Saorsa
16th April 2008, 04:02
An interesting article:
Gaurav: Nepal’s Revolution Is Your Revolution Too (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkud29yZHByZXNzLmNvbS 8yMDA4LzA0LzA5L2dhdXJhdi10aGUtcmV2b2x1dGlvbi1pbi1u ZXBhbC8%3D)
Posted by Mike E (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYWNlYm9vay5jb20vcHJvZm lsZS5waHA%2FaWQ9MTEyOTc4NTc4NA%3D%3D) on April 9, 2008
http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkuZmlsZXMud29yZHByZX NzLmNvbS8yMDA4LzA0L2dhdXJhdi5qcGc%2Fdz0yMDA%3D (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkuZmlsZXMud29yZHByZX NzLmNvbS8yMDA4LzA0L2dhdXJhdi5qcGc%3D)Nepal is in the midst of the intense struggle over the direction of society — as the April 10 constituent elections are held. The Maoists (of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) are contending and seeking to dominate these elections.
Kasama received the following talk from the World People’s Resistance Movement (WPRM) of Britain. Comrade Gaurav (C.P. Gajurel) is in charge of the International Bureau of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist)-CPN (M). This speech was given at Goldsmiths College, , University of London, on Nov. 11, 2007. Gaurav started by thank the WPRM and Prof.John Hutnyk for organizing the program. The subheads are ours.
Events are moving in unpredictable ways in Nepal, as the April 10 election for the Constituent Assembly approaches. We urge you to circulate the link to Kasama’s Nepal resources widely on by email and online discussion.
* * * * *
By Comrade Gaurav
So I should start to explain the particular situation in Nepal right at this moment, then most probably we will discuss other aspects. If you comrades have some queries about our movement, our revolution, you can raise questions that we will then discuss.
In Nepal we waged war and we developed the People’s War in Nepal that was started in 1996 and developed to 2006. The People’s War developed from strategic defensive to the stage of strategic offensive. When we started the People’s War in 1996, we didn’t have arms, we didn’t have weapons. We started war without an army and without weapons. It seems very surprising, war without an army and without weapons, but actually this is what we did.
Now everybody knows, because our People’s Liberation Army has been confined to seven cantonments and fourteen satellite camps, and altogether the United Nations has registered that the strength of the People’s Liberation Army is 31,000 strong. But when we started the war we didn’t have any army. And when we started the war, we ourselves were playing the role of the army. Nobody was trained militarily, we were trained ideologically and politically.
Starting War with the Old Timer
You would be surprised to know, at the start we had only one .303 rifle, which was so old that actually it was not able to fire. It was very old, but we kept it very safe because it provided training for our comrades. Sometimes our comrades joked about this, and they named the rifle as the “old timer” rifle. We had only one, the old one, and we took the rifle from the eastern part of Nepal to the western part of Nepal. For 24 hours each day it was moving!
Now we have some sophisticated weapons that have also been locked in the cantonments and we have an almost 400,000 strong militia, which is working under the name of YCL: the Young Communist League. You may frequently read in the newspaper how the reactionaries are frightened to hear the name of the YCL, because it is the agency which is arresting corrupt people, which is exposing the scandals and punishing them. Because now in some parts of Nepal there is anarchy and extreme impunity, and it is the YCL which is protecting the rights of the people and safeguarding them. So it is a name of terror for reactionaries, but it is actually the friend of the Nepali masses.
When we started the People’s War, out of 75 districts in Nepal we had strong organisation in almost 20, we had some connections around 40 districts, and the organisation was not strong in the other districts, and with that we started the People’s War. Now we have strong organisation everywhere in Nepal, in all 75 districts, and during the 10 years of People’s War we liberated 80% of the population and we were running parallel governments. Actually, we were in effect nearly governing the whole country. The enemy was confined only to the big cities, including the capital and district headquarters, while we were governing the rest of the country.
Peoples War from Strategic Defensive
So this was the situation and the People’s War developed according to the theory of comrade Mao Zedong. The People’s War started from strategic defensive, without arms and without an army and it developed to the higher state, from strategic equilibrium to strategic offensive. In the course of 10 years of People’s War we have developed a very strong People’s Liberation Army. Because we are in the concluding stage of strategic offensive, the task of the revolution is to seize central political power, a countrywide seizure of power. Hence, we had to capture Kathmandu, which is the capital of Nepal. We had to capture the capital and the major towns as well as some district headquarters.
Our People’s Liberation Army is right at the gate of Kathmandu valley. If you have ever gone to Kathmandu, there is one place called Tangot, it is the main gate to enter Kathmandu. Here there was a big police station, in which we annihilated almost two dozen armed forces without any loss from our side, and so we captured Tangot. Right after that we entered into the process of this negotiation.
Many revolutionaries, many Maoists and our comrades have raised one question. You reached the gate of Kathmandu, why was it necessary to enter into the peace process? That is a big question.
War to the Gates — Why Then Change Tactics?
True, we had liberated 80% of the countryside and we had reached up to the gate of Kathmandu. But in order to seize countrywide power, for countrywide victory, our strength was not enough. The Royal Nepalese Army (RNA) was confined to their barracks, they could seldom come out. Whenever they were carrying out actions against our forces, they could just suddenly come out of their barracks, go 4-5 kilometres away from the barracks and encircle a village, and kill each and every person they found before returning. The next day they would propagate that they had killed a number of Maoists from the People’s Liberation Army.
Actually, they were not able to kill our force. They killed the common people. That was their practice for almost one year, since one year back. On the one hand, the RNA could not actually inflict any defeat on our People’s Liberation Army. On the other hand, we were not able to capture their big barracks. They were well fortified, especially with the help of US military experts. They used land mines to surround the barracks, and they used barbed wire. We tried many times but we failed to capture their barracks. That was the situation militarily. We were in a stagnant position militarily. We were trying to make a breakthrough but were not able to capture the barracks, because they were well fortified, and they had lots of modern weapons supplied by India and also helicopters. We were unable to achieve further military victory.
That was the military situation and so far as the political situation is concerned we enjoyed the support of the urban people, but it was not to the level that was required for general insurrection. The support was there, but finally to capture the city and the capital it was necessary to carry out insurrection, revolt. The support provided by the masses was not at a sufficient level in the cities including Kathmandu, because the masses were divided. Some supported Nepali Congress, other people supported other parties and the level of support of the masses was not enough that was required to achieve the final victory. So this was the political situation.
A Plan for Broadening Political Support
So in the midst of this situation we decided that in order to get further support from the masses our party should take some other initiatives to gather further strength. Otherwise the war would remain in a stagnant situation. Neither the enemy could defeat us, nor could we defeat the enemy. That was the situation. For how long could we continue this situation? War has its own dynamics, it cannot stay still for a long time, for example, if we cannot win victory, the enemy will eventually be able to defeat us. We had to take a new initiative. According to the dynamics of war you have to find a new way to maintain a dynamic situation, we should not be in a static situation in a war for long.
In those circumstances our party decided to take different steps, other political manoeuvres. Our party worked out alternative political tactics of going to the negotiations. Right from the beginning we explained People’s War as a total war. Sometimes there is a wrong notion among Maoists that People’s War is simply the war in which we confront the opposite army, the confrontation between two armies, but this is not true. People’s War is different. People’s War is a total war. We are confronting the enemy on all fronts, including the military front as well as the political front, economic front and also cultural front. On different fronts we have to fight the war, so it is a total war.
During the time of the People’s War itself, and even before that also, we entered into negotiations with the government in 2001 and 2003. But both times they ignored our demands. Again we returned to the war. But in 2005 the situation was quite different, the political situation was also different, which had been created by 10 long years of People’s War. For example the political situation was that 7 other political parties, parliamentary parties, were working together and in cooperation with the King to smash the People’s War. They were participating in the parliament, they were part of the government, they formed the government and were in cooperation with the King. They were very much united to fight against us, and it was necessary for us to use political manoeuvring to split the enemy camp. It was necessary, because they were united.
Forming an Anti-Monarchy Alliance
We took the initiative and we called the political parties to unite with us to make some sort of alliance to overthrow the monarchy. But they didn’t accept it. When we proposed this to them in 2001 and 2003 they didn’t accept it. But something new happened in Nepal. King Gyanendra, who was autocratic, staged a coup d’etat and arrested most of the political leaders who were actually working with him. He arrested most of them and put them behind bars and their political parties were banned. They could not carry out any political activities, so there was a big challenge to those political parties. There was a question of existence for those political parties. So this is one aspect, and for that we thank King Gyanendra, for we stretched our hands to those political parties to make an alliance with us, and the situation compelled them to come to join hands with our party.
This was political compulsion, which had been created by the People’s War itself. And it was a good opportunity for us to make an alliance with the 7 parties. We made the 12 point agreement, as it is popularly known, and in that alliance we concretely put forward the demand that we should make an alliance to fight against the autocratic monarchy.
