Views of a Nepali Economist

Acid Attacks and Violence against Nepali Women

Three girls studying in a tuition center at Basantapur, in preparation of their SLC exams, had acid thrown at them by a masked man on February 22, 2015. The main victim of the attack appeared to be Sangita Magar, a sixteen-year old. All she wanted was to get good grades in the upcoming SLC exams. Instead, she got acid thrown at her face by some unknown person. The police say that they have identified the suspect of the crime, but are yet to confirm in public who the perpetrator was.

The world today continues to prosper and reach greater heights through education, civil rights and political rights. However, we have yet to make considerable progress in reducing violence against women. In fact, the events and incidents around us suggest that we are regressing on the issue instead of making progress. In India, for example, five women suffer acid attacks each day. In Bangladesh, a woman suffers from such attack each day. Majority of such attacks on women occur when they reject the romantic or sexual advances or marriage requests from men.

While the incidence of acid attacks in Nepal is not as severe as in India or Bangladesh, there are areas in the terai where acid attacks continue to be perpetrated against Nepali women. The acid attack in Kathmandu is notable because it occurred in the capital. That makes the incident difficult to ignore for the intelligentsia and the Nepali state. It occurred at the heart of a city at the heart of the country. I believe that this is an isolated incident in the valley. However, for the sake of those in the periphery who suffer from such violence every day, I hope the incident in Kathmandu sparks a dialogue to address the issue of violence against women in the Nepali society.

Societies have been busy over the years in creating a system of hierarchy in which women have been reduced to a lower tier through systematic exclusion and discrimination. Patriarchy originated in Mesopotamia around 6000 years ago, and spread all over the world. Thus, women have been struggling against patriarchy and male dominance for over 6000 years now. Marilyn French, in her book “The war against women,” claims that all states in history had laws saying women’s bodies, sexuality and reproductive capacity were property of men. Things haven’t changed much. Even in the most developed western countries, such as the United States, women continue to wage wars against men to retain the rights to their own bodies. Patriarchy continues to be used to justify violence against women over the years. At the same time, women’s movement for equal rights has made women a target for further violence.

As with women elsewhere, there are all sorts of violence—physical, emotional, social and economic—that have been perpetrated against Nepali women. Long ago, Nepali women were forced to die alongside their dead husbands in their pyres. The society no longer considered that moral, and it was abolished. There was a time when women were not allowed in the workplace or in politics. That changed, too. Nepali women have more opportunities to work today than ever before. The last parliament had around 30 percent women representatives. There was a time when sons were sent to school but daughters weren’t. Years of efforts in increasing girls’ enrollment has meant that over 85 percent of Nepali girls of primary school age are now enrolled in schools compared to 90 percent of boys of the same age.

Despite all that progress, violence against Nepali women continues. In fact, it has actually increased over the years as Nepal has grown more progressive socially and economically. Even during the Maoist conflict, a movement against the status quo, rape was used as an instrument of war by both sides of the conflict. The security forces, especially, captured women from the opposing camp and rape them to teach the other side a lesson. Even when a rape does not damage the woman’s body physically, it leaves emotional scars. Those are difficult to heal. Acid attacks do the same. They result in more than a disfigured face or body. These attacks weaken the human spirit. They weaken the women’s confidence and their trust on others. They are an extension of the broader violence against women that exists in our society.

Violence against women is not a distinct Nepali phenomenon. Failure to address it is worldwide. The much touted Millennium Development Goals look into a variety of problems and wish to correct them, but violence against women is sorely missing from the list of problems that the MDGs wish to tackle. There is no denying that Nepali women today enjoy more rights and responsibilities than any other time in history. Compared to women in other regressive countries such as those in the Middle East or Africa or even some Asian countries, Nepali women today enjoy much personal and civil liberties. However, much remains to be done. Let us hope that the attack in Basantapur results in a renewed call for addressing violence against Nepali women.

(Un)developing Nepal

Ernesto Sirolli, an expert in international development, likes to tell a story. He worked in Zambia in the 1970s with an Italian international development organization. One day, his team found an amazingly fertile valley but saw that it was not cultivated. Noticing an opportunity to “teach” the locals how to utilize that land, his team distributed tomato seeds to the locals and asked them to plant the seeds. The locals were not interested. His team thought that maybe the locals were looking for some incentive from the rich Italians. So, they decided to pay wages to the locals to grow tomatoes. That did the trick, and the locals got to work.

