Nepal Maoists: "We chose a new form of struggle"

[As vote-counting shows the election in Nepal to be a massive victory for the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), Fire on the Mountain is very pleased to be able to publish a second interview with Hisila Yami, a central committee member. Like the earlier one, this was conducted in English in Oslo, Norway in December. Where that piece focused particularly on the role of women in the Nepalese revolution, this one deals directly with questions of the revolutionary strategy adopted by the Maobadi. FotM is deeply grateful to the Norwegian comrade who gave us permission to use this interview. This is the first publication of the interview anywhere. The editing and explanatory comments are by FotM contributor Skwisgaar Skwigelf.]



Interview with Hisila Yami
Conducted by Frontlinjer/Campo Antiimperialista

F/CI: How does the CPN(M) see the current stage of the struggle in Nepal?

Hisila: We took a new course after the people's war; we chose a new form of struggle. From the outside it might look simpler, but seen from the inside, it was a much more difficult course. We took a zig-zag path, as we were near to the smashing of the old state, we felt that the US and India was closing in to smash us. This situation could have led to a never-ending war. Today we gain through the legal struggle and on the streets.

Before, we followed a military strategy, where the politics were influencing the military situation. Now we follow a political strategy, and it's much more difficult.

During the peace talks, our strategy was always to break up the alliance between the Ranas [a historical ruling family of Nepal --ed.], the King and Congress. After the second Jana Andolan [the 2006 mass movement against the monarchy --ed.] we began a new alliance, to expropriate the property of the king. The law has been passed, but only on paper. It has not been implemented.

We have today two basic demands: to declare the republic before the elections for the constituent assembly and to go for a full proportional electoral system in these elections. In order to achieve these aims we went into an alliance with the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) [called UML for short --ed.] against Congress, which remains a feudal force. On the issue of a proportional system we could make compromises, but on the issue of the king we are not flinching.

Before it was only us who were in favor of a proportional electoral system. Now, the umbrella front of all ethnic groups ask us not to leave these issues. They have all been raising these issues. There's also increasing support in all the parties and mass organizations. The parties have realized that they can use the ethnic groups to create a vote bank. Also, the UML tried to outsmart us when we left the principle of a full proportional system. But it wasn't for real, it was just to trap us. After they criticized us, they went back on their position again. But we had to unite with them to smash the Congress Party.

After UML diluted our stand, they said that we should "go for the process" both in terms of elections and declaring the republic. It was a middle way, neither to declare a republic directly before, nor after.

Now, sections of congress are complaining that they are being "pushed by the Maoists" and are starting to talk about "returning to the constitution of the first Jana Andolan [the 1990 mass movement against the monarchy --ed.].

Before the elections the People's Liberation Army and the Royal Army should be integrated.


F/CI: Do you think there will be elections for a constituent assembly this spring?

Hisila: Chances are equal. Tomorrow I'm told that they are meeting with Koirala [the prime minister, from the Congress Party --ed.]. There are efforts to come to some understanding and a republic may be declared.


F/CI: What will you do if the demands of a republic and a proportional system are not being met?

Hisila: We will go back to the mass movement. That's why we have the republican front. Prachanda has also said that "even patriotic forces which before were forced to ally with Gyanendra could come over to our side."


F/CI: How will a 40/60 proportional system affect the ethnic groups? Could this stir up new problems with for instance the Madhesi [the populations in the southern lowlands near the Indian border --ed.]?

Hisila: This depends on to which degree the umbrella of the ethnic groups, Janjati Masan, is successful. They want to establish a round-table conference of all the parties, ethnic groups and all the other people. This conference should be the decision-maker on this issue.


F/CI: But if you're running for elections to a constituent assembly without it being a fully proportional system, what are your chances of success?

Hisila: We will make an alliance, preferably also with Congress, but at least with the UML and the other left parties.


F/CI: What are the goals of the Maoists with the constituent assembly?

Hisila: Our goals are the new structuring of the state, federalism, employment, a better health service and to take action against gender disparity. The end result will be what we've been addressing all the time. We'll get radical reforms, not New Democracy, as we initially wanted when we began the people's war. The New Democracy will have to wait for another wave of the people's struggle.

