Kathmandu: Focus this week will be on the merits and demerits of the party positions regarding current events. The supposed all party meeting that brought four parliamentary parties together to patch up a united image of a boycott of the government call for an all party meeting compounds their initial standpoints on the legitimacy of the government. His Majesty the King’s call for cooperation and participation of the political parties in the current government was summarily ignored on grounds of constitutionality by the political parties. As a result, despite calls for their cooperation and participation by the government, their (parties’) public posture inhibits them from appearing to cooperate. Unfortunately, this has had to inhibit their participation in the current events, in effect, sidelining them from the current mainstream. Their efforts to jump back on the political mainstream have been rebounding.

The fact is that the major political parties have had no role in running the country for nearly four months now by their own choice. The people at large, while having been made glaringly aware of this by their own public standpoints, are also clear that the major developments since the King took over have affected the public positively at the grassroots. Given the rampant corruption and widespread bad-governance faced by all, the public are aware that the positive change in society has had no contribution from these major political parties. It is now, in this sense, more than evident to the public that major political parties who ruled the roost four months ago were the sole contributors to the malgovernance of the past years. What is more, their opposition and negative contribution to the current developments has only served to erode public confidence further.

In this sense, outside of continuing to loose their grip on the masses who are clamoring further for better governance from the incumbent government as well. The mainstream political organizations appear to be isolating themselves further from the positive events of the recent days. It would seem only political that they claim a role in the government-Maoists talks to which they have no contribution and , yet, it would seem a matter of compulsive action for them to deny the acknowledgement of government by participating in government calls for an all party meet.

If, then, one would see logic in their non-participation, it is not quite possible to infer that the parties will allow themselves to be bypassed at their own cost. For government, domestic and international demands to seek partisan participation regarding the Maoists insurgency will have been met by the public call. The parties’ themselves who can’t participate because of their public standpoints do so at the risk of significant political loss in the new mainstream. It is thus easy to increase their public visibility and try and gain back their efficacy. The search, thus, for possible “triggers” to regain for them their credibility would not be altogether out of place.

One most possible such trigger is the approaching Student elections. TU conventions at partisan demands don’t allow postponements of the elections for more than two years. The Maoists student organizations brazenly threatened harsh reactions in the event the scheduled elections take place ignoring the government-Maoists talks, the current ceasefire and the slow process of the release of the incarcerated Maoists students. The student wings of the mainstream parties who, aware of the Maoists disadvantage currently, threaten agitation in case the polls are postponed, are likely to take a united stand in disrupting Nepali academia on grounds of the TU decision for postponement. In doing so, the political parties will have riled up the students who compose the spearhead of political action in Nepal. They will also have effectively influenced the course of the Maoists-Government talks.

This is, of course, one likely scenario. The other is perhaps building in the background. Rumblings in the Indian press and the political establishment there often carry a message of Indian muscle on Nepali happenings. Of a sudden, the Maoists have turned “Royal Rebels” in the Indian media and senior politicians see Pakistani hand in Nepal. How these are designed to gain for the political parties in Nepal their lost credibility among the masses remains to be seen.