PAC plans widespread consultations with stakeholders to resolve Naga political issue

August 30, 2024 10 Views No Comment

Morung Express News
Kohima | August 30

The current tenure of the Political Affairs Committee (PAC) formed in November last year, held its first meeting today to deliberate on the Naga Political Issue and the ongoing discussions surrounding the Eastern Nagaland People’s Organisation (ENPO) with the Government of India.

Addressing a press conference following the meeting, Minister for Power, KG Kenye, who is also the government spokesperson, said that unlike the other years, the PAC has included all political parties with elected representatives in the Nagaland Legislative Assembly.

The People’s Democratic Alliance (PDA) government, he informed has nine political parties, encompassing 60 MLAs representing eight political parties and an Independent group. Following the last Parliamentary elections, he said the Congress representative is now part of the PAC as well the political consultative members.

Terming today’s meeting as ‘healthy discussion, which was joined by the two MPs from the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha, Kenye maintained ‘we want a cross section of views and opinions representing the public in the state.

Stating that all have made very good inputs on how to go about, he said, the Committee’s focus is on how to pick up the trails from where the last PAC has left.

“This time around, the members felt that our approach should be towards trying to resolve the Naga political issue” said Kenye while pointing out that all these years, priority has been given to the negotiating parties, the Naga political groups.

Similarly, he stated that, countless times, the PAC has engaged in similar dialogues and discussions with almost every group appealing them to come together as a single entity. Unfortunately, despite so much appeal from ‘our’ people, he observed that ‘they’ don’t seem to be able to come eye to eye or sit their difference on their differences, but continue to maintain ‘separate identities’ of themselves.

Citing the two major agreements with the Government of India, namely, the Framework Agreement and the Agreed Position, Kenye noted that there are certain areas of the FA, which is not being divulged and had not come into the public domain, whereas the later has been brought to the public domain.

With these parallel stands being maintained by them, the Minister said “we thought it is detrimental to the peace negotiations, and could be the reason for the delay in resolving the political issue.”

Consequently, he informed that the PAC has decided to approach the people’s organisations, civil society, tribal hohos, apex Naga bodies and stakeholders as to how to go about in trying to resolve this ‘elusive’ issue that has been confronting the Nagas for seven decades.

After lengthy discussion, Kenye said it was a common concern with a consensus that it shouldn’t waste time in trying to reach out to the Naga public, and seek their views on this matter.

When asked, he said the government will give top priority to mobilise a meeting with the CSO at the earliest. Also responding to a query, the Minister maintained that the intention of coming together of the 60 MLAs cutting across party lines is to give impetus to strengthen the hands of the government of India to expedite in resolving the contentious Naga political issue.

On ENPO issue
The PAC, he informed discussed on the latest developments concerning the ENPO’s discussions with the Government of India.
With the change of guard in the office of ENPO, Kenye informed that a meeting was held with the GoI, which he said, was more or less of a trajectory meeting for the new team. He expressed hope that new team will cooperate with the state government and work closely while trying to resolve the issue.
To a query, Kenye said the state government’s position on the ENPO issue remains clear that ‘without first consulting the Eastern Naga Legislators Union (ENLU) and seeking their opinions on the proposals put forwards by GoI, the state on its own is not in a position to make any recommendations.