Chinese Nitpicking on Tibetan democracyBy Dhondup Gyalpo[Saturday, 19 June 2010, 4:15 p.m.]
If
one were to go by the recent barrage of official Chinese rhetoric, the
elections held by the Central Tibetan Administration are anything but
democratic. Their reason for this: the National Democratic Party of
Tibet (NDPT), which they claim is the “only political party of the
Dalai clique”, has already selected a list of candidates for the coming
elections of Kalon Tripa and Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile.In the
latest article published by People’s Daily, an organ of the Communist
Party of China, it is claimed that His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s recent
comments on democratic elections in exile are only “skin deep”. The
article, titled Dalai Clique’s democratic lies, turned out to be a shoddy translation of the original in Chinese published earlier by China Ethnic News.The
assertion by the author of the original article, Du Xinyu, that NDPT is
“the only political party of Dalai clique” is of course open to debate.
What is even more absurd is the suggestion that NDPT, by virtue of
being “the only political party of Dalai clique”, is the one party that
declares nominations for exile elections. The underlying message
apparently is a misperception, if not deliberate misinformation, based
entirely on their own experience of pseudo-elections in which people
are allowed to vote only on candidates hand-picked by the Communist
Party.Those familiar with the rituals of electioneering in
exile would also know about the conspicuous absence of public hustings
and competing political parties that are the central characteristic of
elections in democratic countries. (This may have been a reason why
Kalon Tripa Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche once explained the Tibetan polity
as “a partyless democracy”.)Notwithstanding the lack of
political parties in the usual sense of the term, the Tibetan elections
are not totally devoid of public campaigning. The exile NGOs and
province/region-based associations that are autonomous of government
engage in their own unique ways of canvassing for polls, a highlight of
which is the declaration of nominations, usually by advertising them in
the print media.NGOs and region-based associations that usually
propose candidates for every election include NDPT, Gu-Chu-Sum
Movement, the associations of the three traditional provinces of Tibet
(Dotod, Domed and Utsang) and their regional chapters, etc.Furthermore,
it would be pertinent to note that even before NDPT made its
nominations public, the association of Domed (Amdo) province of Tibet
has already announced some 13 nominations for Kalon Tripa. According to
their announcement on 16 March 2010, later covered by Tibetan
newspapers, “In a special general meeting of the Domed association held
from 14-16 March 2010, the executive heads and delegates of all the
regional chapters of the association have voted to propose nominations
for the election of Kalon Tripa in 2011. The following [13] candidates
received the highest number of votes. The photos and biographies of
these candidates will soon be posted on our website.”It is even
more interesting to note that the Dharamshala chapter of Domed
association has later proposed a different list of five nominations for
Kalon Tripa and 10 for the Tibetan parliament. Many other NGOs and
associations are also expected to throw their nominations into the ring
for consideration.This proposition of candidates is not merely
limited to NGOs and associations. Several prominent Tibetans, like
former Tibetan Supreme Justice Commissioners, Kalons and MPs, have in
their individual capacities also proposed their choice of nominations
through the media. In fact, even an ordinary Tibetan, or a group of
them, also propose candidates by advertising in the print media.It
would thus be wrong to suggest that NDPT, or for that matter, the
Tibetan administration, carries any role in finalising the election
nominations. Every Tibetan election has a primary round in which people
are free to nominate any candidate they deem fit. In the final round of
general elections, people vote on candidates shortlisted from the
outcome of primaries. Thus, in a true democracy, there is no deciding
factor over and above the people’s vote.The way Du Xinyu has
spun this whole matter is, to put simply, jaw-dropping. He is convinced
to the point of cockiness, that the forthcoming Tibetan elections are
headed for major failure. He reveals that, of all the nominations
proposed by NDPT, one out of total three nominees for Kalon Tripa and
24 out of 45 nominees for Tibetan parliament have already “quitted the
election”.The truth could not be more different. The reason
behind a majority of those who withdrew their names from NDPT’s
nominations is not because they had refused to contest elections; it
was rather to avoid any possibility of conflict of interest. The party
president Chime Youngdrung clarified to this writer that as many of the
nominees are already active members of other organisations, they have
decided not to contest elections through or with support from NDPT. (It
must however be added that it was not unusual in the past elections to
see several organisations rooting for the same candidate.)Another
possible reason for withdrawals could have been the mission statement
of NDPT, which also includes “to struggle for the restoration of
Tibet’s rightful independence.” Those who withdrew their names from
NDPT’s list of nominations could have done so as a statement of their
support to the policy of Middle-Way Approach, which seeks to achieve
genuine autonomy for a Tibet within the People’s Republic of China.In
order to justify his bleak election forecast, Du Xinyu also quoted some
cooked-up figures of abnormally low voter turnout in exile. According
to him, the 2006 parliamentary elections registered a dismal turnout of
26.8% and “considering the fact that a monk could have two votes, the
actual voting rate would be even lower.”According to the
records of the Tibetan Election Commission, the total number of people
registered (or eligible) to vote in the 2006 parliamentary elections
was 70,500. A total of 43,202 votes were cast in the final election.
Since the monks and nuns are entitled to vote in two constituencies,
religious (each 2 seats) and provincial (each 10 seats), in order to
calculate the actual number of people who have cast their votes, we
would have to deduct the votes cast for religious seats. In other
words, if we add up the number of people who had voted in the three
provincial constituencies of Dotod, Domed and Utsang (total 30 seats),
North America (1 seat) and Europe (2 seats), the actual figure would be
37,147, which means the turnout rate was 52.69%.It must also be
noted that thus far, parliamentary seats have not been allocated for
Tibetans in Australia and in Asian countries like Taiwan, Japan,
Russia, etc. The Tibetan people in these countries are however entitled
to vote in the election of Kalon Tripa.Furthermore, it is also
pertinent that during the 2006 election, the popular expectations of a
record turnout did not materialize largely because the poll was, due to
certain unavoidable circumstances, conducted at a time when the
majority of Tibetans were scattered across India for the winter sweater
business.Generally speaking, the factors affecting turnout in
polls is a subject of extensive debate. A low turnout can be attributed
to a whole host of issues ranging from socio-economic and cultural
factors, to institutional factors and modalities of registration.
Sometimes, even different methods in measuring voter turnout can cause
discrepancies in the count.It was as such quite amusing to see
Du Xinyu propounding a whole new theory claiming that: “The voting rate
is an important index for measuring whether a government is a
democratically-elected one or not.” Although the facts and figures
cited earlier should make it amply clear that the turnout rate was
significantly higher than what Du Xinyu has claimed in his article,
there is a growing realization that the voter participation should be
improved, particularly in the light of 2006 Kalon Tripa election which
registered a turnout of mere 44%. The incumbent Kalon Tripa Prof
Samdhong Rinpoche won that election with a landslide majority of 29,216
votes (90.72%).The fact that Tibetan polls are conducted in a
free, fair and transparent manner needs no corroboration. Furthermore,
the popular faith in democratic processes, or for that matter, the
legitimacy of the Central Tibetan Administration, has never been an
issue for the Tibetan people. Thus, the low rate of voter participation
is often summarily attributed to logistics, level of political
consciousness and at times, even to complacency.As in times of
all previous elections, we have been recently witnessing more variety
of efforts from both the administration and NGOs aimed at boosting
voter participation. And of all measures that could help in nudging the
Tibetan people towards the ballot stations, what could be more powerful
than giving them a dose of raw Chinese propaganda slandering Tibetan
democracy. In that context, Du Xinyu deserves a pat on the back for his
vitriolic article, which is provoking Tibetans to think about why they
should vote.