It's nothing new in our strategy, it's like before, when we went to parliament after Jana Andolan I. You never know--later, we might go for a higher leap.


F/CI: What's the power of the Maoists?

Hisila: We've got associations parallel to the state level. We'll be continuing like before, and if we fail, at least we'll fail in a new way.


F/CI: What's the importance of the Indian revolution to the situation in Nepal?

Hisila: In India, we can hope for another leap coming with the Indian revolution.


F/CI:: How do you work on your international relations?

Hisila: With increased globalization we have to use all kinds of avenues. We are taking now intense diplomatic moves from the party headquarters. Before, Maoist leaders were denied entry to the United States, but now that we are in parliament they allow us to go there for talks. Now the US also wants to come to Nepal through the UN. That is why we press for the constituent assembly, because we want the UN to leave as soon as possible. In this we stand together with China and India.

The US want to make us into a new UML.


F/CI: What's your relation to the Communist Party of India (ML)?

Hisila: There are no party relations with the CPI(ML). During the peace process there was some contact and we considered the CPI(ML) easier to deal with than BJP.


F/CI: What do you think of the Norwegian role?

Hisila: Norwegian businessmen are better in some regards, they are more sensitive to public and social issues.

Before, Norway was on the side of the US, now they are more neutral. But Norwegian neutrality can easily shift, they could soon lean towards the US.


F/CI: What will happen to the king?

Hisila: If the king is sensible, he'll run away. If he tries to act smart, he'll be killed or imprisoned. Unlike your king, he's had a lot of power, he even killed his own family! If he were ousted as a result of the people's war, we'd take other steps than we do now. But if he remains silent, we will not touch him.


F/CI: What about child soldiers in the People's Liberation Army?

Hisila: The last statement by Prachanda stated that if it's proved by the UN (they have a system to prove this) that there are children in the PLA camps, they should be sent back to their villages with some economic means. But during the war, we even had children's organizations. We had many orphans, as in tribal societies remarrying isn't a taboo. This leads to children being abandoned, and they would come to us. We even let them help to carry things with the army.


F/CI: Wouldn't it have been better to continue fighting while you were on top?

Hisila: Through all the peace talks, we had the strategy of isolation the king and coming to an understanding with the parliamentary forces. During the people's war we were able to limit and encircle the enemy to the district headquarters. The enemy was fortifying their bunkers and our effort was to bring them to their bunkers and fight. After the two-line struggle [a struggle between Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai--ed.], you had two major military attacks, like the one in Kara, where we lost many people, and in Pili, where we won, but only because the bunkers was still being built.

We were feeling that neither they nor we could win. So the coup was a breakthrough. Whenever before we said to the other parties, "Look, you'll be cheated by the king," they refused this, but then they saw this with their own eyes.

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Women in Nepal: Threshold of a New Era

[Fire on the Mountain is delighted to be able to publish this interview with a leading Nepalese Maoist, conducted by members of the Norwegian revolutionary socialist party Rødt [Red!] for their theoretical magazine, also called Rødt. The interview was conducted in early December (in English), when Hasila Yami visited Oslo and spoke at the memorial service for Tron Øgrim, so it should be read in light of subsequent developments there. Many thanks to Johan Petter Andresen, who granted permission to use this interview, and another one with an Indian revolutionary, which FotM will publish in a day or so.]

Interview with Hisila Yami
Conducted by Jorun Gulbrandsen and Johan Petter Andresen


Hisila Yami is a central committee member of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). Yami was a minister in the interim government until the Maoists withdrew in August 2007. She has written many articles about women’s liberation. The most important are collected in the book “People’s War and Women’s Liberation in Nepal”, ISBN 81-904039-0-7. Published by Purvaia Prakashan, India.


Red!: Is it possible for the working women in the third world to achieve liberation without people’s war?

Hisila: Never before in the history of Asia has the number of women joining the people’s war been so huge. At the same time, we must keep in mind that there is a strong left movement in Nepal. The background for this is that the position of women is very bad. More than 80% live in the countryside. Because of lack of income, the men go to find cash jobs in urban areas or in foreign countries. The women stay behind and take care of the farm and the children. The feudal system does not give the woman the right to own land. There are no openings for her. Her life is between the house and the water source. She is married away to the in-law family at an early age. Normally, she cannot visit her own family more than once a year. By the time she is 35 she is a grandmother and her life is finished. If she tries to go to the city she ends up sexually exploited. So the people’s war gave openings for women.

