SHILLONG, Dec 21: The United Democratic Party on Wednesday shot off a letter to the Chief Election Commissioner, complaining against misuse of the FOCUS and FOCUS + scheme by certain ministers and MLAs associated with the ruling National People’s Party.
In his letter to the CEC, party vice president Allantry F Dkhar said some MLAs and ministers associated with NPP are misusing the FOCUS and FOCUS+ scheme in direct contradiction towards the officially declared beneficiaries who are farmers of Meghalaya.
Giving details of the scheme, he said that Meghalaya has launched a welfare programme of Rs 200 crore in response to the financial troubles that farmers had experienced as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. “Chief Minister Conrad Sangma has visited numerous districts and blocks across the state during the last three months. Farmers are grouped into producer’s groups for this programme and each member of the group receives Rs 5,000. The funds, according to Sangma, can be used as seed money to help farmers scale up their operations,” UDP leader said.
According to Dkhar, the anomaly is the fact that certain MLAs as well as ministers are blatantly distributing such schemes in areas where farming is not possible which goes to show that schemes are being misused for political gains.
Meanwhile, UDP working president Paul Lyngdoh launched another scathing attack on the MDA Government saying the government was being run only by a couple of people since the “Assembly has a number of people with no experience”.
Reacting to a query about the series of allegations of corruption against the MDA Government, Lyngdoh said the state must be privy to a better leadership and corruption-free government while adding that this was compromised in a big way this time as the Assembly had a number of elected representatives with no experience. “People with only business as their background and without any capability to articulate or express themselves were elected and hence the government is being run by a couple of people,” he said.
Asked if the UDP should also take equal responsibility for mismanagement in the MDA, he said that it was the senior NPP leaders who were at the helm of affairs in the Cabinet.
“When you compare Conrad Sangma, James Sangma, Prestone Tynsong and Dhar brothers, they are far more experienced than Lahkmen Rymbui, Kyrmen Shylla and Brolding Nongsiej,” Lyngdoh said.
He also said that even party president Metbah Lyngdoh was not in the Cabinet and was not privy to important decisions taken in the Cabinet.
Asked about the aggressive posture of national parties like the BJP and the TMC, Lyngdoh said he does not think people have become totally saleable and if such a situation has come where everybody has a price tag, then the state should forget about governance and it will be the demise of democracy in the state.
Asked about the internal rift in the UDP with regards to Bindo M Lanong, Lyngdoh said that Bindo Lanong should be happier working as an adviser and ideologue of the party as it requires a think tank.
“We are short of people wearing thinking caps and it is not necessary for every member of the UDP to contest elections because we need to have people running the organisation with skill and knowledge,” Lyngdoh added.