In our 12 point agreement it was not clearly mentioned that we were fighting for the republic, but later, in the 8 point agreement, this was clearly mentioned, that we are fighting for a republic. It was the common point of agreement to fight against the monarchy for the republic. According to this an interim constitution was supposed to be enacted, an interim government was supposed to be formed and election of constituent assembly was to be held.
So far as the other international players are concerned, US imperialism was dead against this negotiation, because the US had its own agenda. US policy was to make an alliance between the 7 political parties and the King in order to smash the People’s War and our Party. But because of the situation on the ground, the parliamentary parties could not agree with the US policy. The situation in Nepal was quite different. They were compelled to make an alliance with our Party against the monarchy instead of following the US suggestion of making an alliance with the King to fight against the Maoist Party.
Secondly, when we were supposed to participate in the parliament, the US threatened that if Maoists were participating in the parliament the US government would cut all aid to Nepal. But it was to happen, and they could not cut the aid, so they finally supported it. Okay, they agreed that the Maoist party could join the parliament, but they still would not allow the Maoists to enter the government. If that happened, not only would they cut the aid, but they would also insist their allies impose an economic embargo on Nepal. But even when we participated in the government they could not do this. So it was the failure of US policy, total failure of the US government and their policy regarding the negotiation.
The Role of India
So far as India is concerned, when the King staged the coup d’etat in Nepal, most of the leaders of the political parties were dependent on India, they were inside prison and their parties were banned, so India was angry with that. The political parties could ask the Indian government not to supply arms to the King, his army, because they said that the weapons would be used against the Nepalese people. There was big pressure on the Indian government, and finally the Indian Prime Minister suspended the supply of arms which was already in the pipeline.
They suspended the supply of arms temporarily, and the King reacted very sharply, he wasn’t expecting that, since he was fighting against the Maoists he thought all the reactionaries of the world would automatically support him. This was his idea but it didn’t happen, and the angry king went to China where he bought arms. This aggravated the contradiction between the Indian government and the King, because according to India, the King was violating all the norms, without India’s consent Nepal is not allowed to purchase arms from a third country. So the contradiction between the Indian government and the King sharpened and we should also thank Gyanendra for this.
In this situation, the Indian government allowed a meeting between the 7 parties and our party to be held in India. It was simply impossible to organise such a meeting in Nepal, because when we invited the 7 parties to our base areas they were very much afraid. If they entered our base area to hold a meeting, when they returned, the RNA would kill them. We were secure in our base areas, our leadership was staying in the base areas, we invited them to come for the meeting in the base areas but they could not go to our base areas.
They were searching for some other place like India. India’s position before was that they would not allow any activities in India for our party. For example, right before that they arrested some leaders of our party and imprisoned them for a long time, including me. You know this very well, because you carried out a very big campaign here for my release and for the safety of my life. Also one of our senior leaders, Comrade Kiran was arrested, including us 150 cadres and leaders from Nepal were arrested. Some were handed over to the Royal Nepalese Army and others were imprisoned for a long time in India.
Labeled “Terrorist” — Leading the People
They treated us as leaders of a terrorist group not as a political party, as a terrorist organisation. This was the situation. But after that the situation changed because an alliance was necessary between the 7 parties and our party. India accepted to some extent that there should be a meeting between the other parties and the Maoist party. There was an alliance, there was the 12 point agreement, and after that the 8 point agreement and a common program called a mass movement. We called the Nepalese people to protest against the monarchy.
After this there was an unprecedented mass movement in Nepal. As everybody knows, it was really unprecedented, this 19 day mass movement. Over one million people in Kathmandu, which only has a population of almost two million people, went into the streets. As you can imagine, if two thirds of the people of London went on to the streets, what would the picture be?
The King used all his force against the mass movement. Forget about firing rifles, they were even using tanks. But people were lying down and they were issuing the challenge: “just bring your tanks”. Why did the people feel so strong? Why had they no fear of tanks and the RNA? There is one very important factor behind that: because they knew very well that the People’s Liberation Army was somewhere nearby. It was quite near. We have our own army, the People’s Liberation Army.
If the RNA did something like killing people, then there would be revenge by the People’s Liberation Army. The people had so much confidence in the People’s Liberation Army, so they were ready to make sacrifices. If there had been no People’s Liberation Army, that confidence and that militancy could not have come out in the masses automatically. Otherwise, in every country this type of mass movement could occur.
Now people sometimes argue that the mass movement alone was decisive, that political change was brought about in Nepal by the mass movement, not because of the ten year People’s War. This is not correct. This is a simplistic analysis. If there had been no People’s War, the new situation would not have arisen, the new alliance would not have been formed.
This alliance was formed with those political parties who used to treat us as the enemy. You can see, those people of Nepali Congress, they declared our party as a terrorist organisation. Our Party was branded as a terrorist organisation by different governments including the US. They issued Interpol warrants against us in more than 120 countries. They declared bounty over our heads, from 100,000 to 5,000,000 rupees, that if Maoists were captured, handed over dead or alive, they will provide that money.
In one press conference when the Home Minister was explaining all these things, that the government had taken the decision that if people capture Maoists and hand them over dead or alive, they will get this amount of money. One journalist asked him whether the government will really pay the money or not, because people had serious doubts in their minds. People used to say that even if they handed over Maoists, dead or alive, or if they hand over the heads of Maoists, the government would take the heads but not pay the money. What will you do? What do you say to this? The Home Minister said no, this is not correct. In the same bag that you bring us the heads of Maoists, we will take the head and fill the bag with money in return.
During that time our heads had a price on them. The same people in the government then, we are making an alliance with them now. This is a peculiar situation, but it happened under political compulsion. They have not become our class friends, our class allies - they cannot, they are definitely our class enemies. But because of this political situation we had to make an alliance with these types of forces. India was also supplying arms to fight our party, but because of the political compulsion this was also suspended. These were the political developments.
Joining a Reactionary Government, Is it Wrong?
And now, as we sum up what we have done, I will explain something more. For example, there is suspicion amongst some Maoist parties that it is wrong for our party to participate in the government. How can Maoists participate in the government, a reactionary government? Have they given up their line, their ideology?
We think this is not true. It is true that in history we don’t have this type of event, of any revolutionary communist participating with the reactionary force in the same government. This is true, we have no such event in history. For example, in Russia comrade Lenin put forward the proposal of provisional revolutionary government. When the Tsar was overthrown, they would form a provisional revolutionary government. This was the proposal put forward by the Bolshevik Party at that time. In the end, the Tsar was really overthrown, but the Bolshevik Party did not participate in the government.
In China, Mao Zedong put forward a proposal, he wrote a book on the subject. It was a proposal that he put forward in the congress of the party. He proposed coalition government with the Chiang Kai-shek reactionaries. Then there were the Chungking negotiations, and Mao participated for 34 days. Even after 34 days that negotiation was still not concluded, he returned to the base areas and Zhou Enlai and other leaders continued the negotiations. Mao put forward the proposal of coalition government, but this did not materialise in practice. In Russia and China, their proposals were put forward but actually in practice did not materialise, but in Nepal we have participated in the government.
Later on we pulled out of the government because of different reasons that I will explain. When we evaluate this, whether it was right to participate in the government, our evaluation is that it was correct because of two reasons. It was clear for us that by participating in the government we would not be able to resolve the problems of Nepal. We received five portfolios in the government, but the whole government and the whole bureaucratic machinery and everything remains in the hands of reactionaries. Definitely, we will not be able to solve the problems of the people. That we knew very well. We are not so stupid to think that by taking these five portfolios we could resolve these problems. But we joined the government for specific reasons.
One of the reasons is that it was necessary for us to develop international relations, because we were totally isolated. As I explained, the government had declared us a terrorist organisation. Interpol issued arrest warrants for most of the leaders of our party in more than 120 countries. We had the support of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) and some Maoist parties, this is true, but from other international players we were totally isolated. So it was necessary, because we think at present Maoist forces are not very strong internationally compared with the forces of reactionaries. In terms of strength we are negligible, so depending on only RIM and Maoist forces the revolution cannot succeed.
Prerequisites for Maintaining Revolutionary Power
Secondly, we would not be able to sustain our revolution. If we were able to capture power on a certain day, it would be very difficult to sustain it for a long time. We are encircled by enemies, and the strength of the enemy is many times more than the strength of our Maoist forces. So we feel that we should develop relations. We should use the contradictions among different reactionary forces so that they will not be unified to attack our revolution. We also want to increase support from outside. The unity among the RIM forces is fundamental. The unity among Maoist forces that are not in the RIM is also very important. This is an ideological question. Ideologically it is a vital question for us.
In spite of this we should look for support from different circles, which are not Maoist but are progressive forces, who don’t want autocratic monarchy in Nepal, who maybe want bourgeois democracy, democratic rights, prosperity for Nepal. Secondly we should strive to get the support of anti-imperialist forces, because imperialism is the main enemy of the people in the world today. We should seek support from broad anti-imperialist forces, some democratic forces, social democratic forces who claim to be communist though clearly they are not, but at least they support the struggle against the monarchy.
