ELECTIONS IN NEPAL: JOURNEY TO THE FRONTIERS OF DEMOCRACY IN SYRIA
On 10 April in Nepal has voted to elect the Constituent Assembly. The elections, the first after a decade of civil war and 13,000 deaths, were part of the peace agreement signed November 21, 2006 between the seven main political parties in Nepal and the Maoists. Repeatedly postponed the date originally scheduled, owing to the tense atmosphere that reigned in the country, the April elections have seen a strong popular participation. More than 60% to 17.6 million voters, which, in an extremely backward country and consists of areas difficult to access as Nepal, is an absolute record. The Maoist Prachanda, against all odds, won a landslide victory winning 118 seats out of 216 total. The election results should lead to the abdication of King Gyanendra and discussed the transformation of the country, still the only Hindu monarchy in the world, in a federal republic.
The following is what I saw, I heard, I heard in those days, first in Kathmandu and later in the valleys of Langtang and dell'Helambu, two regions located in the north east of Nepal, the border with Tibet in China.
Soldiers. Many soldiers.
corners roads, the gun pointed at the ground. Seated in a row on open trucks that move slowly along the avenues. Serious faces of soldiers who emerge from helmets too big and can be glimpsed behind the newly built wooden Garritt the beautiful 'is better in the corners of the wall that surrounds the royal palace. Soldiers who walk to Thamel in groups of two or three. Or, more compact, to protect the Chinese Embassy by the monks dressed in red a few weeks demonstrate against repression in Tibet. In the hands of the thin bamboo sticks.
They are soldiers who do not fear those who patrol the streets of Kathmandu a few days before the election. Dear, if you Regards, smiling.
of soldiers in the city, one sees few. Someone is seen at checkpoints out of the city. Other, more numerous in the villages of the valleys of Langtang semiisolati. A Trishuli, a village that would be regarded as the city, they stand around a knot of soft drinks. They wear camouflage uniforms, almost all too large for their bodies minutes. Chatting and laughing, her long hair knotted tightly blacks on the nape.
not bat an eye, soldiers and soldiers during the passage of Maoist Prachanda. Sworn enemies less than a year and a half ago, now the militants / guerrillas invaded Kathmandu. They say he arrived in the capital about 45000. Took to the city from the mountains of Dolpo, villages hidden in the valleys around the Annapurna massif, from Solo Khumbu and the stifling of the Terai plains. Festoons of flags with the red hammer and sickle on a white hang from one house to another in the streets around Durbar Square.
replace the Tibetan prayer flags, which, these days, are more discrete. The rikshiò stationed in front of the guesthouse in Thamel exhibit glued to the seats the party's propaganda leaflets.
hammer and sickle are painted with red paint on light poles on the rusty gates of the shops on rotted wooden doors of the houses. On the walls in English and Nepali wish long life to Marxism-Leninism and his interpreter, the valiant comrade Prachanda.
Pushpa Kamal Dahal, alias Prachanda, or in Nepal, "the reckless". In pronouncing his name many people lower their voices. To some, this Brahmin of fifty-three years is a hero, who gave voice to the millions of underprivileged who live in this country, one of the world's poorest. For other Prachanda is nothing more than a feudal leader, responsible for extortion and murders that for more than ten years have affected the inhabitants of the poor indiscriminately villages in the most remote and isolated areas of the Himalayas. The gardener of the guesthouse notes that the Maoist leader carries his years well. It is in perfect health and well-fed, note. He adds in a low voice that his diet if the man is paid for with money extorted from the poor wretches like him.
The speakers for cars, trucks and jeeps shabby propaganda for the militants are the three major parties. People are talking about curiously. It is rare for someone to call a party by his name. Thus, the Nepali Congress becomes " the tree," the tree, or rather the oak, which is the symbol of party, while the UML, the reformist Marxist party, becomes, for the same reason, t he sun 'the sun. Only the CPN, Prachanda's party, has no name. It confuses people with its leaders. And for those who will vote on whether to declare states that will vote for him. For Prachanda. The Great Waldo Pepper.