After some time, the valley was filled with tons of red Italian tomatoes hanging from their plants. One morning, everyone woke up to see hundreds of hippos from a nearby river come to the valley and eat all the tomatoes and the plants. When Ernesto’s team looked at the farmers with horror, the local farmers replied, “That’s why we don’t do agriculture in this valley.” The point is that the Italians did not bother to ask why the locals had not cultivated the valley. They simply assumed that the locals did not know any better, and needed some “lessons” on agriculture from the wise Europeans. The current state of development work in Nepal has similar problems, and some more.

First, the development sector’s incentives are not aligned properly. Budget and programming for a project is often determined by the parliament or some ministerial committee of the donor government. The donor’s staffs put too much pressure on local Nepali implementing institutions to spend the budget within a specified timeframe. Often, the Nepali institution knows that activities designed by the donor will not produce results. The donor’s holier-than-thou attitude scares them from alerting the donor of any shortcomings. So, they remain silent and spend the money because an inability to spend is taken by the donor as a signal of the local organization’s inability to perform.

Misaligned incentives stifle innovation and savings. For example, a local organization becomes efficient and innovative and save $70,000 out of the $500,000 budget it is given for a program. It asks the donor if it could use that savings on a similar program that it believes is worthy of those funds. Does it get commended for its efficiency and innovation? Does the donor permit the local organization to divert that savings to another worthwhile project or cause? We would like to say ‘yes’, but it rarely happens. It is more likely that the donor will note that the local organization does not have the capacity or ability to spend the money it is given. It is more likely that this evaluation will result in no future work for the local organization from that donor.

Second, the development sector in Nepal is very myopic. It is riddled with short-term projects. Even when programs are long-term, the donor judges the program based on immediate short-term output or short-term participation rates. As a result, programs on peacebuilding or good governance, which take a long time to gestate and produce results, are often deemed unworthy because immediate results are not visible. Judgment based on participation rates allows the program to create perverse incentives in order to get better results. There are programs that provide incentives such as per-diem or similar compensations to people who use the programs in order to boost participation rates.

For example, a paralegal program in Nepal works to resolve people’s disputes locally. To attract participation in the program, people get paid Rs 500 if they approach the program to resolve their dispute. However, such incentives backfire. I have met people who have told me they faked a dispute on a Friday morning, approached the program on the afternoon, accepted the program’s suggestions to “mend their difference,” and together went to a local bar in the evening to spend the money each of them received.

Third, local knowledge is either ignored or deemed inferior by donors. There is an excessive top-down control over projects and resources because donors do not trust local Nepali organizations. Plans and programs are designed and resource allocations are determined abroad. The role for local organizations is limited to implementing the activities, and simply checking the various boxes that the donor wants checked. This is especially true of most UN programs and projects. Very little local knowledge input is utilized in designing programs.

The top-down approach and distrust of locals completely ignores the reality that locals know the conditions and problems better. Instead, we have parachute consultants, who consider themselves “experts” on this or that issue, dropping in from abroad to design local programs. They aren’t much interested in listening to what the locals have to say, and are more interested in instructing the locals what to do. They believe they know better. I’m not implying all of them are evil or intentionally obnoxious. Some of them are guided by benevolent ignorance, like the Italians who were so excited to teach Zambians how to grow tomatoes that they forgot to ask the locals why they hadn’t cultivated the obviously fertile valley. Donors should note that dismissing local knowledge results in program failure.  

Fourth, many development programming ideas are either outdated or repeated to an extent of being counterproductive. Donors compete against one another to launch the same program in the same districts. Their efforts would be much more productive if they collaborate or create a basket fund to which everyone contributes, and a joint team runs the program. There have been some efforts on that front in recent years. Governments of the UK, Denmark and Switzerland recently created a “Governance Facility” that aims to exercise collaboration on peacebuilding and local governance programming. If that brings good results, it could show others the way in those fields. But, there is scope for so much more. More donors need to follow suit.

Also, most development organizations still utilize outdated tools and concepts. Their reliance on logframes and short-term result capturing matrices is counterproductive in areas of long-term development needs. When they are not utilizing outdated tools, they create new ones simply for the sake of it. A few years ago, the World Bank proposed a list of 22 social accountability tools, and launched a project called PRAN to train Nepalis to use the tools. However, those are too many tools, and even the World Bank would agree that PRAN was not a successful project.

