Goa Congmen desperate for Faleiro's ouster as party chief

Goa Congmen desperate for Faleiro's ouster as party chief
RAJU NAYAK

PANAJI, AUG 20: A majority of Goa Congressmen ascribe the recent split in state party to the extremely low popularity ratings of PCC chief Luizinho Faleiro among party MLAS and partymen.

It is a pity that the Goa Congress, which had won a clear majority in the last Assembly, has had to suffer a second split in its ranks in a period of just nine months. This split means that a total of sixteen MLAs have deserted the Congress Party in a span of nine months, leaving it with a meagre strength of ten members, including Speaker Pratapsing Rane, who is known to harbour some resentment as he feels that the Congress High Command had done injustice to him during the time of selection of the Congress Legislature Party leader after the result of the Assembly polls, last year.

Partymen feel that the insistence of the Congress High Command to retain Luizinho Faleiro as the PCC chief despite persistent demands of his ouster from the post were intriguing. They felt that this had led to the sorry state of the party in Panaji.

The Indian Express has found out that Faleiro has manipulated the electoral rolls of active members for the organisational elections to be held in September, this year, to his advantage. This had paved the way for the latest party split and the formation of the five-member Shaikh Hassan faction.

Giving an instance of this, Filipe Neri Rodrigues, a member of the breakaway group, alleged that a Faleiro confidante Moti Dessai, a South Goa District Congress Office-bearer and an appointee on the scrutiny committee, had hounded out 1,000 members from his constituency from the party's primary membership on the false pretext of not completing 365 days as primary members.

He said these 1,000 members were the same people who had joined the Congress in the presence of both Faleiro and Chief Minister Francisco Sardinha when he was admitted to the Congress Party, around a year ago.

Rodrigues further charged that Dessai had taken this step, obviously with the PCC chief's blessings, in a bid to sieve off Faleiro's opponents from the party in order to ensure his reelction in the September party polls.

Another dissident, Jose Philip De Souza, held South Goa District Congress President M K Shaikh for following the same tactics.

Although the defectors have been quite forthcoming in their criticism of Faleiro for committing irregularities in the run-up to the polls even Goa Pradesh Congress Committee General Secretary and Faleiro confidant admitted that there were several complaints of genuine members being struck off the rolls for their `perceived inconvenience' at the time of election of the PCC president.

Even State party general secretary disclosed that the case of six active members from Margao being thrown out for no plausible reason other than their loyalities being with State Youth Congress President Vijai Sardesai, was presently lying for a final decision with the chairman of the party's Central Election Authority, Ram Niwas Mirdha.

On being telephonically contacted, Vijai Sardesai lamented that attempts to keep the state unit of the party restricted only to a select group of sychophants had affected the party's image during this crucial phase when the need of the hour was to show unity in its ranks to function as an able opposition in the state.

The tendency of the Congress High Command to selectively oversee the affairs of the party through chosen eyes of a few has brought about anger and general disillusionment among the rank and file of the party in the State.

This revelation has surprisingly come from a veteran Congressman and former MP Shantaram Naik, who said that in future there was a dire need for the appointment of only those central observers who would go deep into the matter and not just be `cosmetic' as has been in the recent past.

The known Rajiv loyalist and one of the famous members of the 'Shouting Brigade' in Parliament said that the Goa unit of the Congress organisation as well as the Legislative wing was affected by 'political cancer' but that the high command had invariably recommended only a ``mild crocin'' to treat the chronic malady.

Consequently, if Shaikh Hassan is to be believed, another batch of four MLAs was on the verge of quitting the party. If this happened, the Congress in Goa would be further weakened, much to the delight of chief minister Sardinha who knows that his strength was inversely proportional to the weakness of the Congress.