FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2024
Blaise Costabir
Last month, there was an appeal to vote wisely. Given the confusion surrounding the run up which will settle once the nomination process is closed. Till then we can expect the party hopping to continue. The mess is palpable, here today and gone tomorrow. The aspirants seem to be party agnostic, their speeches seem to indicate that they will win irrespective of the party. They use words like “My People”, oops because they are elected they have become kings and we subjects. Was it not supposed to be they serving us?
Many of the elected representatives who have jumped keep repeating that their supporters encouraged or decided that they should defect. This logic has a major flaw, the MLA forgets that he was elected by voters, and he must remember all voters are not supporters and all supporters and not voters. So, if he was elected by voters he has no right to switch based on supporters advice.
The major reason given for jumping is “Development”. Whose development and what constitutes development. Is an MLA, elected to ensure the roads are hot-mixed or that pavers are added in the compound of a religious place or footpath in the middle of nowhere with fancy lights that do not work. Is this really development. Was not your MLA voted to develop Goa, why is he doing a PWD engineers’ job?
In five years, the assembly met 80 times for 512 hrs and 9442 questions were asked. So each question assuming no other work was done was answered in three minutes. Pathetic performance so where is the development? This how much they worked.
Why is the coal issue, three linear projects, taxi meters, shack policy, garbage disposal etc not discussed in the assembly? Why is it made into a local problem? If you make a garbage treatment plant in constituency X, does it mean the tax payer from constituency Y is not involved, is it not his money too. What we are seeing is each MLA is head of a Republic, and Goa has 40 such Republics, this has to change.
To bring about change we need to think before we vote. We need to study each candidate. The MLAs will not make the change because it is not in their interest. So it is imperative that voters force the change and now is a good time.
There are three major factors: Party, Manifesto and Candidate.
Party, is not recognisable, leaders are imported hours before giving them a ticket so party ideology is out of the window. Tickets saleable to the highest bidder.
Manifesto, only parties contesting across Goa will have such a document not independents. It is an important document reduced to mere paper because our PM promised 15 lakh to each citizen and later said it was poetic license and thus made this important document a joke. We can still push for its implementation.
Candidate: The most important factor in this election. Each of us should make a table and put down the factors related to each candidate and then take a decision. Factors that maybe important are expanded below.
Education: For a sweepers job in Government, one needs to be a graduate. So why elect uneducated leaders, a change is needed, so educated candidates should get more importance.
Criminal Background: This is very important. How can you elect a person to be a law maker, when he is a law breaker. The defence that “innocent until proven guilty” does not hold water when we can see that cases are suppressed especially if the criminal is in the right party or jumps to the right party.
Corruption: No one is corrupt in our system. The system protects the corrupt. But if you study the election affidavits of candidates you will see clearly that the assets and income growth of sitting MLAs is surely not coming from legitimate sources. A study of four affidavits between 2007 and 2017 of an opposition MLA from South Goa, reveals some interesting information. In 2017 his wife made 78 FDs across North Goa, and his cash assets increased to 48 lakh while his income for the year was 18 lakh, he suddenly added Rs 2 lakh exempt income, wow suddenly his fields are productive, must have sold lots of coconuts? For 2022, we have a Minister whose business is in mining declaring his income increased 3200% when everyone involved in mining is crying.
Background: If the candidate is an incumbent, did he deliver as an MLA, were his actions beneficial to Goa. Did he jump and let you down post 2017? If he is new, what did he do before joining politics. Why do we need professional politicians? To become professional, they have to do illegal activities like foster vote banks and develop slums around the constituency. Spend some time on this aspect. Ask the candidate questions.
Choosing “None of the above”, is a waste of a precious vote, it makes a statement but nothing else. If 99 voters choose NOTA and 1 chooses a candidate X, X will be elected. So better option is choose best from those available.
You can get information about your candidate from website of “Association For Democratic Reforms/ (www.adrindia.org)”. They are committed to cleansing the political system and lots of data and analysis is available for study.
Based on these few points, you can take an informed decision who to vote for, make groups in your area and discuss pros and cons and finally your decision is the best. Vote you must. Goa needs your Vote.
(The author prefers to write rather than chat in a balcao).
