Kathmandu: The continued stalemate in the parliament appears to have approached a crucial stage. With both the ruling Koirala quarter and the Opposition camp remaining adamant on their declared stands, the deadlock apparently will continue for quite some long time. Unless a miracle happens in the immediate days ahead, the nation is sure to suffer immensely. Anti democratic forces and sectors inimical to Girija regime have apparently converged at one point with one single agenda and that being the summary ouster of Prime Minister Koirala. Add to this the Maoists advanced declaration that they would also observe a nation bundh on April 6 which in essence would add fuel to the fire to the already declared several street programs devised by the entire rock solid opposition to press the Prime Minister further for resignation.
In the process, the UML and the allied political parties Monday initiated the beginning of their almost month long program aimed at the ouster of Prime Minister Koirala. The climax of the UML led program would be on April 8 when the entire opposition will address public gatherings at several important districts of the Kingdom to raise awareness among the people regarding the Prime Minister’s involvement in the Lauda air procurement affair.
Much dangerous could be the April 6 Nepal bundh sponsored by the Maoists which has been declared to protest Girija establishment’s what they prefer to call “anti-national” schemes to crush the innocent peoples through the use of the Royal Ordinance which in effect has been brought to, says a press release issued by the insurgents, take care of the insurgency.
A section of the intellectuals fear and opine that what would be the dimension of the April 6 bundh if the lay men join the bands of the Maoists out of frustration? They also hasten to add that since the people at the lowest rung have remained brazenly neglected by the state so they might prefer to be-friendly with the insurgents and make the April 6 bundh more chaotic than what the government might have imagined of!
However, thanks that the Maoists have stated in their press release that their bundh will be a “peaceful one”.
Only the time will tell whether it would be a peaceful one or just will take a different course thus terrifying the national population.
The fact is that the parliamentary opposition have vowed that they would spare no efforts for Prime Minister Koirala’s ouster come what may. If some weight is given to their strong worded statements made against the Prime Minister then what could be concluded in advance that this round the opposition will not settle for less.
Not very surprisingly, Koirala who is the real target of the opposition remains undeterred and apparently has been hinting his colleagues that he would face the opposition onslaught both in the parliament or in the streets.
The fact is that internally Koirala has become weaker for he is being advised by his own one time close aides to resign. In addition to this new phenomenon, Koirala is being subjected to continued pressures from Krishna Prasad Bhattarai and his detractors from within led by Sher Bahadur Deuba. Insiders say that Deuba is just obeying the dictates of Bhattarai and is adding to the pains of Koirala. If this is a fact then Bhattarai is playing double.
That he is playing double gets reflected from the fact that at the one hand he is pressing Girija to step down from one of the two posts which at the moment Koirala is occupying, on the other he is concurrently hinting Koirala not to resign under the threats of the opposition.
“The Bhattarai game plan is to push Koirala to the wall so that he finally yields and resigns from the leadership of the parliamentary party of the congress”, said a Bhattarai loyalist on condition of anonymity.
If he does yield, it could be used as a face saving formula for the mentally disturbed Prime Minister, added the same source.
In essence, Bhattarai wishes to see Koirala stepping down from the Prime Ministers’ chair and handing it over to his all time protégé Sher Bahadur Deuba.
Koirala is not at all unaware of this Bhattarai design, say Koirala men. “If Koirala is pressed hard, he would hand over the chair to some one else than a Bhattarai chum”, so said a Koirala inner circle man.
All put together comes out a scenario that makes it amply clear that neither Koirala nor the opposition will compromise at least for the time being. This automatically means that the national population will have to wait for a miracle to occur which will properly take care of the impasse seen in the parliament since fifty days or so.