Politically we made this a point. During the war against the colonisers in 1816 the women fought bravely. The party used this as an example that women can fight. In 1944 there was a united woman’s effort to fight against the Rana system. The party was formed in 1948 and all the fronts were formed. Through these examples from history we showed that women have played, and must play, a central role.

Already in 1995, one year before we started the people’s war, we made a rule that there must be minimum two women in each unit. A unit had between 5 and 11 members.

In the period of the first people’s uprising in 1990 it was normal among communists that the husband worked as a full time party worker while the wife worked as a teacher and took care of the family. But we broke that rule in 1993-4.

There are many concrete reasons for the women to join the PLA. The were oppressed by the police, or the families sent the women to avoid them from getting raped by the enemy. Many women also saw PLA as a possibility for another type of life, a better life.

You should know that also before the people’s war, the left was strong in Nepal. The 8th of March has always been celebrated. There was of course a gender ground for that. The left started working with women’s liberation at an early stage. It was the women’s mass organisation that first made an independent program for women’s liberation.

The women’s fronts were very active in 1996. The attacked the men who wasted time playing cards and drinking liquor. They also attacked men that bashed women. Another example is the protests against beauty contests in the urban areas.

Right now the front is organising a wide women’s front for a federal republic. We always look for a united front in our political work.

Red!: What do you think are the main achievements during the people’s war in Nepal pertaining to women’s liberation?

Hisila: Because of our intervention the government was forced to amend many feudal laws. Many NGO’s were also forced to do work directed at women. And the state started employing women.

In the liberated areas the women are now given the right to property. Even now, in other areas, the women have to return their parent’s property when they get married.

We have introduced the right for women to get married again when the husband is martyred, and we have introduced the right to divorce and remarry.

The women in the liberated areas are getting justice through the people’s courts. The formal state organs are expensive and take a lot of time.

We have also politicised women. We have taught them that they have to fight against the state, the police and the military. When you fight, you learn about state oppression in practice. When the enemy rapes women, it teaches them about the gender character of the state.

The party was generous to promote women's leadership fast. In connection with the reorganisation of the party in August, the central committee was downsized to 35 members, and there are now only two women in the central committee. But the reorganisation upgraded women’s representation and positions in the lower levels of the party.

Our demand is that 40 % of those employed by the state must be women.

Red!: What did you find were the main methods that you applied to achieve your goals?

Hisila: In the autonomous regions we made sure that many members are from the local areas. We needed to develop their social skills. They were often more interested in PLA, and the possibility of a lot of mobility. And their uniform gave them a good feeling. PLA was more technical work and made it easier for them to partake. Another positive factor was the collectivity in the PLA. Collectivity is a very important part of their culture.

We also used the method of positive discrimination of dalits and women. In running of the autonomous regions we had the rule of minimum 20 % dalits and 40 % women in leading organs.

Red!: How do you combat males oppressing females in the party and the PLA?

Hisila: The women are more vocal now at every level. One of the reasons for the promotions is exactly that the women are more vocal. But still it is a problem at every level for women to get heard.

We have also had deviations because of our cultural heritage. One example is when a politbureau member had an extramarital relation with a central committee member. The man was given more punishment than the woman.

In two line struggle: there is a tendency to pit women against women. But there is also a tendency to treat women differently than men, something I have experienced personally. When my husband Baburam Bhattarai was taken action against in 2005, this was given a political motivation, but when I was taken action against, the reasons given were my negative influence on him.

Red!: How do the women organise within the party and in the party leadership?

Hisila: When the women are in the women’s front they all work together. But in the party the women do not get together.

Red!: What are your immediate goals in the struggle for women’s struggle in today’s context?

Hisila: We should do away with the feudal system. The feudal system gives nourishment to the mini-kings in the households, and it reinforces the idea of the son as more worth in the family.
To attain this goal we are developing a united republic front of women’s organisations.
We are working for the implementation of the positive steps that were made with the interim constitution.

