Campaigning for 27 February 2023 Assembly election in Nagaland will come to an end today at 4:00 pm. Meanwhile candidates are in a frenzy making their last effort to reach out to their electors, 48 hours before Nagaland goes to polls.
The ruling BJP and NDPP alliance is looking for retaining power. Both the parties have agreed on a seat sharing formula, wherein the NDPP will be contesting in 40 seats, while the BJP will be contesting in 20 seats. The alliance leaders have exuded confidence of winning 40-50 seats and forming the next government.
Meanwhile, the Naga People’s Front (NPF) will be contesting in 20 seats as 2 of its candidates retired few days ago.
NPF Secretary General, Achumbemo Kikon exuded hope of getting a good result. He said, the party is looking for atleast 12-15 seats this time out of 20.
“This time we have set up only 22 candidates out of which unfortunately two of them retired already so we are left with 20 candidates and out of this 20 candidates, we are expecting good result. Everyone of them have given their best till today and I know for sure that the people of Nagaland will definitely prefer NPF then the other party. So as the secretary general of the party I am hopeful that we will get a good result,” said Kikon.
Kikon in his message to the electorates he said,”I have a very serious appeal to the electorates of Nagaland. Everyone of us should remember that the Naga Political movement is at the back of our mind. We have struggle quite some years, quite a lot generations after generations and since the stand of the NPF is for an honourable acceptable and inclusive solution to the Naga Political issue, we have to stand on our own feet ,even to fight an election we need an home grown political party and NPF is one who has stood the best of time for the past few years sacrificing for the people of Nagaland and for the Naga Political issue. We also stood for development and an inclusive Naga way of life. We don’t believe in tribalism and sector ism and therefore it is my humble appeal to the electorates of Nagaland to kindly support and to kindly vote for the NPF candidates all over Nagaland and together we will make Nagaland a proud state to stand on it’s own feet.”
JDU President NSN Lotha, asserted that the party is very confident of their performance and exuded hope of winning majority number of seats.
Lotha also appealed to the electorates to come out on the polling day ajd exercise their votes.
Independent candidate from 4 Ghaspani-I, Pushika Awomi, stated that he is satisfied with his poll preparedness and he was able to reach out to the people in a very short span of time.
“…their response is very positive and I am very much encourage by the electorates. They are encouraging me, contributing and lots of supporters are coming up . This is overwhelming and I am really happy and I am waiting for the election day so that they will come forward and vote for me,” added Awomi.
On the other hand, the Congress is contesting in 21 seats. Other political parties like NPP and NCP are contesting on 12 seats each, LJP (Ram Vilas) on 15 seats, RPI (Athalwale) on 9 seats, JDU on 7 seats, RJD on 3 seats CPI and RPP on 1 seats each. There are also 19 Independent candidates in the fray.
After the campaign comes to a close the poll bound state will come under a set of security restrictions.
As per ECI guidelines Sec 144 CrPC will be enforced in the state from 10pm-6am for the next two days.
While the international borders with Myanmar and Bangladesh were sealed and vigil heightened, the Inter state borders with Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh were also sealed on Friday.
