My reaction to Gurung’s statement was, ‘Why didn’t he speak on this issue when the question about federalism was raised four years ago, before the CA election in 2008?’ It, in fact, goes back to the 2006 uprising that brought down the monarchy. We may have been spared of much agony and saved billions of rupees, if we had this much of foresight.
If Gurung and other eminent politicians had debated the federalism option at that time, we could have thrashed out our choices prior to the CA election and, more importantly, a serious discussion on federalism would have forced the contesting parties to fight the election on the basis of this single issue.
The election results would then have sent a clear message to politicians whether people want federalism or another form of republic and, on the basis of this mandate, the CA could have more comfortably focused on framing the details of governance.
This opportunity, however, has been missed and, primarily for this reason, the constitution-drafting job remains where it was four or six years ago. Looking ahead, the new CA election toward the end of this year may produce a much clearer mandate for a federal or non-federal constitution that will enable the CA to vote for the type of constitution and then agree on the details of a full constitution.
By observing people’s enthusiasm for federalism, it wouldn’t be outlandish to predict that two-thirds to 90 percent of votes would be in favor of a federal constitution, basically confirming the intent of Maoist revolution and public’s desire of making a clean break from the past governance system of a unitary and, in Nepal’s case, autocratic state.
FEDERALISM HISTORY
Typically—and across the world—the federal structure of government has evolved from the existing state structure made up of one center and regional administrative units—provinces, autonomous zones, independent territories—loosely or tightly connected to the center. The incentive for the states and center to enter into a federal governance system has been to form a union through give-and-take negotiations in which regional governments shed some powers, mainly those dealing with foreign relations, currency and finance, and country’s defence, to the federal government and retain much of the rest, generally the ones affecting people’s lives on a daily basis—health, education, public safety, and development of local infrastructure. Jurisdiction over some ambiguous areas—national highways, natural resource management, environmental protection, national research, higher education—are shared between federal and regional administrations.
Looking at Nepal’s situation, the first set of difficulties in the application of federal model is that there is no record of delineated regions or territories that have functioned separately from central government. Local administration units have existed as the outposts of central administration that had absolute control on hiring and firing of officials posted at local levels. Local governments that do exist are tightly regulated by respective central ministries and, most notably, have limited powers to impose and collect taxes for meeting local needs.
In the absence of an existing local governance structure, it is almost impossible to divide the regions and territories using any of the conceivable criteria of ethnicity, economics, geography, or any other. Regions and communities have got no experience of acting independently of central administration which makes them prone to making use of their independent status either too aggressively or too sparingly, depending on the closeness they feel with central authorities.
The most vexing point affecting bipartisan relations will be of reaching an agreement on financial matters—how much to tax that doesn’t conflict with central government’s fiscal objectives and what claims they can lay on the national treasury to finance local operations. Also, how the foreign aid money gets allocated for regional and national projects is going to be an extremely contentious issue. Besides setting the parameters for day-to-day administration, the task of creating well-defined, mutually acceptable, and easily recognizable state boundaries will prove to be a daunting task, especially when no such boundaries had ever existed.
TWO-STEP PROCESS
All these doubts and difficulties about the federalism option should give us a warning to proceed slowly and cautiously to ensure that our choice of this particular form of government helps lay the foundation for nation-building and does not become a destructive force ushering in an era of conflict and clashes.
For ensuring that we make sustained progress towards creating a federal state, we need to make a course correction by negotiating a middle position between a unitary state—our historical baggage—and a full-fledged federal state, of which we have no history and no experience. If we just rush toward federalism without the background knowledge of how this system actually works, we are likely to face disastrous consequences for our national polity and for our nation-building effort.
What I perceive to be a win-win compromise is to first create pseudo states to help gain the experience of a federal system—how the federal states relate to each other and to central administration. Probably a five-year timeframe allowed for the experiment would yield valuable insights in self-governance, power-sharing, and for laying down the ground rules for inter-state relations. Because of the state structure conceived on an experimental basis, people would be less hooked up to emotional and aesthetic aspects of federalism and, instead, would focus on its practical and beneficial aspects.
A study-group can officially be assigned to monitor and report to Parliament which parts of federalism be accepted and adopted and which should be discarded. It would be worth the new Parliament’s time to review and debate the findings of the study group on a periodic basis and take decisions cumulatively with the goal of yielding a completed constitution at the end of its five-year term.
In order to simplify the process of experimental federalism, a much fewer number of states can be created based on geography and, in most part, ethnic and indigenous labeling of the states should be avoided. The intention would be to gain knowledge of the running of a federal state system that is manageable, beneficial and less prone to conflict and divisions. This experiment will, thus, serve as a stepping stone for setting-up a permanent state structure with full knowledge of what will and what will not work. We can compare this option to a young couple entering into an informal alliance before getting married—the courtship period. The interim period helps reduce the chances of future break-ups and friction, setting the foundation of a long and mature relationship.
sshah1983@hotmail.com
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