The Independent MLA also made light of Mickky Pacheco’s challenge to him for a debate, saying Mickky’s servility to the BJP has now made him irrelevant to Goa and Goan politics.
Reacting to the chief minister’s pro-Mopa outburst and his assertion that Goa does not mean South Goa, Sardesai said the CM spoke as if he was not the chief minister of South Goa. He reminded the government that even the areas of Bardez and Tiswadi do not wish to be indirectly merged as a part of Maharashtra through Mopa airport.
Vijai said the Chief Minister was intentionally creating a North-South divide in the State so as to hide the Mopa scam and bulldoze the project without any mandatory environmental clearances or creating an Express Highway which was a pre-condition to the airport project as mandated by experts and consultants of the State government itself.
He further reminded the Chief Minister that the mandate that he got in the Assembly and Lok Sabha polls could not be misconstrued as support for Mopa as neither in BJP manifestos was Mopa mentioned nor was the BJP South Goa candidate and now MP taking any categorical stand on the airport issue.
“During the Emergency, one could regularly hear democratic and progressive opposition being castigated as “foreign agents” or being instigated by foreign hands inimical to the country”, he said, while drawing comparison to the emergency to Parrikar’s statement that foreign funds were funding the anti-Mopa agitation. “This was indicative that under Parrikar regime, there’s an undeclared emergency in the State”, he said, adding it’s an irony that those who had been held by the Supreme court to have received foreign funds from mining companies are today trying to wrongly defame those fighting for Goa’s identity and Dabolim airport.
Meanwhile, strongly condemning the dictatorial statement made by Parrikar on the Mopa airport, the Goans for Goa has said the BJP had come to power due to rampant corruption by the Congress party.
The GFG also condemned Parrikar’s statement that people of North Goa have as much right as those of south Goa to demand an airport in the north, saying the statement does not befit the chief minister of a State, as it is aimed at dividing Goans on the Mopa issue.
Saying that Goans have understood the evil designs of the Chief Minister, GFG Convenor Kennedy Afonso said the people of Goa will teach Parrikar a befitting lesson, even as GFG reiterated that People’s Power will ground Mopa should the Chief Minister try to bulldoze through the project.
Afonso said the GFG will start a village campaign and activate all the forces, even as he demanded a referendum to decide the issue in a peaceful and democratic manner.
