Nepal revolutionaries blocked from forming gov’t

Nepal has erupted in a wave of protests following the swearing in of Parmananda Jha as vice president on July 23. Jha had insisted on being sworn to the post in the Hindi language, spoken widely in neighboring India, rather than in Nepalese.

Many in Nepal saw this as confirmation that India was involved in maneuvering behind the scenes to lock the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist (CPN-M) out of the new government. India has long interfered with Nepal’s internal politics and was a strong supporter of its reactionary monarch, King Gyanendra.

The CPN-M is Nepal’s largest party and immensely popular with the masses. It won more than half the directly elected seats in April elections for a Constituent Assembly (CA). For more than a decade it led an armed struggle that finally toppled the king and led to the creation of a Constituent Assembly.

However, an alliance of bourgeois forces—the Nepali Congress Party (NC) and Jha’s group, the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (MJF)—has recently been joined by another left group, the United Marxist Leninists (UML), in blocking the CPN-M from assuming the posts of national president and vice president and chairperson of the Constituent Assembly.

While the Maoist CPN-M is the largest party in the CA, and recently won a majority of the seats up for direct election, additional seats assigned under a proportional representation system keep it from having a voting majority. By forming a bloc, other parties were able to elect a Congress Party candidate to the post of president and a UML candidate as chairperson of the assembly.

Jha’s decision to take the oath in Hindi angered many, even from student groups affiliated with the Congress Party and the UML. Together with CPN-M youth, they organized five consecutive days of angry protests. They chanted slogans, blocked vehicular traffic and burned effigies of Jha. Activists filed a case to demand that Jha retake the oath in the Nepali language. The Supreme Court then ordered Jha to submit a written explanation of his decision to take the oath in Hindi.

Maoists rethink decision to form government

The CPN-M was widely expected to

form the next government after its resounding victory in the April CA elections. The Maoists had worked diligently to forge an alliance with UML for elections to the presidential and vice presidential slots. That would have paved the way for the two communist parties to form a governing coalition under a Maoist prime minister. Together, the two parties control a solid majority of CA seats.

However, the CPN-M and UML were unable to agree on a presidential candidate. The UML pushed for its former secretary, Madhav Kumar Nepal. The CPN-M publicly stated it would support a UML candidate for president, but only if the candidate was a woman or from another oppressed group.

The Maoists ended up backing Ramraja Prasad Singh, an ethnic Madhesi, for the post of president, and women’s leader Shanta Shrestha for vice president. Singh is not a member of CPN-M but is widely viewed as Nepal’s first revolutionary republican because his group in 1985 carried out bombings against the royal palace, prime minister’s office and parliament.

Singh and Shrestha lost their bid for the presidential and vice presidential slots once the UML joined the Congress-MJF coalition.

The CPN-M then publicly stated that it was unlikely to form the next government, since the alliance would threaten the stability of a CPN-M government, but could remain in the Constituent Assembly as an opposition party. Maoist Chairman Prachanda put forth three conditions for his party to form the next government.

Prachanda stated, “First, this so-called alliance should be broken. Second, a Common Minimum Program (CMP) should be forged—which should also reflect Maoists’ manifesto to a large extent. Third, there should be a guarantee that no one will engage in an exercise to pull down the government for at least two years until the constitution is written.” The initial reaction from the other parties was not positive.

The CPN-M and UML have been holding separate talks to see if they can form an alliance to lead the government, despite their earlier inability to find a common presidential candidate. Prachanda recently articulated his party’s view that the NC-UML-MJF alliance was aimed at restoring the Congress party leader, Girija Prasad Koirala, as prime minister.

“Domestic and foreign forces are conspiring to make Koirala prime minister. If that happens, that will be against the people’s mandate. We will bring people in the streets against such a move,” said Prachanda.

Prachanda also appeared to rule out the possibility that, if Koirala is reinstated, the CPN-M would return to the jungle to wage its armed struggle. He warned, “Petty kings are making every effort to block Maoists from climbing to power. If this effort continues we will push the petty kings into the jungle instead.”