<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107171152/636937c29c7e80680e03fe5ajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="793"/>After ten years of blood and 12 years of trying to come to terms with why it was shed, Nepalis had great hopes for 2018.Last year this time, there was a sense of achievement and optimism. The first <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/the-election-fever-federal-and-parliamentary-election,3982" target="_blank" rel="noopener">elections for three levels of government</a> under the new Federal Constitution had been held. The UML <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/show-stopper-headline,4101" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Maoist alliance swept the elections</a>, and the expected unification of the two <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/a-two-party-state,3968" target="_blank" rel="noopener">parties</a> was supposed to mark the end of unstable coalition politics, and finally deliver development. We had a straight-shooting <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/oli-here-for-good/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">can-do prime minister</a>, who despite failing health, had shown gumption and promise during campaigning.One year later, much of the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/let-a-thousand-flowers-bloom/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">euphoria has evaporated</a>. The past year has been one of missed opportunities, miscues, inaction and blatant blunders. Two months after the election results became clear, the lameduck Nepali Congress prime minister finally stepped down and the two communist alpha males K P Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal decided to <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/one-body-two-heads/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">co-chair their united party</a>, and rotate the prime ministership.Formal party unification took another month. Still, there was hope that Oli would hit the ground running, even if it was through showcase development, cleaning up the roads of the capital and launching major projects.Alas. It may have been unrealistic of us to expect the same septuagenarians from the same parties to suddenly govern with accountability and efficiency. The Nepali people did not expect much, so they were not surprised to see no improvement in their lives. The roads were still dug up, the <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/public-transport-syndicate,3531" target="_blank" rel="noopener">bus syndicates</a> that Home Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa promised to eradicate were still around, tanker operators were still striking for the right to steal oil, the culprits who absconded with 33 kg of smuggled gold were never caught, nor those responsible for the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/justice-for-sale/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">rape-murder of Nirmala Panta in Kanchanpur</a>.There were some bright spots, and these were mostly in sectors led by efficient and relatively young former UML ministers in the Cabinet like <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/does-nepal-need-a-4th-international-airport/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rabindra Adhikari</a> (Tourism), <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/win-win-migration/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gokarna Bista</a> (Labour) or <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/calendar-of-economic-change/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Yubaraj Khatiwada</a> (Finance). But even they are finding it difficult within their ministries to get the wheels of government to turn.The rent-seeking state is so habituated to extortion and extraction that Bista has run into a wall in implementing his ground-breaking accord with the new regime in Malaysia to remove <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/kleptocrats-of-kathmandu-and-kualalampur/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">exploitation and costs for Nepali migrant workers</a>. Adhikari, despite all his efforts, cannot go beyond cosmetic improvements at Kathmandu airport. Khatiwada’s valiant efforts at fiscal discipline and capital spending are not yielding results, and this has resulted in a <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/banking-on-a-course-correction/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">liquidity crisis that threatens the banking sector</a>.If that is how honest politicians are prevented from delivering, one can imagine what is happening in the ones led by corrupt and ruthless ministers lining their pockets as if there was no tomorrow. The sordid list of impunity and abuse of authority is long and makes for thoroughly depressing reading every morning: ambassadors on the take from traffickers, justices who hurriedly clear criminals ahead of their imminent retirement, absconding multiple-murderers appearing on stage with the CDO and police, and a ministerial secretary demanding a Rs250 million bribe to release funds for the much-delayed Melamchi water project.What is worse is that the public is now so cynical about officials plundering the state that these investigative reports do not even raise eyebrows anymore. Media exposes cause a brief flutter before society shrugs, and moves on.We hoped to be able to wish our readers a happy new year 2019. But Nepal and Nepalis will probably just muddle through another 52 weeks.