Three days before the election it is hard to find a place on a bus leaving from Kathmandu. The parties have requisitioned all the collective means of transport, from big monsters to Tata Chinese minibus in a bad way to transport voters to polling stations and to their villages or at least where the driveways come. Tens of overcrowded vehicles clog the arteries leaving the capital. People are massing on the roof, the legs drawn to his chest for lack of space. Most young travelers standing on steps outside, or if they are balancing on the bumper hanging on to luggage racks. Inside, rolled over each other, shaking women, the elderly and some children. No one protests. Unperturbed passengers stoically face the hardships of the journey.
buses are strongly characterized those who move from Durbar Marg or from peripheral stations. Carrying supporters of the Nepali Congress , those of the Sun or the followers of Prachanda. The men crouched on the roof waving incessantly flags and propaganda when the bus makes a stop in a village shaman in a group through the streets shouting slogans. Motorists trying reckless overtaking them heels smile lifting the fingers in a V sign for victory.
In these days before the election, the rules of the road do not seem carried forward more. Soldiers at checkpoints allow the passage of vehicles overloaded with a quick nod of his arm. The most loyal soldiers, in an attempt to give a semblance of control, make the gesture to get on the running board. Glancing inside the vehicle, above the heads of passengers blocking the entrance, then go down and weary men lay huddled on the roof. That in turn, calmly lay the soldiers. Then the buses depart acres between puffs of black smoke and smell of kerosene.
Trishuli, the last village before the road does not turn into a nightmare of potholes, rocks and streams overflowed, is a must for coaches of those voting, international observers of the jeeps and trucks of soldiers . In dining, facing a plate of the bhat supporters of different parties have no problem mixing. No rivalry, no animosity. A little players as they would any amateur sports teams that met in a coffee bar in a first highway to reach the tournament site. Two soldiers in a corner, straightened his uniform. Busy chatting among themselves, the machine gun on the back left shoulder. Every now and then glancing sideways here and there.
A Duncan, the first village after Trishuli you enter the Langtang region, for years in the hands of the Maoists as evidenced by the faded writing on the walls of houses. "Wellcome to Maoist area," reads one written in broken English drawn with red paint on the wall of a ghompa.
Along the dirt road, made ten years to allow the Nepalese army truck to reach the lead and zinc mines located on the slopes of Ganesh Himal, the checkpoints are multiplying. A Duncan, near a Garritt, an iron bar closes the road. A soldier, who is barely visible just behind the sandbags, stands guard at the barrier and with a wave of his hand distributes traffic to the checkpoint. It does not seem particularly vigilant. The guerrilla war ended nearly two years ago and apart from the occasional skirmish, the relationship between the army and supporters of Prachanda are lying. The soldier is watching us and looking bored with after about ten minutes beckons us to move on.
missing three days to Sunday, April 10, the date of the election. From Syabru Besi, last inhabited place reached by a four-wheel, it takes three days of walking to get to Langtang, the capital and seat of election of the entire region. A slow gradual climb along the Langtang Khola, amid forests of oak and rhododendrons.
During this time the rhododendrons are in bloom. Flowers red, pink or white that can be seen from afar through the tangle of branches of maples and pines along the River.
Just before Changtang, better known as Lama Hotel, at the lower ridges, a few hundred meters dangling from the river of giant hives blacks. Near the hives long ropes dangling in the wind. Are fixed to tree trunks by the side of the rocky ridge. Serve the beekeepers of the neighboring villages at the time of honey collection will descend from the top ropes are then swung to allow men to reach the hives.
Entella the play between the trees, the monkeys sacred to Hindus worship under the effigy of Hanuman, the monkey god beloved by children. Small, gray head and the long winding queues, moving in herds of thirty or forty. Easily fall from the trees and play Rimche on the sandy river. A Tabela Ghora
the trees and the monkeys disappear and give way to pastures of yaks. They are small yaks of Langtang. Smaller than the yak large Tibetan plateaus. Graze in the middle of a herd of goats and horses nervous that strong-legged trot around long free hands to prayer that divide into two paths.