The World Bank’s approach is akin to throwing the kitchen sink at a problem and hoping that something works. The approach needs to be more focused. I find that only three of those tools—Right to Information, Public Audit, and Public Expenditure Tracking System—actually produce decent outcomes. Others may find a couple more that work. It would be harsh to say the rest of those tools are useless, but they don’t appear very solid. New approaches to solving problems are always welcome, but they should have a lasting characteristic instead of simply appearing to be another fad that the development industry churns out once every decade.

Finally, most development programs suffer from poor institutional learning. A management change results in loss of years of learning. A decade-long program suddenly comes to an end, and all those years of knowledge and wisdom are not transferred to others. Sometimes, poor human resource policies make the matter worse. For example, local staff in Nepal’s JICA office may be seasoned veterans with decades of development work experience, but they have to report to recent Japanese college graduates on a one- or two-year term that can only be understood as an “exposure” posting. A long-term commitment of human and other resources is critical for institutional learning and its continued transfer.   

European Games

On January 11, I had written that the constant spat and disagreement between Nepali political parties has broader repercussions. I had argued that forces that are quiet at other times take advantage of the political chaos, and attempt to undermine the Nepali state and the political process.

An example of such attempt was the British ambassador trying to insert himself into Nepal’s religious matters by asking that the new constitution grant Nepalis a right to convert their religion. We all knew which religious conversion the ambassador was promoting (conversion to Christianity, in case you are wondering).  Another example was the Indian ambassador asking KP Oli to clarify his Freudian slip targeted towards the Madhesi leadership.

It is time the Nepali leaderships tell foreign ambassadors that we appreciate their help on many matters, but there are some matters they should wisely sit out on. However, now the Europeans appear to have joined the circus. A group of EU ambassadors have been discovered to have conducted a meeting with the divisive Madhesi political activist CK Raut.

The EU ambassadors claim that CK Raut requested to meet them on “humanitarian grounds.” However, any diplomat would know that holding clandestine meetings with a known secessionist, no matter what the grounds, is problematic. It can be seen as undermining the Nepali state. Did the EU ambassadors not know that Raut had been arrested by the Nepali state and charged with sedition and is out of jail on bond? They must think Nepalis are fools to believe that the ambassadors were unaware of the consequences of their action. They are smart diplomats. They knew very well what they were doing, and they still did it.

As representatives of their respective states, the EU ambassadors’ meeting with Raut can be seen as an interference on Nepal’s sovereignty. The United Nations’ “Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic Affairs of States and the Protection of their Independence and Sovereignty” mentions that “… no State shall organize, assist, foment, Finance, incite or tolerate subversive, terrorist or armed activities towards the violent overthrow of the regime of another State, or interfere in civil strife in another State.” Therefore, the EU ambassadors violated the international non-intervention, non-interference principle when they met with Raut, an individual recognized and charged by the Nepali state as a secessionist. The ambassadors should also know that such charges were not laid on Raut by some autocratic dictatorship. Raut was charged as a secessionist by the justice system of a democratic state.

How would the French people feel if the Nepali ambassador to France starts holding clandestine meetings with Basque nationalists on “humanitarian grounds”? Would the Spanish government appreciate the Nepali ambassador to Spain holding meetings with the Catalan secessionists on humanitarian grounds? The more important question is: was the meeting with Raut a one-off meeting with these EU ambassadors or was that the only meeting the Nepali media found out about? How many times have the EU representatives held meetings with the known secessionist?

The EU ambassadors should have considered the reaction that their action would generate. Their actions could put a strain on the long-term relationships that Nepal has with the EU states. Some of that stress has started to materialize. The Nepali government has started to question if the Europeans only met with Raut or if they are also funding his activities. For the sake of both Nepalis and the European missions in Nepal, the Nepali government should launch an investigation to determine who has been funding Raut’s secessionist activities. The EU missions should hope that they aren’t found supporting Raut’s activities directly or indirectly.

The Europeans have been here before. They funded and provided legitimacy to fringe ethnic actors and groups during and after the Madhes movement. That came back to bite them. A number of donors, including the DFID, had to distance themselves from such actors because they were undermining the Nepali peace process. The Raut incident suggests that the Europeans are at it again. Why do they keep courting extreme fringes when there are plenty of moderate voices that could use their support?

The Nepali state has been very hard-at-work trying to ensure that isolated actors like Raut are kept at bay from getting a larger stage. However, by holding meetings with a declared secessionist, the Europeans are legitimizing such isolated actors and their actions. In the process, they are undermining the Nepali state that is already fragile. The EU states are known for asking for accountability from Nepali actors and institutions that they support. Are the EU representatives and ambassadors accountable to anyone?

