An exclusive interview with CPN (Maoist) leader Prachanda by MRZine (reposted by Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with permission).
By Mary Des Chene and Stephen Mikesell
It
is 14th Jeth, 2065, [Tuesday May 27, 2008] in Nepal, the day before
the constituent assembly is to convene and declare Nepal a full republic. The king remains in his palace. The form of the new
government, who will lead it, whether the old parliamentary parties
will join in a Maoist-led government or, as they have indicated so far,
will boycott and try to isolate it -- these and other basic questions
remain to be resolved.
The following is an early morning interview
with CPN (Maoist) leader Prachanda, before he embarked on a last
intensive round of negotiations to try to bring the parliamentary
parties into a coalition government under Maoist leadership.
Kathmandu, May 27, 2008.
You may become Nepal's new head of state within a few days, but the
parliamentary parties are putting up a lot of blockades. Yesterday
your party put forth a 9-point proposal to address the current
political impasse. What are the main
barriers to formation of a CPN (Maoist)-led government at this point?
What are the challenges and what are the proposals you've made to the
parliamentary parties?
Intensive debate,
discussion and struggle is going on, on the question of formation of
the government, and mainly on the questions of the head of the state
and the head of the government. These questions raise so many
ideological and political issues, involving the class interests of the
parties.
Yesterday we had a very serious discussion.
The parliamentary parties, mainly the Nepali Congress and the
CPN (UML), want to have their own person be the head of state. They
want to check, they want to block our party from forming the government
and filling the position of head of state. Therefore intensive
struggle is going on right now. As we discuss these issues with the
leaders of the other parties, it seems to me that intensive and serious
class struggle is going on, on the level of ideology and political
line. Because we have the status of the largest party through the
constituent assembly election, the initiative is in our hands, but
nevertheless intensive struggle continues. I think that by tomorrow
we'll not be able to have consensus about the questions of the head of
state and the formation of the government. Therefore right now we are
thinking that we'll make an agreement only for the declaration of the
republican system. And on that there will be consensus -- there should
be consensus.
Your party has a clear
mandate from the election to form the next government. The
transitional government of the past two years has functioned on the
basis of political consensus governed by the Seven Party Alliance
accords and other formal agreements. From election day onward you've
stressed the CPN (Maoist) commitment to continue with coalition
government under those accords. The major parliamentary parties have
set a number of conditions for participating in a Maoist-led coalition
government, several of which you've stated directly contravene signed
accords. At this point, if a coalition government under your party's
leadership cannot be formed, what will be the main reasons?
I think that before the elections the parliamentary parties, especially
the largest parliamentary party, the Nepali Congress, never expected
that we would become the largest party through the election. Therefore
they made so many agreements and compromises with our party, like those
concerning the questions of a two-thirds majority and a simple majority
[to change the government]. At that time they were in the leadership.
Therefore they thought that a two-thirds majority requirement for
changing the government would be just fine. But later on, when they
saw that the Maoists had become the largest party and were going to
lead the government and be head of the state, then they changed their
position. Now they hold that a simple majority should be the means to
change the government. Previously, up until the election, they didn't
expect that they would lose through the election, and they thought that
they could easily disintegrate our organisational structure and exert
control over the PLA [People's Liberation Army] cadres and so on. But
now, after the election, they think that it is going to be a very
serious question. Therefore now they are making a proposal that our
arms should be destroyed, and the PLA cadres should be disbanded or
they should join vocational training or something like that. They're
trying to raise those kinds of ridiculous things. This is against the
peace agreement. This is against the spirit of the interim
constitution.
The major parliamentary party, the
Nepali Congress, has changed their positions after the election and are
showing themselves to be against peace. It is going to be proved -- I
think within some days, maybe within one or two weeks -- it will be
crystal clear that the major political parliamentary parties are
against peace, against any kind of change, against forming a coalition
government under the leadership of the Maoists. They are against the
people's mandate, you know. It will be clear. If they will not move
ahead in keeping with the spirit of the interim constitution, if they
will not follow the peace agreement we have already made and all the
other agreements and accords, ultimately it seems to me that it is a
question of class outlook. The opposing classes are struggling in a
very new contest. And one thing that is quite clear is that the
proletariat and our revolutionary party have taken the initiative in
our own hands. They [Nepali Congress and UML] are the losers. Right
now, in this battle, in this electoral battle, they are the losers and
we are the winners. Therefore a big debate and discussion and struggle
is going on.