We are also working for the government to put priority on employment, education and health. This is especially important for women as they have a higher percentage of illiterates and are more exposed to illness, for example reproductive diseases.

We are also working for proportional elections instead of first past the post in connection with the elections to the constituent assembly. In this connection our demand is that 50% of the representatives shall be women, and that dalits, ethnic and national minorities also shall be proportionally represented. [Since this interview the Maoists have made a compromise with Nepali Congress where the elections to the constituent assembly shall be 60 % proportional and 40 % first past the post. The constituent assembly will decide the form of the state and the election procedures for the federal republic.--Red!]

Women communists can be a good rallying point to develop unity. When you see sectarian violence, you see that the women get be attacked because they bear the babies. The women can be invoked to be a uniting force in developing the new federal system.

We are encouraging a new generation of leaders, and here we must have continuous leadership development of new women leaders.

Red!: What do you think are the main achievements for women after the peace agreement in November 2006?

Hisila: The question of citizenship right. Before there was male linearship. Now the child gets citizenship if the mother has no husband. Another positive step is that when women and dalits buy land they don’t have to pay normal taxes.

Red!: What role do the various family structures among the different ethnic groups play in oppressing women in Nepal?

Hisila: In the Hindu family the concept of purity is very important. The parents want their children to get married very early to avoid her having sexual relations before she is married.

Red!: Nepal is entering the first phase of a national democratic revolution. What are the main aims for women in this phase?

Hisila: Women should be brought into the productive force. Today they are still the ones that stay behind. The right to parental property is also a central question. And they should have access to health services. Today a lot of time is spent doing household work. A lot of infrastructural work needs to be done to reduce the time used on household work. A lot of energy is waisted because of the lack of infrastructure. There must be put much more effort into education. There are less than 10 % girl pupils in the schools.

Now, in the autumn of 2007 the peace process is getting stretched out. This has led to some negative tendencies that have been detrimental to women. There is a tendency to reverse the achievements from the people’s war. There is a tendency that men dare to oppress women more openly. That’s one reason why we want to achieve elections to the constituent assembly as soon as possible.

Another example of the tendency to reversal is that some places they are reintroducing dowry again. And lastly I could mention that reactionaries that fled during the people’s war are returning and that we have witnessed an increase in wife bashing.

During the people’s war the PLA were active all over the rural areas. Now the situation is more evolutionary. Now there is a certain disillusionment. The PLA is now stationed in the cantonments. People are missing the collective life where the PLA played a central role. People are returning home and the situation is not as positive in the field. Some are a bit disappointed.
This is also a reason why we want to go forward as fast as possible--so that we get more results to show. It’s a very painful process right now.

Red!: How large is the women’s front that supports you?

Hisila: All Nepalese Women’s Association (Revolutionary) has approximately 10 000 paying members.

Red!: Which texts do you use for developing the general theory of women’s liberation in Nepal?

Hisila: We use among others F. Engels book on The Family, The State and Private Property, Women and Socialism written by Bebel, a collection of writings by Marx, Engels and Mao. We also use collections of articles written by our own comrades.

Red!: How will you avoid the valiant female liberation soldiers sacrificing their lives as cannon fodder for a male dominated party leadership and a male dominated state that ends up oppressing women as in Russia, China, a.s.o?

Hisila: It’s very much connected with political deviation. Political deviation will also affect the situation for dalits and women. The main line is the central issue, and this is the only way to avoid counter revolution.

Red!: What is your view on the relationship between class struggle and women’s liberation?

Hisila: They are very close. Women were the first to be oppressed, and will be the last to be liberated when class oppression ceases. So the test of whether class oppression still exists is if women’s oppression still exists or not.

Red!: Can the working class get liberated without the women in the working class taking the lead in the liberation of the working class as a whole? What would this mean concretely in Nepal?

Hisila: The litmus paper is whether the women get the leadership or not. In Nepal we say that the mass organisations should have 50% women in the leadership. But the party is an ideological organisation and this rule should not apply.

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Tron Øgrim, Bang A Basin!