It is also necessary to utilise the contradictions between different states. For example, if we didn’t participate in the government and we were not in the parliament, I would not be able to travel to Europe. It would be simply impossible because we were listed as a terrorist organisation, we could not travel abroad and contact the people to explain our position and get direct support from them. This trip would have been impossible
Nepal is between two big powers, two huge powers, two giants, China and India. Now the relationship between China and India is better than before. There is no war between China and India. In the past there was a war, but now there is not, they have a better relationship, they have trade relations. But still there are differences, there are contradictions between them. So being in the government we are able to use these contradictions.
Indian Intervention
For example, I will tell you something that happened quite recently in Nepal. India was trying to intervene in the Terai. India didn’t directly intervene militarily, but they were creating chaos in our plains, as well as into the rest of Nepal, by providing every help to their agents. There was this type of intervention. But just 3 or 4 months ago, the ambassador of China gave a statement and said that if there was intervention from outside in Nepal, it would not be tolerated by China. They gave this statement, which is very significant. India was defeated by China in the 1962 war, and when the Chinese challenge India they will be demoralised. When they hear the name of the Chinese army they become frightened, they remember 1962, when the Chinese army gave them a very big defeat.
Quite recently there was a delegation from China that came to visit Nepal including Professor Wang who is the architect of foreign policy of the Chinese government. He leads academic institutions in China. He came to Nepal and in an interview in Kathmandu he said that the US and India are intervening in Nepal in different ways. There is a limit to everything, and if this limit is exceeded, China will not tolerate it. That was a big challenge but all these things didn’t happen spontaneously. We had different rounds of talks with the Chinese leadership and we are talking to the Chinese government and Party representatives about this question.
For example, I myself talked to these people and I said before the coming statement, if you support us, what support will you be providing? You are not saying anything about this. First of all you will send your opinion to the Chinese government, which will take 2 months to reach Beijing, then you will discuss this and only make decisions after 4 more months. Within 6 months what will happen in Nepal? Nobody knows. So what is the use of your support? They said no, it will not be like that. We will make decisions quickly. We welcomed this statement.
Right at this point of time we are making the revolution in a situation when there is no socialist camp. There is no socialist country to support the revolution. We have to make revolution in this situation, which is quite difficult. It was a similar situation in 1917 when the Bolshevik Party, under the leadership of Comrade Lenin, made revolution in Russia. But then there were some positive factors. For example, there was a very strong working class movement in Europe. Now it seems to be dead. But during that time it was very strong, especially in Germany. This was a positive support to the Russian revolution.
Also, the government of Russia, the Tsarist government, was heavily engaged in the First World War. The people of Russia, including the army, were tired of that war. Actually, they were angry with the Tsar. That was another factor, and Lenin put forward the slogan of “peace, bread and land”. The people were very happy. Lenin won support from sections of the army of the Tsar, and they deserted the army and joined them. These were the positive political factors in the Russian revolution, but in Nepal we don’t have this kind of support. In Asia, there is definitely some struggle, some revolutionary movements, but they are not very strong. Our country is not engaged in any war, and there is no world war. So in this situation, it is more difficult to accomplish the revolution. You can continue the revolution, you can start the revolution, but to accomplish the revolution is an uphill task.
If you are not able to utilise the contradictions among different reactionary forces, it is very difficult. Now if we sum up the correctness and incorrectness of our political tactics, we think that it is basically correct. What is the aim of political tactics? The aim of political tactics is to create a split in the enemy camp and unite the revolutionary forces. We were successful in doing that, because we split the monarchy and political parties, who were fighting against us together. We split them, and we took the political parties and we have almost smashed the monarchy. Now in Nepal the monarchy is almost gone. Officially it is not gone, but in reality it is almost gone.
Isolating Political Enemies and Rivals One by One
Now we are trying to isolate the Nepali Congress Party. It is the turn of Nepali Congress to be isolated, because we have already isolated the King and nearly smashed the monarchy. Now it is the turn of Nepali Congress, which is also a reactionary force. They declared bounty on our heads. They declared our party as a terrorist organisation. Now comes its turn. Now we are uniting with the Communist Party of Nepal United Marxist-Leninists (UML), which was always advocating unity between Nepali Congress and their party, to fight against our party. Now we are going to split them.
They are on the verge of a split, for example, quite recently we put forward two proposals in the parliament. First, a republic should be declared from the parliament. Second, the mode of the election should be fully proportional. These are the two points we put forward for discussion in the parliament. Over this issue we were able to split the Nepali Congress and UML.
When we put forward this proposal, UML was in a very difficult situation, whether to support our proposal or oppose it. All communists have an inborn character to want a republic. No communist in the world would support a monarchy. UML claim to be communist. If they opposed our proposal they would be afraid that we Maoists would expose them among the masses that they are no longer communist, they are pro-King. But, if they vote for the Maoist proposal, it will be passed. So they were in a very difficult situation.
Furthermore, they supported fully proportional elections before, and when it comes to a vote, if they vote in favour that would support the Maoists, if they vote against that would expose them to the masses. They were in a very difficult situation so they tried to negotiate with our party, “please don’t go for voting, lets compromise”. But we were determined. Our party’s central committee had decided that we could not compromise on these two issues. We could never compromise. We didn’t compromise and finally it went to a vote, and UML was compelled to vote in favour. There was an agreement with UML because they submitted the proposal with amendments. Actually, they supported a republic in a different way, and we supported their amendments. Regarding the electoral process, they supported fully proportional elections. When it came for voting, with the support of UML our proposal was passed by the parliament with a majority.
Because our proposal was passed by the majority, and Nepali Congress voted against our proposal, we were staking up the issue - to expose and isolate Nepali Congress. Now we are putting forward the proposal for making amendments in the constitution. For example, here, according to the constitution, to make amendments requires a two-thirds majority. A simple majority is not enough for that. But to ask the government to put forward that proposal in the parliament, a majority can work. Because now, UML and our party together, we are in the majority. We are compelling Nepali Congress to put forward that proposal for discussion. Because according to the constitution, it is the government which should put forward the proposal to amend the constitution, not any political party. It is the responsibility of the government.
Now Nepali Congress is in a dilemma. They are in a very difficult situation, they can go neither way. If they put forward that proposal for discussion in the parliament then they will be facing a moral problem, because quite recently they voted against that proposal. Putting forward the same proposal in the parliament to get the majority is a moral question for them, number one. If they don’t put forward that proposal, they will be defying the majority. In that case we will have the right, constitutionally, to ask them to resign from the government. “You have no moral right to be in the government because you are defying the decision of the majority!” So they will no longer be in the government. Our tactical line is thus isolating Nepali Congress.
Nepali Congress and UML were fighting collectively against our party, and we have told the leaders of UML that it is their turn to be Prime Minister. “If you want to be Prime Minister, first you should topple the Nepali Congress government”. We know very well that we should not hold this post at this point of time. Using the post of Prime Minister we are creating a split between Nepali Congress and the UML.
We are isolating the enemy one by one. We don’t know when the turn of UML will come. We are waiting for that. But the monarchy has been isolated, and secondly, now Nepali Congress has been isolated. It is very difficult even for the US and India to defend the Nepali Congress now. They are keeping mute, because according to their own definition of democracy – forget about our democracy, we define it in a different way – but their definition of democracy is that it is the rule of the majority, whoever enjoys the support in the parliament, they will form the government. This is their principle, it is their definition. But if you are in the minority, you don’t have that right. Whoever enjoys majority support, they have the right to govern. Since Nepali Congress is not able to enjoy majority support the US and India are keeping mute. We are saying “you please define your own democracy. What is your democracy? Did you redefine it?” They are keeping mute.
We are able to split Nepali Congress from UML. One by one we are trying to isolate them. This is political tactics. This also applies in the case of military actions. For example, Mao has already instructed us that when you have to eat a full plate of your food, rice, if you are hungry, you should not lift the whole plate and eat it like this. What is the proper way of eating? You should eat gulp by gulp. This is tactics. Finishing the food is our strategy, putting all this material in our stomachs is our strategy. How do we fulfil this strategy? By eating gulp by gulp. We have almost finished “eating” the monarchy. Then we are going to “eat” Nepali Congress and hopefully some time later we will “eat” other revisionists, this is our aim.
So now when we evaluate our tactics we think that they have been basically successful. Right at this moment the struggle is going on in the parliament and they are in the minority. We are trying to use this majority and minority to develop the struggle. If you ask about the election of constituent assembly, this is tactics.
Will the Elections be Held?
When will the elections be held? This is not a matter of so much concern for our party, frankly speaking. We have to make revolution, for however long we can use these tactics to make revolution, we will use them. When and in which day the election will be held is of less importance. But definitely we will be using the elections of the constituent assembly as long as we can. It is necessary, because it has become the agenda of the nation. Every international paper is talking about the constituent assembly, but five years back it was only the agenda of our party. Nobody else accepted it.
