Bihari Krishna Shrestha <biharishrestha@gmail.com> wrote
Dear all,
With due respect to Mr. Neupane and his advice as to the relevance of
the Pakistan's 2005 earthquake experience to Nepal's situation, it has
to be said that, despite many geographical similarities between the
earthquake hit regions of the two countries, manmade differences
abound in the two situations thus rendering Pakistani preparedness
nonreplicable in our own case for the following reasons:
1. His Right Honorable President of the Federal Democratic Republic of
Nepal, Dr. Ram Baran Yadav is no Gen. Pervez Musharraf, then President
of Pakistan and vice versa. Dr. Yadav's position , according to our
constitution, is "alankarik" that translates in English as
"ornamental". So, earthquake or no earthquake, President Yadav
functions by every letter of the national statute. Then, we also have
a prime minister in Mr. Sushil Koirala and the less said the better
about that functionary. But then, we also must acknowledge that he is
after all the product of our democratic process, installed to lead a
country that, despite its quarter century long history of democratic
restoration, remains one of the poorest and least developed in the
world, and is now more widely referred to as "desperately poor" by the
international media in the recent earthquake reporting worldwide.
2. While Gen Musharraf had the temerity to keep the politicians,
otherwise the disturbing and distorting elements in any situation
involving resources, off limit in earthquake relief and rehab in the
Pakistan of 2005, our own quake and promise of aid amounting to
trillions of rupees are seen as the godsend for our own parties and
their politicians who are now beginning to fight among themselves,
head over heels, in executing their intrinsic political dharma of
bhagbanda. One has to be darn stupid to miss what promises to be an
immense bonanza.
3. In Nepal, earthquake relief as many other issues of importance to
people can always wait. The very first thing that needs to be sorted
out is political power, for which now all major parties are
banging--i..e putting--their heads together to see who would be the
fittest of them all to be the new PM and how big should be the cabinet
so that there are enough hands to handle the gigantic task of
earthquake reconstruction. This decision has to be made in the
context of the fact that Deuba and Babu Ram had both found out that
half a hundred ministers are too few. Clearly, the Maoists
specifically too should be on board so that they could mobilize their
very efficient youth wing, the YCL, to bring the relief and rehab
support to just about every single household they are so familiar
with--and vice versa--in the countryside.
4. And as long as such fundamental issues are not sorted out, the
people should not be bothered by the fact that the country has been
without local bodies--which by legislation remain the main institution
for managing disaster at the local level--for more than half the time
of our "democratic restoration".
Because of these major differences, the lessons proffered by Mr.
Neupane's example of 2005 Pakistan is simply not going to be
applicable to our very particularistic democratic context in Nepal.
This can as much be inferred also by the platitudinous comments made
by the intelligentsia of Nepal--most of whom are members in this email
forum--that in no way even obliquely suggest that
a. Maybe, the President of the Republic should take over the task of
national reconstruction as he has done for rebuilding a subject of
relatively lesser importance, the Churia restoration, compared to
rebuilding the lives of the quake victims numbering in millions.
Although this may be the only mechanism to keep the Nepali
politicians--known mainly for their greed, corruptibility and lack of
scruples--away from this historic challenge, nobody has even thought
of it, for the simple possible reason that t hey themselves are as
much of the members of the Nepal's feudal class who, by definition,
are able to find modus Vivendi with whatever the power that be. It is
part of their fashion that they must be seen as being in favour of
"democracy", although our own version has been "the government of the
corrupt, for the corrupt and by the corrupt".
b. That maybe, the security forces, mainly the army, that have so far
done a very good job in the present quake should be given the
exclusive responsibility as in Pakistan of 2005 to manage relief and
rehabilitation of the quake victims.
c. They are also not perturbed by the fact that what relief is being
distributed at present, it has been lop-sided in that the people
living in the roadside and in more accessible places have benefitted
the most, because, for the aid givers, the inaccessible areas are far
too remote. The only way to make the relief and aid distribution
universally accessible is to build and empower the victims themselves
in the form of their own "user groups".
