Out of power and completely out of sync, the Congress in Goa, appears completely rattled by the inroads made by the AAP over the last few weeks, even as its top leaders here, have threatened to bounce back in the upcoming 2017 State Assembly polls.
Reduced to an unprecedented strength of nine legislators in the 2012 State Assembly elections, the Opposition party in Goa faces an uphill task, with deep rifts between its top leaders and lack of both hunger and confidence in its cadre, with State Assembly polls just six months away.
The question over whether the fatigued Goa Congress is in a position to put in a creditable performance at the upcoming polls, was first raised by the Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal during a recent Goa visit.
The Aam Aadmi Party co-founder, in his signature sweeping style of commentary, said during a public meeting, that the Congress was not even a factor in the 2017 state assembly polls in Goa.
“The Congress has no chance in these polls. This is a straight fight between the BJP and the AAP. You take this from me in writing. The Congress will not get a single seat in Goa, just like it happened in Delhi. You do not waste your ballot by voting for the Congress. If you vote for the Congress, your vote will be wasted and divided,” Kejriwal said on August 20.
Since then however, the Congress appears in overdrive to prove otherwise to the Goan electorate.
“They can say whatever they want. But fact remains that the AAP has to prove themselves in Delhi first, where they are in government. They should just stop dreaming about Goa just yet,” Congress general secretary Trajano D’Mello told The Pioneer.
The AAP has been in existence in Goa for three years. For much of that duration, the new political party appeared slack in its performance, with a virtually non existent cadre and its local leadership struggling to cope with the demands of an opposition outfit. The arrival of Kejriwal in May 2016 and his two subsequent visits to the state appears to have ended the lethargy in the state leadership and energised the cadre.
Such is not the case with the Congress however, which is plagued with the curse of having too many leaders, eager to pull their own party colleagues down.
Out of the nine legislators, which the party was reduced to, in the forty-member Goa legislative assembly, St. Cruz MlA Atanasio Monserrate has already been sacked for anti-party activity, while Dabolim MlA Mauvin Godinho has been openly hobnobbing with the BJP.
While the leader of Opposition Pratapsingh Rane has been attacked by his party’s legislator colleagues for not being effective enough in his performance in the assembly over four years, his son Vishwajeet Rane has been brazenly defying the state Congress president luizinho Faleiro, whose leadership he has described as one which will lead the party to doom.
A modest Rane even acknowledged flaws in his party, but claimed that the people of Goa “know” the Congress party better as against the AAP and insists that it would hold the party in good stead come the 2017 polls.
“I admit that our party is not perfect, it has flaws, but it is in case of all political parties. But one thing must not be forgotten, that people of Goa know the Congress party. We will have to work hard to impress upon them once again,” the Poriem MlA said.
A senior Congress leader however told The Pioneer that it’s top leadership appears to be more interested in battling each other, rather than political opponents.
“We have had three state presidents in the last four years. There are five ex-chief ministers who are jostling for best positions in the party and ticket distribution at the same time. We simply do not appear to have the stomach or the drive to take on the ruling BJP or the AAP,” the Congress leader said on condition of anonymity.