If they were successful in disbanding your army, how would that affect the possibility of creating the republic?
It would be very difficult. But I think they have already agreed to
implement the republican system from the first meeting of the
constituent assembly.
Right. But if your army was not there, then what force would you have against the king [who] remains in the background?
We will not disband our army. How could we agree to disband our army
or destroy our arms? It has been formally agreed that both the armies
should be integrated and a new national army should be established and
organised. And we have never agreed to go with DDR, you know, this DDR
formula [Disarmament, Demobilisation, Reintegration]. What we said is
that, here in Nepal it is quite necessary that both armies should be integrated
to form a new army. It is the essence of our agreement. Now, when
they see that the Maoists have won the election, they want to change
the previous agreement. Therefore at the moment we do not want to
focus our discussion with the parliamentary parties on the questions of
integration and so on. We want to focus our discussions on the
questions of implementation of the republic and the republican system.
It is quite clear, and the masses know it very well, the masses are
clear that the first sitting of the constituent assembly will implement
the republican system and even all the parliamentary parties have
already agreed to go with the republican system. In this phase of the
struggle, we Maoists want to focus our whole effort to implement that
previous agreement. I think that they cannot reject or retreat from
the previous agreement on the question of the republic. If they
hesitate to implement this republican system tomorrow then ... It
is going to happen you know. This is the historical turning point
against the feudal system. If they will hesitate, I think that they
will be crossed by the masses. The masses will not tolerate them.
Because they have already lost through the election. If they hesitate
to implement the republican system, then they will lose yet more, you
see.
Tomorrow. on the day when the constituent assembly sits to declare the republic, the Kathmandu
District Administration has declared restrictions on marches, rallies
and assembling on the streets surrounding the convention centre, the
palace and other places in the capital. But many marches and cultural
programs have already been announced, and the people seem sure to come
out, whether to ensure that their will is carried out or just to
celebrate. How are you viewing that move to restrict the people's
movement?
We have already decided to
hold rallies all over the country. There will be mass rallies in all
seventy-five district headquarters. And here in Kathmandu there will
also be a victory rally, a republican rally. It will be a great day
for us, for the people of this country. But they will not go to
encircle the palace, or go near the Birendra International Convention
Centre hall where the first meeting of the constituent assembly is
going to be held. But they will be in the streets, near Singhadarbar
[the usual parliamentary venue] and in other places. They'll be
chanting slogans in favor of the republic and so on. But there will
not be -- we are trying our best not to be in a confrontation tomorrow.
It would not be good, it would not be proper to have any kinds of
confrontation tomorrow. We want to show the masses who are in favor of
the republican line. There will be a festive atmosphere. It will be
like a people's festival, a republican festival. It will be very big,
and a great thing for our people. But some reactionary people, mainly
those who are loyal to the monarchy, they are trying to carry out some
sorts of sabotage and some sorts of terrorist activities. Yesterday
they exploded some small socket bombs near the convention center hall,
and in the houses of civil society figures. But I don't think they
will be able to create some big sabotage or anything.
If you have to form a sole government without the cooperation of the other parties are you ready to do that?
Yes. If they are not ready, and if they want it so, then we'll form
our own government without their cooperation. They may think that
within three months or a hundred days -- there's the saying that 100
days is the honeymoon -- that after the honeymoon they can encircle us
and dismantle our government. They think like that. But we believe
that once we are in the government we'll take so many decisions,
important decisions, in favour of the masses of the people and in favor
of our nation, and that those kinds of decisions will allow us to have
a broader mass base and broader organisation and will ultimately help
us to move ahead.
