From A World to Win News Service
Revolutionary Worker #1227, February 1, 2004, posted at rwor.org
We received the following from A World to Win News Service.
January 19, 2004. A World to Win News Service. In an enormous step toward the emancipation of all of Nepal, the people of the Magar region in the western part of the country have established their own revolutionary autonomous regional government. The Magar people are a minority nationality who have been oppressed and without political power since Prithur Narayan Shah conquered them and Nepal's other minority peoples--who together make up the majority of Nepalese--when he led the violent unification of Nepal in 1768.
The Magar Autonomous Region was announced on January 9, 2004, amid a gathering of 75,000 people of that region. A convention held on the 7th and 8th of January of the 130 representatives of the Magar Autonomous Region elected a 27-member Working Committee.
The People's War led by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) has inflicted severe defeats on the armed forces of the monarchy, making it possible for the people of much of rural Nepal to seize political power and set up their own ruling United People's Committees. CPN(M) policy is to fight for a country- wide united government of anti-feudal and anti-imperialist patriotic forces, within which the oppressed nationalities will have the right of self determination.
Comrade Prachanda, chairman of the CPN(M) and supreme commander of the People's Liberation Army, and comrade Baburam Bhattarai, the convenor of the United People's Revolutionary Council (the embryo of the future Nepal-wide revolutionary government) sent their greetings to this mass assembly. Comrade Diwakar, a member of the standing committee of the CPN (Maoist), Comrade Krishna Bhadur Mahara and Comrade Ravani of the Maoist revolutionary movement of India delivered speeches to this event in person.
According to a report on the Nepali Maoist website Krishnasen Sambad Samiti, the village of Thawang in Rolpa district was specially decorated for the event. Welcome gates were set up to greet the representatives and delegates coming from different parts of the region and the country. The surrounding hills were decked with communist red flags.
Thawang is the village where in 1980 the people completely boycotted elections and all the ballot boxes were turned in empty. This was on the call of the forerunner of the CPN (Maoist), the Communist Party of Nepal Mashal, which appealed to the people to oppose the elections to the local councils (called Panchayats) run by feudal notables under the authority of the king. Right after the boycott, the Royal Army came to the village and destroyed it. The Maoist people of Thawang stood firm on their commitment. This great revolutionary beacon encouraged people throughout the country to stand up for the complete destruction of the reactionary system and fight for a New Democratic Society as part of the advance to socialism and eventually communism, a world without classes or any form of oppression. Thus this village remained the center of gravity of the Maoist revolutionary movement in Nepal. Since the initiation of the people's war on 13 February 1996, the revolutionary masses of Thawang have been a firm pillar of revolution. Despite the destruction of village and several subsequent Royal Army operations with horrible atrocities, this village has remained an inspiration to the Magar region and the whole country. Now it has been the historic site of the declaration of the autonomous government of the Magar community.
Nepal is a multinational, multilingual country dominated by the Brahmin and Chhetrie castes since the country's forcible unification. Nepalese society was united under the feudal centralized monarchical regime not through fraternal harmony among the people, but through suppression, repression and discrimination. The real unity of the people can only be achieved through revolution to smash these chains, make people politically sovereign and thus pave the way for economic and cultural development.
Because this step was taken as part of a people's war led by a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist party, it is a step toward uprooting the class, caste and national oppression of the Nepali people and the country's domination by India and imperialist powers. The declaration of the autonomous region is aimed at the monarchical regime which represents and enforces that system of oppression.
According to the KSS news service, the people of other oppressed nationality regions will also declare regional and national autonomy in different parts of the country.