Editorial
Volumes are being spent by experts in analyses of the onerous developments in politics last week. Willy-nilly experts now concur that we are heading for elections. If anyone was right, it was Prime Minister K.P. Oli who had the foresight to predict that he would emerge a stronger prime minister even if he lost his Supreme Court case. If, that is, the ‘rest’ in parliament combine to match Oli with the votes to unseat him. Looks like Oli is headed to be lame-duck with the polls as agenda. But the numbers game aside, precedence is that most serious polls in Nepal take place only when poll responsibility is shared overtly from the government or with tacit undercurrents of support. Especially the Nepali Congress appears more than eager to take advantage of the seeming fragmentation of the Left whether or not Oli is willing. A thoroughly sceptic public though would prefer to leave the predictability of the polls to the machinations of our foreign handlers. After all, a section outside the country would have an agenda to re-seat their favourite clients at the helm by ‘strengthening the constitutional processes through the obviously democratic practice of the polls.
But this is too simple for Nepal. Outside of the impending tussle for the election government, we must brace ourselves for the polls itself. The stakes this round are too high. The fissures are too deep. Both the once again renamed UML and Maoist parties must lick their wounds by appearing to assimilate would be deserters. Fragmented leadership in both communist camps can hurt at the husting. Again, individual acrimony and traded insults so far seem irreparable. All these aspects cast aspersions at the certainty of peaceful elections. What the renewed UML and Maoist leadership will do to their numbers in parliament and the leadership pyramid lurks over everything from candidacy to policy coherence. To expect the electorate to remain immune from the highly publicized and mobilized fracas would be unreal. Whether the prime minister himself can see a divided lot blemished from public laundering emerging healthily from elections is anybody’s guess despite his public posturing favouring the polls.
The near certainty of the polls notwithstanding, the above also make it feasible for foreign mentors opting to postpone polls by allowing Oli to complete his two-year remaining term in office after which the scheduled election may be allowed. It will after all give strength to the system. Such steps and arguments favour the constitution. This constitutional carousel though is precisely what has been exposed. Our politics has been running round in circles and the current constitution has been actually promoting this at the cost to national performance. None but Prime Minister Oli admits that the constitutional impediments to his performance stem from the need to share the spoils. It is this that now propels the conclusion that we are headed for serious intervention to tame impudent politicians who cannot be tamed in the current constitutional mess.
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