In the second national congress of our party we decided that we should go forward with this tactic. At that time nobody else accepted it, because for these 7 political parties the existing constitution was one of the best constitutions of the world. They said to us that we are challenging the constitution, which is one of the best in the world, so they could not agree with that. Now everybody is talking about it, including US imperialism. They were so concerned and were saying that the Maoists were going to destroy the constituent assembly. Now it has become the agenda of everybody. But so far as our party is concerned we are very clear, it is a tactical line. With that tactic we are able to create the spirit. We were able to build up the mass movement through those tactics and we are using these tactics to make revolution in order to succeed in New Democratic Revolution.
We will definitely be using these tactics, we are not going to give them up. It would be wrong. It will be a burden on the part of the Communist Party to give up the tactics which are already established within society and internationally. It is just like giving up arms to the enemy, saying “just take these arms and attack us”. We are not so stupid. We should not be so stupid that we give the arms to the enemy and say do whatever you like. We will use these arms ourselves. This is the situation in Nepal.
We know very clearly that Nepali Congress will never accept these two proposals because they have their own compulsion. They cannot accept these two proposals because they think that if the monarchy is abolished and a republic is declared, everybody will understand that this republic has come into being because of the Maoists. It is a Maoist instigated republic. The whole political benefit will be taken by the Maoists.
There will be proportional elections and some reactionary people and some journalists, are intimidating Nepali Congress now. These journalists are taking the statistics of the last election and showing the total strength of the Nepali Congress – two Nepali Congress Parties which have joined together – altogether was 180 and something seats. If you go to the polls with this full electoral process, you will get less than 70 seats. So they will suffer a lot. And how much will the Maoists gain? They will either win a majority of the seats or will be the biggest party in the parliament. Nepali Congress are really afraid of that, even though we don’t give importance to the elections.
We communists don’t give that much importance to these elections, but for the reactionaries elections are everything. As you can see, it is not very common in Europe and in the UK, but if you go and observe elections in South Asia, in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, people kill each other over the election. No matter how many people will be killed they still want to win the election. This is the way elections are fought. For reactionaries the election is decisive. If they think beforehand that they are going to be defeated, why would they vote for that? It is suicidal for them, they will not accept our proposal, we know.
This is good and bad, there are two aspects. On the one hand it is good, but on the other hand it is bad. It is good because if they will not accept it, we will develop the mass movement. When we have achieved a majority, that achievement will be used against Nepali Congress, and that will develop the mass movement that we have already. It is in our agenda that we work out the plan of the next mass movement to press the government to put forward this proposal in parliament. To make amendments in the constitution by a two-thirds majority will also not really happen, so we can develop the mass movement. We are using this majority, the weapon of the majority, against Nepali Congress. We are making the plan of developing the mass movement and our aim is to seize central power. This is the aim of the mass movement.
Apparently it seems like the situation is very simple, because we have already achieved a majority and Maoists are in a better position, we will go forward easily. But this is not true, because everything is approaching a climax in Nepal. We are in the process of a very big change. If communists succeed, are able to capture state power, it will not only be a victory of the Nepalese people, the Nepalese proletariat, but it would also be the victory of the revolutionaries of the world today. It will be the centre, the base area of the world revolution.
Revolutionary Movements around the World
Reactionaries, including US imperialists, know this very well. So it is US imperialism which is trying its best not to allow the revolution to succeed, not because of economic reasons, even though the US has an interest to exploit, to extract wealth from Nepal. We don’t think like that, because Nepal is not a big economy for the US and it is not easy for the US to extract wealth from Nepal. But politically it is very important. Once the revolution succeeds in Nepal it will have a big impact at the international level – because revolutionary movements are building up, taking shape in different parts of the world today.
For example, in neighbouring India there is a significant Maoist movement. The government has repeatedly accepted that it is a political threat. According to the government evaluation, previously the nationalist movement was the greatest political threat. But in the last 2 to 3 years they have been saying that the Maoist movement is the greatest threat to the Indian government. If the revolution in Nepal will succeed right at their border, definitely this will have a direct impact and maybe the Indian reactionary class will not be able to stop the revolution there. If India were liberated then it will be a very big thing for the world revolution.
There are also other countries where revolutionary movements are developing, for example in Turkey, some comrades in Iran are trying to make a breakthrough there, as well as in Peru and in the Philippines. If the revolution in Nepal succeeds then there will be a great effect on the world revolution. Other movements will move forward with tremendous strength. Even if other people don’t know this, the CIA and US imperialism know its significance. They will do their best to prevent it. They will do their best to prevent the revolution at any cost.
During the 1990s the Soviet Union disintegrated. Actually we didn’t call it socialism, it was not socialist, but popularly it was known as a socialist country and western imperialism defined it as socialist. The imperialists were very happy with the collapse of the Soviet Union and they declared that Marxism will never come back again. For western imperialism, socialism existed for seventy years in the Soviet Union and then collapsed. They claim, now there will be no more socialism. The best system in the world is capitalism, not socialism. It has been proven from practice. They were getting like that, Marxism has gone, it is dead, it will never come back. But now there is a revolution under the leadership of the Maoist Party in Nepal. All their arguments, all their proof, all their efforts will be shattered. So they are very much afraid of the revolution in Nepal. So definitely imperialism will do its best to prevent the revolution from being accomplished in Nepal.
If you ask me the question of whether in Nepal we are fighting against the monarchy only, this is not the case. The monarchy is almost finished, because even Nepali Congress have taken a position that will not support the monarchy. All the 7 parties have accepted that we are not for monarchy, we are for a republic. Now the king is no more the head of state, he is no more the supreme commander of the army and has no following among the masses. So actually, we have already finished the monarchy.
In fact, we are fighting against US imperialism. US imperialism is trying to restore and revive the monarchy. It is trying to organise the reactionaries and regressive forces around the monarchy. It is getting support from Indian reactionaries, Hindu fundamentalists. The real fight in Nepal is against US imperialism. In this situation, we think that it is a good thing that we have the opportunity to fight US imperialism. But it is difficult, it is not easy to fight against US imperialism. So the fight against US imperialism has to be carried out internationally, because it is the enemy of the people of the world.
Now we are striving to develop anti-imperialist struggle throughout the world. We are trying to make alliance with the forces who are fighting against US imperialism. In order to fight US imperialism internationally it is necessary to gather support from all revolutionary people, anti-imperialist people, Maoist and all revolutionaries of the world.
We are making tours of European countries in order to gain support. We have to get support from all different forces against US imperialism with the aim of supporting the revolution in Nepal. This is also a significant step for you in Europe, because you are supporting the revolution in Nepal. We should definitely get support from the broad masses in Europe. I think there are many good people in Europe. There are many revolutionaries, many communists, who are very enthusiastic about making revolution in their country, or accomplishing revolution anywhere in the world. Time and again they have expressed their solidarity, regarding our release from prison, saving our lives, supporting our revolution in Nepal. If you have a correct line, you have a much higher fighting capacity.
You may think that since there is no revolutionary movement, that there is no working class movement in Europe, so therefore nothing can be done here. Comrades, you should not be disappointed. Communists should not be disappointed. You have the strength, provided you have the correct ideological and political line and you dare to implement that line, you can do it.
I will give some examples. When I was in prison, the Prime Minister of Nepal visited Belgium in order to procure arms from the Belgian government. Belgium produces lots of arms, and they had already agreed to supply arms to the Nepalese government. Our comrades during that time, they were not a large number, there were around 100 comrades in Belgium, and they knew that this guy had come to Belgium to procure the arms that can be used against the People’s War. So they organised a protest and they contacted different political forces including the Workers Party of Belgium (PTB), which was against supplying arms to suppress the people of Nepal. They got support from PTB and some other anti-monarchy forces and some revolutionary forces. They protested in the parliament and even the Green Party supported them. They protested inside the parliament and in front of the European parliament and they shouted slogans. Finally the government decided not to supply the arms on this occasion.
Even 100 people can do that, if you have a correct line, if you have a correct ideology. It is a very big thing to stop the supply of arms to the Royal Nepalese Army. Actually, it was a major support for the People’s War. If the arms reached Nepal it would have a very bad effect on the People’s War. But they were able to stop it. So we should not be disappointed, we have that strength, because our ideology has a huge strength. When we implement this ideology then it becomes a material force. Ideology is in our minds, if we write, it goes onto the paper, and when we implement it, it becomes material force. So our ideology, invincible ideology, definitely creates invincible force.
Comrades in Europe, we have that ideology, if you work on the correct political line, you can create a major force. It is necessary to gather support internationally to support the People’s War in Nepal. Supporting the People’s War in Nepal ultimately means to fight against US imperialism. Now it is clear, while making revolution in Nepal we are side by side fighting against US imperialism, and definitely it is a big task.
It is Your Revolution Too
We think that the revolution in Nepal is not only the revolution of the people of Nepal, it is your revolution also. We are making revolution for everybody, it is our common effort. Once the revolution in Nepal succeeds, it will be the base area of the world revolution. I hope and believe that we accomplish the revolution in Nepal with our combined force.
Thank you very much.
