Naga People’s Front President Dr. Shürhozelie Liezietsu has stated that the 2023 state general election was purely a “money game”, a gambling bout where the highest bidder became the winner.
The veteran politician was addressing the felicitation cum thanksgiving programme for the two newly elected members was held on Saturday here at NPF central office in Kohima.
It was an election in name, where political ideology and principles had no place and even election manifesto had no meaning for the people, Liezietsu added.
He pointed out that the ruling alliance partners had put in maximum efforts with their money and other government machineries to crush NPF however, against all these onslaughts, NPF’s two MLAs survived and referred them as ‘Big winners’.
Out of 10 political parties in the recently concluded general elections, 9 were national political parties and NPF was the only regional political party and out of 60 seats, we could secure only 2 seats, stating this he said there is no reason to be discouraged because NPF is the only party which has its roots in the Naga society and on the Naga soil whereas, the rest are all migratory political parties in nature.
The former chief minister encouraged the party’s two MLAs to hold NPF fort with pride because from this stem having it’s root in the unique history of Naga people, new shoot will sprout when spring comes which may not be far behind.
Making a scathing attack on the former 21 NPF MLAs who defected to NDPP, he stated that it was a well-planned action with mischievous calculation made by them to defect only at the eleventh hour so that NPF was not given any chance to reorganise itself to face the election in 10 months time.
“Indeed, the purpose served them well in weakening the NPF party to its lowest ebb. But I do admit that this was the weakness of the party. It was indeed a plan to destroy NPF but they have failed to achieve their ill motive goal,” Liezietsu said.
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Admitting that the impact of the damage done to NPF was great at one point of time and the party was having doubt whether NPF would be able to participate in the 2023 elections, he said, inspite of facing all these odds, many NPF party leaders took interest to contest the election on cock ticket and in the process, it received 39 applications and 22 were given tickets.
He remarked that NPF had least idea that the parties in power had made such huge preparations to finish the only regional political party in Nagaland.
“We failed to understand why they harboured such grudge against this small party which represents the identity of the Nagas. As a result, we have seen the flow of money which we have never seen before. My humble assessment is that NPF expenditure on the whole election processes may be less than the expenditure of a single Assembly Constituency candidate of the national political parties,” added Shürhozelie and questioned whether Nagas can survive as a people following this trend of elections in the long run.
In conclusion, the President asserted that elections come and go every 5 years and members of the Legislative party also keep on changing however, the party goes on with no change. He also signalled the former defected MLAs who had gone astray from the party in search of greener pastures to come back to the party and that there is no hurry.
Earlier, MLA Kuzholuzo Azo Nienu and MLA Achumbemo Kikon were felicitated by the President, Manipur NPF President Minister Awangbow Newmai and other party functionaries.