Gradually, the trail climbs up the mountain walls of prayer are more numerous. And so are the water mills built to run continuously to the wheels through prayer. From Ghora Tabela, where a couple of soldiers occupy an outpost on the Desert of the Tartars, one can see the shining roofs of Langtang.
Langtang, the district town of the same name, is a village of fifty houses and some lodge inhabited mostly by Tarang or exiled Tibetans. The houses are scattered, lying on the turf on which an endless lazy grazing yaks and horses. Apart from the lodge, the houses are small, dry stone or mud. Almost all have a flat roof in Tibetan style. Among the other house a maze of stone walls that enclose small plots planted with buckwheat, potatoes, wheat, turnips, barley and garlic.
Langtang is also the land of crows. They fly in pairs or in flocks over the village. Enter and leave the network of prayer flags that starts from little hands dry stone at the center of the country. Whizzing above the crowd that rushes in front of the village school.
The raucous cries of crows mix with the dull sound of a drum that comes from a tiny ghompa installed inside a house.
sessions on the lawn around the house, three old busy chatting. A mechanically spins his prayer wheel. Another ride and deft shelling while clutching a wooden rosary in his left hand.
the background, the ice fall down from Langtang Lirung and 6780 meters of Kinshung.
There is an air of celebration today in Langtang. Among the people who crowded around the school yard that serves as a polling station the excitement is palpable. Almost all women wear the traditional dress: long, heavy skirts, aprons under rigid colored wool, hand woven, short jackets and sweaters from which emerge. The blacks are tight shiny hair in a long braid hanging down hard on his back .. Most young people wear the scarves knotted at the nape, the older blacks tiny hats with cloth.
They shake women, or rather they embrace each other, holding firmly to the life in front of the seat reserved for them. There is no need the crowd,
to shake it. The space, the boundless space of the grass, not missing. Still, for what mysterious reason, they, the women huddle. Do not push. They wait patiently for their turn. But everything, absolutely everything, you keep connected.
to serve as a polling place is the courtyard of the school, a building with one floor, the tin roof, that surround the courtyard on three sides. The third side is closed by a network of branches, twigs of maple, bamboo, pulled up as best. By branches were charged two narrow crevices allowing access to the courtyard. Serve as input the seat and are watched over by soldiers. A soldier for entry for women and a soldier than for men.
Inside the courtyard sits the Election Commission under the eyes, at times alert, at times ridanciano, a fist of soldiers in blue uniforms. The voting booths are placed at the bottom of the courtyard, along the wall of the school. Pink for girls and blue for boys, are just two simple tables on which were placed the cardboard screens. Screens are too low, must have thought the commissioners, to ensure the secrecy of the vote. This explains the blue nylon hanging like laundry hanging in the sun by an electric wire that crosses the courtyard and ends, as a kind of down on the cardboard screen.
There is so much accuracy and great reliability.
Just outside the school, on the wall of gray mud of what appears to be a pen, are fixed with nails election posters. The first two exhibit the list of parties that present themselves for election. I begin to count them and then I lose myself fascinated to study the symbols. On party lists in the running there are no names, but only symbols. Symbols curious and suggestive. A sun, an oak tree, an umbrella, a five-pointed star, a cow, a rooster, a moon, an oblong drum, the traditional hammer and sickle, another hammer and sickle, but in this case with the sickle-shaped gun and the hammer with a stick, a toothed wheel, the face of a soldier's hat with a scout, a ring, a ladder, a teapot, a horse, a pair of glasses, an arrow, a sword, an alarm, a soccer ball, a torch, a kite ...
The people observe carefully the symbols of the party then proceeds to explore the colorful posters that explain how to vote in the comics. Again, the message is given to the design. Clearly and unambiguously.