Gaurav: Nepal’s Revolution Is Your Revolution Too (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkud29yZHByZXNzLmNvbS 8yMDA4LzA0LzA5L2dhdXJhdi10aGUtcmV2b2x1dGlvbi1pbi1u ZXBhbC8%3D)
Posted by Mike E (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5mYWNlYm9vay5jb20vcHJvZm lsZS5waHA%2FaWQ9MTEyOTc4NTc4NA%3D%3D) on April 9, 2008
http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkuZmlsZXMud29yZHByZX NzLmNvbS8yMDA4LzA0L2dhdXJhdi5qcGc%2Fdz0yMDA%3D (http://www.cancercheck.info/index.php?q=aHR0cDovL21pa2VlbHkuZmlsZXMud29yZHByZX NzLmNvbS8yMDA4LzA0L2dhdXJhdi5qcGc%3D)Nepal is in the midst of the intense struggle over the direction of society — as the April 10 constituent elections are held. The Maoists (of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) are contending and seeking to dominate these elections.
Kasama received the following talk from the World People’s Resistance Movement (WPRM) of Britain. Comrade Gaurav (C.P. Gajurel) is in charge of the International Bureau of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist)-CPN (M). This speech was given at Goldsmiths College, , University of London, on Nov. 11, 2007. Gaurav started by thank the WPRM and Prof.John Hutnyk for organizing the program. The subheads are ours.
Events are moving in unpredictable ways in Nepal, as the April 10 election for the Constituent Assembly approaches. We urge you to circulate the link to Kasama’s Nepal resources widely on by email and online discussion.
* * * * *
By Comrade Gaurav
So I should start to explain the particular situation in Nepal right at this moment, then most probably we will discuss other aspects. If you comrades have some queries about our movement, our revolution, you can raise questions that we will then discuss.
In Nepal we waged war and we developed the People’s War in Nepal that was started in 1996 and developed to 2006. The People’s War developed from strategic defensive to the stage of strategic offensive. When we started the People’s War in 1996, we didn’t have arms, we didn’t have weapons. We started war without an army and without weapons. It seems very surprising, war without an army and without weapons, but actually this is what we did.
Now everybody knows, because our People’s Liberation Army has been confined to seven cantonments and fourteen satellite camps, and altogether the United Nations has registered that the strength of the People’s Liberation Army is 31,000 strong. But when we started the war we didn’t have any army. And when we started the war, we ourselves were playing the role of the army. Nobody was trained militarily, we were trained ideologically and politically.
Starting War with the Old Timer
You would be surprised to know, at the start we had only one .303 rifle, which was so old that actually it was not able to fire. It was very old, but we kept it very safe because it provided training for our comrades. Sometimes our comrades joked about this, and they named the rifle as the “old timer” rifle. We had only one, the old one, and we took the rifle from the eastern part of Nepal to the western part of Nepal. For 24 hours each day it was moving!
Now we have some sophisticated weapons that have also been locked in the cantonments and we have an almost 400,000 strong militia, which is working under the name of YCL: the Young Communist League. You may frequently read in the newspaper how the reactionaries are frightened to hear the name of the YCL, because it is the agency which is arresting corrupt people, which is exposing the scandals and punishing them. Because now in some parts of Nepal there is anarchy and extreme impunity, and it is the YCL which is protecting the rights of the people and safeguarding them. So it is a name of terror for reactionaries, but it is actually the friend of the Nepali masses.
When we started the People’s War, out of 75 districts in Nepal we had strong organisation in almost 20, we had some connections around 40 districts, and the organisation was not strong in the other districts, and with that we started the People’s War. Now we have strong organisation everywhere in Nepal, in all 75 districts, and during the 10 years of People’s War we liberated 80% of the population and we were running parallel governments. Actually, we were in effect nearly governing the whole country. The enemy was confined only to the big cities, including the capital and district headquarters, while we were governing the rest of the country.
Peoples War from Strategic Defensive
So this was the situation and the People’s War developed according to the theory of comrade Mao Zedong. The People’s War started from strategic defensive, without arms and without an army and it developed to the higher state, from strategic equilibrium to strategic offensive. In the course of 10 years of People’s War we have developed a very strong People’s Liberation Army. Because we are in the concluding stage of strategic offensive, the task of the revolution is to seize central political power, a countrywide seizure of power. Hence, we had to capture Kathmandu, which is the capital of Nepal. We had to capture the capital and the major towns as well as some district headquarters.
Our People’s Liberation Army is right at the gate of Kathmandu valley. If you have ever gone to Kathmandu, there is one place called Tangot, it is the main gate to enter Kathmandu. Here there was a big police station, in which we annihilated almost two dozen armed forces without any loss from our side, and so we captured Tangot. Right after that we entered into the process of this negotiation.
Many revolutionaries, many Maoists and our comrades have raised one question. You reached the gate of Kathmandu, why was it necessary to enter into the peace process? That is a big question.
War to the Gates — Why Then Change Tactics?
True, we had liberated 80% of the countryside and we had reached up to the gate of Kathmandu. But in order to seize countrywide power, for countrywide victory, our strength was not enough. The Royal Nepalese Army (RNA) was confined to their barracks, they could seldom come out. Whenever they were carrying out actions against our forces, they could just suddenly come out of their barracks, go 4-5 kilometres away from the barracks and encircle a village, and kill each and every person they found before returning. The next day they would propagate that they had killed a number of Maoists from the People’s Liberation Army.
Actually, they were not able to kill our force. They killed the common people. That was their practice for almost one year, since one year back. On the one hand, the RNA could not actually inflict any defeat on our People’s Liberation Army. On the other hand, we were not able to capture their big barracks. They were well fortified, especially with the help of US military experts. They used land mines to surround the barracks, and they used barbed wire. We tried many times but we failed to capture their barracks. That was the situation militarily. We were in a stagnant position militarily. We were trying to make a breakthrough but were not able to capture the barracks, because they were well fortified, and they had lots of modern weapons supplied by India and also helicopters. We were unable to achieve further military victory.
That was the military situation and so far as the political situation is concerned we enjoyed the support of the urban people, but it was not to the level that was required for general insurrection. The support was there, but finally to capture the city and the capital it was necessary to carry out insurrection, revolt. The support provided by the masses was not at a sufficient level in the cities including Kathmandu, because the masses were divided. Some supported Nepali Congress, other people supported other parties and the level of support of the masses was not enough that was required to achieve the final victory. So this was the political situation.
A Plan for Broadening Political Support
So in the midst of this situation we decided that in order to get further support from the masses our party should take some other initiatives to gather further strength. Otherwise the war would remain in a stagnant situation. Neither the enemy could defeat us, nor could we defeat the enemy. That was the situation. For how long could we continue this situation? War has its own dynamics, it cannot stay still for a long time, for example, if we cannot win victory, the enemy will eventually be able to defeat us. We had to take a new initiative. According to the dynamics of war you have to find a new way to maintain a dynamic situation, we should not be in a static situation in a war for long.
In those circumstances our party decided to take different steps, other political manoeuvres. Our party worked out alternative political tactics of going to the negotiations. Right from the beginning we explained People’s War as a total war. Sometimes there is a wrong notion among Maoists that People’s War is simply the war in which we confront the opposite army, the confrontation between two armies, but this is not true. People’s War is different. People’s War is a total war. We are confronting the enemy on all fronts, including the military front as well as the political front, economic front and also cultural front. On different fronts we have to fight the war, so it is a total war.
During the time of the People’s War itself, and even before that also, we entered into negotiations with the government in 2001 and 2003. But both times they ignored our demands. Again we returned to the war. But in 2005 the situation was quite different, the political situation was also different, which had been created by 10 long years of People’s War. For example the political situation was that 7 other political parties, parliamentary parties, were working together and in cooperation with the King to smash the People’s War. They were participating in the parliament, they were part of the government, they formed the government and were in cooperation with the King. They were very much united to fight against us, and it was necessary for us to use political manoeuvring to split the enemy camp. It was necessary, because they were united.
Forming an Anti-Monarchy Alliance
We took the initiative and we called the political parties to unite with us to make some sort of alliance to overthrow the monarchy. But they didn’t accept it. When we proposed this to them in 2001 and 2003 they didn’t accept it. But something new happened in Nepal. King Gyanendra, who was autocratic, staged a coup d’etat and arrested most of the political leaders who were actually working with him. He arrested most of them and put them behind bars and their political parties were banned. They could not carry out any political activities, so there was a big challenge to those political parties. There was a question of existence for those political parties. So this is one aspect, and for that we thank King Gyanendra, for we stretched our hands to those political parties to make an alliance with us, and the situation compelled them to come to join hands with our party.
This was political compulsion, which had been created by the People’s War itself. And it was a good opportunity for us to make an alliance with the 7 parties. We made the 12 point agreement, as it is popularly known, and in that alliance we concretely put forward the demand that we should make an alliance to fight against the autocratic monarchy.
