The Maoist leader Prachanda, top center, stumped last month in Katmandu. More Photos >
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After 10 years of fighting, Nepal’s Maoist insurgents have come out of the jungle and will take part in elections to choose a special assembly to rewrite the Constitution. That bold experiment will give this nation of 27 million an opportunity to cement peace and install a fully elected government, while most likely ending the monarchy that has ruled Nepal for 250 years.
But it is not without risks. Their rivals accuse the Maoists of bullying their way to power in a campaign marred by violence and intimidation. The Maoists insist they do not want to go back to war, but neither have they renounced armed struggle. Judging by the campaign, critics here and abroad say they do not trust that yesterday’s insurgents will act as democrats in the future.
A recent campaign stop for the former insurgent leader, known by his nom de guerre, Prachanda — or “the fierce one,” in Nepali — opened with the snap-crackle of small-gun fire blasting from a pair of scratchy speakers, punctuating a rousing revolutionary tune. “Light the lamp of love,” the lyrics went. “I go carrying the flag of revolution and Nepal in my heart.”
United Nations monitors have said that despite an agreement among the political parties to maintain peace, “violence and intimidation by party workers continued,” but they accused the Maoists supporters of responsibility for a majority of attacks. Rival parties have felt the sting most.
“Still there are some doubts about their intentions,” said Shekhar Koirala, who is on the central committee of the rival Nepali Congress Party. “Still, they feel they can capture the government by sheer force. That is one big worry.”
With 10,000 polling places, about 10,000 candidates and more than 234,000 election workers to supervise the entire operation, Nepal has never had elections quite like this before.
The Constituent Assembly will not only decide whether to abolish the monarchy, but it will also determine how the country’s ethnic groups and castes will be represented in government and even what kind of government Nepal will have.
Nepalis will in effect cast two votes. They will choose a candidate to represent their district and separately choose a party. To ensure that women and ethnic and caste groups have a voice, each party has had to abide by certain quotas.
The elections have been delayed twice, in part because of an armed ethnic uprising in Nepal’s southeastern plains. Though the situation is mostly calm now, a handful of ethnic Madhesi factions there continue to threaten candidates.
“This election is part of the peace-building process,” the election commissioner, Bhojraj Pokharel, said in an interview. “This is not a normal election.”
The vote will take place two years after street protests forced King Gyanendra to cede power and brought the Maoists out of the jungle. Under a peace deal, the rebels agreed to sequester nearly 20,000 fighters and to lock up their weapons under United Nations supervision.
As the Maoists strive to cast themselves as law-abiding leaders, word and deed reflect an awkward balancing act. Sometimes, for instance, the Maoist leader, Prachanda, whose real name is Pushpa Kamal Dahal, says his party will “capture” the state. He salutes the guerrillas who have fought and died for the Maoist cause.
Once, he even referred to an October Revolution, which some Nepalis took as a veiled threat that his cadres would take up arms again if they did not win the vote. Prachanda says he has not uttered the phrase since campaigning began.
On a recent morning, as hammer-and-sickle flags fluttered in the wind, Prachanda arrived at his campaign rally in a black-and-white checkered blazer. His hair was slicked back. He could have passed for a 1940s union boss were it not for the marigold garlands that hung on him like a florid neck brace.
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