Babush Monserrate has given such a crippling blow to the Congress Party in the State that most people in Salcete opine that there is no future for the party unless it changes its leadership even as the party leaders put up a brave face to say that they expected chicanery from Babush.
Former Goa Pradesh Congress Committee President, Luizinho Faleiro, said he was not at all surprised with what Babush did. “This type of behaviour is expected from him as Babush does things only to serve his interest,” he said.
National Secretary Girish Chodankar practically repeated the same words and said that Panjim Block Committee meetings were held earlier only because he did not trust Babush and wanted to build up the organisation irrespective of who the candidate was.
“It was a blunder on the part of some of our leaders to even go to Babush knowing very well how he had ditched us in 2007 when he withdrew as the Congress candidate at the assembly elections,” he said.
MLA Filipe Neri Rodrigues however refused to comment on the development. “Babush is not a member of the Congress Party and that is why I would not like to comment on him,” he said.
Zacharias Goes a die-hard Luizinho loyalist from Telaulim said this was a lesson from which the Congress has to learn and made amends if the party has to have any future in Goa. “Some Congress leaders are responsible for this embarrassment and the party should take action against them,” he said.
Member of Aquem Baixo Panchayat Agnelo Dias said: “Babush has compromised only to save his skin so that the various cases pending against him are withdrawn.”
Edmund Gomes from Dramapur whose wife had contested the panchayat elections said he was totally dumbfounded by the developments. “It looks as if the Congress has no control absolutely over what is happening within the party,” he said.
Sita Antao who was the Chandor village co-ordinator for Aam Aadmi Party said the Congress party has no future in Goa as people have lost all faith in it and what Babush did was a one manifestation of the Congress losing its base in Goa. “It is time for people to look out for an alternative and AAP could be that,” she said.
Felix Furtado from Chandor said the Congress was crumbling under its own weight.
“Congress leaders are not working for the party but only for themselves and that is why this is happening,” he said.
He opined that the Congress will have to revamp itself totally with a new leadership. “They have to have new leadership which need not necessarily be young but should be honest and clean like the ones AAP has,” he said.
