It is outright silly to believe that either CPN-UML or UCPN (Maoist) is driven by national interests, ie, maintenance of law and order situation in the country, therefore, are claiming for the portfolio; rather, it’s for their own economic interests.
Home Ministry, thanks to rampant politicization of the Nepal Police is a lucrative ministry. It is a well-known fact that the police officers posted at the “right places”, ie, customs, major cities and border towns have to bribe the minister to first, get posted to those places and deliver a monthly “purse” to the minister so that they do not get transferred to ‘un-lucrative’ places. If the leaders were concerned about maintaining law and order situation, then SP Ramesh Kharel who finally made the Valley residents feel safe and secure would not have been abruptly transferred. Also, let’s not forget, there’s money to be made while buying equipments, rations and uniforms for the police force. But it doesn’t just stop there.
There’s money to be squeezed out of the youths who want to join the force, or to recruit one’s relatives and party workers to the National Investigation Department. And in addition to all this, the home minister can spend up to Rs 50,000 a day in his discretion without having to report the details of how the money was spent in regular circumstances and up to 500,000 during “special” circumstances. Of all the money that is to be made, even if the party receives a certain percent, then that’s quite a lot. Keeping this in mind, it is likely that both the UML and Maoist want the easy money for their leaders and for themselves. It’s nothing but our politicians’ love of easy money that is depriving the country of a functioning government at the moment. The tussle for home ministry has shoved other pressing agendas such as constitution-writing and the management of ex-combatants along with peace building to the backseat. As things appear now, it seems highly likely that we will miss the deadline to promulgate new constitution, yet again.
Our collective failure to ask the Maoists why they want the home ministry and the CPN-UML what interest it has in keeping it will only embolden the political parties. Therefore, the time is now to demand for answers and explanations if we do not want to be hoodwinked and taken for a ride, once again.
If the machine readable passport (MRP) deal with the Oberthur Technologies was not signed, maybe the Maoists and UML would be fighting over who gets to head the foreign ministry because of the money that could be made from the kickbacks from the company getting the MRP deal. If Nepal Army was to go on a massive modernization program and buy arms and choppers, maybe both parties would state their claim to the defense ministry, again for the kickbacks from the Russian companies. If Nepal’s flag carrier, Nepal Airlines Corporation was to buy new planes or lease aircrafts from other companies, then both the UML and Maoists would be fighting for the tourism ministry. And one does not need to be a rocket scientist to figure out why the Madhes-based parties always seem to eye the ministry of soil and forest conservation. To think that because the leaders of the Madhes-based parties are from the Tarai region, where most of Nepal’s forests are, theyknow all that is to know about trees and soil conservation is silly. Rather they want it for the wood-money.
Democracy is supposed to empower people and make them demand answers from their rulers/leaders, but our democracy seems to have enfeebled us. Collectively, we seem satisfied that we are now a democracy, albeit a dysfunctional one. But, democracy without leaders adhering to its ideals is no different than dictatorship because in both cases the leaders only care about their own interests rather than that of the masses. Given our current situation, it is not wrong to say that we were hoodwinked by the leaders and that a dictatorship was replaced by another dictatorship. The only difference is: It was one man running the show in the past, whereas, we have the top-leaders of the major three parties running the show now.
Our collective failure to ask the Maoists why they want the home ministry and the CPN-UML what interest it has in keeping it will only embolden the political parties. Therefore, the time is now to demand for answers and explanations if we do not want to be hoodwinked and taken for a ride, once again.
trailokyaa@yahoo.com
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