After the euphoria of the so called April Revolution, the nation and its citizens seem to be slowly getting back into the reality of the situation. Especially their belief (if they ever truly believed) that the same incompetent and corrupt politicians would take the country out of the quagmire towards a brighter future is being shattered – those they helped into power have started showing their true face. The leader of this pack of incompetent politicians, no matter what his supporter would like to believe him as, is undoubtedly a certain GP Koirala. He has been the one who has been trusted at every crucial period in the country’s political landscape post-1990, and he is without a doubt the one who has betrayed the peoples trust in him the most. Let us go through a few of his political sins so to speak.
Continue reading ‘Misplaced trust: future of the country in the wrong hands’
Archive for the 'politics' Category
A learned friend of mine, while we were just talking about political happenings in Nepal, asked what “arms management” meant exactly? I tried to explain him on the basis of what I had read on the Nepali news media, recent interviews with political figures, including Prachanda, in Nepal and Kul Gautam’s interview to eKantipur. He wasn’t convinced with either my answer or of what the people were saying back in Nepal, which made me think this issue through a bit more seriously. Really, what does arms management mean and why are we not talking about “arms decommissioning” instead? Continue reading ‘Why are we not talking about “Weapons Decommissioning”?’
Let me first make it clear that I am using “insider” here in the broadest sense of the word – meaning a Nepali’s observation of the events back home, from a foreign land obviously. In any narrow sense of the word, I am no insider - either to political elites of the country or to any royal/feudal & military classes. I am just a lay person with interests in socio-economic, political, and, may I say, environmental aspects of the society and the nation that I grew up in. With these disclaimers, let me move on to what I intended to write about here.
Continue reading ‘The state of the state: an “insider’s” observation from outside’
Robin Lustig of the BBC’s The World Tonight, one of my favourite BBC broadcasters, seems to be in Nepal thesedays. Last night I heard his report from Nepal, on The World Tonight, about his meeting with a maoist commander in Janakpur area. And early this morning, I found his news piece on BBC online - Up close with Nepal’s Maoists, which is basically a summary of his audio report that I heard last night. I didn’t know Robin was so much of a purist - he has translated even the Maoist commander’s name to English, from Commander Bikalpa (my guess from Robin’s translation) to Commander Alternative. Even interesting is the name of their political spokesman - Commissar Content, which in my guess must be Commissar Santosh! Continue reading ‘Robin Lustig in Nepal…’
Fund for Peace (FfP), a Washington, D.C. based organisation has recently released its ranking of “failed states” – called the Failed State Index 2006. Nepal is listed at number 20, in fourth place among the South Asian countries, after Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. In its preamble it states:
We encourage others to utilize the Failed States Index to develop ideas for promoting greater stability worldwide. We hope the Index will spur conversations, encourage debate, and most of all help guide strategies for sustainable security.
Of course, the debate has already spurred, especially in Pakistan as it was placed in 9th place, above Afghanistan. BBC quoted Pakistani information minister saying the report “joke of the year”. Whatever the opinions and facts, the report did succeed in spurring the debate so that’s good. But what about similar debates in Nepal? So far I have not heard a single official comment regarding the report, nor have I seen any analytical piece regarding this issue in the mainstream media. So, is this report worth debating over (in case of Nepal)? I think it is. Continue reading ‘Nepal – the 20th failed state?’
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