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A year wasted

<figure><img width="1500" height="844" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107111152/6368e4019c7e80680e0333b4jpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Victims of the conflict sign up for a debate on the draft amendments to the 2014 Transitional Justice Act in Kathmandu on Tuesday. Photo: OM ASTHA RAI</figcaption></figure>A few months ago a group of <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/state-of-impunity,2976" target="_blank" rel="noopener">transitional justice</a> experts from Colombia came to Kathmandu, sharing their country’s experience in post-conflict reconciliation with Nepal’s government attorneys and human rights lawyers. Colombia’s ability to resolve its long-running FARC insurgency, and how it has grappled with transitional justice, has lessons for Nepal even though our conflict ended long before Colombia’s.  Soon after the visit, the government proposed <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/just-not-justice/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">amendments to the Transitional Justice Act</a>, which was previously condemned by conflict victims and the international community for not adhering to accepted human rights values, of which Nepal is signatory. It had provisions for blanket pardon of war crimes, but families of conflict victims have doubts that, even with the new changes, they will ever get justice.  The draft amendment is heavily influenced by Colombia's 'restorative justice' practice, which focuses on reconciliation and reparation rather than punitive measures. Even so, the amendments are much better than the existing law (The Enforced Disappearances Enquiry, <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/truth-about-truth-commission,3565" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Truth and Reconciliation Commission</a> Act 2014), which is full of loopholes allowing former guerrilla commanders and state security personnel to go scot-free. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/just-not-justice/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Just not justice</a>, Om Astha RaiThe proposed law is an improvement because it is broadly in tune with a 2015 Supreme Court verdict on a case filed by <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Commissions-of-convenience,1530" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Suman Adhikari</a>, whose father was dragged from a class he was teaching and <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=16781#.WzHctVUza70" target="_blank" rel="noopener">executed by the Maoists in Lamjung in 2002</a>. The Apex Court had denied amnesty for perpetrators of four types of crimes: extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances, rapes and torture.This means Maoist cadres who tied Adhikari to a tree and shot him in the head can be taken to the court. The army officers who detained, raped and killed 14-year-old Maina Sunar in Kavre will also have to face prosecution. Ex-rebels or security personnel charged with similar atrocities cannot be pardoned. However, just like the existing Act, the draft amendment is so loophole-laden that it can be abused by powerful politicians to get themselves off the hook. For example, if passed by Parliament into law, it will allow transitional justice bodies to reduce the severity of sentencing if perpetrators help with the investigation, or apologise and express a commitment to not repeat their crimes. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/when-our-son-was-killed/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">When our son was killed</a>To put it more precisely, if ex-rebels are convicted of abducting and murdering a civilian and slapped with a 10-year jail term, they will have to spend only four years in jail. And the draft amendment also has provisions for 'open jail' or 'community service'. War criminals could easily walk free even if found guilty, and there isn’t much clarity on what constitutes 'community service'. Will joining a political party and contesting polls be defined as 'community service'? The Act leaves a lot of elbow room. That is exactly why conflict victims are reluctant to accept the draft amendment: they suspect that culpable politicians will cunningly manipulate the law and get themselves off the hook. They are seeking some foundational laws based on which justice can be delivered. For example, they want to know beforehand whether all will get 75% discounts in sentencing, or if there will be criteria determining who deserves reduced punishment. They want to know whether convicted criminals will be able to walk free. