By DM Thapa As mentioned many times before by this writer, the political field has become more chaotic after the so-called ‘fair and free’ election for the House of Representatives (HOR) and also provincial assemblies which ended recently. The race is already on for who will be the next prime minister of the country, though to be fair, the incumbent prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, no matter how inept he is, still leads the race. But wily politician, Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ is also vying for the post, though his party has performed dismally in the elections and it has only a few votes in comparison with its better performance in the past and also it looks weak in front of its two largest competitors, the Nepali Congress and the CPN (UML), another Left party which was its partner in the past. Naturally, another clever politician, the chairman of the UML, KP Oli, is also in the race as he leads the main opposition party and he is trying his best to break the present alliance that stood against him and his party. He also wants to be the prime minister. The largest party after this election, the Nepali Congress, already has almost half a dozen contenders to be the chief executive besides Deuba. The foremost contender is young Gagan Thapa, who also happens to be the son-in-law of veteran Congress leader Arjun Narsigh KC, which is reported only in a seldom manner by our so-called ‘free media’ as most can guess is dominated by Nepali Congress supporters, like exactly how the so-called ‘messiahs of the free press world’ is dominated by the Western nations. Just look at the way things are reported about how events are commented about international issues by this free media and you will know what this writer means. Even the tragic war in the former Soviet Union state Ukraine is reported in a biased manner and similar policies are followed in reporting developments in countries which the Western nations, led by the United States of America (USA) are concerned as ‘enemies’ by them. Right now, the environment is just right for foreign powers to play their games openly here in this country. There is a hung parliament and political parties are ready to sacrifice their own independence just to get to power, no matter whose stooge they may have to be. It is no wonder the Indians have sprung up first and the ambassador of that country has given priority to meeting leaders of the major parties, to get things going the way the Indian government wants to do so. At least the activities of the Indian ambassador have been reported in the media outlets, but other foreign nations must also be holding private parlays with other Nepali political leaders and influencing them in their own ways. This holds true in foreigners dealing with the so-called civil society leaders, intellectuals, the media and also anyone who has some influence in society. None less than the chairman of the Upper House in Parliament has said that the country has become worse off with the recently held election results. Like many others, he has also predicted that the inability of any single party to win a simple majority is not good for the impoverished country’s political sector, which influences all other sectors that affect the people in general. As said by many other experts and analysts too, the country has benefited and also seen changes politically, but as far as the ordinary people are concerned, no real change has taken place to uplift their lifestyles. Yes, there is political freedom, freedom of speech and other such political gains which politicians and their foreign backers constantly like to harp on. But what about the realities, what gains have the people received in real terms? Have they had better physical infrastructure like good roads clean drinking water and other development projects? Have they had access to good health care, good education and better social support? No, and this is an empathetic NO! The people have been only given promises, that also mostly during election times and no such promises have been fulfilled. For example, right now the issue of landless people being ousted from lands which they have been occupying has taken much interest and both the political parties and the media have tried to take advantage of the situation. Yes, every Nepali citizen has the right to settle down in any part of the country, but they cannot do so by occupying government-owned land, specially along the river banks. This writer doesn’t want to take any sides, but an illegal settlement is not allowable. It is even more of an irony that many such owners of illegal land, who claim themselves as landless, are hiring their landless given property for huge profits, while they stay somewhere else. This is cheating the nation and such acts must not go unpunished, no matter how unpopular anyone making such decisions against the ‘illegal’ landless be. Being just some weeks after the elections, it must not go unmentioned that the illegal settlers are being used as ‘vote banks’ by political leaders. This is very unfortunate, as we even extend our sympathies to the landless, we must alert them that what they are doing and what the political leaders are doing is wrong. One analyst rightly pointed out that the landless could go back to their own districts of origin and ask for some sort of help from the local governments there. Everybody should not target only the urban cities or townships and create more problems in these areas. We understand many facilities, including employment opportunities can be found in the urban sectors only. But this is where the government and the many numbers of INGOs and NGOs must focus their attention so that the country’s demographic structure is not altered for the worse. Now the demographic indicators point out that the workforce of the country either goes abroad to do dangerous and dirty work or they opt to come to the cities where they feel they can make a better income. This trend must change and the government has a major role to play in bringing changes to such a trend in the country. Otherwise, no matter how many elections we may hold or how many constitutions we may amend, it will mean nothing, unless the people can feel a sense of security and well-being through the political changes we have seen.