SHILLONG, MAY 7: Chief Minister and national chief of the ruling National People’s Party (NPP) Conrad K Sangma today said party’s victory in Williamnagar will definitely have an impact in the upcoming Ampati bye-election scheduled to be held on May 28.
“That will definitely have an impact in the Ampati bye elections and we are going to the Ampati bye elections with a positive mindset and with a mindset that people wanted a change and that change has come in and we want to take it to the next level,” Conrad told reporters here on Monday.
Exuding confidence that positive effect of Williamnagar election will also be there in the Ampati bye-election, the NPP national chief said the party had won with a comfortable margin and this reflect the fact that the people were looking for a change and that change also came.
He however said every election is different and every constituency has got its own character and own challenges and therefore the party cannot take anything for granted.
The newly elected NPP legislator from Williamnagar Marcuise N Marak defeated Independent candidate Sengbath R Marak by a margin of 4860 votes.
The bye-election was necessitated after Leader of Opposition Mukul Sangma, who contested and won from two seats in the February 27 elections, resigned from Ampati and retained Songsak constituency in East Garo Hills District.
The NPP chief also informed that election committee of the party will soon take a call on the candidature of Clement G Momin, whose name was cleared by both the district and block committee of the party.
Clement will take on Opposition Leader Mukul’s daughter Miani D Shira as Congress candidate for the bye-election to the Ampati seat.
It may be mentioned here that Clement had unsuccessfully contested against Mukul twice.
In the 2008 election, he lost on an NCP ticket to Mukul by a margin of 2,966 votes. However, in the 2013 elections, the victory margin of Mukul soared to a staggering 9,036 votes.
On the infighting within the Congress, Conrad said that it is very unfortunate that the leadership within the Congress had to end up not supporting its official candidate (Deborah Marak in the just concluded Williamnagar election) adding this will also impact the Congress’s performance in the Ampati by poll.
“However, it is a matter of the Congress they have to sort it out. Secondly, when situation is like this then definitely it will impact the moral of the workers and confidence of the voters will go down because they will see that the leadership in the Congress are not together and not united and seeing what happen in Williamnagar I think the voters as well as the Congress workers will be demoralized,” he said.
Asked whether Mukul is losing his ground in Garo Hills, the chief minister said, “This is for the people to decide and that will reflect on what kind of situation, this is politics, whether you live up to the expectation or not. Yes people have repose their faith in us and it is our duty to carry that forward.”
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), one of the coalition partners of the MDA government led by the NPP, has also decided to again field Bakul Ch Hajong as its candidate for Ampati seat. Mukul had defeated Bakul by a huge margin of 8104 votes during the Assembly elections.
Reacting to a query on this, Conrad said that party politics should not be mixed with governance.
“We have been very clear that governance is different and politics is different even when we fought the election in the beginning we fought separately. Party politics and party survival and growth are something every party wants for their political party,” he said.
Asked, the chief minister expressed confidence that the MDA led government will complete its full five year term. “We are together and we are focus on that as election will come and go and political party might take decision but that will not affect the governance process,” he maintained.
By Our Reporter
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