Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Election 2013: The People Have Spoken

English: Election logo of Nepali Congress.
English: Election logo of Nepali Congress. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
One can already see the outlines of the election results.

  1. There has been an anti-incumbency wave against the Maoists and the Madhesi parties, but that does not explain their full defeat. Two and a half million people have been disenfranchised. Those were people who would have mostly voted for the Maoists and the Madhesi parties. 
  2. The Nepali Congress and the UML have won rather decisively. But this is not a mandate against federalism. This is more a mandate for peace, law and order, the democratic process, and normalcy. And this is not any clear mandate against the identity based federalism that the Maoists and the Madhesis have been known for. The NC and the UML do not have even a simple majority, let alone a two thirds majority. 
  3. A coalition of non-Maoist parties will likely come into power. That might include Madhesi parties. 
  4. On the contentious issue of federalism the mandate is no different from what it was in the last constituent assembly, that the two sides need to work together and forge some sort of a compromise. Neither a purely identity based federalism nor a purely geographic federalism is in the cards. 
  5. There has been no conspiracy. The Maoists might still have lost, but their wide loss is due to the disenfranchisement of 2.5 million voters, the anti-incumbency factor, and the people saying law and order and the economy are higher priority to them than federalism. 
  6. The Maoist split hurt them big time. I am surprised the UML split has not been hurtful. 
  7. The Madhesi parties have been punished for their numerous splits as predicted. But they still stand a strong chance of going back to power. The NC and the UML don't seem to have the numbers. Sadly the Madhesi parties might not unite even after this clear defeat.  
  8. The Maoists and the Madhesi parties will likely do better on the indirect election side. 
  9. One hopes for a new constitution by the end of 2014. Nepal needs local elections and state elections right after that. 
  10. Prachanda should be elected president. That way it would be okay to keep the Maoists out of power. What are we looking at? Sushil Koirala for PM? KP Oli for DPM? Will Gagan Thapa end up in the cabinet?

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Friday, November 15, 2013

A Global Citizen

Globe
Globe (Photo credit: Joe Shlabotnik)
Globe showing Asia - Satellite image - PlanetO...
Globe showing Asia - Satellite image - PlanetObserver (Photo credit: PlanetObserver)
(written for Vishwa Sandesh)

A Global Citizen
By Paramendra Bhagat (www.paramendra.com)

People who attempt and succeed at global endeavors, all else equal, will make more money than people who are based entirely either in Nepal or in America. There is enormous money to be made in the Nepali market, in the South Asian market, once there is political stability in Nepal, which should happen soon. As soon as the country has a constitution and regular elections, the law and order situation surely will improve. The beauty of a democratic arrangement is if the people demand law and order, they will get law and order. If they demand political stability, they will get political stability.

When there are elections in America, you can follow the polls and have a pretty good idea of how the horse race is shaping up. But there is no poll taking in Nepal. I have no idea how the various political parties will fare. My wild guess is the parliament will be even more fractured than last time. On the federalism issue as well, the people will give a fractured verdict. Neither the identity federalists nor the geographic federalists will garner the two thirds majority needed to push through, and so a grand compromise will have to be forged out, which means the last assembly was just as good for the purpose as the next one will be, which means the country just wasted billions of rupees on a second election.

A few years back when I was the only full timer among the 200,000 Nepalis in America working for Nepal’s democracy movement, it cost me money. But contributing to Nepal’s economic revolution to last decades is to be a money maker.

I am a network marketer with ACN. A few days back I spent a few hours one fine morning reaching out to some of my friends outside America for the business. I sent out Facebook emails to about 50 friends spread across the United Kingdom, Australia, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Belgium, Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Denmark, the Czech Republic, and Finland.

One of the challenges for me in the business has been how do I reach out to people in my personal network who are spread across the United States who I don’t have the option to bring to a meeting in New York City. Looks like digital technology can go a long way. Emails, phone calls, and videos shared can go a long way. The basic premise behind the Internet is that geography ought not matter.

When Mike Maser, the top performing Senior Vice President with ACN, was at my house a few weeks ago – the guy makes 80,000 dollars a week – I told him if we could do NYC right, we could go from a presence in 24 countries to a presence in 124 countries. Nepal is the poorest country outside of Africa, and quite literally every town in Nepal is represented in NYC. That means it has got to be the case that literally every town on the planet has somebody from that town living in this city. A few weeks later his brother Patrick Maser relayed that same thought on stage at Hotel Pennsylvania when he addressed over a thousand people.

A big part of tech consulting is to do with techies in India for me. That really speaks to the Indian in me. But that is also tremendous in terms of business efficiencies. I also bring the home ground advantage of not getting tripped by cultural nuances when communicating with my engineers. They can be subtle, but I have had friends who went on to raise millions for their startups who have been tripped by the same, to the point they plain gave up.

Nepal hydro as I see it has a major role for the investors who are based in New York City. You necessarily have to get investors from India, China and America excited if the sector is to take off like it deserves to.

But then globalization can also go the other way. The inter mixing of peoples can feel dizzying for some, and they look for symbols and people to clutch to. NYC is very diverse, but it also has ethnic enclaves. People who are alike congregate. You can see that in Jackson Heights. The various country groups maintain strong inbound bonds.

Globalization and the Internet bring enormous opportunities. For the first time in human history, it feels like poverty can be eliminated. That is going to be the biggest achievement of my lifetime. But those same forces also put pressure on people’s traditional sense of being. I for one feel very comfortable crossing the lines, and mixing things up. I am known to visit various places of worship in the neighborhood. And I will take absolutely anyone of any background into my network marketing business. I am not trying to be the master of some ethnic ghetto. I want the members of my team to be typical New Yorkers bound by the city’s subway system. Screen time as time spent staring at the laptop and the phone has to be matched with face time: time spent networking with people, building teams. And so I mean to point out health benefits to networking.

For a guy like me who has been to every nook and corner in America, my choice of NYC as my base is some statement. This is a city I have chosen. I am a New Yorker and a global citizen.
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