You've used the term
"economic revolution" and said that after forming the government the
task is economic revolution. Tell us a bit about your first steps; the
economy is in very bad shape.
Yes, I think
that economic development and sustainable peace have a very compact
relation. Without having development it is very difficult to have a
sustainable peace. And here in our country there are huge natural
resources: for example, we have a huge hydro potential, tourism can be
a big industry in this country, this beautiful country. There are so
many things we can do.
For the time being what we
are seeing is that we should have to follow a mixed economic system. I
also want to qualify that it is not exactly a mixed economic system; we
are trying to develop some new approaches in our transitional economic
policy. We have not completed the democratic revolution, you know. We
are in the process of the completion of the democratic revolution. But
after 10 years of peoples war we have achieved some political and some
socioeconomic change, which is already in process. Because that
revolution is in the transitional phase we are trying to develop some
new tactics and new policy according to the overall economic situation
and national situation of the first decades of the 21st century.
Therefore we shall have to follow a transitional economic policy. Not
exactly the economic policy of the New Democracy, not exactly the
economic policy of the bourgeois system, but something in-between. We
are saying that this is a transitional economic policy, and we want to
decide our own priority by ourselves.
And we want to
encourage the national capitalist, or ``national bourgeois'' as we say,
we want to encourage them to invest and to generate employment, and to
invest in the industrial sector, which will create some new
possibilities. And through them we want to attract the foreign
investment, but according to our decision, according to our
priority. Until now, all the decisions have been taken not by the
Nepali people and the Nepali government, but by the foreigners and
international institutions, like the World Bank. But this time we want
to change that pattern. We want to decide our own priorities, we want
to encourage our national bourgeois to have a conducive atmosphere for
investment and generation of employment, and through them we want to
attract the foreign investors according to our decision, according to
our priority. In the rural area and in the hydro sector we want to
have small hydro projects, medium-level hydro projects, and big hydro
projects. Not just the large ones.
One
problem is that you are being handed over a practically bankrupt state,
one heavily in debt, and that won't leave you much leeway, at least if
you work in the old terms, so how are you going to address that?
I think it is a challenge, and we are taking it as a positive
challenge. The first question is to mobilise the millions of the
masses to rebuild this country. Until and unless we mobilise the
masses, nothing can be done. We will transparently divulge everything
to the mass of the people: this is the situation here in the country,
the world government and world state has led this country to this
bankruptcy. Now, if everyone of this country, every citizen of this
country will not make a commitment to go ahead to build the country
themselves, it will be very difficult for us sustain and undertake
development. Therefore our first priority will be to educate the
masses of people about the real situation of the government and all
these things that have happened in the past.
The
second point is that we will try our best to mobilise the national
bourgeois, the national capitalists. There are so many people who can
contribute. If we draw up a scientific plan, an economic plan,
according to our situation, we can mobilise those industrialists and
those national capitalists or national bourgeois to invest in a more
productive way. And I also think that, because we are in between China
and India, both of which have very fast growing economies, we can
benefit from their growing economies. I myself have tried my best to
have serious discussions with China's Communist Party and China's
government. How can they help to rebuild this country? How much will
they be able to contribute, and how far can they mobilise their peoples
to invest here in our country? And we were also talking with the
Indian parties and Indian government officials: how can they contribute
to our efforts in rebuilding this country? So I think that from both
these countries, according to our plan and according to our priorities,
we can mobilise positive economic input.This is something
challenging, we know it, but this is something beneficial for this
country.
What about the role of the youth
of this country in all of these plans? The thousands who are migrant
labourers outside the country, now the thousands and thousands who are
unemployed here, and the Young Communist League, your own youth
organisation?
Yes, we are working on
drawing up a plan to mobilise the youth in rebuilding this country.
