Political Culture Needs Improving

Dr. Trilochan Upreti

The people of this country have been fooled by the politicians time and again. The people have been told how Nepal would be transformed into a Singapore or Switzerland in a short span of time. However, no one till date has declared any policy, vision or strategy on how this formidable dream can be achieved.

Sycophancy

The then King Birendra had enunciated a national policy and plan to raise the Nepalese standard of living to Asian humanitarian standards by the end of the last century. It was never defined what that standard meant, because different countries of Asia such as Japan, the Arab world or Bangladesh have different levels of development and economic standards. Sycophants and subservient politicians of the then regime kept repeating this rhetoric, although they themselves never understood the meaning and significance of that national target. And the world laughed at the then regime's madness not because it had set an unreliable target but due to the very ambiguity of the so-called national objectives.

Later, after the restoration of democracy, the politics of the day and its key players gambled again over the fate of the Nepalese people by enunciating a policy of saying good things and doing just the reverse. They had been obsessed with the illusion that whatever they think is the national dream and plan, whatever they do is democracy and their dictation and wish is the national determination. They never bothered to be real democrats. Rather they acted as dictators within their political parties while they had ample opportunity to sit at the helm of governance.

At the time of Jana Andolan II, the leaders apologised to the people and said they would not repeat these anomalies and aberrations if the people gave them a chance to return to power in the future.One former prime minister had promised to make Nepal like Singapore if he and his party were elected. His party was indeed elected, but instead Nepal turned more like Somalia than Singapore. Again, no one understood what he exactly meant by making the country another Singapore.

Whether he meant a clean administration, a safe country in terms of law and order or learning from the Singaporean system of how to rule the country or making our living standards equivalent to Singapore. When the people were facing a dearth of drinking water in Kathmandu, our respected leader was promising to flush the streets of the capital with waters from the Melamchi.

Literally, the opposite has occurred concerning the availability of water in Kathmandu despite the fact that friendly nations and multilateral institutions had provided adequate funds for this purpose. We simply could not make this happen due to our own ineptitude and visibly corrupt activity. These incidents, along with a few others, have sufficiently proved that we cannot implement projects on our own. We did fight for the Korean labour quota, but didn't use it properly. We lost huge amounts of funds given for the development of the Arun III hydropower project due to infighting among ourselves, and we could not use the money given for other development projects as well.

We are unable to implement any development project on time and within the allocated amount of budget and cannot narrow down our differences or make a national policy for national development or welfare.We have even failed to appoint the authorities to run our universities for one entire year. Similar has been our failure to appoint diplomatic representatives, which has kept our foreign missions inactive at such a crucial period.

All this is a shame for the entire Nepali people. All in all, those ministers who were seen to be the most radical in their policy have now been seen as corrupt. For example, eight vehicles were distributed to their cadres, misutilising oil and maintenance costs. Interference by party cadres in the daily administration and pressure to provide benefits to one's party followers is common practice here.The credibility of our politicians is not as high as it is generally made out to be. Had they not been involved in corruption and filled up public posts with their own people who are normally unqualified, Nepal would, perhaps, have come closer to Singapore or Switzerland in certain aspects. How the leaders have been acting after Jana Andolan II could be a topic of research.

They have neither improved nor rectified their past mistakes. Rather, they are repeating the same corrupt and inefficient behaviour. Just see the appointments they have made during the past one year. All of them have been filled up by relatives or political sycophants! The diplomatic appointment saga has been frustrating and full of despair. Similarly, the home and defense administration has also come under huge criticism from the people at large. Ministers have never been able to act tactfully and efficiently, and they have always given importance to less important things. Even now, all the appointments and posts are being shared among the parties as if this is what Jana Andolan II was all about.

Sensitivity

Our leaders' dealing with the peace process has been appreciated both nationally and internationally, although some problems have surfaced in its implementation. However, their attitude has not improved. Until they stop appointing their cronies to lucrative posts, it is going to disappoint the common people. They need to appoint qualified, clean and suitable professionals by ignoring the recommendation of people with political inclination. They got to understand the sensitivity of the people and be aware that they are under people's scrutiny.

Source: The Rising Nepal, April 23, 2007