Nepal’s political parties are no exceptions to this rule. The Nepali Congress (NC), the so-called grand old party, is under the grip of a coterie, despite its claim to be a mass-based party, and serves the interests of a certain class. Unable to resist the wind of globalization, it has whole-heartedly accepted neo-liberalism in its worst form and become the ultimate hope for the beneficiaries of the current system. Basking in its past glory, the party still claims to be the only vehicle for change in Nepal and operates under the guise of socialism.
Worse is the condition of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), whose party name sounds more radical and dangerous than that of the Maoists. Run by an irremovable coterie, the party of the petty bourgeois has developed a system of patronage for survival and this explains why the UML like most Madhes-based parties cannot afford to stay out of the government. Sidelined by the tide of ‘radical’ Maoist movement – and backed by the status-quoists and regressive elements – its constituency is ever shifting to the right of the center in the country’s political spectrum.
The condition is dire with the UCPN (Maoist) that precipitated into oligarchy faster than any other parties in Nepal. The former rebels clenched victory in the elections, they had ‘concrete agendas for social change’, and they were still untested for public offices at a time when the parliamentary parties had already lost their credibility among the commoners. But the process of ‘oligarchification’ had already gripped the party and sapped its synergies. Said to be innovative, said to be brilliant strategists, the Maoist hyperbole soon faded into reality. The genesis of the party’s fall needs to be explored a bit.
Insurgency & Culture of Warlordism
The process of oligarchification has its roots in the culture of warlordism that developed in a few years of the insurgency. With the remarkable success on the military front, the party pulled a large number of youths and expanded its organizational base. The victory had however its own dangerous side effects; those commanding the war, most of them from petty bourgeois background, developed a culture of warlordism. Indulging in the thrills of war, making handsome money from dubious financial dealings, leading luxurious lifestyles, meting out severe torture to the juniors for alleged defiance, and treating the rank-and-file combatants as servants while serving the seniors obsequiously, were some of the characteristics of the warlordism. Party insiders still remember with aghast the ruthless power exercised even by some ordinary area in-charges, which created Red Terror. The flowering culture of warlordism replaced the party’s ‘mass line’ – one of the core principles propagated by Mao Zedong that the party should always stay well-connected with the masses, work for them and win their hearts.
Party leaders admit in private that they were shocked at the growing culture of warlordism and that’s the reason why some leaders backed the party’s tactical shift during the historic Chunwang meeting. “We were convinced that quitting the protracted people’s war was a clear deviation from the revolutionary path. But we thought that it would be better to begin a new process rather than let that dangerous culture to blossom,” says a senior leader of the party. But the end of the war did not lead to any solutions; the landing of the party in the hurly-burly of open politics opened up enormous financial opportunities instead and in turn gave birth to one powerful class within the party.
Red Versus Expert & Birth of Oligarchy
Maoist communist parties seek to balance the dichotomy between Red and Expert, which means the party cadres – and by extension all the people – should combine ideological consciousness and political commitment (redness) with technical knowledge and special abilities (expertise). In Nepal, these words are however used to signify the conflict between two types of cadres: Those educated and wily cadres are called experts, while those devoted to the causes of revolution are called reds. This dichotomy played out in the famous Kharipati national conclave in 2008 when Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who was prime minister at that time, was besieged by the so-called Red who complained that they were being treated as unwanted trouble-makers, while the experts had benefitted the most and become nouveau riche after the party’s entry into the peace process and the subsequent rise to power.
Interestingly, the top three leaders of the UCPN (Maoist) have three classes of cadres. Among the ‘experts’, most of those who have benefitted from the party (including the warlords) are with Chairman Dahal, while Vice-Chairman Dr Baburam Bhattarai commands a majority among the educated middle class. Senior Vice-Chairman Mohan Baidya, on the other hand, has the following of the core Maoists who are honest and suffered the most during the insurgency (‘reds’) and who are deprived of opportunities.
The class division in the party has widened so much that some leaders enjoy flashy cars and luxurious flats in the capital, while others are struggling to manage two square meals a day. Children of some leaders study in expensive private schools, while others go to public schools in villages. And while some are busy amassing property misusing their power and positions, others are struggling for survival in Kathmandu. Without any mechanism to check the irregularities, the problem only aggravated. The class division is also stark in the PLA cantonments where the commanders relish food in their separate mess the way Nepal Army officers do.
Baidya-Bhattarai alliance & regeneration
Dahal, who enjoys almost absolute political and financial powers in the party, has developed a system of patronage to maintain his hold. And that’s the reason why Baidya and Bhattarai have lately forged an alliance against Dahal demanding that the latter make the party’s financial system transparent and share his executive power with other leaders. But Dahal knows the cost of sharing his powers with others and is not likely to give in to their demands easily.
The fact that the party has not held its general convention for the last 20 years accounts for the ossification process of its oligarchy. Most of the leaders hold the same positions in the same committees for years and some chiefs of the party’s state committees are so powerful that Dahal himself cannot simply remove them.
The party now looks like a federation of the three political parties – led by Dahal, Baidya and Bhattarai. The monolithic party structure that worked well during the insurgency has struck on the open society, which has led to multitudes of problems and degradation of the party. Without adapting to the nature of society where it functions, the existing internal crisis will only deepen. Will Baidya and Bhattarai be able to force Dahal to regenerate the party now? Oligarchy meets its end, anyway. Only that it may cost the party dear.
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