburam Bhattarai to roil the waters to their liking. But it would be less likely to let any one of them dominate the process, much less the outcome.
Ansari blamed India’s premier external spy agency, RAW, for the failed plot to kill him. But sloppiness is not an attribute normally associated with RAW, especially when it comes to physical liquidation. Perhaps whoever was behind the attack wasn’t really trying to kill Ansari? Maybe they were anxious to see the Maoists get the home ministry, even more so than the ex-rebels themselves?
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REMEMBER LANDGREN?


Kathmandu, 17 March: 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. She claimed to have been "promoted" for her new assignment in Africa where the locals did not welcome her in contrast to her deification by the Maoists in Nepal, 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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