(c) Copyright: Mukesh Khanal

FLAWED NARRATIVE

Economic development in Nepal has never been inclusive. There is still a disparity based on geographical difference, ethnic groups and rural-urban divide. Minorities and marginalized groups continue to suffer under poverty. As a result, social exclusion and economic poverty are still strongly correlated. Seventy percent of the ‘untouchables’ and 60% of the indigenous population are poor. Over 42% of households in the mountains are poor while the figure is only 23.4% in the plains. Only 4% of households in Kathmandu valley are poor. The figure for urban areas outside the valley is 33%.

Poverty and lack of economic opportunities has meant that Nepal is losing its working-age population to overseas work. Around 65% of Nepalis who leave Nepal every day as migrant workers are 29-years old or younger. The other 35% are between 29 and 44 years of age. So, the Nepalis who leave are at the prime of their life. As a result, many Nepali villages in the hills and mountains have virtually lost all their working-age population to the Middle East and other migrant destinations. That demography of 15 to 44-year olds is the target demography of almost all the development programming in Nepal. When that target population is missing from most program locations, it becomes difficult for development organizations to carry out their mandate and programs. The trend for migration does not seem to be slowing down. Therefore, international and national development organizations in Nepal have a real problem in their hands in the coming decade.

This exodus, of mainly working age males, has not been all for the negative. In the absence of males, women in such locations have shouldered more responsibilities. Remittance income has supported them in this role. Their ability to venture into new responsibilities have been made easier because of remittance income which has been increasing each passing year. According to the World Bank, Nepal was the third largest recipient of remittances in 2013 with $5.4 billion. The 2011 Census showed that 25.4% or 1.4 million Nepali households had at least one member of the household living abroad. With the guaranteed financial support from remittance income, those left behind—mainly the women—have become more participatory in community work and decision making. For many, the absence of males has been an opportunity to participate in economic and social work which they would not have had a chance to engage in otherwise.

Nepal’s remittance story is sad. It did not arise because excellent Nepali workers wanted to go global to take advantage of lucrative opportunities overseas. It arose out of inequality and uneven level of development across Nepal. The Maoists exploited this inequality and uneven economic development to launch their revolution. The Maoist conflict has now ended, but the issues still remain. For example: despite having similar geography, demography and climate, the mid- and far-western terai are much less developed than the eastern terai. Jhapa, Morang and Sunsari in eastern terai are among the top five contributors of revenue to the coffers of Nepal government. But, Kanchanpur, Kailali, Banke and all other districts in mid- and far-western terai are decades behind in development.

The eastern districts also rank very high on human development indices. Residents of Jhapa and Sunsari are also disproportionately represented in the Nepali civil service. Similarly, hilly districts in eastern, western and central Nepal are much more developed than those in the mid- and far-west. Among the hilly districts, Palpa and Syangja are disproportionately represented in Nepali civil service. Kaski and Kathmandu are much more developed than similar hilly districts in mid- and far-west. It would not be a stretch to say that there has been a systematic exclusion of mid- and far-west Nepal from the development process. The Maoist conflict successfully exploited that exclusion but did not actually solve it.

There are many in Nepal who believe that the remittance economy has helped to narrow the development gap between the haves and the have-nots. They believe that the poor have been able to go overseas for work, and the remittance income they send home has helped their household enter the coveted middle-class. But, there is a story of exclusion and exploitation within that story. Manpower agencies and brokers charge a much higher rate from workers than advertised. The government has set a maximum fee of Rs 60,000 that agents can charge for sending a migrant worker to Malaysia and Rs 80,000 for Korea. However, agents in Jhapa last year were charging Rs 260,000 as fees for Malaysia and Rs 700,000 for Korea. This practice of extorting higher fees than what is allowed by the government results in exclusion of the poor from an opportunity to go to these lucrative destinations.

As a result, the poor either don’t go to these lucrative destinations or end up taking huge loans to fund their trip. The high rates make the trip affordable to only the middle-class Nepalis who can afford to pay such high fees. This exclusion based on affordability hurts the poor two ways. First, they are unable to go and work in places like Malaysia and Korea that have better working conditions and pay higher wages. Second, the problem of affordability forces the poor to choose locations such as the Middle Eastern countries or India where labor practices are sketchy and wages aren’t great. They are able to sustain a livelihood and be able to make their families slightly better off, but they will always lag behind the middle-class.

Nepal’s remittance story is not inclusive, and does not do much for the poor Nepalis. Nepal’s poor need a different narrative.