PLA integration is one of the most crucial and sensitive issues in the current peace process -- more so in the context of the Maoists quitting the government and taking a more radical stance -- and it needs careful handling. But Minister Bhandari has flunked in her first ever public statement on the issue. She should read the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) before making public comments on integration in the future. Article 4.4 of the CPA says: “The interim council of ministers shall constitute a special committee to supervise, integrate and rehabilitate the Maoist combatants”. Samaayojan is the Nepali word used in the CPA to suggest integration. Some pundits have argued that the term samaayojan was not intended to be understood as integration. But we go by the Ministry of Peace and Reconstruction’s official translation of the CPA in which it uses the word ‘integration’ for samaayojan.
Complicated issues like PLA integration are bound to create controversies. But a responsible person like the Defense Minister should always tread a practical and middle path mindful of the possible damage that her public views can have on the peace process. If Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s view of integrating all the 34,000-plus PLAs into the Nepali Army once the Maoists had an upper hand represents one extreme, Bhandari’s views that no PLA combatant would be integrated into the national army represents another extreme.
Nepal’s peace process needs to be guarded against such extremes and a first step toward that would be to reconstitute the Special Committee for Integration and begin work promptly. As far as we understand, the spirit of the CPA is to integrate some of the PLA combatants into the national army, even if that is just a symbolic gesture of truce. It is up to the Special Committee to decide what that number would be and whether the integration should take place on a unit-wise basis as demanded by the Maoists.
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