By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Jan 20: After UDP bitterly complained against NPP’s clever manipulation of government schemes for electoral gains, NPP has retorted by accusing its coalition partner UDP of being a bird of fair weather.
NPP openly questioned UDP’s convenient silence when the weather turned turbulent.
On Friday, NPP reacted sharply to UDP allegations stating that the latter was crying foul after targetting the NPP on the inter-state border issue and taking political mileage out of it despite being coalition partners.
In a no-holds-barred statement, NPP State president WR Kharlukhi said “They are talking of the schemes we are using, what about them when they targeted the NPP in the case of border dispute when they realised that there were protests in some pockets and the opposition were raising the heckle. They tried to stay away and single us out (to weather the storm).”
“We are a coalition together and it should be for good or bad and not just for good,” he quipped.
The UDP is bitter about NPP’s alleged misuse of government schemes in constituencies where there are already UDP candidates and termed the act of its coalition partner as “manipulative and disrespectful.
UDP general secretary Jemino Mawthoh had recently alleged that at the fag end of the term, NPP has usurped schemes to undercut the UDP candidates.
Earlier, UDP working president Paul Lyngdoh aired his frustration over misuse of FOCUS in West Shillong where he is fighting to wrest the seat from NPP’s Mohendro Rapsang.
Kharlukhi laid it thick by saying, “They should know first, there is no electoral alliance and they should be very clear that we are fighting against one another. What does he (Jemino) expect? We will just allow them to win when we are fighting against each other.”
The NPP State president further said, “This is an electoral battle and we are fighting the elections and they will use whatever in their power and we will use whatever in our power”.
Although in a coalition, the coalition partners have decided not to have any pre-poll alliance and face the elections as individual parties without any prior understanding even as they are open to some sort of post-poll alliance depending on the outcome of the polls.
It is still early election days and it is not a full blown war. But the charges and counter charges by the number one and the number two parties in the MDA coalition create room for speculation whether or not they would be able to bury the hatchet after March 2.
In the free-for-all election, both NPP and UDP are ambitiously working to outsmart one another and attain upper hand when it comes to formation of new coalition in a likely hung Assembly.
Interestingly, both are posturing to form government on their own.