In our 12 point agreement it was not clearly mentioned that we were fighting for the republic, but later, in the 8 point agreement, this was clearly mentioned, that we are fighting for a republic. It was the common point of agreement to fight against the monarchy for the republic. According to this an interim constitution was supposed to be enacted, an interim government was supposed to be formed and election of constituent assembly was to be held.
So far as the other international players are concerned, US imperialism was dead against this negotiation, because the US had its own agenda. US policy was to make an alliance between the 7 political parties and the King in order to smash the People’s War and our Party. But because of the situation on the ground, the parliamentary parties could not agree with the US policy. The situation in Nepal was quite different. They were compelled to make an alliance with our Party against the monarchy instead of following the US suggestion of making an alliance with the King to fight against the Maoist Party.
Secondly, when we were supposed to participate in the parliament, the US threatened that if Maoists were participating in the parliament the US government would cut all aid to Nepal. But it was to happen, and they could not cut the aid, so they finally supported it. Okay, they agreed that the Maoist party could join the parliament, but they still would not allow the Maoists to enter the government. If that happened, not only would they cut the aid, but they would also insist their allies impose an economic embargo on Nepal. But even when we participated in the government they could not do this. So it was the failure of US policy, total failure of the US government and their policy regarding the negotiation.
The Role of India
So far as India is concerned, when the King staged the coup d’etat in Nepal, most of the leaders of the political parties were dependent on India, they were inside prison and their parties were banned, so India was angry with that. The political parties could ask the Indian government not to supply arms to the King, his army, because they said that the weapons would be used against the Nepalese people. There was big pressure on the Indian government, and finally the Indian Prime Minister suspended the supply of arms which was already in the pipeline.
They suspended the supply of arms temporarily, and the King reacted very sharply, he wasn’t expecting that, since he was fighting against the Maoists he thought all the reactionaries of the world would automatically support him. This was his idea but it didn’t happen, and the angry king went to China where he bought arms. This aggravated the contradiction between the Indian government and the King, because according to India, the King was violating all the norms, without India’s consent Nepal is not allowed to purchase arms from a third country. So the contradiction between the Indian government and the King sharpened and we should also thank Gyanendra for this.
In this situation, the Indian government allowed a meeting between the 7 parties and our party to be held in India. It was simply impossible to organise such a meeting in Nepal, because when we invited the 7 parties to our base areas they were very much afraid. If they entered our base area to hold a meeting, when they returned, the RNA would kill them. We were secure in our base areas, our leadership was staying in the base areas, we invited them to come for the meeting in the base areas but they could not go to our base areas.
They were searching for some other place like India. India’s position before was that they would not allow any activities in India for our party. For example, right before that they arrested some leaders of our party and imprisoned them for a long time, including me. You know this very well, because you carried out a very big campaign here for my release and for the safety of my life. Also one of our senior leaders, Comrade Kiran was arrested, including us 150 cadres and leaders from Nepal were arrested. Some were handed over to the Royal Nepalese Army and others were imprisoned for a long time in India.
Labeled “Terrorist” — Leading the People
They treated us as leaders of a terrorist group not as a political party, as a terrorist organisation. This was the situation. But after that the situation changed because an alliance was necessary between the 7 parties and our party. India accepted to some extent that there should be a meeting between the other parties and the Maoist party. There was an alliance, there was the 12 point agreement, and after that the 8 point agreement and a common program called a mass movement. We called the Nepalese people to protest against the monarchy.
After this there was an unprecedented mass movement in Nepal. As everybody knows, it was really unprecedented, this 19 day mass movement. Over one million people in Kathmandu, which only has a population of almost two million people, went into the streets. As you can imagine, if two thirds of the people of London went on to the streets, what would the picture be?
The King used all his force against the mass movement. Forget about firing rifles, they were even using tanks. But people were lying down and they were issuing the challenge: “just bring your tanks”. Why did the people feel so strong? Why had they no fear of tanks and the RNA? There is one very important factor behind that: because they knew very well that the People’s Liberation Army was somewhere nearby. It was quite near. We have our own army, the People’s Liberation Army.
If the RNA did something like killing people, then there would be revenge by the People’s Liberation Army. The people had so much confidence in the People’s Liberation Army, so they were ready to make sacrifices. If there had been no People’s Liberation Army, that confidence and that militancy could not have come out in the masses automatically. Otherwise, in every country this type of mass movement could occur.
Now people sometimes argue that the mass movement alone was decisive, that political change was brought about in Nepal by the mass movement, not because of the ten year People’s War. This is not correct. This is a simplistic analysis. If there had been no People’s War, the new situation would not have arisen, the new alliance would not have been formed.
This alliance was formed with those political parties who used to treat us as the enemy. You can see, those people of Nepali Congress, they declared our party as a terrorist organisation. Our Party was branded as a terrorist organisation by different governments including the US. They issued Interpol warrants against us in more than 120 countries. They declared bounty over our heads, from 100,000 to 5,000,000 rupees, that if Maoists were captured, handed over dead or alive, they will provide that money.
In one press conference when the Home Minister was explaining all these things, that the government had taken the decision that if people capture Maoists and hand them over dead or alive, they will get this amount of money. One journalist asked him whether the government will really pay the money or not, because people had serious doubts in their minds. People used to say that even if they handed over Maoists, dead or alive, or if they hand over the heads of Maoists, the government would take the heads but not pay the money. What will you do? What do you say to this? The Home Minister said no, this is not correct. In the same bag that you bring us the heads of Maoists, we will take the head and fill the bag with money in return.
During that time our heads had a price on them. The same people in the government then, we are making an alliance with them now. This is a peculiar situation, but it happened under political compulsion. They have not become our class friends, our class allies - they cannot, they are definitely our class enemies. But because of this political situation we had to make an alliance with these types of forces. India was also supplying arms to fight our party, but because of the political compulsion this was also suspended. These were the political developments.
Joining a Reactionary Government, Is it Wrong?
And now, as we sum up what we have done, I will explain something more. For example, there is suspicion amongst some Maoist parties that it is wrong for our party to participate in the government. How can Maoists participate in the government, a reactionary government? Have they given up their line, their ideology?
We think this is not true. It is true that in history we don’t have this type of event, of any revolutionary communist participating with the reactionary force in the same government. This is true, we have no such event in history. For example, in Russia comrade Lenin put forward the proposal of provisional revolutionary government. When the Tsar was overthrown, they would form a provisional revolutionary government. This was the proposal put forward by the Bolshevik Party at that time. In the end, the Tsar was really overthrown, but the Bolshevik Party did not participate in the government.
In China, Mao Zedong put forward a proposal, he wrote a book on the subject. It was a proposal that he put forward in the congress of the party. He proposed coalition government with the Chiang Kai-shek reactionaries. Then there were the Chungking negotiations, and Mao participated for 34 days. Even after 34 days that negotiation was still not concluded, he returned to the base areas and Zhou Enlai and other leaders continued the negotiations. Mao put forward the proposal of coalition government, but this did not materialise in practice. In Russia and China, their proposals were put forward but actually in practice did not materialise, but in Nepal we have participated in the government.
Later on we pulled out of the government because of different reasons that I will explain. When we evaluate this, whether it was right to participate in the government, our evaluation is that it was correct because of two reasons. It was clear for us that by participating in the government we would not be able to resolve the problems of Nepal. We received five portfolios in the government, but the whole government and the whole bureaucratic machinery and everything remains in the hands of reactionaries. Definitely, we will not be able to solve the problems of the people. That we knew very well. We are not so stupid to think that by taking these five portfolios we could resolve these problems. But we joined the government for specific reasons.
One of the reasons is that it was necessary for us to develop international relations, because we were totally isolated. As I explained, the government had declared us a terrorist organisation. Interpol issued arrest warrants for most of the leaders of our party in more than 120 countries. We had the support of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) and some Maoist parties, this is true, but from other international players we were totally isolated. So it was necessary, because we think at present Maoist forces are not very strong internationally compared with the forces of reactionaries. In terms of strength we are negligible, so depending on only RIM and Maoist forces the revolution cannot succeed.
Prerequisites for Maintaining Revolutionary Power
Secondly, we would not be able to sustain our revolution. If we were able to capture power on a certain day, it would be very difficult to sustain it for a long time. We are encircled by enemies, and the strength of the enemy is many times more than the strength of our Maoist forces. So we feel that we should develop relations. We should use the contradictions among different reactionary forces so that they will not be unified to attack our revolution. We also want to increase support from outside. The unity among the RIM forces is fundamental. The unity among Maoist forces that are not in the RIM is also very important. This is an ideological question. Ideologically it is a vital question for us.
In spite of this we should look for support from different circles, which are not Maoist but are progressive forces, who don’t want autocratic monarchy in Nepal, who maybe want bourgeois democracy, democratic rights, prosperity for Nepal. Secondly we should strive to get the support of anti-imperialist forces, because imperialism is the main enemy of the people in the world today. We should seek support from broad anti-imperialist forces, some democratic forces, social democratic forces who claim to be communist though clearly they are not, but at least they support the struggle against the monarchy.
