A clean sweep

This morning I drove past a Standard Chartered Bank signboard praising "Magnficent, Mystical Nepal". Now another "M" can be added to that; Maoist. For the Maoist party has enjoyed a landslide success following Thursday's polls. Through the ballot box they have won a battle that they were incapable of winning militarily - the conquest of Kathmandu valley. The scale of the Maoist victory has surprised everyone, probably even the Maoists themselves. There isn't the slightest question of vote rigging and there was a remarkably good turn out considering the logistical difficulties of getting to election booths in Nepal. So what has happened? My suspicion is that this has been in large part a protest vote against the mainstream parties who have done so little for the electorate in the past. Now another party is being given a chance to deliver on promises and at least while the Maoists are in power there will be no return to violence for the war-weary population.

Maoist Chairman Prachanda is already sending out reassurances to potentially unsettled foreign stakeholders that the Maoists will follow a constructive path and I really hope they can. At the end of the day we are all (development organisations included) aiming to make society a better place and to help the downtrodden, although our methods have differed somewhat in the past. There is such a need for social reform in Nepal that it can only really be fully addressed by action from central government. Organisations like mine can only nibble at the edges of issues like the trafficking problem and child labour, hoping that through our advocacy and example others more powerful will intervene. Now the Maoists can do something that really would be revolutionary in Nepal.


This afternoon I took a little trip out to Dwarika's Shangri La Resort in Dhulikhel, about one hour's drive out of Kathmandu. It was great to escape the filth of town for a few hours and to see in the Nepalese new year with a drink, a dal bhat (lentils and rice) and the sound of the cuckoo.

Tuesday

Tuesday is the best day of the week in this part of Kathmandu. The reason for this is that during the dry season we endure 40 hours of scheduled power cuts (load shedding) per week but on Tuesdays we are given some relief with electricity all day. The simple pleasures that one takes for granted elsewhere can really be enjoyed on a Tuesday - including watching television, feeble as the available channels may be. As the monsoon season approaches next month there is the prospect of the reservoirs being replenished and the annual lifting of the restrictions. This may even come a little sooner than normal as we have been having a great deal of unseasonal rain over the past week or two. Habula, our elderly domestic security guard, attributes this latest reflection of climate change to the Nepali people having been "bad". I expect he's probably right.

Nepalese Garden Birds

The bush outside my office window serves me well for a spot of birdwatching in between e mails. This afternoon I photographed these two chaps - an Oriental White Eye (well named) and a Jungle Myna. There are a number of Myna species in Nepal. This one, in spite of its name, is frequently seen in inhabited areas. Yesterday morning I heard the first cuckoo of Spring, so maybe he will present my next photo opportunity.

Last week on April 1st (note the date) a news item ran on the front cover of The Himalayan Times saying that sale of alcohol had been banned in the run up to the election. After quotations for and against the move the reader was directed to page 2 where it said "Cheers". Bizarrely though this April Fools Day prank has been prophetic as the Election Commission has since decided that such a ban will be a good idea after all. Other restrictions will come into force including no vehicular movement being allowed on the day of the election itself. This is presumably in the assumption that all voters will be by then back in their home areas and within walking distance of a polling station, which I find rather optimistic. The cuckoo's arrival could be well timed.

A short drive across Kathmandu on a Wednesday morning

After visiting the Social Welfare Council (our local regulatory body) this morning I had a blog post-provoking drive across town.

I found myself drawn to a billboard advertising a new brand of alcohol with the slogan "You don't need an occassion (sic) to celebrate with passion”. With my hard-learned knowledge of the 3R’s, the outcome of an old-fashioned Irish education, I dislike bad spelling - with a passion – and it is doubly shocking when even major displays (as opposed say to quick e mail exchanges) exhibit spelling errors. Oh, and the alcohol brand in question was called “Passion Cooler”; this is probably clinically accurate but I’d have thought that the product’s marketing people would be trying to push this stuff as offering exactly the opposite effect.

The final sight, just before I arrived home, was that of an election jeep from the Nepal Rastra Party winding its way in front of us along the back streets. The blaring loudspeakers were bad enough but to my horror Party workers were throwing leaflets out of the back adding to Kathmandu’s already gross litter problem. Such conduct would be anathema these days apart from anywhere else but here. I expect the paper hadn’t been recycled either.

A critical time

It is quite difficult to read the situation in Nepal from here in UK, but to me it seems that the next day or two will be critical in determining whether or not successful elections to a new national constituent assembly (already twice postponed) can be held on schedule in April. The parties which represent the ethnic Indian (Madhesi) population in the south of the country have been insisting upon their rights and aspirations (which include autonomy and a right to self-determination) being recognised as a prerequisite to their participation. On the other hand the Prime Minister is saying that he will not countenance any political developments that could lead to a break up of the nation. The Madhesi have upped the ante by calling an indefinite strike in the south that has now entered its tenth day, preventing imports from India and led to the worst shortages - especially of petrol, diesel, kerosene and cooking gas - since 1990. Even the dead are disadvantaged by a strike which is preventing the import of cremation pyre wood to Kathmandu temples. The Madhesi parties have also ignored Wednesday's deadline to register their candidates with the Election Commission; everyone knows that if they don't participate in the elections they will be fundamentally flawed.

Now the deadline for electoral registration has been extended until Sunday and meantime, we are told, intense discussions are going on behind the scenes to reach some compromise in meeting the Madhesi demands. If these discussions fail it will represent disaster for the country.

As ever, we have to carry on working and managing as best we can under increasingly difficult circumstances. Just today we have agreed to take into our Bhairahawa refuge two more children of a prisoner held in the local jail. And I am working hard to raise the funds to purchase our new arts rehabilitation centre in Godwari, Kathmandu. This process got off to a good start this week following news that we had received a pledge of £50,000 towards the estimated £250,000 budget, courtesy of our regular funder, The Sylvia Adams Charitable Trust (see my post of 31st January). If another application that I have made to another Foundation comes through we'll be half way there.

Now all that the living need is for common sense and peace to prevail in Nepal. As for the dead, they can settle for the rekindling of the open air cremation fires along the sacred Bagmati river in Kathmandu, generating their strangely familiar aroma once again.