A skeptic’s look at alliances By Eugene Correia
As the game of negotiations and strategic moves on the political chessboard is going on and as the final list of candidates is still a long way to be out, I find that electoral coalitions in Goa do not fare well. At the current stage, the Congress and the NCP are still trying to accommodate requests from their respective members for tickets. The NCP says it would field in all the 40 seats but could settle for at least 12 in an arrangement. How much of the slice each gets is still to be seen. On the other front, the UGDP and the GVP are wrangling over the composition and shape of the alliance. Both are trying to drive a hard bargain and, in the process, stepping on each other's toes and egos. Mickky Pacheco's hard-headedness versus Radharao Gracias' resilience is a battle to watch. If the SGF is accommodated to form a three-dimensional "third front" or even if the Tirnamool Congress is provided a look-in, since the party just made its presence, it would be a sort of scrambled eggs or rather scrambled egos. The clashing of egos can be expected and one can see demands and counter-demands from the parties make the ship sail unsteadily into the electoral waters. The call for the "third force" by Dr. Willy de Souza is a desperate cry from the old man of Goan politics to bounce back into the thick of politics from the sidelines to where he was pushed. With no place to drop his anchor, Dr. de Souza has found Mamata Banerjee's party to be a safe harbour. But Kolkata is too far away from Panaji. The gamble for seats is currently focussed on Salcette which is the domain of Christian politicians and where the heavyweights are well-armed to wrestle each other to the ground. There are no hard and fast rules in politics and there is no love lost between these battle-weary politicians. But then politics makes strange bedfellows. Yesterday's friends are today's enemies, and vice-versa. Whatever party ticket they stand on, it is not going to change their true colours. They could walk into each other's camps and embrace each other with gay abandon but there's no guarantee these former buddies or new buddies will hold hands together for long, as has been proved in earlier elections. Those who got elected on newly-formed political outfits abandon the parties to join the national parties, wooed by either a ministerial post or some present or future consideration for appointments on government boards. Though a "third force" or "third front" is sometimes an important factor when the electorate wants to defeat the current government, I fear it may not work in Goa, or at least it will not last if such an alliance comes to power. There would be the usual pulls and pressures from the national parties over members to cross the floor. I am a skeptic regarding such groupings from known politicians who can throw the aims and objectives of their coming together to the winds once they get into the assembly. Past records prove that such politicians cannot be taken seriously. The moves they play on the political chessboard prior to elections is to fool the voters to defeat the incumbent candidate. So, beware of such electoral coalitions. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Protect Goa's natural beauty Support Goa's first Tiger Reserve Sign the petition at: http://www.goanet.org/petition/petition.php ---------------------------------------------------------------------------