On a first poster is designed paper Nepal, but instead of rivers, mountains and cities, many small figures emerge from the waist up. In pairs, men and women, each with physical features, different clothes or hairstyles. Dark-skinned women wearing the sari, women wearing headscarves, Tibetan with long black braids, dressed in Western women, women with strange headgear dishes curiously reminiscent of a certain ethnic group in Yunnan China. In a sort of strict moral Manzoni appears next to every woman a man, her husband, the fashion show of clothing and physical features within the same ethnic or social class. A boy jumps from a little man with his finger and the other lists seriously, "Chetri, Tamang, Raj Gurung, Ghurka, Sherpa .... '.
Below, two large clocks on the same manifesto. The first episodes with the hands on the 7 in the morning. The second on 17. The message speaks for itself: all citizens, whatever their ethnicity or their religion are invited to go to the polls to vote among the seven in the morning and five in the afternoon.
The other posters are designed in the same spirit. In one, ever the comic, explaining how they put the vote on the board. In another the process that the voter must make when they enter the polling place. Be recognized by the commissioners, make the brush thumbnail with indelible ink, irrefutable proof that he has already exercised the right to vote, gather behind the voting booth, insert the ballot, sign and quit. A third poster explains what is not right to do: it's not just tear the campaign posters, it is unfair to put pressure on the group in a family that is about to vote, not just light a fire and cook in the vicinity of the seat, much less present armed to the vote. Everything is explained with beautiful colored drawings, from which breathes an air of quiet confidence.
And it is of this order and tranquility of this, real and tangible, all that I speak. I talk about the school teacher, proudly, in an English school. "We have news everything is going well, "he says. "Throughout the country, except in a few places. There was no violence, no intimidation - reaffirms with a smile. This time we will succeed. "The couple of places in question, you will know a week later, are in the Terai, where the insurgency has not been eradicated. In this case it is a minority, the minority Madhesi, claiming autonomy for at least six months and blocks the supply of fuel from India.
A soldier comes out of the seat and politely invite a man who is smoking a cigarette to a few feet away. The man agreed to without objection, moved a few steps and starts to chat. Shortly after two, the soldiers that will be handling the voting block the entrance with a few branches were across and make mention of people queuing to disperse. What's going on, ask around. Nothing. Only a moment's pause to allow the Committee to drink tea. Large colorful Chinese thermos are transported inside the courtyard. Males dissolved row.
The women continue to sit well in line, hugging each other. Inside the polling station commissioners and soldiers sitting at a table sipping tea that act as the school desks. An old Tibetan
walking slowly across the lawn, accompanied by two men. She is dressed with the traditional dress and exhibits two large gold earrings with long lobes wilted. Feet, a pair of slippers. "It started this morning before dawn from his village," he said the schoolmaster. "He walked at least eight hours to get here to vote in Langtang. "The accompanying two children. One of them holds par hand. The old wasted no time to rest. You put directly in line behind other women, her face wrinkled and parchment from the sun. A boy runs up and puts up a white note. A note any, torn from a notebook.
"As we proceed to the identification of voters? I ask the teacher. I am puzzled. Those who exhibit documents, in fact, are a minority. "You see that old? "I am the man, pointing to a man who is sitting at a table inside the enclosure. "He is the historical memory of this valley. You always lived here and knows all the families. When he was presented in front of a stranger face he can make the right questions. "Who are you? What is your father?" And your mother? "Where is your village? Who is your cousin? And the blade of your village's name?" . No one escapes the interrogation of Dzochen. He, Dzochen, knows all, or at least the history of all families in the valley. It is he, Dzochen, our register of electors. And it is very reliable .... '.
Apparently, the old woman accompanied by children is not the only electricity that had to travel the long distances to reach polling stations. Langtang is the capital of the mountainous region. The villages are far away, sometimes more than a day's march. One guy tells me that many have come to the village since the night before, to be ready to vote early in the morning and be able to return to their homes by evening.
