MPP : Languishing in the ICU : Remove the dukandar mindset
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: March 06, 2013 -

Consensus candidate or a case of no takers ?

Only one man in the fray for the election to the post of President of the Manipur People’s Party and there is nothing yet to suggest that the party is on the recovery route after the humiliating show it put up in the election to the 10th Manipur Legislative Assembly held in 2012.

Not a single MLA and nothing to suggest that corrective measures are being taken up at the grass root level.

Not at all an encouraging sign for a party which lays claim to being the oldest regional political party in the North East region. More like a patient in the Intensive Care Unit on ventilator.

Not yet time to write its epitaph but if the malaise is not diagnosed and remedial measures taken up correctly, then the structure behind Mapal Kangjeibung, a bristling commercial centre in Imphal, may just be the only defining aspect of the party, which was once considered to be the only party which could challenge the Congress in the State.

It is not an unexpected stroke or a massive heart attack that came without a warning, but the degeneration of the MPP as a political party has been a gradual process.

Something which was evident to all the political watchers of the State, but which was denied by the men helming the affairs of the party.

Infighting, internal political intrigues and the utter failure of the party’s leadership to read the pulse of the people all combined together to sketch the pathetic picture that is MPP today.

The nails on the coffin of the MPP have not been hammered in by some outside force, but from within and this is the biggest challenge lying before the leaders of the MPP.

Nowhere is the poverty of ideas to re-invent itself and rejuvenate the system of the party so well manifested than in the leadership vacuum that one sees within the party today.

No new ideas, no young blood and no fresh energy to refurbish the image of the party.

In the last 365 days, the MPP has been tottering from one president to another care taker president to yet another care taker president, clearly demonstrating the past failure to groom the youngsters.

A clear indication that there is no such thing as second rung leadership. Or maybe it is more a case of a few leaders of the party monopolising every aspect of the party.

Or it could be a case of the party failing to attract fresh talents. Either way a damning statement on the affairs of the party.

The gradual decline of the MPP could be seen from its shrinking base in the hill districts and from a party which has touted itself as an entity representing the whole of Manipur, its influence and reach cannot go beyond the four valley districts.

The last time the MPP had an MLA from the hill districts was more than 15 years back, when the late Somi Shimray represented Chingai Assembly Constituency as an MPP MLA in the Assembly.

Even in the four valley districts, the MPP has not been able to generate any interest. N Sovakiran, a former MLA from Heirok Assembly Constituency, who is the lone man in the fray for the post of MPP president has his task cut out.

To rejuvenate the party he will need to move beyond the rhetorics which MPP leaders had perfected to an art form, but which failed to deliver when it mattered.

The new president will need to clear the growing belief that the MPP is today nothing much more than the structure standing behind Mapal Kangjeibung.

In other words, he needs to realise that a political party cannot be run and managed with the mindset of a shopkeeper or a dukandar.