It is also necessary to utilise the contradictions between different states. For example, if we didn’t participate in the government and we were not in the parliament, I would not be able to travel to Europe. It would be simply impossible because we were listed as a terrorist organisation, we could not travel abroad and contact the people to explain our position and get direct support from them. This trip would have been impossible
Nepal is between two big powers, two huge powers, two giants, China and India. Now the relationship between China and India is better than before. There is no war between China and India. In the past there was a war, but now there is not, they have a better relationship, they have trade relations. But still there are differences, there are contradictions between them. So being in the government we are able to use these contradictions.
Indian Intervention
For example, I will tell you something that happened quite recently in Nepal. India was trying to intervene in the Terai. India didn’t directly intervene militarily, but they were creating chaos in our plains, as well as into the rest of Nepal, by providing every help to their agents. There was this type of intervention. But just 3 or 4 months ago, the ambassador of China gave a statement and said that if there was intervention from outside in Nepal, it would not be tolerated by China. They gave this statement, which is very significant. India was defeated by China in the 1962 war, and when the Chinese challenge India they will be demoralised. When they hear the name of the Chinese army they become frightened, they remember 1962, when the Chinese army gave them a very big defeat.
Quite recently there was a delegation from China that came to visit Nepal including Professor Wang who is the architect of foreign policy of the Chinese government. He leads academic institutions in China. He came to Nepal and in an interview in Kathmandu he said that the US and India are intervening in Nepal in different ways. There is a limit to everything, and if this limit is exceeded, China will not tolerate it. That was a big challenge but all these things didn’t happen spontaneously. We had different rounds of talks with the Chinese leadership and we are talking to the Chinese government and Party representatives about this question.
For example, I myself talked to these people and I said before the coming statement, if you support us, what support will you be providing? You are not saying anything about this. First of all you will send your opinion to the Chinese government, which will take 2 months to reach Beijing, then you will discuss this and only make decisions after 4 more months. Within 6 months what will happen in Nepal? Nobody knows. So what is the use of your support? They said no, it will not be like that. We will make decisions quickly. We welcomed this statement.
Right at this point of time we are making the revolution in a situation when there is no socialist camp. There is no socialist country to support the revolution. We have to make revolution in this situation, which is quite difficult. It was a similar situation in 1917 when the Bolshevik Party, under the leadership of Comrade Lenin, made revolution in Russia. But then there were some positive factors. For example, there was a very strong working class movement in Europe. Now it seems to be dead. But during that time it was very strong, especially in Germany. This was a positive support to the Russian revolution.
Also, the government of Russia, the Tsarist government, was heavily engaged in the First World War. The people of Russia, including the army, were tired of that war. Actually, they were angry with the Tsar. That was another factor, and Lenin put forward the slogan of “peace, bread and land”. The people were very happy. Lenin won support from sections of the army of the Tsar, and they deserted the army and joined them. These were the positive political factors in the Russian revolution, but in Nepal we don’t have this kind of support. In Asia, there is definitely some struggle, some revolutionary movements, but they are not very strong. Our country is not engaged in any war, and there is no world war. So in this situation, it is more difficult to accomplish the revolution. You can continue the revolution, you can start the revolution, but to accomplish the revolution is an uphill task.
If you are not able to utilise the contradictions among different reactionary forces, it is very difficult. Now if we sum up the correctness and incorrectness of our political tactics, we think that it is basically correct. What is the aim of political tactics? The aim of political tactics is to create a split in the enemy camp and unite the revolutionary forces. We were successful in doing that, because we split the monarchy and political parties, who were fighting against us together. We split them, and we took the political parties and we have almost smashed the monarchy. Now in Nepal the monarchy is almost gone. Officially it is not gone, but in reality it is almost gone.
Isolating Political Enemies and Rivals One by One
Now we are trying to isolate the Nepali Congress Party. It is the turn of Nepali Congress to be isolated, because we have already isolated the King and nearly smashed the monarchy. Now it is the turn of Nepali Congress, which is also a reactionary force. They declared bounty on our heads. They declared our party as a terrorist organisation. Now comes its turn. Now we are uniting with the Communist Party of Nepal United Marxist-Leninists (UML), which was always advocating unity between Nepali Congress and their party, to fight against our party. Now we are going to split them.
They are on the verge of a split, for example, quite recently we put forward two proposals in the parliament. First, a republic should be declared from the parliament. Second, the mode of the election should be fully proportional. These are the two points we put forward for discussion in the parliament. Over this issue we were able to split the Nepali Congress and UML.
When we put forward this proposal, UML was in a very difficult situation, whether to support our proposal or oppose it. All communists have an inborn character to want a republic. No communist in the world would support a monarchy. UML claim to be communist. If they opposed our proposal they would be afraid that we Maoists would expose them among the masses that they are no longer communist, they are pro-King. But, if they vote for the Maoist proposal, it will be passed. So they were in a very difficult situation.
Furthermore, they supported fully proportional elections before, and when it comes to a vote, if they vote in favour that would support the Maoists, if they vote against that would expose them to the masses. They were in a very difficult situation so they tried to negotiate with our party, “please don’t go for voting, lets compromise”. But we were determined. Our party’s central committee had decided that we could not compromise on these two issues. We could never compromise. We didn’t compromise and finally it went to a vote, and UML was compelled to vote in favour. There was an agreement with UML because they submitted the proposal with amendments. Actually, they supported a republic in a different way, and we supported their amendments. Regarding the electoral process, they supported fully proportional elections. When it came for voting, with the support of UML our proposal was passed by the parliament with a majority.
Because our proposal was passed by the majority, and Nepali Congress voted against our proposal, we were staking up the issue - to expose and isolate Nepali Congress. Now we are putting forward the proposal for making amendments in the constitution. For example, here, according to the constitution, to make amendments requires a two-thirds majority. A simple majority is not enough for that. But to ask the government to put forward that proposal in the parliament, a majority can work. Because now, UML and our party together, we are in the majority. We are compelling Nepali Congress to put forward that proposal for discussion. Because according to the constitution, it is the government which should put forward the proposal to amend the constitution, not any political party. It is the responsibility of the government.
Now Nepali Congress is in a dilemma. They are in a very difficult situation, they can go neither way. If they put forward that proposal for discussion in the parliament then they will be facing a moral problem, because quite recently they voted against that proposal. Putting forward the same proposal in the parliament to get the majority is a moral question for them, number one. If they don’t put forward that proposal, they will be defying the majority. In that case we will have the right, constitutionally, to ask them to resign from the government. “You have no moral right to be in the government because you are defying the decision of the majority!” So they will no longer be in the government. Our tactical line is thus isolating Nepali Congress.
Nepali Congress and UML were fighting collectively against our party, and we have told the leaders of UML that it is their turn to be Prime Minister. “If you want to be Prime Minister, first you should topple the Nepali Congress government”. We know very well that we should not hold this post at this point of time. Using the post of Prime Minister we are creating a split between Nepali Congress and the UML.
We are isolating the enemy one by one. We don’t know when the turn of UML will come. We are waiting for that. But the monarchy has been isolated, and secondly, now Nepali Congress has been isolated. It is very difficult even for the US and India to defend the Nepali Congress now. They are keeping mute, because according to their own definition of democracy – forget about our democracy, we define it in a different way – but their definition of democracy is that it is the rule of the majority, whoever enjoys the support in the parliament, they will form the government. This is their principle, it is their definition. But if you are in the minority, you don’t have that right. Whoever enjoys majority support, they have the right to govern. Since Nepali Congress is not able to enjoy majority support the US and India are keeping mute. We are saying “you please define your own democracy. What is your democracy? Did you redefine it?” They are keeping mute.
We are able to split Nepali Congress from UML. One by one we are trying to isolate them. This is political tactics. This also applies in the case of military actions. For example, Mao has already instructed us that when you have to eat a full plate of your food, rice, if you are hungry, you should not lift the whole plate and eat it like this. What is the proper way of eating? You should eat gulp by gulp. This is tactics. Finishing the food is our strategy, putting all this material in our stomachs is our strategy. How do we fulfil this strategy? By eating gulp by gulp. We have almost finished “eating” the monarchy. Then we are going to “eat” Nepali Congress and hopefully some time later we will “eat” other revisionists, this is our aim.
So now when we evaluate our tactics we think that they have been basically successful. Right at this moment the struggle is going on in the parliament and they are in the minority. We are trying to use this majority and minority to develop the struggle. If you ask about the election of constituent assembly, this is tactics.
Will the Elections be Held?
When will the elections be held? This is not a matter of so much concern for our party, frankly speaking. We have to make revolution, for however long we can use these tactics to make revolution, we will use them. When and in which day the election will be held is of less importance. But definitely we will be using the elections of the constituent assembly as long as we can. It is necessary, because it has become the agenda of the nation. Every international paper is talking about the constituent assembly, but five years back it was only the agenda of our party. Nobody else accepted it.
