PANJIM: Having faced a bitter reality on being betrayed by its senior MLAs, the Congress on Sunday stripped its MLA Michael Lobo of the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) position besides naming senior leader Digambar Kamat as key co-conspirator for leaving no stone unturned to weaken the party.
A visibly upset All India Congress Committee (AICC) incharge Dinesh Gundu Rao, who made every attempt to keep his MLAs intact, conceded the party has been going through the rough phase.
“There has been a lot of speculations and rumours going around in Goa for quite some time… There was aconspiracy hatched by some of our own leaders, hobnobbing with the BJP to see that the Congress Party, which is the principal opposition party, is weakened and to engineer split and defections from within the Congress,” he said.
Addressing a press conference that was delayed by around two hours owing to the fiasco, Rao unveiled the names – Kamat and Lobo, while clandestinely admitting the two leaders have left the party red-faced.
“So this conspiracy has been led by two of our own leaders – Kamat and Lobo. These are the same leaders who took loyalty pledge before the Gods, during the 2022 Assembly polls campaigning not to defect the party come what may. The pledge, at all the religious institutions was led by Kamat and recited by other party candidates,” he said as he was accompanied by MLAs Sankalp Amonkar, Adv Carlos Ferreira, Rudolf Fernandes, Yuri Alemao and Alton D’Costa, for the briefing.
In a direct pot shot at the BJP, Rao also questioned how the two Congress leaders could forget their loyalty pledge. “It is a clear reflection of his (Kamat) belief in God, how much he values God and what is the true value of his oath,” Rao lamented.
Rao’s anger towards the two leaders did not end here. He charged Kamat and Lobo of working in the background with the BJP to split the Congress “because BJP does not want any Opposition, especially the Congress, to question its authoritarian regime.”
The AICC leader went on to add that while Lobo, who is facing a series of cases has compromised his loyalty to the party precisely to safeguard his own skin, Kamat did it for greed of power. As a punishment to Lobo, the party has stripped him of the Leader of the Opposition position, he said.
Now with the two leaders betraying the Congress, Rao said that the matter has been brought to the notice of the High Command even as action as per the law will be initiated against them. “They took an oath and gave affidavits not to defect,” he said.
Stating that his party still has the numbers in the House, Rao said Congress will take the issue aggressively and expose the two leaders before the public.
“The Congress won’t be disheartened and neither be weakened. We will take up this issue in an aggressive manner and also take it up before the public exposing betrayal by the two leaders for the sake of power and personal greed,” he said.
The AICC incharge kept attacking Kamat and Lobo, who purportedly did not share cordial relations within the party, stating they have sold their principles and made attempts to weaken the party.
“It is very sad to say Kamat is indulging in cheap, dirty and desperate politics. Of course Lobo whom we made Leader of the Opposition… his behavior exposed what kind of an individual, person, traitor and backstabber he is. There are so many words to describe him but we cannot use these unparliamentary words before the media. This shows what kind of character he (Lobo) has.”