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-struggle-for-transitional-justice/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The struggle for Transitional Justice</a>, Hari Phuyal <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/yesterdays-enemies-todays-comrades/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Yesterday's enemies, today's comrades</a>, Om Astha Rai<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/united-we-stand/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">United we stand</a>, Editorial <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/doors-closed/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Doors closed</a>, Om Astha Rai<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-struggle-for-transitional-justice/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">After waiting nearly two decades for truth and justice</a>, families of conflict victims are at the end of their tethers. They are lonely and helpless. Some do not expect the government to do anything, so they have given up even demanding justice. The <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/yesterdays-enemies-todays-comrades/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">former enemies are now the state</a>, and they do not want to revisit wartime atrocities. The main opposition NC is led by someone who let the army detain and murder innocent people by imposing a state of emergency in 2002.  They feel neglected, and passing the new TRC law without addressing their concerns will be a blunder.Conflict victims had always pinned their hopes on the UML, which was not directly involved in the war and played a strong role in advocating for transitional justice after the 2006 ceasefire. But <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/doors-closed/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the UML no longer exists, and the Maoists have subsumed themselves and their conflict-era atrocities into the merged Nepal Communist Party</a>. Prime Minister K P Oli, who also co-chairs the new party along with ex-Maoist supremo Pushpa Kamal Dahal, has already gone back on his justice commitment for conflict victims. He recently endorsed the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/united-we-stand/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">presidential pardon to Balkrishna Dhungel</a>, a convicted murderer. Oli has not been pressing Dahal to arrest one of the accused in the <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/dead-and-dying,3955" target="_blank" rel="noopener">murder of Krishna Ahdikari, whose mother Gangamaya is in frail health on her hunger strike</a>. Replicating Colombia's restorative justice formula in good faith could work in Nepal if conflict victims were backed by leaders with political will, and a strong civil society. But they are all alone, and the state is indifferent to their pain. Photo: Bikram RaiRead also:<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/state-of-impunity,2976" target="_blank" rel="noopener">State of Impunity</a>, Editorial<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/dead-and-dying,3955" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The dead, and the dying</a>, Om Astha RaiThe <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=14983#.WzIIAdUza70" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Editorial in Nepali Times ten years ago this week</a> (#406, 27 June - 3 July 2008) dealt with the new government's promise of prosperity. Sound familiar? Here is an excerpt:'There isn't much left to say about the political disarray that we haven't already said in the past two years. Dispensing advice from this pulpit is a pretty futile exercise. In the end, it looks like whatever anyone says, the political parties will always be obsessed with their game of musical chairs.There is apprehension that Nepal's regime change also represents an ideological shift, and there will be a temptation to flirt with utopian undertakings and showcase populism. No matter who comes to power, out of enlightened self-interest if nothing else, please keep your dirty politics out of the economy.Actually, the country's economy is in such a precarious state because of past abuse. It will need a dose of realism in the short-term, hard-nosed determination in the medium-term and visionary pragmatism in the long-term.' <img width="579" height="904" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107111152/6368e4059c7e80680e0333b5jpeg.jpg" alt="">