At 5 pm the polling stations closed on time. They could all vote. Women in line. People come from far away. Around the school are formed knots. Men, for the most part. Nesun seems annoyed when asked the name of the candidate who gave the preference. Prachanda meet almost everyone. A man points to my sunglasses. I am puzzled and then I remember that there is one between parties whose symbol is just a couple of glasses. Then he laughs and walks away. A young Tibetan representative of an NGO based in Kathmandu, softly approaches me and tells me in English that is not true that everyone who voted for Prachanda announced, but who do so out of fear, because you never know. Here the Maoists, he said, are the masters.
women, except that some old chat sessions on the ground have departed. A group of children playing nearby. Slid down a short descent mud on the edge on some pieces of plastic or some large cartons. Use them as sleds. A girl collects water from the river and poured down on conscientious to make it more smooth and flowing.
After yet another tea ceremony urns are sealed under the eyes of those who remained. A couple of soldiers left to guard the polling place. Tomorrow morning at dawn the ballot will be carried downstream. On the back, two soldiers escorted by sherpa porters and representatives of major parties. In three days to reach DUMC, and from there be transported in a military truck to the capital to be counted.
the evening the porter at the lodge and the guides are excited. When know the results? - I ask. "Definitive? "He says Norbu, a guide himalyana old as 85 had participated in the expedition on Annapurna and Dhaulagiri Messner. "In three weeks," he says, as if it were obvious.
But in the days following the voices bouncing from one valley to another. "Already 20 MPs," he told me, Dharma, in Kajino Ghompa. He is a Brahmin, he says proudly. He adds: "As Prachanda! '. Three days later, Ghosaikund, Tashi, who is driving in the mountains and the monsoon season, when there are few Western tourists that climb up the valley, is the singer in Kathmandu, shoot The figure of 102 seats allocated to the Maoists. "But how do you know? "I ask. We are at 4800 meters, the day before there was a snowstorm, and few who have managed to reach the lakes. The people know it, he says, the entries run from one valley to another.
It's cold in Ghosaikund. The lakes are partially covered by a thin layer of ice. The air is crisp and crystalline. Around the stove that night, all huddle in blankets. The wind chill is seeping between the planks of the shelter and the roots are introduced in the oven regularly burn well and can not heat the room. The porter chatting animatedly, rakhsi sipping. In conversation, at times, I say the name Prachanda.
I understand.
In Langtang, Kajino to Ghompa Syabru Thule and the Maoists have swept. How can I ask. How is it possible for Tibetan refugees, people who fled from Tibet to escape the harassment of Chinese compact voted for the man who is a friend of China and that even three years ago took on a model of the Pol Pot Khmer? "People say their vote as a vote of the village chief," he says Tashi. "And the village chief is a wise man. He knows that the victory of the Maoists put an end to the requisition, to extortion, the forced recruitment. If Prachanda wins the country rediscover peace at last. "But people know what Pol Pot did, what happened in Cambodia? Tashi, can not understand. She looks at me smiling. "If Prachanda will not do what he promised, he says, people send him away. Two years ago we took to the streets to say NO to the king. We will do the same with Prachanda. '. I'm going to talk about the risk that the press is silenced, that NGOs go away, that tourist agencies consider Nepal as a country not very reliable, but say nothing. Tashi is safe and confident. And maybe my classes, my concept of democracy, here, does not work.
Here is the snow. The air is thin and there is so much silence.
I walked the Langtang between April 7 and April 23. In addition to Claudio, my life partner and to Andrew, my son came Bal Kumar, Ram Giri, Gokul Raj Kumar Gurung and Purna. I have no words to thank them. As usual, the Navy has taken good, excellent, one of us.
Some photographs taken in the Langtang find here
A great site for travel stories Marco Santamaria is that you can visit by clicking here
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Only a few lines to say how the state of beautiful trip to Milan and the lakes and as we had during those days. enjoy four days have been good. The good hotels (not the first time, but instead very centric). 
