Nepal: Realising Peace Potential of Constitution
TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 27 Feb 2017
Tatsushi Arai – The Kathmandu Post
Shared commitment to managing divisive identity politics, inter-party competition and foreign interests is essential.
20 Feb 2017 – The process of building a democratic federal state requires reconciling various competing needs of its constituents and international stakeholders. The promulgation of the 2015 constitution made these needs more conspicuous than before at the international, federal, provincial and local levels. The constitution also introduced a new framework of civic and political engagement designed to reconcile these competing needs and manage conflicts arising from the competition.
At the federal level, a key challenge in Nepal’s state-making consists of ensuring the seven federated provinces establish and sustain equal and mutually-supportive relationships with the central governing mechanism under the federal state. To build such constructive relationships, visionary leadership, strong consensus-building skills, and constituents’ active participation are needed. A shared commitment to managing divisive identity politics and inter-party competition is essential.
Four interconnected dimensions
At the provincial level, it is important to overcome the tension between diverse identity groups’ aspirations to claim their respective homelands and the responsibility of each of the seven federated states to govern its territory.
At the heart of this tension is an enduring dilemma: while constituent members of each identity group aspire to live in their homeland together, provincial boundaries separate them from one another.
Careful inquiry into these communities’ aspirations for their respective homelands, however, reveals that there are at least four interconnected dimensions of the communities’ commitment to their homelands: (1) economic (access to land and resources; allocation of state-generated revenues to meet policy-supported local needs), (2) cultural (freedom to practice distinct customs and religions; freedom to speak and teach distinct languages), (3) political (eligibility to vote and to be elected and appointed in order to ensure adequate group representation; freedom of speech and assembly), and (4) security (ability to join and play an active role in defence and law enforcement services; institutionalised guarantees of human rights and justice).
Unpacking the multidimensional nature of one’s need of a homeland is important because constituent members of each of the identity groups have varying degrees of commitment to one or more of these four dimensions.
The relative importance they attach to these dimensions corresponds to their age, gender, education, occupation, and other critical determinants of their lives and future outlooks.
Farmers cultivating their ancestors’ land for livelihood, for example, may prioritise the economic and cultural aspects of their homeland demand, while their young educated offspring may prioritise the cultural aspect over the economic aspect if they seek career opportunities away from home.
It is possible that the latter are concerned more about cultural bonds, community support, and non-discriminatory treatment than about the physical location of their motherlands.
In other words, identity groups’ attachment to their respective homelands can be expressed in either a territorial or non-territorial manner, often with significant overlaps.
In this context, non-territorial association with one’s homeland encourages members of a given identity group to cross provincial boundaries in order to meet their collective identity needs.
Possible lesson from Europe
With respect to local level governance, the scheduled elections of representatives in over 700 administrative units will be of vital importance.
As exemplified by the Swiss federation that consists of 26 provinces divided into 2,700 local communities, the most essential foundations of democratic governance and federalism exist at the grassroots level.
It is at the grassroots level where interactions between diverse community members are most intimate. In Nepal, these local units of governance offer small identity groups a realistic chance of assuming leadership roles. Also, in each of these local units, elected representatives and constituents of different identity groups can get a hands-on experience in practising inter-communal collaboration and democratic governance.
They can make decisions about economic, cultural, political and security issues, and experience firsthand the fruits of their decisions and collaborative efforts.
To realise the vision of social justice and equality espoused in the 2015 constitution, the Nepali government and civil society must actively encourage qualified women, Janajati, Dalit, and Madeshi candidates to openly and freely contest in the local elections.
These candidates, in turn, must demonstrate their commitment to serving all Nepali citizens irrespective of their group identities.
The candidates must also uphold the highest standard of financial accountability, reject corruption, and advocate community development. To this end, constituents must demand and examine their candidates’ election pledges.
Both the federal and provincial governments and civil society organisations can play a vital role in ensuring a fair playing field for all, sponsoring a practical, affordable mechanism of election monitoring, and providing skill-building opportunities for the elected representatives beyond the duration of their election campaigns.
State-sponsored investment in sustained capacity-building for elected local representatives can prepare them to enter provincial and federal politics over time and gradually expand the pool of experienced and trusted leaders capable of strengthening Nepali democracy.
Defensive defence
These steps in state-making can generate positive impact for democratisation when Nepal can exercise sovereignty and conduct an independent foreign policy. The public debates on the diverse international influences on the 2015 blockade and protests in the Terai region, however, underscore the importance of Nepal’s ability to maintain its status as a self-standing political and economic entity in relation to India, China, and western countries.
Recognising both new and historical aspirations of New Delhi and Beijing for regional security, resource and market access, and international respect, Nepal’s foreign and defence policy must build on a balanced and practical understanding of the dynamic tension and partnership between its two giant neighbours.
One way of realising a more promising future of Nepal’s foreign and defence policy, therefore, is to establish an integrated practice of defensive defence and proactive peacemaking. Concretely, learning from the Swiss model of defensive defence, Nepal can dedicate a sizeable portion of its defence budget, personnel, and intelligence gathering effort to make its mountainous terrains unconquerable.
Concrete steps required to realise this vision include training armed forces to become leaders of broad-based active nonviolence and civil disobedience. Importantly, such a national commitment to defensive defence must be pursued with a complementary effort to avoid all forms of provocative and aggressive military posturing.