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Rocky transition to justice

<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6ef9c7e80680e0314b3jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1400" height="859"/>The unification of the Communist Party of Nepal Unified Marxist-Leninists and the Communist Party of Nepal Maoist-Centre to form the Nepal Communist Party (NCP) took a roller-coaster eight months, but finally happened last week. The announcement has been accompanied by metaphors and hyperbole — as if we were witnessing the merger acquisition of two multinational banks, not two parties that believe in the dictatorship of the proletariat.Some commentators have called the new entity the most powerful Communist Party in the world, without specifying the scale of measurement. They talk about it as if the NCP is as monolithic as the Communist Party of China. The co-chairs of the merged party, K P Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal, have compared each other to ‘captain and co-pilot’ of a jet, or as atoms of ‘hydrogen’ and ‘oxygen’. We are left guessing who is flying the plane, and who is the first officer. Or which one is the explosive hydrogen gas, and who the oxygen in this new water molecule.Nepal may now well be politically stable, but accountability is a mirage and prosperity seems to pertain only to rent-seekers in office. Ahead of the budget, the government’s presentation to Parliament of its policies and programs is mostly old wine in an old bottle: we are told Nepalis will soon be twice as rich as the country graduates to middle-income status by 2030, generates 15,000MW of power within a decade, doubles harvests in five years and ends overseas migration.It is all right to dream, but targets have to be realistic. Reaching all the goals listed in President Bhandari’s speech to Parliament on Monday are predicated on transparency, better governance and delivery. These need a structural overhaul of the state system, and no one seems to be talking about that.The unified party may have shared a Communist past, but in thought, principles and behaviour they could not have been further apart. What may make the merger work is that the NCP now has one common ideology: crony capitalism.Much as we would like to give the benefit of doubt to the neo-Communists, and wish the merger well for the sake of long-suffering Nepalis, there is reason to be skeptical. The government and the party that now leads it is off to a rather slow start.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6f29c7e80680e0314b4jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="720" height="540"><figcaption>Bal Krishna Dhungel, an ex-Maoist MP convicted of murdering Ujjain Kumar Shrestha in Okhaldhunga during the insurgency, after his release from the Central Prison. Dhungel has been granted presidential pardon on Republic Day. Pic: Khila Bahadur Bhandari</figcaption></figure>All we have heard so far are promises and more promises: making Nepal “like heaven” in ten years, bullet trains whizzing through tunnels to Kathmandu from south and north, international airports galore.Meanwhile, the Ring Road in Balkhu is a muddy quagmire where the only Great Leap Forward is what pedestrians have to take to avoid large puddles. After much hullaballoo over cracking down on bus syndicates, an Oli-loyalist minister has sacked the Director General from the Department of Transportation who was trying to get bus route permits out of the clutches of the mafia.One year after elected mayors and village chiefs took over, and nearly six months after the provinces got their own elected leaders, the devolution process is going nowhere very fast. Kathmandu municipality seems to be comatose, Lalitpur’s mayor is everywhere but nowhere, and in many rural municipalities elected contractors are awarding lucrative infrastructure projects to themselves, and plundering natural resources.The UML and the CPN-MC came together out of necessity.The UML was tired of being a junior partner in unstable coalitions because of its fragmented vote bank. The Maoists had disintegrated into little pieces, and Chairman Dahal needed to secure his own political future. He also wanted to wash his hands of the blood he helped spill during the war by leaving no trace of his Maoist party.The loser in this game will be the survivors and families of victims of war crimes and human rights violations as we report in this issue (page 1,11). Reports that Bal Krishna Dhungel, accused in a war-era murder in Okhaldhunga, is getting a presidential pardon on Republic Day next week presages even more serious attempts to evade truth, justice and reparations. The groundwork has already been laid by weakening the mandates of the Commission on Enforced Disappearances and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.The unified party, as well as the opposition NC and the security forces, are united in this attempt to let bygones be bygones. The people’s apathy and their lack of confidence that politicians and warriors will ever face up to their crimes, helps the perpetrators.Meanwhile, the families of more than 1,400 disappeared Nepalis still do not have closure. Relatives of the dead and wounded are still struggling.The ghosts of the dead will continue to haunt the NCP as long as it does not confront its violent past, and make amends.

