Unity Among Parties A Must Again

Yuba Nath Lamsal 

Politics and politicians often wear too many jewels of adjective in their crown of power. Great thinkers like Aristotle, Plato and Socrates defined politics as an art of governance for the common good of citizens. However, Machiavelli defined politics as a craft to deceive people and maintain authority over them. With the march of time and dawn of modern civilisation, the idealist definition of politics started slowly losing its charm and Machiavellian politics came to rule the roost. Everywhere in the world, politics is now being branded as a nasty vocation scrambling for power, position and perks, while leaders are called as the bosses rather than servants of the people.

It is perhaps this reason why politics seems to have lost attraction for ordinary citizenry all over the world. It is perhaps this reason why some tend to call politics a ‘dirty game or a last resort of scoundrels’. However, these are nasty comments on politics made by cynics. Any rational person does not subscribe to such malicious views on politics because politics is not always a dirty game but an art of governance. Politics is made dirty by the misconduct of those who handle it. The way modern day politics is being handled, it is becoming a power game in which its movers and shakers play ugly games to grab power and retain it in whatever way possible in which morale and logics have a little say.

Nepal’s current politics is suffering from similar syndrome. The level of consistency in the rhetoric and action of our politicians is far low, which sometimes raises the question of credibility. What politicians say is often taken just for granted but not taken seriously. This is so because words and actions of the political parties and leaders seldom match, while ideological oscillation and vacillation are creating a huge gap between the people and the parties. But we have no option other than trusting the parties and politicians.

Not all politicians are equal and they are not to be equally blamed for what we have been witnessing at present. Nepal has, of course, produced some visionary leaders who fought throughout their lives for the cause, ideals, ideology, people and the country. BP Koirala, Puspa Lal Shrestha, Manmohan Adhikari, Madan Bhandari and Ganesh Man Singh are some personalities who commanded high esteem and respect because they always stood firm and unwavering for ideals and ideology, for which they also had to suffer a lot. BP Koirala is, perhaps, the most towering personality in Nepal’s contemporary political history whereas Puspa Lal was a great revolutionary.  

But present day politics seems to have deviated from the ideal and ideology these visionary leaders pursued, although the major political parties claim to have followed the path and ideals their founders championed. Now politics ceases to be a mission to serve the people but has become a vocation to be pursued for profit. Ideals and ideology have taken the back seat of the parties and politicians. Immediate gains and profit are what make the difference and guide and motivate the leaders and their works. This is a bitter reality of the present day politics in Nepal.

But there are still rays of hope as our leaders have realised that they made mistakes and they would correct the past wrongdoings. That is a silver lining in our politics which makes up optimistic. It is this realisation which brought all major parties together last year that made the promulgation of the constitution possible.

Democracy is the system in which different actors having diverse ideology and interests exist. They have differences on different issues. But they narrow differences and make compromise on certain national issues for the greater cause of the country and the people. This is the beauty of democracy. That is exactly what happened last year prior to the promulgation of the constitution.

However, this wisdom and unity collapsed and crumbled like a house of cards soon after the promulgation of the constitution. The political parties had been expected to demonstrate their unprecedented unity until the next parliamentary election, which is crucial for the implementation of the new constitution and institutionalisation of all the gains we achieved through different struggles and movements in the past.

Now the challenge lies on all political parties how best and successful they will be able to implement the constitution. Elections are the best and immediate step for the successful implementation of the constitution. However, the vacillating position of our parties on some political issues for facilitating the election appears to be doubtful.

If the parties and government truly keep their promises and act accordingly, election for the local bodies are to be held within the next six months or probably by mid April, 2017. Constitutionally, the election for central parliament  of all levels (local, provincial and central parliamentary level elections) are to be held by January 2018 because the tenure of the present Legislature-Parliament will come to an end in the third week of January, 2018. The local and provincial level elections are also necessary because the upper chamber of parliament cannot be complete without the provincial and local elections.

The constitution has stipulated a bicameral federal parliament consisting of the House of Representatives and the National Assembly. The 275 member House of Representatives, the lower chamber of parliament, is to be composed of 165 members directly to be elected from the people on the basis of first-past-the post system, whereas the rest 110 are to be elected on the basis of proportionate representation system. The tenure of the House of Representatives is five years, unless it is dissolved earlier in accordance with the constitutional provision. The upper chamber of parliament, which is called the National Assembly, will have 59 members and its tenure is of six years. The National Assembly is a permanent body, of which one third of its members are elected in every two years. The National Assembly, according to the Article 86 of the constitution, will have 56 members to be elected by an electoral college consisting of members of the state assemblies of all provinces, chairpersons and vice chairpersons of all village bodies and mayors and deputy mayors of all municipalities and three members to be nominated by the President on recommendation of the Government of Nepal.

The government and the Election Commission seem to be committed and also serious to hold all three levels of election in time within the next 14 months. But the environment for the election, so far, has not been created. There are political and legislative issues connected to the election. These issues must be settled before the elections are announced. The most important issue at hand is the one raised by Madhesi and janajati parties, which is related to the demarcation of the federal provinces, for which amendment in the constitution is required. However, the amendment is not possible without unity among the major parties. If this issue is not settled, it will be difficult to hold the elections. The parties are, therefore, required to once again demonstrate the sense of unity and cooperate with one another for the successful implementation of the constitution.