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With the announcement of single-phase local elections on May 13, the country has entered election mode. This is something to be celebrated. There was a lot of political uncertainty following the downfall of the KP Oli government. People had given a five-year mandate to the communist coalition of CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Center), which eventually merged into the Nepal Communist Party (NCP). Yet the NCP split and the government it led fell after three years. Nepali Congress, distant-second in the last parliamentary elections, never had the mandate to lead the government—and yet it does now. 

 It is only right that the political logjam be cleared through elections. The Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government was vacillating over local polls in what was a purely political calculation. It even seemed ready to bend electoral laws and even the constitution to postpone polls. But continuous pressure from the Election Commission, the opposition parties, the media and the civil society paid off and the government was forced to announce a timely election date. This shows that despite the myriad deficiencies in the three organs of the state, it is still difficult to easily subvert Nepal’s democratic spirit.

 Besides all the usual challenges for any elections in Nepal—including curbing sky-high campaign spending—there is also the added burden of holding such a vast mass-mobilization exercise during a deadly pandemic, which, despite its ebbs and flows, shows no sign of soon disappearing. The big challenge here will not be getting voters to maintain social distance or wear masks. It will rather be to convince political parties to resist from holding unnecessary rallies and gatherings: such reckless electoral campaigning was largely responsible for the troubling recent spurt of covid infections in the neighboring Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, and in West Bengal and Assam a year earlier. 

 It will be a tricky balancing act between continuing with a vital democratic exercise and safeguarding public health. But the announcement of local elections undoubtedly represents a rare silver lining in the otherwise gloomy Nepali political skies.

The debate over the MCC compact has dragged on for far too long for anyone’s good. For a controversy that has been years in the making, there are understandably strong opinions on either side. Those opposed to it remain adamant that it is a part of US military strategy and inimical to Nepal’s interest. Those in favor find not much wrong with a compact that has over the years had the support of all of Nepal’s major political forces. Moreover, as they see it, the time-bound, transmission line-and-road grant project is very much in Nepal’s interest.

We believe time has come to settle the debate once and for all. The country has been endlessly debating the MCC compact over the past five years, as if it had no more pressing issue. The longer the compact has dragged on, the more domestic political actors have been inclined to use it for partisan gains. True, the Americans did not help their own cause through their contradictory statements on the compact. But then it is up to Nepal to settle it, based on its own calculations.

The government should table it in parliament and let the sovereign body decide its fate. We are in favor of endorsing a compact that successive Nepali governments have committed to implementing. But if the parliament rejects it, so be it. At least that will be the end of the story. The compact has been so politicized and hyped up that instead of vital national issues like implementation of federalism and better preparing the country for future pandemics, the electoral debate has come to be perversely centered on a comparably innocuous bilateral agreement.

Any foreign help comes with strings attached. What Nepal has to decide is if it needs continued US support and presence. This newspaper has long argued that it is dangerous for Nepal to completely rely on its two neighbors. (Remember Lipulekh?) We will also do well to internalize that all future American help and engagement with Nepal will, in one or the other way, be linked to its strategic objective of containing China. So let us first be clear about what we want.

The Sher Bahadur Deuba-led coalition government came into being, via a court order, after erstwhile Prime Minister KP Oli started playing fast and loose with the constitution. Oli had twice dissolved the federal lower house on dubious constitutional grounds and the Supreme Court had to step in to check his excesses. The parties in the current ruling coalition—Nepali Congress, CPN (Maoist Center) and CPN (Unified Socialist)—had been up in arms against Oli and his ‘totalitarian ways’. But they seem to be doing no better.

It is unfortunate that the ruling coalition, and Prime Minister Deuba in particular, is trying to postpone local elections for partisan gains. Deuba and those in the coalition apparently believe local elections before federal and parliamentary elections will work to the main opposition’s favor. And so they want to put them off by six months by using a constitutional loophole. But the constitution most definitely doesn’t say local elections

should—or even can—be held six months after the expiry of the term of the local bodies.

It would be both logical and desirable to first hold the local elections in April—as proposed by the Election Commission—and then the two remaining ties of elections. Postponing local elections will leave a political vacuum at the local level, which the constitution does not envision under any condition. Last week, we wrote approvingly of the ruling coalition’s ‘agreement’ to start local elections on April 27. Perhaps we spoke too soon, placing our faith in the alliance to uphold the constitution.

If none of our major parties is committed to democratic values and so readily abuse the constitution, it will only be a matter of time before this constitution too fails, not because of its inherent flaws but largely due to its drafters’ failure to uphold its spirit. Again, better sense should prevail and Prime Minister Deuba should push ahead with local elections, with or without the support of his coalition partners. We expect a little statesmanship from the five-time prime minister close to the end of his political career. 

Finally, the ruling coalition has heeded the Election Commission and agreed to hold local elections at the end of April. This clears the way for elections to all three tiers of government, forestalling a worrying political and constitutional vacuum. It could also break the current political logjam. As important, timely local elections will prevent a repeat of the ugly post-2002 period when local bodies were without elected officials for 15-long-years, their absence spawning a corrosive culture of ‘corruption by consensus’.

The ruling coalition, and particularly Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, had been hesitating to announce local elections as it feared the April timing would benefit CPN-UML, the main opposition, and harm the coalition partners, including Nepali Congress. But constant pressure from the UML as well as the civil society paid off and the coalition had to relent. However this decision came about, it is the right one. There can be no democracy without a periodic renewal of people’s mandate.

Also read: Editorial: Everyone’s responsibility

Covid-19 will continue to stalk local elections, even though the country is projected to be well off peak-infection by April-end. More worryingly, the Election Commission could struggle to properly enforce election code of conduct. In 2017 local elections, some ward-level candidates had spent up to a million rupees in campaigning; a whopping Rs 50 billion were spent just on campaigning for local elections across the country. If running in local elections is so costly, contesting provincial and federal elections has become prohibitive, barring all but the richest folks from contesting.  

Does the commission have enough money and manpower to strictly enforce the code of conduct across the country, come April? Can it defy those in power and function with a high level of independence? How will it ensure compliance with covid protocols? How will the commission, historically notorious for buying all kinds of unnecessary vehicles and equipment on election-eve, minimize its costs this time? The deliberations on these vital questions have to start today. Two-months is not a long time given the scale of the task: managing elections across 753 local units, with tens of thousands of candidates in the fray.