Narayan Manandhar

Earlier, I have written that the study report of the Karki Investigation Commission will end up as an albatross to Sushila Karki Government (6 February op-ed). The tenure of the commission, ended on 11 February, has been extended for the third time, by 25 days, ending on 8 March, that is, three days after 5 March elections. The total tenure is stretching its tail like this: 3 months + 1 month+ 20 days + 25 days.

There is hue and cry over recent extension plus the government willfully delaying to release the report. It is expected to shed light on 8-9 September incidents leading to this political changes. The act may come as the final straw in the back of a camel. The commission, including the government, has now lost their credibility. This only prove former PM Oli to be correct refusing to give testimonials to the commission.    

The Interim Government headed by Sushila Karki is in a classical catch 22 situation: Releasing the report before elections might influence election outcomes; releasing after is tantamount to betraying millions of voters. What if the culprits mentioned in the report happen win elections? This is what I earlier refer to as a situation of albatross. 

Let me first give you the samples of public opinions and speculations on tenure extension and government intentions before writing mine.

  • Opinion 1: The report implicates the then PM Oli and his Home Minister Mr Lekhak for the incidents. Releasing this information could derail scheduled 5 March elections; as Oli is already critical of the Interim Government and skeptical about the elections. Therefore, the best option for the government is to withheld the report.
  • Opinion 2: Oli knew or is being informed in advance that he is not being implicated or the commission has spared him from taking actions. One can infer this from Oli demanding the report to be released before the date of elections. Why would some one demand this if he or she is implicated?  If this is true, this will obviously offend Gen-Z supporters who are hell-bent demanding unconditional arrest of Oli and his minister Lekhak.
  • Opinion 3: This option is some how the combination of options 1 & 2. The report has identified not just one but all possible usual and unusual suspects - Oli, Lekhak, Balen, Ravi etc.  - and this might influence upcoming elections including the reputations of Gen-Z popped up Karki Government. The best option for Karki Government is to “pass the buck” to the next elected government and you go off to your holidays.
  • Option 4: This is the combination of all of the above options. Definitely, the report is sensitive and will impact or influence election outcome. Only way to avoid is to defer its submission. The formation of the commission itself is a time buying strategy to content Gen-Z discontent. In the past, we did have experience sending sensitive reports into a deep freeze.
  • Opinion 5: This opinion may look like a cheap argument but does carry some weight. Who cares? This is simply a bhatta pachune aayog (a kind of sinecure job in Nepali). More you stay with the commission, more you benefit from power and perquisites. 

My personal opinion is different. What I see is the possibility of the report lacking “quality”. One can gleam this from the people heading the team, the controversy surrounding its formation, lack of cooperation from the stake-holders and allocation of limited time (three months) given the scale of the work to be carried out. I, honestly, doubt they receive required professional, technical inputs and backups in performing their tasks. What we should know is not the contents of the report or the culprits pointed out or left out in the report. It is the methodology that matters. After receiving written statement from Oli, I suppose, instead of face-to-face meetings, the commission got happy with written responses from Deuba, Prachanda, Balen and so on. Remember, there were so much natak in writing letter to Oli. For me, the situation is similar to a research student, faced with a difficulty in data collection using face-to-face interviews, managed through administering structured questionnaire! These responses can go into appendices thereby making the report fat, thick and unreadable. Who will read 1000 pages long report? 

As for the tenure, the media reported that they spent 20 days just for establishing the secretariat. Personally, I don’t know Mr Gauri Bahadur Karki. But I do remember as a an attention seeking guy from his periodic emails received. He may be good at investigating micro-credits and cooperative, but this investigation is, definitely, beyond the reach of kalo kote wakils in Nepal. When I say kalo Kote wakils that applies to people in the judiciary as well. They are good at writing ambiguous, double meaning words, phrases and sentences, something akin to 1000+ pages long “Royal Palace Massacre Report” - all descriptive, nothing conclusive in character. No where it explicitly speak of inebriated crown prince Dipendra finished the job.  I had a similar experience reading nearly 1400 pages long parliamentary investigation study  report on cooperatives. The report is loaded with long, useless descriptive literature reviews and surveys, giving an impression of a PhD student, and boils down to two controversial lines: One, saying the study team did not find any evidences against Ravi Lamichhane involved in mobilizing funds from cooperatives, and, two, being an MD of Galaxy TV, actions be taken against him (and others) for the misuse of cooperative fund. The media did carry a joke on this: The culprits killed the protected animal in the jungle, Ravi did not had a hand in it but he took part in consuming the meat! Let us hope we don’t end up with un-bahadur like sentences in the Gauri Bahadur Karki report.