I first titled this Tron Øgrim, RIP, but that's really the Latin phrase "Requiescat In Pace" (Rest in Peace). Tron was neither a big personal fan of resting, nor, as a pretty hard-boiled materialist, did he believe in an afterlife, even one resembling a deep, quiet nap.

Instead, I will cite in his honor the 1964 Talk On Questions Of Philosophy by Mao Zedong, the Chinese revolutionary leader and thinker whom Tron met in Beijing once:

If there were no such thing as death, that would be unbearable. If we could still see Confucius alive today, the earth wouldn’t be able to hold so many people. I approve of Chuang-tzu’s approach. When his wife died, he banged on a basin and sang. When people die there should be parties to celebrate the victory of dialectics, to celebrate the destruction of the old.

So who was this guy? Tron Øgrim was a Norwegian revolutionary and Communist. Born into a family which had taken an active part in Norway's resistance struggle against Nazi occupation, he became active in the global upsurge of students and youth in the 1960s. He was a leader and theoretician who helped bring into being the Arbeidernes Kommunistparti (Workers Communist Party) of Norway. The AKP was one of the most successful of the anti-revisionist parties that sprang up in advanced industrial countries in the 1970s. It merged only this year with the Red Electoral Alliance (itself a AKP spinoff where Tron had made his political home since the 1990s) into a new party called Rødt, meaning Red.












(From left, Tron, Pål Steigan (of the AKP) and some Chinese dudes...)


There's much more I could say about Tron, and I may try in a future post, but right now I want to point directly to a profound class on the theory and practice of revolution he was in the process of teaching, a class that I and, I hope, hundreds of other people were taking at the time of his death. Tron was one of the very first listmembers when another Norwegian, Magnus Bernhardsen, started an invaluable internet resource, the Leftist Trainspotters e-mail list. The 'spotters list, as members call it, tracks developments in left organizations around the world, with a generally observed "no polemics" rule that keeps a bunch of participants with dramatically diverse politics in line.

A couple of years ago, Tron sensed that the revolution in Nepal, led by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) was a development of world historic significance. He began tracking it with a fierce intensity. Soon the Leftist Trainspotters list would get posts almost every day, sometimes more than a dozen at a time, on the Maobadi (the Maoists) and other political and social forces in Nepal. Usually these would just be articles from the English language press, mainly Nepalese and Indian, often with a brief comment attached to highlight a particular point or development. Some listmembers complained and more just hit the delete button, but many of us read with fascination.

One lesson in Tron's "course" had to do with epistemology, the study of how we come to know things. Tron practiced in a thoroughgoing way some basic Marxist principles about knowledge. First, he sought truth from facts. I am hardly alone on the US left in being inspired by the success of the comrades of the Maobadi in their struggle to free their country from feudalism and imperialism, but for too many of us, things stop at "Boy, is that ever cool! Too bad there's nothing like this happening here." In particular, Tron was careful to reserve judgement and consider the sources of information which suggested problems in CPN (M) theory, strategy, tactics, structure, policies, organizing or ability to respond to changing conditions, but he never dismissed that information out of hand because it made him uncomfortable.

A second point on epistemology. Tron understood, and was showing us, that the general resides in the particular. It was only by steeping himself in the everyday realities and political minutiae of the rapidly changing situation in Nepal that he could develop an overview which could genuinely be used to make sense of developments. Did he use Marxist categories, like class, armed struggle, bourgeois democracy, reformism, etc.? Sure, these were his starting point. But he was able to apply them in a deep way because he schooled himself to the point where he could tell you, for instance, the political history and current role of scores, probably hundreds, of individuals and groupings in the bubbling political life of a tiny Asian country.

The other big lesson I have been learning, or relearning, with Tron as teacher is just what a tricky and complex business making a revolution is, even in a small country that Western experts call "underdeveloped." The CPN (M) launched a classic Maoist people's war in 1996, and in less than a decade controlled a wide swath of Nepal's countryside, and drastically destabilized the old monarchy that ruled the country. Rather than continue fighting, with the attendant toll of damage and death among the people, and the risk of Indian military intervention, the Maobadi, under a truce, entered a complex process of negotiation and election to pursue their goal of creating a New Nepal. It was this more than anything else that drew and held Tron's attention.