In addition, learning from the precedent of Finnish diplomacy during the Cold War, Nepal can take a greater leadership role in preventive diplomacy and proactive peacemaking on the international stage. It can, for example, progressively build and expand a cadre of well-trained multi-lingual diplomats and mediators capable of bridging the competing and complementary needs of India, China, and other regional and global stakeholders.
To this end, Nepal can allocate a portion of its defence budget to enable emerging leaders and qualified university students to master Chinese in addition to English and to acquire advanced degrees and practical experiences in conflict resolution, diplomacy, and related fields.
In addition, Kathmandu can establish a world-class institute capable of engaging Indian, Chinese, and other international stakeholders for joint research, leadership development, preventive diplomacy, and conflict resolution.
The rationale for allocating a portion of the country’s defence budget for these causes is that Nepal as a small landlocked country can defend itself far more effectively by pre-empting regional conflicts than by building a stronger army that cannot withstand foreign invasions.
None of these proposed measures, however, should stand in the way of Nepal’s sustained effort to build well-trained armed forces and law enforcement personnel whose primary task is to maintain law and order within its borders.
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Democracy as a Learning Process: Nepal in Search of Peaceful Future
A public seminar delivered by Prof. Tatsushi Arai, School of International Training, at an event organized by Kathmandu based research organization Arc Insight and Analysis on 4 Feb 2017:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcB36ZNRQHU&feature=youtu.be
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Tatsushi Arai is a professor of Peacebuilding and Conflict Transformation at School for International Training Graduate Institute, USA, and a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment. email: tatsushi.arai@sit.edu
Go to Original – kathmandupost.ekantipur.com
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Nepal is a country which has a long history of communal harmony where all castes, religions and languages have survived and flourished with tolerance and co-existence. The Nepali language establishes the unity and collective identity of the diverse ethnic groups of Nepal. The Nepali Language has been both the official and the Lingua Franca between ethnic groups of Nepal (as well as abroad). Because it is the international language, we respect English language too. We regard the Hindi Language also but not as an official language, because everybody has their own mother languages. If Hindi also is accepted as an official language, that will mean the domination of India. And we’ll never support the suicidal demands of Indian agents.
Since 2006, we, the Nepalese people are fighting against the naked intervention of India’s RAW and CIA. The Republic, secularism and federalism are agendas of India-RAW & the CIA but are not the actual issues of Nepal. The reality is that we should have Nepal as a good example of ‘unity in diversity.’ That is, we must recognize the multi-cultures and multi-languages of Nepal as the national assets.
Now, it’s because of our corrupt leaders we have to be dependent on India. There was a time in Nepal about 15 to 20 years back, where food was cheaper in Nepal than in India. We even had good factories for cloth, cement, leather etc. In the name of privatization our corrupt leaders fell prey to Indian conspiracy and sold the factories to Indian brokers by the traitor’s regime. So, the main problem in Nepal is actually the corrupt and culprit leaders, who are backed up by foreigners and don’t feel responsible towards the country.
To save Nepal they should join hands with the royal institution and stand against expansionist and imperialist conspiracy and fight imperialist force. Due to the Nepali Congress’s and UML’s downfall, since 10 years ago, the regime was handed-over to the King Gyanendra in 2001. The situation was such that the king had to take over the power in a hurry. But, the Congress and UML did not support the King and instead joined hands with the Maoist rebels by the command of the Indian intelligence agency-RAW and foreign leaders. As we already know that, the state system must run on the basis of reason and result. To only blame the royal institution, taking it as the cause for all the problems is nothing but treachery.
The reality of the crisis in Nepal is that the Nepali Congress (NC), UML and Maoists had betrayed the political agreement of 2006 with King Gyanendra. No one can succeed by breaking an agreement. In 2006 the agitators were pleading for monarchy as an alternative force in times of crisis. An agreement was reached to reinstate the House of Representatives, which was dissolved under NC recommendation-2002, although the monarchy did not posses the right to reinstate it. The monarchy reinstated the parliament and appointed Girija Prasad Koirala to the post of premiership. The oath of office ceremony for the Prime Minister was administered by the king himself in the royal palace premises. Gradually, the agreement reached with the king was broken and the royal institution was attacked, which is a huge betrayal to Nepal.
After the political betrayal, the foreigners became active- especially RAW, the CIA, Europeans nations and UNMIN, by taking some of the Brahmin leaders into their confidence. That transitional time made it easy for them to destroy the Nepalese identity. The Royal institution, a Hindu and Buddha Kingdom and the Nepalese language are fundamentals of our national unity.
Since 2006 anarchy and lawlessness are ruling the roost in Nepal. Criminals are roaming freely if they are Maoists or unseen force. These criminals’ gangs fear no one because they have been given the backing of the political party leaders. Many criminals are executing serious crimes even in broad daylight. The Nepalese people are feeling that the country is in the worst situation in Nepalese history. The Constitution of 1990 was forcibly removed by the same vicious circle using unilateral and undemocratic process. It would cure Nepal to reinstate the ‘constitution of 1990’ in order to fill-up the democratic and constitutional gap with the presence of monarchy, political parties and nationalist forces including the army, police, court and various organizations of the nation. From that path, we can get the solution and then all the nationalists should move ahead by creating coordinative relations between nationality, the Royal Institution and democracy.
Thank you
Dirgha Raj Prasai
Kathmandu