Bhutan Votes .....(2)

Sanney , from Dovan village under Sompangkha constituency (Sarpang Dzongkhag), lives in Gelephu and drives our tipper truck. About a month back he came to me saying tail light of the tipper was not working. It was high time we fixed it because local police caught him thrice but he got away with some story. I asked if it was the same police. He said different person every time. There was high chance that one of those three would catch him again. We fixed the light. He got away thrice. A street-smart fella ! I know it because he also gets away from me with his little story when he does a small “side business”. He does not know that I let him get away because he is pretty resourceful at the level and gives good output.

Last Wednesday (29 May) he asked permission to go to Dovan to vote (31 May primary round) because people there were telling him that he must come.  He said he would return on Sunday (2 June). The truck had to be parked for three days. I let him go. He returned to work on Monday (3 June). I asked Sanney, “ how did the voting go”?  He said he had to walk for more than a day to reach his village because the feeder road was completely blocked with landslide. He only knew “Chara (bird) Party” and “Ghora  (horse) Party”. His “sathi-bhai” (friends and family) told him to press “Chara Party” button, and he did it. Didn’t he see four black buttons? He said there were  quite a few but he did not care to see. He just pressed the "bird" button with right thumb. I asked, “you did not think of the feeder road and having to walk  more than a day while pressing the button?” He answered with a question  ” sir, wasn’t that feeder road constructed by the government?”  The street-smart guy is politically inert! And so are most of the rural population.There you have the educated/uneducated, urban/rural votes split.

Yes,  it was  either “Chara Party”  or “Ghora Party” , not so much DPT or PDP leave aside Druk Phuensum Tshogpa or People’s Democratic Party, in villages.   I do not need to tell you what “equity and justice” or  “empowering people for liberty, equality and prosperity…”  … blah … blah … means on ground or above. 

The “Chara Party” and “Ghora Party” are  not just village jargons.  These are political space carved out since 2008. It was much easier then because there was no primary round, the political space was empty  and there were just “bird” and “horse”.  You will know how difficult it is to carve out a space if the space is already  more or less occupied. You need to penetrate and convince people to shift position not with the intention of additional occupancy but replacement of one of the two.  Did Druk Nyamrup Tshogpa (DNT) or  Druk Chirwang Tshogpa (DCT) try to penetrate gewog, chiwog and remote communities? It was out of their reach, and they did not even try. So why would you be surprised with the DNT result? I am not.

Is there additional primary round space  for two/three more parties? Well Sanney did not care to look into other buttons when there were just four, and then why would the others look elsewhere  when their “friends and families have told them to press specific button”.   The “friends and families” do not tell to press specific button out of nowhere. Primary round of three would make strategic sense, more than that is new parties’ dilution of the chances.  I am not saying, the primary round result is.

The primary round election result did not have big surprises but had some results that raised few eyebrows.  The DPT walked away with 33 seats, PDP 12 seats and DNT just 2.  The Pelela-east were swept by DPT except DNT stronghold, Thrimshing (Trashigang), but Pelela-west was dominated (9 seats out of 14) by PDP. You may call sympathy votes/stronghold or whatever, East going with DPT was expected. Looking at DPT-PDP nexus and also because DPT being the ruling party, the voting pattern in west tend to point towards anti-DPT pattern rather than pro-PDP  drive. The south is somewhat balanced. I call balance even though  DPT grabbed 7 out 10 seats mainly because the differences are marginal.  So how did PDP pull the rabbit out their hat, when everyone thought the “horse”, only a few weeks ago, was  hardly breathing. Did it get injected some oxygen drips? You will find out. It isn’t rocket science. The fact is the “horse” is up and running (the race).

Assuming voters turn-out of around 55% (same as primary round), 23% of the DNT & DCT votes (of which 33%, 9%, 24% and 34% are in the pockets of eastern, central, western and southern regions respectively) are up for grabs in general election, and will be shared by DPT and PDP . The share gets added to DPT’s primary round slice of 44.5% or PDP’s 32.5%. Without going too far, anyone in the street will tell you that DCT/DNT supporters are less likely to press the “bird” button in the forthcoming general election. And the shocking comment like people did not vote for DPT because they are ungrateful for what DPT has done in last five years  is not going to help them. The setting makes figures exciting and race competitive.

The straight line extrapolation will throw light on the election scenario, even though actuals may be pretty far from what is deduced here. With less than 75% of DCT/DNT votes to PDP, DPT will form the next government hands-down and PDP will sit once again in opposition benches.  If PDP can grab 75%,  one constituency of eastern, two constituencies of central, two  of western and solid four of southern region will move to PDP basket. The score: DPT:- 26; and PDP:-21. Still DPT government.

With 80% of DCT/DNT votes to PDP, one more constituency  each from eastern, central, western and southern region will take PDP side.  The result: DPT-:22; and PDP-25.  PDP forms the government, DPT is pushed to opposition benches.

Let DPT/PDP do their due diligence to find out which are those  13 critical seats  (east:2, central:3, West:3 and south:5). And,  they have to be smarter than going with blank assumption that the educated and/or urban votes will go along with the dropped out candidates,  Not only these, work out strategies to win those borderline 13.  Wow, borderline?  The 75-80% of DCT/DNT votes a borderline? No way, skeptics would say. Ladies and Gents, I am talking politics, not mathematics! The Bhutanese Politics, which gave us last five-year the Parliament of 45:2 ratio.