United we stand

In what must be the biggest political tamasha in seven decades of Nepal’s communist movement, the UML and the Maoists formally merged on Thursday to create the Nepal Communist Party (NCP)The union was formally announced at a press meet in Kathmandu after registering the new party at the Election Commission. This is now the most powerful party Nepal has ever had with 174 seats in the 275-member Parliament, and can comfortably rule the country for the next five years. It can also amend the Constitution if one of the two Madhes-based parties backs it, to take the combined strength to two-thirds.Leftist analyst Shyam Shrestha thinks the NCP is now one of the most powerful communist parties in the world: “Only China and Vietnam have communist parties more powerful than the NCP, there is reason to celebrate.”The opposition Nepali Congress, which was the first elected party in Parliament in 1960 and governed Nepal for most of the period after democracy was restored in 1990, will now be further weakened. It has accused the united Left of dragging the country to communist authoritarianism. Shrestha disagrees: “We are living in a modern democracy where dictatorship cannot thrive.”Shrestha is upbeat that the emergence of a strong political force has <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/regular-columns/Comment/a-stable-nepal-in-2018,1090">effectively ended</a> an era of political instability in Nepal. The <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/a-two-party-state,3968">unity drive was first announced</a> before elections last October, but ran into trouble over power-sharing and leadership issues after the alliance swept polls. <figure><img width="640" height="960" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6b59c7e80680e03149djpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Pic: Gopen Rai</figcaption></figure>After <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/blogs/thebrief/2018/02/15/oli-once-more/">UML Chair K P Oli was sworn in as Prime Minister in February</a>, Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal began lobbying for a ‘respectable’ presence of his comrades in the unified party. ‘Respectable’ was a code for Dahal’s demand that he should lead the united party, be prime minister in two-and-half years after Oli, and all positions should be divided 50-50.Read also: <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/two-horse-race,3960">Two horse race</a>, EditorialWhen Oli became too busy with Indian Prime Minister <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/a-modi-fied-oli/">Narendra Modi’s visit last week,</a> negotiations stalled. Dahal suspected Oli was no longer interested in unification, and was wooing the Madhesis. The Maoists even boycotted some of Modi’s events. But a two-hour meeting between Oli and Dahal on Wednesday cleared the air, and they hurried the unification process, timing the announcement for the 25th anniversary of the death of charismatic UML leader Madan Bhandari in a car crash. <figure><img width="1500" height="902" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6b79c7e80680e03149ejpeg.jpg" alt=""><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>The other hurdle was semantics: finally, the UML accepted the Maoist-led ‘<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=6187#.Wv2OAe6FPIU">People’s War</a>’ and Maoists agreed to the UML’s ideology of ‘People’s Multi-Party Democracy’. It is not clear if Oli promised to help Dahal in the first general convention of the unified party, or to relinquish prime ministership halfway through his term. The new party’s Standing Committee has 43 members (25 from UML and 18 from Maoists) and 441 Central Committee (241 from UML and 200 from Maoists).Ex-Maoist Ganesh Shah says Dahal’s brief to his comrades about unification was unusually brief: “He did not talk much, he just told us how party committees will be formed, he may have been under pressure to push the unification.”Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/a-political-pilgrim/">A political pilgrim</a>, Om Astha Rai <img width="1920" height="1280" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6ba9c7e80680e03149fjpeg.jpg" alt="">

One body two heads

Even after the UML-Maoist alliance won a near two-third majority in Parliament-Province elections three months ago, not many were sure this would translate into the much-promised political stability.Maoist Chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal was prodding his UML counterpart KP Oli to take turns at prime ministership, letting down voters who catapulted them to power in the hope that it would end political wrangling once and for all and usher in an era of prosperity. Dahal kept bargaining even after Oli was sworn in as new prime minister on 15 February.But Dahal made a sudden U-turn this week and agreed to allow Oli to complete his full five-year term. The seven-point unification deal signed by Nepal’s two largest communist parties makes no mention of any rotational prime ministership.The deal is also silent about Oli and Dahal co-chairing the unified party, but its seventh point states that the general convention will be held ‘harmoniously as a unity convention’. Analysts interpret this to be a tacit understanding that Oli will help Dahal assume leadership of the unified party.Political analyst Shyam Shrestha says Dahal has decided to put aside his immediate ambition to unify the communist party, but this will ultimately yield him political dividends: “That Dahal will be the ultimate leader of the unified party is a foregone conclusion.”To summarise: Dahal has let Oli stay in Baluwatar for a full term in exchange for a commitment to eventually hand over party leadership to him. Technically, this also means Dahal can hope to be prime minister after the next parliamentary polls, but he probably knows it could easily happen before that because of Oli’s poor health.The UML-Maoist unification may finally ensure stability, but it has also raised a question about what kind of a party will be governing Nepal. Oli and Dahal both launched their political careers using violence, and both have now proven themselves to be shrewd at parliamentary wheeling-dealing as well.Dahal has distanced himself from Maoism, and Oli has not gone back to left extremism. The question now is: will the unified party be more like the UML or the Maoists? Dahal has climbed half-way up to take the UML saddle, while Oli is still riding.During his short first tenure in 2015-16, Oli inspired many Nepalis to dream of a Nepal that does not solely depend on India and maintains equidistance with China. He has returned to power as one of Nepal’s strongest prime ministers. He does not need to pay the nationalism card anymore -– just work to leave a firm legacy of nation-building.

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A year wasted

Rocky transition to justice

United we stand

One body two heads

Not as easy as it seems