Since the entry of the (now) UCPN-Maoist into mainstream politics with the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Accord in 2006, there has been a raging debate about the party’s evolution (or lack thereof) into a mainstream democratic party. Some believe it has come a long way since the civil war.
The largest elected force in the last Constituent Assembly, it is now a firmly established democratic force. Virtually no one in the party top brass or rank and file even contemplates going back to war. What’s more, the party this year even held its first General Convention in 23 years. [break]
And for better or worse, its leaders are now adept at power politics and the kind of hard negotiations characteristic of democratic polity. But the Maoists have as many detractors, and they have just found new ‘proof’ of the Maoists’ inherent anti-democratic nature: The ongoing party plenum has decided to back Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s proposal to centralize leadership and demote all other office bearers to central committee member status.
If the party leadership chosen by the General Convention, the supreme decision making body of any political party, can be reversed so easily, this group reasons, it would be travesty to speak of internal democracy in UCPN (Maoist). Not that the General Convention which selected office bearers at the discretion of the ‘headquarters’ rather than through fair vote can exactly be labeled an exercise in internal democracy either.
The latest decision of the Maoist chair to dissolve all the posts decided at the General Convention, and the party plenum’s unanimous endorsement of it, has indeed sent a strong signal that UCPN-Maoist is still a highly centralized party and its apparent exercise in democracy like the General Convention is a sham. This kind of top-down decision making would be hard to imagine in more established democratic parties like Nepali Congress or CPN-UML.
The decision to centralize leadership going into the November polls might also be interpreted as a sign of desperation. After the refusal of former vice-chairman Baburam Bhattarai to accept the post of ‘senior leader’ Dahal had no option but try to accommodate the former’s demand of dissolving all office bearers except the chairman. In fact, it might just have saved the party from a possible split on the eve of the CA polls.
Now the question is: How can UCPN (Maoist) project itself as a democratic party before the electorate? If the party chairman can reverse the decision of the General Convention at the stroke of a pen, what is the guarantee that he won’t assume dictatorial powers if he gets into high office following new polls? How can a party where all powers are concentrated on a single person convince voters that it believes in check and balance? UCPN-Maoist has tried to give a message of ‘unity’ through its unanimous endorsement of the decision to centralize powers on the chairman.
But there is a big risk that just the opposite message might filter through: the only way the party can stay united is under a dictatorial leader. Vice chair Bhattarai’s decision to quit on the eve of CA polls seems to have opened a Pandora’s Box for the Maoist party. Notwithstanding Bhattarai’s pronouncements, it is hard to see how the decision has benefitted the party in any way thus far.
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