header banner

Politics for Dummies

By No Author
So what does it take to be a successful politician in Nepal? Some of you may say that you need both brains and brawn. Do you need to be a Board First like Dr Baburam Bhattari or be a not SLC Pass like Sushil Koirala? Do you need to be like KP Oli who is an expert at giving funny answers to serious questions or be a flip-flopper like Prachanda?

Dr Baburam Bhattarai's got brains. He has a PhD. It's not easy to get a PhD. You can't just buy it across the border like the other degrees that many of our civil servants seem to have. Prachanda may not be smart like the doctor but he still has enough brains to grow a vegetable garden. After all, he has a BSc in Agriculture. While Dr Bhattarai has too much brains, Prachanda has the brawn. Well, he may not have the strength to participate in the Iron Man Triathlon but he has lots of folks who have the muscles. And not to forget, he has the money as well. When you have both money and muscles, then you have more staying power in politics.

Nobody can understand what Sher Bahadur Deuba says. You need to have a PhD in linguistics to understand Deuba or else you will be as confused as him. But looking back, Deuba will be around for another decade because he has the skills to motivate people to join him in his great cause to get back in power. So how does Deuba motivate his cronies? He offers them gifts such as cash and cars. We have all heard about the power deals back in the days when MPs were offered Pajeros and suitcases full of cash so that Deuba could stay in power.

KP Oli is itching to become our next Prime Minister. He also is known for having muscles who can make money for him and his political party. We already have a few muscle-men who have become ministers in the current cabinet. They all are under Oli's wings.

I attended a dinner party last week. Some of the attendees were graduates of Ivy League Universities in the West. Half of us were graduates of okay schools overseas and some of us were just regular graduates from colleges in Kathmandu. Well, we all graduated a decade ago.

The Ivy League graduates were full of ideas on how to develop Nepal. The Okay School graduates were full of ideas on how to start a business in Nepal that will help them to eat three meals a day and save enough to buy a car, then a house by 2030. The regulars who never left Nepal and continued to learn the ins and outs of our system for the past decade were just enjoying the drinks and chicken chilly.

They had already made enough money to buy a car. They had made enough to buy a house and take their wives and kids to Europe for their annual vacation. Most of them made their money by offering products and services to government agencies with their lowest bid. And not to forget, the kickbacks offered to both the minister and top ranking civil servants as well.

A friend of mine who graduated from Harvard a decade ago, then got drunk and turned into Nostradamus, predicted that he would become the Prime Minister of Nepal by 2030. The Ivy League folks cheered him. The Okay School graduates just smirked while the Regulars all laughed out loud as if it was one of KP Oli's nonsensical gibberish. Drinking is fine. Most of our politicians are alcoholics but they do not make deals when drunk. The deals are made when they are suffering from hangover and only millions of rupees will take care of their headache instead of the usual Alka-Seltzer stuff we take.

Just because you have a degree or even a PhD from an Ivy League school doesn't mean that you get a free pass in our national politics. Our political parties will welcome you into their fold because having a few PhD ones will also make them look smarter.

But if you do get a ticket to stand up for election, then you need the money and muscles to win from your constituency. Well, if you are hoping to be a member of the parliament from the PR quota then you will still need to fork out a few million rupees to whoever is offering you the seat.

Look at Umesh Shrestha. He has made tons of money. He has schools, pharmaceutical companies and many more. He was one of the major fundraisers for the Maoist back then. And now, he is a CA member from Nepali Congress. Why? Well, Prachanda decided to make Lharkyal Lama a CA member. Why? Well, he must have offered him much more than the usual khata and a bottle of Black Label. And this is the same guy who was a CA member from CPN-UML in the previous CA and even became a minister. So, money talks, cow dung walks.

To win elections in Nepal, you need cash and lots of it. There will be influential local leaders who can bring in votes. You don't need to buy a bottle of whiskey and two kilos of meat for all voters. Just hand the cash to the so-called local hoodlums in your constituency. They will do the rest.

It's not about your policies and what you can do for your constituency. It's all about how to bring local leaders together to help you win. So, you need to find cash to pay them off. They need your cash to hire local thugs to intimidate voters and if any opportunity arises, then even vandalize the voting booth or steal the voting box.

Well, not much of that happens in urban areas but if you are standing up for election in remote areas then you need to watch Lord of the Rings, all of them, more than thrice. Then work out on your battle plan to win and be a MP then maybe a Minister and one day the Prime Minister, if you can help your fellow MPs enjoy the benefits that come with being a lawmaker. So, do you really want to be a politician? If yes, then throw out your moral science textbooks from high school because Machiavelli will do.

kalumaila99@gmail.com


Related story

Politics and Business

Related Stories
OPINION

Neither balancing nor bandwagoning

My City

Decoding Nepali Celebrities’ New-found love for...

The Week

Dummies guide to elections

The Week

Contouring Dummies

POLITICS

Minister Shrestha vows to keep education sector fr...