Katmandu, Nepal – As parliament convened here Friday for the first time in four years, the new prime minister signaled momentous changes in Nepalese politics at a moment that history might well remember as the crossroads between war and peace.
The new leader, Girija Prasad Koirala, at 84 the elder statesman of Nepali politics, was too ill to attend his swearing-in ceremony as he assumed the post of prime minister for the fifth time, his fellow Nepali Congress party officials said.
But in a letter presented to parliament and laden with promises, he seemed to offer a hand to the Maoist rebels, vowing to invite them for talks, to announce a cease-fire in reciprocation for a rebel announcement on Wednesday of a three-month unilateral cease-fire, and to hold elections on a new constitution that will decide the fate of the monarchy, the rebels’ chief demand.
On Sunday, parliament will debate those issues, which were all included in an accord signed last fall by the Maoists and Nepal’s political parties.
Such promises were nothing short of astonishing, considering Koirala’s earlier antipathy to the rebels.
Five years ago, in his fourth term as prime minister, Koirala ordered the Royal Nepalese Army to tackle a Maoist insurgency brewing in the hills. Top army officials, unaccustomed to anything but a ceremonial role and answerable ultimately to the king of Nepal, refused.
Now, after three weeks of rowdy street protests in the capital and a concession by King Gyanendra to give up absolute control of the state, Koirala and the new government he will form when parliament resumes Sunday face many challenges.
The army that once defied Koirala’s instructions remains under the ultimate command of Narayanhiti Palace. Its chief of staff has promised to cooperate with a new government, but it remains an open question whether troops on the ground will in fact honor a cease-fire and follow the directives of an interim government that could include the Maoists.
Then there are the Maoists. The new government faces the choice of taking a hard line against the rebels or treating them as partners in pushing the king to retreat. The Maoist war has cost 13,000 lives in 10 years.
So far, the Maoists have offered promises but little real proof that they will begin to play by the rules of parliamentary democracy.
Whether they will compromise for the sake of wielding power in the new government, a “bourgeois democracy” in their lexicon, is uncertain.