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 The National Reconstruction Authority officials say their hands are tied. As the SRBC Pappu JV, better known as Pappu Construction, has bid the lowest amount for the reconstruction of the damaged central bank building at Baluwatar, and since the bid meets all the technical requirements, the infamous company is sure to bag the contract. Of late the construction company has come under withering criticism for inordinate delays in vital infrastructure projects and for shoddy work.

Of 41 bridges that Pappu has committed to build, it has missed the deadlines on 25. Yet it continues to get lucrative government contracts. One reason is that it has friends in high places. The company is owned by Hari Narayan Rauniyar, a federal lawmaker from the Federal Socialist Forum Nepal that is a part of the KP Oli government. Curiously, Rauniyar is in the federal parliament’s development committee that is man­dated to monitor progress of national development works. Parliamentary regulations prohibit MPs with such conflict of interest from serving in its committees. (Two Nepali Congress members of the development committee have similar conflict of interest, and they have predictably come to Rauniyar’s defense.)

The government may make all the noise it likes about its big ambitions for national development, about its crack-down on cartels, about zero tolerance for cor­ruption. But people will have hard time trusting it when even the most egregious violators of the law are being rewarded instead of being harshly punished; when contractors and medical college owners can sit on vital parliamentary bodies and brazenly tweak the rules for personal benefit.

The Oli government is powerful enough to change this. For instance it can alter the public procurement rule that favors the lowest bidder, irrespective of the bidder’s quality of work. In what will be a powerful deterrent, it can also cancel long-delayed works and punish the contractors. No country has prospered on the back of corruption and shoddy work. The longer the government takes to act against these fraudulent contractors and self-serving MPs, the greater will be public disenchantment. They gave the left coalition two-thirds majority with the confidence that the coali­tion would use the ensuing stability to realize its elec­toral agenda of common prosperity—and surely not to further cement corruption and cronyism.

It may have been made with the best of intent. Many of its provisions may be laudable too. But three years after the promulgation of the new constitution, its success or failure largely hing­es on one, whether it can be implemented and two, on whether the new charter, through amendments if needed, can embrace all sections of the society. The promulgation of the new constitution was a monu­mental feat no doubt: For the first time in Nepal’s dem­ocratic history people’s chosen representatives had written a constitution on their own.

It set in motion the process of institutionalization of the federal democratic republic, particularly with the completion of three tiers of elections under the fed­eral setup. The rationale for federalization was simple enough. The unitary state centered on Kathmandu had miserably failed to meet the aspirations of the down­trodden and the marginalized communities, even as it enriched a handful of elites. The goal was thus to decentralize governance, to take democracy to the grassroots through empowerment of provincial and local bodies. Things have not gone as planned.

The three elections have been completed but there has been no meaningful devolution of power and resources. The federal government has in fact been loath to empower provinces and local bodies. But the local representatives are not blameless either; instead of bringing democracy to the grassroots they are busy buying expensive vehicles and giving themselves all kinds of unearned perks with the help of new tax­es they have levied. These were the kind of excesses under the old unitary state that the federal setup want­ed to do away with.

The other big challenge is accommodating the mar­ginalized communities that still feel left out of the polit­ical mainstream. With so many competing demands, that won’t be easy either. The risk is that as voices of disgruntlements intensify, and federal and lower tiers of governments quarrel over power and resources, people’s faith in federalism, and by extension the new constitution, will erode. This in turn could once again boost undemocratic forces.

It is now upon the drafters of the constitution to ensure its longevity by timely amending it, quickly drafting requisite laws, better training the old bureau­cracy on federal ways and by instituting a culture of good governance and accountability.

It has happened at last. Two and a half years after Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli signed the landmark trade and transit agreement during his state visit to China in 2016, the protocol to make the agreement functional has finally been agreed to. China will now allow Nepal four ports and three dry ports for third-country trade. As per the agreement, Nepali cargo vehicles will be allowed into China to ferry goods to and fro from these ports. When the finalized protocol is signed at the highest level—most probably during the expected Nepal visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping, sometime in 2019—it will be a monumental development for the landlocked Nepal.

It will once and for all end the state of Nepal’s near complete dependence on India, with which it does nearly 90 percent of its trade and through which it carries out all of its third-coun­try trade. When the Chinese routes are open, never again will India be able to impose the kind of crippling economic blockades it has resorted to whenever Kathmandu has not agreed to do its bidding. That at least is the idea.

But there are some hitches. The nearest Chi­nese port is over 2,600 km away while the port of Kolkata that Nepal has traditionally relied on for third-country trade is just 627 km from the Nepali bor­der. That being the case, how many traders will choose Chinese routes instead of Indian ones? Thus by the time the finalized protocol is signed, Nepal and Chi­na must explore ways to make transit via China both cheap and hassle-free. For instance one advantage of Chinese ports could be that the freight-handling there is fast and Nepali traders will not have to spend much to store their goods there.

We believe that irrespective of the issue of financial viability, just having the option of reaching the high seas via China will greatly boost the morale of the landlocked country. In today’s interconnected world, no country can afford to completely rely on another; it must rather look to engage with the widest spectrum of countries possible. We also hope that India under­stands this and that it does not look to punish Nepal for ‘cozying up’ to China. Such churlishness will only undercut India’s standing among the smaller countries in the region.

The constitution confers on all Nepalis over 18 years of age the right to vote in any one electoral constituency in the country. Yet around four million of them were denied a vote in the last electoral cycle in 2017. Electoral laws required that you be present in person if you wanted to vote. As this option was often unavailable for migrants, they were, in a way, disenfranchised. This is why the Supreme Court order to the government to arrange for Nepali migrants abroad to vote in elec­tions in Nepal is timely. For a remittance-dependent country, it was criminal to deny those living and working abroad, Nepal’s lifeblood, their inalienable right to adult franchise.

But while the apex court decision is laudable, it will not be easy to implement. The first thing that the Election Commission must do is find out exactly how many Nepali citizens are living abroad. With Nepalis now scattered all over the world, this will be challenging. In that case, perhaps a start can be made by making voting arrangements for those who show an active inter­est in exercising their franchise. But even this is easier said. How does the commission find out if they have already renounced their Nepali citizenships, in which case they can’t vote?

There are many other technical and logistical hur­dles. But if it was impossible, 110 countries would not be doing it. There is a growing realization that in a world that is getting more and more integrated thanks to the rapid growth of information technology and eas­ier travel, it is both immoral and impractical to deny the legitimate citizens of a particular country their fun­damental right to vote.

As the Nepali government is now under legal obliga­tion to act likewise, and as it is a complicated issue, it may not be a bad idea to constitute a team of experts to suggest feasible ways. Thankfully, the next round of elections are not scheduled for years. The focus over the next few years should thus be on allowing maxi­mum number of Nepalis abroad to vote rather than piloting the idea among select communities. There is enough time.