Bhattarai for PM? Not yet!

DR RAMESH KHATRY
While I sit in front of the computer screen and finger my keyboard, the radio announces that the prime minister (PM) contest on Friday (July 23) will feature Pushpa Kamal Dahal against Ram Chandra Poudel. Many hoped that Dahal would give someone else a chance. Thus the late Bal Bahadur Rai’s warning in a recent issue of Himal Khabarpatrika comes true—Dahal only preaches inclusiveness, he doesn’t practice it; Janajatis beware! Dahal has become another Girija Prasad Koirala who, while living, thought Nepal would perish without his tutelage. History repeats itself. Dahal acts like Lenin, Stalin, and Mao who didn’t allow for alternate leadership until death greeted them. Lenin fought against the Tsarist dictatorship; but ended up a despot himself, making way for Stalin’s totalitarianism.

Recently, articles advocating Dr Baburam Bhattarai as the new PM have appeared. After the Constituent Assembly election in 2008, I have maintained that no Maoist should lead our country, and thus gone “against the tide” (which is also the name of my monthly column). Two years later, events have vindicated my view. I still wish no Maoist will become our PM until the party renounces violence, returns confiscated property, disbands the despised Young Communist League ( YCL), and pledges to become a totally democratic party. The Nepali Congress (NC), the United Marxist-Leninist (UML), most other smaller parties, and the majority of our country people have demanded the same.

Dahal would have succeeded as the first republican PM of our country had he given more attention to nation-building than attempting to grab power through the sacking of the incumbent commander-in-chief. In politics, no one can rule out a comeback but Dahal probably shot himself too severely in the foot for a repeat of such good luck. So, the charming boy Bhattarai has recently had best wishes for the post of the PM.

The late Koirala once remarked that he didn’t fear Dahal that much, but he dreaded Bhattarai. I have caught the same “Koirala” bug, and share a similar dread. Somehow, Bhattarai doesn’t inspire trust. God forbid that without some drastic conversion, he sit on the PM’s chair.

“Whether Dahal or Ram Bahadur Thapa or Bhattarai, the unconverted Maoist will always push for a totalitarian rule!” Do I still want Bhattarai for PM? Not until he shows genuine conversion toward democracy.
For all his imputed “love for the country” (others make this claim for him), Bhattarai hasn’t renounced violence. He has an uncanny way of keeping absolutely quiet when Maoist murderers go berserk. Thus, I haven’t heard any comment from Bhattarai when Ramhari Shrestha, Birendra Sah, and Uma Singh lost their lives to Maoist assassins. In 2008, Bhattarai gave an interview to a national daily in which he claimed that his party would continue to use the ballot and the bullet. His cadres have followed him to the hilt. Ultimately, violence consumes the perpetrator as M K Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, and Nelson Mandela have aptly demonstrated. These followed Jesus who said: “All who draw the sword will die by the sword!” Maoists’ unpopularity now stems from the “power-comes-from-the-barrel-of-a-gun” philosophy they continue to advocate.

This brings me back to my favorite thesis that unrepentant mass murderers can’t effectively lead our country. Why? Any murder disables the ruler’s psyche, burdens the conscience, and twists normal thinking; mass murder even more. If Maoist leaders repent of the 16,000 lives lost because of their so-called “People’s War” and thus regain a healthy conscience, I would vote for Bhattarai in the next election.

Perhaps, I will never forget the callous statement Bhattarai scribbled after watching a photo exhibition (which Kunda Dixit, Nepa-laya, and the Federation of Nepalese Journalists organized) in memory of the 10-year civil war. After seeing scores of tear-jerking pictures, like his cadres’ butchering of Lamjung’s school teacher Muktinath Adhikari, what does Bhattarai write in the comments book? “The nature of violence is based on history and class. To forget that and to make a classless and non-historical analysis of violence is not helpful. If these pictures had been presented from a class-based perspective, they would have been more useful and realistic.” What tattered philosophy from the so-called Maoist ideologue! With a few sentences from his pen, Bhattarai justified the Maoist murders, maiming, and mutilation. (The state was even guiltier, but here I am dealing with a candidate whom many desire for our next PM.)

People have commented that as the Finance Minister Bhattarai excelled by collecting the most revenue. Great! The UML-led government which resigned last June has surpassed that as well. Many have forgotten that Baburam threatened to unleash the YCL after our businessmen, who naturally took their money overseas or across the border. Thus, Bhattarai who gathered much revenue shot the goose that laid the golden eggs. He encouraged perpetual strikes in our industries. Just count the number of multinational companies that left our country because of Maoist interference.

Bhattarai hasn’t spoken a word about returning properties the Maoists have confiscated. In this, he follows his mentor Lenin who declared that “soviets should forthwith confiscate landlords’ estates without compensation, nationalize all land, and divide it among the peasants”. When Lenin lacked funds or grain to feed the Red Army, he ordered his cadres to grab surplus grain without compensation. Maoist cadres have done the same by confiscating rice harvests. Those the Maoists call “peasants” squat on private property and swell the party’s vote bank, thus Bhattarai’s known reluctance to return properties to their rightful owners. “Voluntary”, give-or-die donations to Maoists’ coffer continue.

Lenin had a slogan: “All power to the Soviets!” By 1921, he had crushed other opposition parties, and eliminated his opponents through “show” trials and on-the-spot death penalties. Our Maoists have attempted similarly through their kangaroo courts and killing of NC/UML cadres. The Maoist quest for a “People’s Republic” continues, and Bhattarai hasn’t deviated from this goal. Should he become the PM, Bhattarai would pursue this aim as Lenin, Stalin, and Mao did. Dahal tried to impose Maoist totalitarianism until President Dr Ram Baran Yadav intervened. Bhattarai will attempt the same. He still claims (in interviews to Nepali and foreign journals) that the Maoist revolution continues. This gives a chill to those who yearn for true democracy.

While the debate for a child monarch raged during PM Koirala’s last tenure, some politicians remarked: “Whether a child or an adult, a serpent will always bite at the opportune time!” We should apply this to the Maoists in general and Bhattarai in particular. “Whether Dahal or Ram Bahadur Thapa or Bhattarai, the unconverted Maoist will always push for a totalitarian rule!” Do I still want Bhattarai for PM? Not until he shows genuine conversion toward democracy.

Source: http://www.myrepublica.com/portal/index.php?action=news_details&news_id=21418