Why? Because when a revolutionary situation is present in a country, all kinds of unexpected and overlooked contradictions and social forces suddenly come to the fore. In Nepal, this has included oppressed nationalities, both indigenous and immigrant (like Tibetans), with their own languages and cultures. Suddenly they have pushed their way into the roiling center of political life. Some, like the Magars in the west, have tended to united behind the Maobadi as the force most dedicated to breaking the old feudal system and challenging the privileges enjoyed by the majority (Nepali-speaking) Khas people, while others, based on old contradictions between various nationalities, are being actively courted and organized by reactionaries and Hindu chauvinists to oppose or sabotage the alliance of political forces the CPN (M) has entered to fight for a republic.

And though the national question looms large, which any Maoist would expect, it is far from the only contradiction suddenly becoming more prominent in Nepal. Just last week I exchanged emails with Tron about the Blue Diamond Society, an organization formed to fight for the rights of Nepal's impressive array of sexual minorities. I asked, among other things, what he thought about charges, mainly in the Western media, that the Maoists were puritanical homophobes.

Here's what Tron emailed me in response, accompanying the most useful of the articles he had forwarded to Leftist Trainspotters:

I post some material below.

First, here, my thoughts.

I dunno about the Maobadi, but I'd GUESS

a) That the Maobadi has never had this high on their radar (just like every other party in Nepal).

b) So I'd expect that the party would be chock full of traditional and spontaneous prejudice, just like the western commie and socdem movements 30-40 years ago.

I'd also expect that there are milieus IN and AROUND the M, who are totally opposed, modern, secular and influenced by the modern western gay liberation and left movement.

c) It is very easy for western journalists to come there and describe stupid statements - and even brutal acts against gays, which would not surprise me as the big and undisciplined Maobadi movement has hotheads who have been beating up more or less everybody else, except for tourists! - as results of "the party line"

Not taking into account what I guess may be the case -.

+ This is an expression of general social prejudices in Nepal

+ This is NOT a "line" as the Maobadi (I guess) has very LITTLE line on this.)

(Take this story of the two lesbian lovers alleged to have been held in a Maobadi camp. This may be true (or it may be different: These girls may have been "recruited" and just happened to have been lesbians - which is not very nice either. Or something else. However, even if this story IS true, I'd be very surprised if this has been discussed and decided on a high policy level in the CPN(M).)

Of course, I may be wrong on this.

d) I don't believe in journalism which prettifies "left crimes and errors". Like Mao said: Soviet farts stink, too!

I do, however, believe in nuanced journalism who try to describe it like it is.

If there's two sides on this q (or more!) - to get that clear.

AND, very important: WHICH WAY DOES IT GO? Developments?

To the better or worse?

My 50 øre.

All the best -
cto

That short note, generously knocked out in a few minutes at the request of someone he had only met a few times, shows the value of the comrade we have lost.

I can't say I much feel like banging a basin, but I will go out today and belt a couple of good Norwegian beers to celebrate the victory of dialectics--and to honor one whose everyday political practice taught me some dialectics.

Tron Øgrim, ¡Presente!


UPDATE: Greetings Norwegian Guests!

We are in the midst of a small-scale but spontaneous display of people's globalization. Folks at one of Tron's online "homes"--the Leftist Trainspotters e-mail list--who have never spent time in Norway have been stunned to see the extent of the coverage of his death, as numerous newspaper articles (not just obituaries) are posted to the list by Magnus Bernhardsen and others. Norwegian Wikipedia, where Tron was a valued contributor today has the flag of Norway at half staff on its logo.

At the same Norwegians seem surprised to learn how much respect old Tron had earned around the world. Dozens of messages from across the globe have filled the Leftist Trainspotters list, lamenting Tron Øgrim's death, showing how widely he was respected by revolutionary thinkers everywhere.

This Fire on the Mountain post has had hundreds of hits today. Spurred by a link at a hastily erected website, Tron Øgrim er død, and some kind of instant message propagating on Telenor, Norwegians appear to be eager to see what someone from another country has to say about old Tron. At last check, more than 70% of our visitors today come from Norway! Welcome, and please feel free to drop a further word in the comments section below on how Tron's death is being felt in Norway.

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