Our YCL has already been mobilised: thousands and thousands of youth
were mobilised before the election in a political mobilisation. Now we
are going to mobilise them in the constructive work, in economic
development. And we are also trying to make a connection with all the
people working outside the country. Non-resident Nepalis are there,
and the organisation of non-resident Nepalis; those people can contribute more in
rebuilding this country, and we want to invite them to invest here in
Nepal. We have already developed a plan for how we can mobilise
thousands of peoples who are outside the country, who are doing
business elsewhere. Some of them have done a very good job, they have
earned substantial amounts of money, they can invest here, and we can
contact them.
And also I think that we can bring back youth who are in
Arab countries and all over the world, if we have a plan for building
this country. I have already discussed some hydro power, medium-level
hydro projects. And if there will be five, six or seven of such kinds
of project all over the country, we can mobilise thousands and
thousands of youth in that kind of project. And when they see that
there are jobs in our own country, they will come back and we can
mobilise that kind of youth.
And what about bringing young people back into agriculture, which is the base of the economy here?
Yes, we have already agreed to carry out scientific land reform. Here
in Nepal there is a different situation in the Tarai [lowland plains],
in mountainous areas and in the hilly regions. We have to make a
complete plan of land reform for the hilly region, for the Himalayan
region and for the Tarai. But the main focus of this scientific land
reform will be the Tarai because the bulk of the agricultural land is
there. There should be land ceilings and the land of absentee
landlords should be redistributed among the peasants. But our main
focus will be commercialising the farming. Without commercialised
farming we can't develop agriculture. And we want to establish
agro-based industries. We can't mobilise the youth in the agricultural
sector with only the traditional ways of farming. We have to create
something new by creating jobs in agro-based industry. And that will
ultimately commercialise the overall farming, and it will be a
revolutionary step to raise the living standards of the people.
[Stephen Mikesell and Mary Des Chene are anthropologists who study Nepal's economy and politics. This interview first appeared in MRZine. It is reposted here with express permission.]
The Himalayan nation of Nepal has become the world's newest republic, ending 240 years of monarchy.
A constituent assembly meeting in the capital, Kathmandu, overwhelmingly voted to abolish royal rule.
The Maoists, the largest party after laying down arms and standing in last month's elections, were committed to ousting King Gyanendra.
People celebrated wildly in the streets of the capital after news of the assembly vote.
The approved proposal states that Nepal is "an independent, indivisible, sovereign, secular and an inclusive democratic republic nation".
Only four members of the 601-seat assembly opposed the change.
Rajesh Subedil,
student in Kathmandu
Royal privileges "will automatically come to an end", the declaration says.
It also states that the king's main palace must be vacated within a fortnight, to be transformed into a museum.
"I am overjoyed," student Rajesh Subedi, 21, told AFP news agency as Kathmandu celebrated.
"This is the most important day of my life."
The BBC's Charles Haviland in Kathmandu says it is not clear how soon King Gyanendra will leave.
The Maoists and other politicians are being conciliatory about the monarch now being ousted and say he should live on in Nepal as a private citizen.
Attacks
In the run-up to the vote, suspected royalists threw three small bombs in the capital.
One exploded at an open-air theatre in Kathmandu on Wednesday evening, injuring one person. Another went off outside the assembly venue but no-one was hurt.
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People celebrating and marching on streets of Kathmandu
On Tuesday, another two explosive devices were left in a park, but police said only one exploded, slightly injuring two people.
Some militant pro-Hindu and pro-royal factions are campaigning violently against Nepal's shedding of its royal - and its officially Hindu - status.
The assembly was given the initial task of rubber-stamping the abolition of the monarchy.
But the vote was delayed by 12 hours, while the Maoists and the other main parties settled differences about distribution of power between the president and the prime minister in an interim period.
The government of the new Nepalese republic is expected to be led by the Maoists, who only entered politics in 2006 after signing a peace agreement that ended a decade-long insurgency.
The assembly has two years to come up with permanent arrangements for a new constitution.
The monarchy's fall from grace has come swiftly and was heralded by the 2001 massacre in which the then-Crown Prince Dipendra killed his family and several other royals, our correspondent says.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/south_asia/7424302.stm
Published: 2008/05/28 23:36:13 GMT
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