Democracy has been squeezed out by the two extremes: the Monarchists and the Maoists. It is for the democratic center to fight back. Street protests will not do. And the old mantra of constitutional monarchy and multi-party democracy will not do either. And the single word mantra of democracy will not.
The call has to be for a Democratic Republic. The king has done what the Maoists would only have dreamt of. He has taken away all fundamental rights. And that has to be countered by an all-out call for a Republic. No more talk of a Constitutional Monarchy. King G can not be trusted. Ever since he got onto the throne, he has been playing the cat and mouse games of a feudal aristocrat with the feeble parties and politicians. He is the Nepali Musharraf. He does not have Queen Elizabeth in mind. Even if the insurgency were to be quelled and "democracy" reinstalled, he would want to play Big Brother. He intends to be a "Constructive" Monarch, not a Constitutional Monarch. A constitutional monarch is politically irrelevant, but he never intends to become politically irrelevant. He intends to be active and meddling even if democracy is reinstalled.
It is for the Nepali Speakig High Caste Male dominated institutions like the Nepali Congress and the UML to shake off their love affair with the concept of a Constitutional Monarchy that they have been parroting, come hell or high water.
Unilateral disarmament is ineffective politics. The king hits the democratic forces, those forces need to hit back. And you hit back by creating and amassing support for a Republic. And saying, after the Republican forces take over, the entire top brass of the army will be purged. If you do not create such a platform, the army has no incentive to think twice before doing the Gyanendra do. The army and King G went after the civilians. Human rights abuses have gone up. They are acting as if the Maoists were the lesser problem, first gag the common peoples and the politicians.
The Nepali people pay the king, the Nepali people pay the army. And ought to treat the two like they might treat clerks at the post office, with human respect, but with a clear understanding as to whose payroll these people are on. Both have given ample evidence they need to be fired.
What King G wants is to do the 100 days mantra to calm things down, hoping the initial reactions will go down, people will get used to it. This is an Active Monarch, playing the chess game of politics. Whoever elected King G?
It is for the democratic forces to create that political platform, and it is for them also to respond to some of the charges levelled against them. As in, yes, some of us were corrupt, but we intend to pass major anti-corruption legislation, and, by the way, look at the "royal corruption." The royal "budget" has been increased 10-fold by King G. That puts to shame all the corruption of the entire batch of Congressias. And look at the army's budget. 70% of the national budget.
This major issue has to be addressed head on and in all honesty if the democratic forces are to expect ground support.
The mantra of Democratic Republic is also to be a face saving possibility for the Maoists. Yes, the democrats are also Republicans now. Join us, or expect to get sidelined.
Not too much stock can be put in ancient communist ideology. These Maoists have been organizing the Dalits and the Janajatis. Mao never heard of Dalits and Janajatis. These legitimate social grievances have to be addressed. Maoists are not just hooligans with guns. They have a clear political agenda.
Most of the persecuted politicians conveniently have Nepali Speaking High Caste Male names. They need to do some soul searching into the social reality that marginalized the Dalits and the Janajatis. The social agenda of the Maoists has to be addressed to demilitarize them eventually.
Democracy is also a mechanism to address social inequalities, also a mechanism to address poverty, also an anti-corruption mechanism. The democratic forces will have to present that larger vision of democracy. So far they have failed to do so.
India, US, UK matter, but only so much. King G might be able to use those powers. Already he has asked for 100 days just to present a plan to deal with the Maoists. And these powers are okay with that. Democracy will not be a gift of the foreign powers. It will have to be earned by the Nepali people. And political leadership helps.
The installment of a Democratic Republic of Nepal will have to be the work of the Nepali democratic forces all over the world, and primarily in Nepal, coming together and organizing and launching an effective counter to the king's move.
Street protests are hard to organize in a police state that Nepal has now become. And when they were organized, they were ineffective. Because they were designed to "convince" a monarch who does not speak that language. This monarch can not be convinced out, he has to be forced out. And the way to do that would be to create a broad Democratic Republican political platform and to coalesce a large, international coalition of Nepalis around it.
I have a feeling the Maoists will come into the mainstream if the democratic forces were to switch their allegiance from Constitutional Monarchy to Republicanism and were to agree to the idea of a Constituent Assembly to draft a new constitution. What kind of democrat are you if you do not agree to the idea of a Constituent Assembly? Let the 27 million Nepalis decide what kind of constitution they want. Yes, as a Madhesi, I expect such an Assembly to turn Nepal into a federal state, which is the only solution to the second class status of Madhesis in Nepal, as the Janajatis. Noone who is against the idea of a Constituent Assembly can claim to be a democrat, no such person has a right to protest the king's autocratic move.
I don't see the king and the army defeating the Maoists militarily. I don't see the Maoists taking over the country militarily. So the onus is on the democratic forces to create the political platform that gets rid of the monarchy and brings the Maoists into the mainstream.
Hence the clear call for a Democratic Republic of Nepal.
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