In the second national congress of our party we decided that we should go forward with this tactic. At that time nobody else accepted it, because for these 7 political parties the existing constitution was one of the best constitutions of the world. They said to us that we are challenging the constitution, which is one of the best in the world, so they could not agree with that. Now everybody is talking about it, including US imperialism. They were so concerned and were saying that the Maoists were going to destroy the constituent assembly. Now it has become the agenda of everybody. But so far as our party is concerned we are very clear, it is a tactical line. With that tactic we are able to create the spirit. We were able to build up the mass movement through those tactics and we are using these tactics to make revolution in order to succeed in New Democratic Revolution.
We will definitely be using these tactics, we are not going to give them up. It would be wrong. It will be a burden on the part of the Communist Party to give up the tactics which are already established within society and internationally. It is just like giving up arms to the enemy, saying “just take these arms and attack us”. We are not so stupid. We should not be so stupid that we give the arms to the enemy and say do whatever you like. We will use these arms ourselves. This is the situation in Nepal.
We know very clearly that Nepali Congress will never accept these two proposals because they have their own compulsion. They cannot accept these two proposals because they think that if the monarchy is abolished and a republic is declared, everybody will understand that this republic has come into being because of the Maoists. It is a Maoist instigated republic. The whole political benefit will be taken by the Maoists.
There will be proportional elections and some reactionary people and some journalists, are intimidating Nepali Congress now. These journalists are taking the statistics of the last election and showing the total strength of the Nepali Congress – two Nepali Congress Parties which have joined together – altogether was 180 and something seats. If you go to the polls with this full electoral process, you will get less than 70 seats. So they will suffer a lot. And how much will the Maoists gain? They will either win a majority of the seats or will be the biggest party in the parliament. Nepali Congress are really afraid of that, even though we don’t give importance to the elections.
We communists don’t give that much importance to these elections, but for the reactionaries elections are everything. As you can see, it is not very common in Europe and in the UK, but if you go and observe elections in South Asia, in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, people kill each other over the election. No matter how many people will be killed they still want to win the election. This is the way elections are fought. For reactionaries the election is decisive. If they think beforehand that they are going to be defeated, why would they vote for that? It is suicidal for them, they will not accept our proposal, we know.
This is good and bad, there are two aspects. On the one hand it is good, but on the other hand it is bad. It is good because if they will not accept it, we will develop the mass movement. When we have achieved a majority, that achievement will be used against Nepali Congress, and that will develop the mass movement that we have already. It is in our agenda that we work out the plan of the next mass movement to press the government to put forward this proposal in parliament. To make amendments in the constitution by a two-thirds majority will also not really happen, so we can develop the mass movement. We are using this majority, the weapon of the majority, against Nepali Congress. We are making the plan of developing the mass movement and our aim is to seize central power. This is the aim of the mass movement.
Apparently it seems like the situation is very simple, because we have already achieved a majority and Maoists are in a better position, we will go forward easily. But this is not true, because everything is approaching a climax in Nepal. We are in the process of a very big change. If communists succeed, are able to capture state power, it will not only be a victory of the Nepalese people, the Nepalese proletariat, but it would also be the victory of the revolutionaries of the world today. It will be the centre, the base area of the world revolution.
Revolutionary Movements around the World
Reactionaries, including US imperialists, know this very well. So it is US imperialism which is trying its best not to allow the revolution to succeed, not because of economic reasons, even though the US has an interest to exploit, to extract wealth from Nepal. We don’t think like that, because Nepal is not a big economy for the US and it is not easy for the US to extract wealth from Nepal. But politically it is very important. Once the revolution succeeds in Nepal it will have a big impact at the international level – because revolutionary movements are building up, taking shape in different parts of the world today.
For example, in neighbouring India there is a significant Maoist movement. The government has repeatedly accepted that it is a political threat. According to the government evaluation, previously the nationalist movement was the greatest political threat. But in the last 2 to 3 years they have been saying that the Maoist movement is the greatest threat to the Indian government. If the revolution in Nepal will succeed right at their border, definitely this will have a direct impact and maybe the Indian reactionary class will not be able to stop the revolution there. If India were liberated then it will be a very big thing for the world revolution.
There are also other countries where revolutionary movements are developing, for example in Turkey, some comrades in Iran are trying to make a breakthrough there, as well as in Peru and in the Philippines. If the revolution in Nepal succeeds then there will be a great effect on the world revolution. Other movements will move forward with tremendous strength. Even if other people don’t know this, the CIA and US imperialism know its significance. They will do their best to prevent it. They will do their best to prevent the revolution at any cost.
During the 1990s the Soviet Union disintegrated. Actually we didn’t call it socialism, it was not socialist, but popularly it was known as a socialist country and western imperialism defined it as socialist. The imperialists were very happy with the collapse of the Soviet Union and they declared that Marxism will never come back again. For western imperialism, socialism existed for seventy years in the Soviet Union and then collapsed. They claim, now there will be no more socialism. The best system in the world is capitalism, not socialism. It has been proven from practice. They were getting like that, Marxism has gone, it is dead, it will never come back. But now there is a revolution under the leadership of the Maoist Party in Nepal. All their arguments, all their proof, all their efforts will be shattered. So they are very much afraid of the revolution in Nepal. So definitely imperialism will do its best to prevent the revolution from being accomplished in Nepal.
If you ask me the question of whether in Nepal we are fighting against the monarchy only, this is not the case. The monarchy is almost finished, because even Nepali Congress have taken a position that will not support the monarchy. All the 7 parties have accepted that we are not for monarchy, we are for a republic. Now the king is no more the head of state, he is no more the supreme commander of the army and has no following among the masses. So actually, we have already finished the monarchy.
In fact, we are fighting against US imperialism. US imperialism is trying to restore and revive the monarchy. It is trying to organise the reactionaries and regressive forces around the monarchy. It is getting support from Indian reactionaries, Hindu fundamentalists. The real fight in Nepal is against US imperialism. In this situation, we think that it is a good thing that we have the opportunity to fight US imperialism. But it is difficult, it is not easy to fight against US imperialism. So the fight against US imperialism has to be carried out internationally, because it is the enemy of the people of the world.
Now we are striving to develop anti-imperialist struggle throughout the world. We are trying to make alliance with the forces who are fighting against US imperialism. In order to fight US imperialism internationally it is necessary to gather support from all revolutionary people, anti-imperialist people, Maoist and all revolutionaries of the world.
We are making tours of European countries in order to gain support. We have to get support from all different forces against US imperialism with the aim of supporting the revolution in Nepal. This is also a significant step for you in Europe, because you are supporting the revolution in Nepal. We should definitely get support from the broad masses in Europe. I think there are many good people in Europe. There are many revolutionaries, many communists, who are very enthusiastic about making revolution in their country, or accomplishing revolution anywhere in the world. Time and again they have expressed their solidarity, regarding our release from prison, saving our lives, supporting our revolution in Nepal. If you have a correct line, you have a much higher fighting capacity.
You may think that since there is no revolutionary movement, that there is no working class movement in Europe, so therefore nothing can be done here. Comrades, you should not be disappointed. Communists should not be disappointed. You have the strength, provided you have the correct ideological and political line and you dare to implement that line, you can do it.
I will give some examples. When I was in prison, the Prime Minister of Nepal visited Belgium in order to procure arms from the Belgian government. Belgium produces lots of arms, and they had already agreed to supply arms to the Nepalese government. Our comrades during that time, they were not a large number, there were around 100 comrades in Belgium, and they knew that this guy had come to Belgium to procure the arms that can be used against the People’s War. So they organised a protest and they contacted different political forces including the Workers Party of Belgium (PTB), which was against supplying arms to suppress the people of Nepal. They got support from PTB and some other anti-monarchy forces and some revolutionary forces. They protested in the parliament and even the Green Party supported them. They protested inside the parliament and in front of the European parliament and they shouted slogans. Finally the government decided not to supply the arms on this occasion.
Even 100 people can do that, if you have a correct line, if you have a correct ideology. It is a very big thing to stop the supply of arms to the Royal Nepalese Army. Actually, it was a major support for the People’s War. If the arms reached Nepal it would have a very bad effect on the People’s War. But they were able to stop it. So we should not be disappointed, we have that strength, because our ideology has a huge strength. When we implement this ideology then it becomes a material force. Ideology is in our minds, if we write, it goes onto the paper, and when we implement it, it becomes material force. So our ideology, invincible ideology, definitely creates invincible force.
Comrades in Europe, we have that ideology, if you work on the correct political line, you can create a major force. It is necessary to gather support internationally to support the People’s War in Nepal. Supporting the People’s War in Nepal ultimately means to fight against US imperialism. Now it is clear, while making revolution in Nepal we are side by side fighting against US imperialism, and definitely it is a big task.
It is Your Revolution Too
We think that the revolution in Nepal is not only the revolution of the people of Nepal, it is your revolution also. We are making revolution for everybody, it is our common effort. Once the revolution in Nepal succeeds, it will be the base area of the world revolution. I hope and believe that we accomplish the revolution in Nepal with our combined force.
Thank you very much.