As the locals from the Saligao constituency's hindus say: ar're there is a demand for Wilgo!
www.goa-world.com Cong accepts Willy�s candidature for N Goa NT Staff Reporter Panaji April 1: The tug of war between the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party for the North Goa parliamentary seat ended today in a newly-discovered bonhomie, with both of them announcing Dr Wilfred de Souza as their candidate. While the Congress-NCP alliance candidate for the South Goa seat, Mr Churchill Alemao will file his nomination papers tomorrow morning, Dr de Souza said he was likely to file his nomination on April 5. The Lok Sabha elections in Goa are scheduled for April 26. �I have informed the members of the NCP working committee and the executive committee in South Goa to totally and wholly support Mr Alemao. There will be no Clock in South Goa, only the Hand. It is upto the Congress to do likewise in the North,� he said. At that, the Goa pradesh Congress committee president, Mr Luizinho Faleiro said that all the Congress MLAs of North Goa had pledged their support to Dr de Souza. �It is reciprocal. The alliance is at the highest level and will go down to the grassroots level,� Mr Faleiro said. Today�s joint press conference was attended by senior leaders of both parties, including the Leader of Opposition, Mr Pratapsingh Rane, Mr Ravi Naik, Mr Jeetendra Deshprabhu, Ms Victoria Fernandes, Dr Carmo Pegado, Ms Fatima Fernandes, Mr Nilkant Halarnkar and others. When asked what was the rationale behind fielding him, a minority community candidate, in North Goa which is traditionally fought by a majority-community candidate, Dr de Souza said one cannot predict election results. He recalled the Lok Sabha elections of 1971 fought by the Congress-United Goans alliance wherein Mr Purshottam Kakodkar was the Congress candidate for North Goa. �I was his campaign manager. He didn�t stand an outside chance but he won. So these things happen,� Dr de Souza said. �If you go by the predictions of the current exit polls, then the BJP will have won long time ago. But who believes these predictions?� He said he had started his campaign long time back even though the candidate for North Goa had not been finalised. �Whoever was going to be the candidate, the secular front was going to be there. You can always transfer the whole movement to the specific candidate.� When asked if he depended on the support of the Congress MLAs, he said he depended on all Congressmen. �Our common goal is to oust the BJP and I believe the Congressmen will support me in that spirit,� he said. Dr de Souza described the BJP as �100 per cent non-secular.� He said if one strips the BJP facade of normalcy, one finds the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Bajrang Dal and other communal elements of the Sang parivar. If one looks behind that one sees the horror of Gujarat and other communal conflagrations, he said. Dr de Souza belittled his main rival, the BJP candidate Mr Shripad Naik, as inefficient and ineffective in Parliament. �In his 4-year tenure, he held five portfolios. If a man proves his worth, he needs only one portfolio to perform. But he was like a ping-pong ball; bang him here, smash him there. Was it because he could not perform that he was moved so often?� Dr de Souza asked. He also alleged that in a pamphlet printed by Mr Shripad Naik, he was claiming credit for non-existent projects. �Let him show me one thing he has done in my Saligao constituency. The community hall he claims to have built in Bastora is thin air. I can tell the bluffs in my constituency. Likewise the full pamphlet must be one big bluff,� Dr de Souza said. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Small Business $15K Web Design Giveaway http://promotions.yahoo.com/design_giveaway/ ########################################################################## # Send submissions for Goanet to [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # PLEASE remember to stay on-topic (related to Goa), and avoid top-posts # # More details on Goanet at http://joingoanet.shorturl.com/ # # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ##########################################################################
