Agitation closer to the grassroots!

December 29, 2000
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Kathmandu: As the congress Pokhara convention approaches lines are being drawn between the Girija and anti-Girija camp with the Prime Minister’s advantages gradually being unraveled and the Deuba camp still insisting that they have a few surprises up under their sleeves. The emergence of Khum Bahadur Khadka closer to Girija Prasad Koirala has made the Deuba standpoint weak. The much hoped for motion of no confidence has yet to emerge in Parliament. The Deuba point is that they are still hopeful.

 

The congress focus on Pokhara is clearly determined by the Prime Minister’s visit to major urban centers where he is rallying his supporters now for the need for party unity. The congress has clearly suffered vertically in the process of electing Girija supporters for Pokhara. Deuba’s defeat may be a virtual certainty. And Girija babu has ensured that his win will demonstrate his monopoly over the organization. But the weeding out of his opponents and the manner with which this was done is likely to tell on the performance of the organization regardless of the fact that his opponents themselves will not want to weaken themselves further by making a permanent break with the Girija dominated organization.

As example, one might cite the elections conducted under Prime Minister Koirala in 1994 by which the UML gained the largest number in Parliament and congress lost its majority despite the advantage of Girija babu conducting the elections. It is not for nothing then that the government’s standpoint on the widely popular issue of constitutional reforms is coming closer to that floated by the UML. The UML wants an all-party representation in government to be imbibed in the constitution for elections. Girija babu was flipped to power once more with a coalition of the UML in the last elections that brought the UML to its current position as the largest opposition in the parliament. The UML will come close to ensuring this stalemate once the issue of constitutional reforms as demanded by it is settled outside the constitution by a Girija led congress that will be more willing to accommodate the UML in the presence of belligerence from within the Prime Minister’s own ruling party.

The effects of Pokhara, however, is likely to be felt in virtually all urban centers where Girija babu appears to have shunned the established congress representation. Curiously again, much of the local level urban government’s remains dominated by the Left, a substantial portion is in ML hands which is not represented in parliament. In Kathmandu, for example, the antagonism of such personalities as Prakash Man Singh and P.L.Singh will most likely reflect upon government performance. Even in Girija babu’s home districts, Morang and Sunsari, the congress cadre appear to have been paralyzed just recently as last week.

Outside the fact that congress at the moment is ruling with the government machinery and popular mobilization of cadre is at a minimum in dealing with opposition, the Prime Minister must also have to cope with the fact that congress cadre are being singled out by the opposition to the point of virtual incapacitation.

The effects of these on a opposition program now virtually led by the Maoists even by proxy would most likely be momentous.

Pokhara, Biratnagar, Butwal, Narayanghat among others have already been tested grounds in an exercise at paralysis. Even Kathmandu has seen repeated success in such. Already all Left Students organizations have declared that they will be on the warpath on the issue of private schools. With the campuses closed, the the focus on the schools for agitation must be viewed with significance. Politics has now shifted from the campuses-grounds for previous political agitation-to the schools, which are more in numbers, more grassroots, situated and can be more widely affected at the population’s very doorstep.