(TibetanReview.net, Aug24’24) – In what is seen as an overture to China, Nepal has lifted on Aug 22 a ban it imposed nine months ago on the popular social media app TikTok ostensibly because its Chinese owners, ByteDance, agreed to abide by Kathmandu’s terms. The app is already banned in India and faces a deadline for a similar action in the USA as well, especially because of privacy and security concerns. The Chinese government can lawfully order the company to turn over its user data at any time.
The ban was imposed when Mao-admiring, but perceived sometimes as pro-India, communist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal, or Prachanda, was the Prime Minister. And the lifting of the ban has occurred under Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli, leader of Nepal’s largest communist party known to be trenchantly pro-China and for his occasional India-baiting antics.
The lifting of the ban was preceded by the Chinese ambassador to Nepal, Mr Chen Song, writing on the social media platform X on Aug 22 morning, “Today is a good day.” Many Nepalese took it to mean that the talks to reinstate TikTok had been finalized, noted the nytimes.com Aug 22.
The app was banned last year after the company refused to curb what the Prachanda government described as hate speech that disturbed “social harmony.” At the time, Nepali officials said that they had resorted to the ban after TikTok declined to address concerns about troubling content.
Nine months on, “a meeting was held on Friday (Aug 23) at the ministry with the TikTok vice president. The TikTok delegation has committed to accept all the government conditions,” kathmandupost.com Aug 24 quoted the ministry’s spokesperson Gajendra Thakur as saying.
Prithvi Subba Gurung, a Nepalese government spokesman, has said TikTok would now have to abide by certain directives, such as naming a point of contact in the country.
“We have set a few conditions such as TikTok to be used for promoting Nepali tourism, supporting us for digital safety, digital literacy and digital education and curb hate content,” Mr Gurung was quoted as saying.
Earlier, TikTok had sent several letters to the Nepal government requesting the ban be lifted, saying the ban was causing financial losses to the company and the country.
Before the ban, there were around 2.2 million TikTok users in Nepal, noted the report.
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The decision to reinstate TikTok is seen as signalling Mr Oli’s belief that, amid the geopolitical bickering between China and India, the Himalayan country was better off aligning with China, given the fact that Nepal’s neighbour to the south had also banned the app.
India banned TikTok and a large number of other Chinese apps in a series of decisions since 2020, citing security and privacy concern, after Sino-India relations plunged to their nadir in many decades in the aftermath of a violent night clash between the troops from the two sides in the Galwan Valley of eastern Ladakh.
Mr Oli, 73, returned to power in July as the leader of a new ruling coalition, taking charge of the government for the fourth time. He has made no secret of his opposition to India’s influence in Nepal.
During his first stint as prime minister in 2015, he stood up against a crippling economic blockade that India had imposed over certain provisions in Nepal’s Constitution, the nytimes.com report noted.
During his second stint as prime minister, after elections in 2017, Mr Oli revised Nepal’s political map in a way that further soured relations with India.
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On Aug 22, Nepal and China also agreed to expand a few development projects aimed at strengthening bilateral ties, including an agreement to complete the upgrade of a highway in Kathmandu, the Nepalese capital, as part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative project, the report said.
Also, the decision to reverse the TikTok ban has come as Nepal again requested China to convert a loan of 1,378.74 million yuan (around Nepali Rs25.88 billion) from the China Exim Bank into a grant. The Nepal government had used this loan to finance the construction of Pokhara International Airport, reported the kathmandupost.com Aug 23.
Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel made the request during a meeting with Yang Weiqun, vice chairman of the China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA), held at the Ministry of Finance on Aug 22, the report said.
The airport came into operation after inauguration in Jan 2023 but failed to generate sufficient income to sustain itself and service the loan. Failing to operate regular international flights from the airport, the authorities are now using it for domestic flights.
Therefore, successive governments in Nepal requested the Chinese side to convert the loan into a grant, multiple times in the past as well, the report said.
Although not a Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) project, China projected it as such during the inauguration amid protests from Nepali leaders. Chinese loans for BRI projects attract much higher interest rate.