EMN
Dimapur, June 23
The chief minister of Nagaland, TR Zeliang, is convinced that every legislator in the just-settling state government has “confidence in my leadership” and “our collective efforts” would be successful.
In a letter addressed to the editor of the Asian Age on Tuesday, the chief minister refuted several points of contention the newspaper is said to have reported, particularly in regard to the Naga political issue.
The reports are said to have claimed that the “miffed” Bharatiya Janata Party wanted to replace the Nagaland chief minister and that he was “camping in Delhi to meet the prime minister to seek appointment with prime minister of India, because the Home Ministry is not in favor of talks with NSCN-K”.The Chief Minister’s Office said the clarification was “to clarify the aspersions cast among the readers”.
“…it must be clarified that I am confident on each legislator and each legislator have confidence in my leadership and hope that our collective efforts will surely bear fruit,” the clarification said.
Elaborating his refutation, Zeliang also joined politicians who frequently cite the Naga political issue as a point of reference when faced with criticism: the “…reports are far away from the reality, and can only be perceived as a deliberate attempt to destabilize my government with complete misinformation and to derail the ongoing peace process”.
At the first instance concerning the NSCN-K, he said, the report was “borne out of the ignorance on how the prime minister of India, Modiji is handling the issues and the rapport he has with the chief ministers of the country”.
“During my previous visit to Delhi earlier this month, I had one to one discussion with the Prime Minister and later with the Union Home Minister. No appointment had been sought either with PM or HM during this visit,” Zeliang said.
He explained: “I had time and again reminded the Government of India that the Nagaland Government should have been informed before accepting abrogation of ceasefire proclaimed by NSCN (K). As for my Government, the priority is the early settlement of Naga political problem so that peace reign in the state and economic development is brought about in full swing without further disturbance from this more than 6 decades conflict. Yes, I had also expressed my views that the ceasefire abrogation with the NSCN-K should be revisited by the Centre because we don’t want violence to restart again and loss of precious life from either side. I want peaceful dialogue to continue and resolve the conflict amicably and honourably”.
On the allegation raised in the Asian Age that the Nagaland chief minister was also hit by dissident activities following his alleged involvement in the international money laundering racket, Zeliang replied: “I must say that it is yet another attempt to sensationalize the dead issues by those perpetuated and propagated dissident activities who has lost their foothold in the state after I had taken over the reign”.
Also, the reports that the BJP party was “miffed” and was looking for alternative to replace him because he had taken Congress MLAs into “my government”, Zeliang said it was “misconstrued”.
Zeliang said that the formation of what he called “all party government” was the “unanimous decision of all legislators irrespective of the party affiliations” and “necessitated due to the fact that the Nagas are going through a peculiar situation on account of Naga political problems, which needs the collective effort of all stake holders”.
The objective of forming “all party government including the independent MLAs is to collectively push forward the issues and achieve which each individual party could not achieve in their respective regime,” the Naga people’s front leader stated.
“As such, I have appealed to all legislators to keep the common Naga issue above party politics and work cohesively to achieve the desire goal. In the light of above, it must be clarified that I am confident on each legislator and each legislator have confidence in my leadership and hope that our collective efforts will surely bear fruit,” the chief minister stated.
