Shashi Malla: Carter's futile visit

The visit to Nepal by former US president Jimmy Carter has not contributed substantially to the peace process, nor has it strengthened good governance and the possibility of free and fair elections to the Constituent Assembly in the foreseeable future.

What it has achieved is to shore up PM Girija Prasad Koirala's autocratic regime. At a time when the oligarchs of the Seven Party Alliance plus the Maoists (SPAM) are at loggerheads on practically every aspect of government and cannot move ahead, Carte heaped praise on Koirala, who allegedly "has been a hero for me with his reputation and his integrity." This is the same man who due to his inability or unwillingness to practice inner-party democracy, caused his own party to split. Little positive can be said about his track record in orderly and clean governance. Carter seems to have missed the wood for the trees when he further elucidated: "He has been the focal point around which the peace and future democracy of this country has been built." It seems he was not properly briefed on current affairs and recent Nepalese history.

Koirala, in the meantime, continues to hog the limelight by making sensational statements. His latest has been in announcing to a visiting Pakistani journalist delegation and their Nepalese counterparts that the country would be best served if King Gyanendra and Crown Prince Paras abdicated in favour of a child monarch. Firstly, this is not a novel suggestion. This very newspaper had made it already a year back in this space.

Secondly, while Koirala is entitled to voice his personal opinion, in his capacity as a PM of an unelected interim government he would have done well to demonstrate his impartiality rather than going on a rant regarding a question which is to be decided by the people themselves. Thirdly, nothing stops him to raise this point with the Narayanhiti Palace directly if he wishes to. If he really means business, then this would have been the way to go about this.

Koirala seemingly realized that he got ahead of himself (after virulent Maoist attacks), as one day later he said that he had no 'affection' for the monarchy and that the constituent assembly polls would decide the fate of the monarchy while talking to a delegation of the Nepal Teachers Association at his official Baluwatar residence.

That Koirala inventively raised this issue in this forum is probably in relation to ulterior motives.

It could be a move by his coterie to draw the King out and make a false move and then achieve a fait accompli even without the Constituent Assembly. Strangely, this 'initiative' is coming at a time when there is little support for retaining the monarchy within the SPAM and within Koirala's own party. Those in favour of a constitutional monarchy would do well to be wary of another trick from the wheeler-dealer. In the view of the authors, whether or not Nepal will retain its monarchy is a decision of the people. Full stop. As stated again and again in this space, this question of state structuring is one that is not to be pre-emptied by an unelected interim parliament.

We believe that it is exactly the unpredictability as to how the Nepalese people will vote on this that makes some political quarters want to abolish the monarchy prematurely. Let us not forget that the termination of the monarchy was a key objective of specifically the CPN-Maoist all along.

In this context, it is interesting to observe that the 'interim government' tabled a bill in the 'interim parliament' amending the 'interim constitution' whereby the monarchy can be abolished by a two-thirds majority, if the King was found conspiring against the holding of CA elections. And it is the cabinet which will decide whether the King is creating obstacles. There should be no difficulty in bringing forth trumped up charges. Since the oligarchs have already swelled the ranks of MPs with their own members, the necessary majority should be no hindrance at all. Carter's assessment missed this point also.

Koirala's (he is also the defence minister) zigzag political course is an open book. Some time back, he had only praise for the Nepalese Army. At the same time he and his closest advisers are conspiring to undermine the morale of the officers' corps. They are actively promoting the interests of a shady major-general who is set to be promoted to lieutenant-general over the heads of other more deserving officers with distinguished careers. It is also planned to appoint him as the chief of the general staff, and is, therefore, slated to be the next army chief. This is corruption and nepotism of a high order.

It gets even better. The Nepalese weekly "Tarun" has published detailed reports of this officer's misdeeds while serving as the battalion commander of the UN Peace Keeping Force in Lebanon from February to September 1990. Among others, this man has been accused of illegally selling rations and UN equipment in the market for personal profit.

Strangely enough, the then force commander's (Brig. Gen. J.K. Konrote) confidential report has been expunged from the records at Army HQ. The negative assessment should have, at least, barred him from further promotion, but he has risen in the ranks since then. Carter did say something about the lack of political support to the police in the dismal law and order situation, but he had no words about the army, although it is now going to play a more active role in the CA-elections and the Carter Center is supposed to monitor them.

Carter does have a reputation for shooting his mouth off. He broke tradition by criticizing incumbent president George W. Bush. Stung by the overall harsh critique, he then promptly had to eat his own words and backtrack. In Nepal, instead of looking at reality in the face, he has followed the soft policy of appeasement which is diametrically opposite to that of the hard-line policy of resident US envoy James F. Moriarty and the current American administration. In fact he has undermined US policy vis-à-vis Nepal. C.P. Gajurel, the head of the CPN-Maoist's foreign department was quite upbeat about Carter's interaction with his party leaders (including himself): "Carter's commitment towards the Maoists was a significant political event in Nepal's context". However, it is most unlikely that the Bush administration will change its stance regarding the Maoists in a hurry, specially since the political equations remain the same, and their youth wing continue to harass the common people.

Although there were flashes of understanding, Carter did not draw the right conclusions. Thus, to the Election Commission he did express concern whether the CA polls would really be inclusive in nature. He also had his reservations about the sudden postponement of the verification process for Maoist arms and fighters. And he did raise the question of the law and order situation in the country. However, these should have been raised in detail and resolutely with Koirala and Maoist warlord Prachanda. Instead he praised Koirala to the skies and attempted to give the Maoists a clean slate.

After meeting head honchos Baburam Bhattarai and Prachanda, Carter did not reject the suggestion that he take the initiative in asking the US government to drop the official terrorist tag on the Maoists. In fact he stated that the Bush government should establish political contacts with them. This would be tantamount to full-scale 'diplomatic' recognition through the back-door. And this without any quid pro quo from the Maoists. They could continue their mayhem with benign international support. The Maoists' penchant for not honouring their commitments is well known and Carter should have been fully cognizant of that fact before agreeing to act as an intermediary with the US government. Some comfort may be gained by the fact that he visited as a private US citizen and none of his views or recommendations are of a binding nature.

Most handbooks on business administration describe different approaches to managing a project.

The preparations for CA elections can certainly be considered to be a rather complex project. The Carter Center's role in this project can be described as that of a steering committee. A steering committee is supposed to manage a project into the right direction. There are different ways to manage a project, such as management by objectives, management by results or even management by exceptions. Now, in which way did Carter try to manage the Nepalese run up to the CA elections? After taking stock of what he said and did during his visit and after long deliberations, the authors can only conclude that during his visit to Nepal, he practitised 'management by helicopter': Fly in, create a lot of turbulence on the ground, lift off.

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