'We're in the Process of Announcing A Decisive Movement'

Nepal Verified News recently caught up with Swagat Nepal, spokesperson for the Joint Movement Mobilization Committee formed for the restoration of constitutional monarchy, to discuss the status of their movement and the way forward.

Certain analyses point out that the mobilization committee has not been as effective as it should have been. Your thoughts?

In the capacity of spokesperson for the joint movement mobilization committee, I must say this: a popular movement is unlike an ordinary movement.

Programs of a movement are declared through a press conference.

Let me clarify here: people turned up spontaneously (on March 9) to receive the King upon his arrival at the airport (Tribhuvan International Airport) from Pokhara. It was not a popular movement, people were not participating in a movement.

Also, the event in Tinkune (March 28) was not part of a popular movement. The banner displayed at the event made it clear that it was a program to make public the ideological framework of the movement. We have not announced the movement, as yet.

A panicked government concluded that all this should be stopped before it gains strength. 

In a phase-wise manner, we will announce programs associated with this movement. Only then can analysts conclude whether the movement became successful or not. 

At Tinkune on March 28, two people died. One can question the moral ground on which the government stands and point at the lack of magnanimity on its part. Still, is the Tinkune violence not a setback for your cause?

Two days before the Tinkune event, the Prime Minister directed (cadres of his party) to pounce on protesters, just like a tiger pounces on a cow. The videos of the PM’s directives are there in public domain, all people have access to them.

What does it show? It shows that he had a premeditated plan to foment violence, to kill.

Aware of this design, our friends, who were participating in the event in Tinkune, made a wise decision and left when police started driving them away instead of staying put and declaring other protest programs. That way, they helped minimize the losses. While the PM issued orders to kill, supporters of the campaign exercised restraint.

For any movement to succeed, there are two preconditions. A movement becomes successful when a government sheds blood of innocent civilians and when it forces people to go underground. Both the preconditions have been met in this case, so it is not a setback. 

Has the arrest of Durga Prasain and two senior leaders from the Rastriya Prajatantra Party not impacted your cause? 

These arrests have indeed made an impact, they have made a positive impact. People now know how cruel and how tyrannical this regime is. All this will benefit the movement. 

The international community now knows how undemocratic the current regime is, so our movement will enjoy global solidarity. 

For example, officials of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights have started speaking against the regime’s atrocities; they have started expressing solidarity against the regime. Our movement is gaining strength from all this. 

Police have started arresting even those who posted pictures showing the arrest of their relatives. Such steps have only caused a surge in popular support for the movement against the current autocratic regime. 

In a way, it’s a rerun of the popular protest of 2019 BS (62 years ago). At that time, people stood against the Panchayat regime’s act of suppressing dissent. The same scenario is recurring.

At present, the environment is conducive for our movement, the PM’s directive to kill people participating in a peaceful, logical and intellectual uprising has further established the inevitability of this movement.  

When is the committee formally announcing its movement? 

We are in the process of forming some departments, committees and subcommittees under the current leadership. By the way, the leadership of a movement is never stationary. In fact, an ideology, a school of thought is what guides a movement. Currently, we are in the process of documenting our guiding philosophy and principles. The process of giving our organizational structure a full shape is very much on. 

But one thing is clear: Keeping an individual under house arrest won’t stop our movement. Rather, it will make way for a more powerful movement. 

Currently, we are in the process of announcing a powerful movement.