SHILLONG: The ruling alliance’s common candidate for the Lok Sabha election in 2019 is yet to be named as the allies have not held any meeting to take a decision.
However, the UDP, an alliance partner, has already announced the name of former MLA Jemino Mawthoh as its candidate and he has already started campaigning.
The MDA partners were to decide the name of the common candidate in the meeting of the coordination committee of the alliance, which is due for some time now and they will meet only next year.
Speaking to The Shillong Times here on Friday, Mawthoh, who campaigned in Umroi on Friday, expressed confidence that the MDA partners would zero in on his candidature.
“I can say that we have a very good coordination committee and our party will seek the support of all partners,” he said, adding that there was positive response from the public for him.
When asked whether it would be a challenge for him to take on the two-term sitting MP Vincent Pala, Mawthoh said he cannot comment anything on the performance of the MP and “I leave it to the wisdom of people to make their decision”. While the alliance is yet to come to a consensus, the BJP is unsure whether it would support the common candidate or it would field its own candidate from both the constituencies.
BJP leader AL Hek reiterated that as a national party, it should contest the elections from both seats but added that a final call on the matter would be taken by the central leadership.
He also said the party is identifying the probable candidates who can be fielded.
Earlier, even NPP had expressed confidence that the alliance would be able to agree on common candidates.
On the other hand, the Congress is likely to field its Pala from Shillong constituency while a search panel is on the job to identify a probable candidate from Tura constituency.
