Nagaland: Naga People’s Front reach out to ruling NDPP for merger

The Naga People’s Front has reached out to the ruling Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party or the NDPP to merge with it.

Talking exclusively to Northeast Live, NPF legislature party leader and former Chief Minister TR Zeliang stated that there is nothing wrong in inviting another regional party to merge with his party. However, Zeliang said that the NPF is yet to receive any official communication from the NDPP.

While affirming that resolving the Naga issue is the top priority, TR Zeliang said that both the regional parties can create the desired common platform to address the grievances of the people. Zeliang believes it is important that the NDPP merges with the NPF ahead of the 2023 assembly elections.

Worth mentioning, the then opposition party of Nagaland, NPF, had come together with the state government to form an opposition-less government in September last year. MLAs and party leaders of the NDPP, BJP and NPF as well as the independent MLAs, had unanimously resolved to adopt the nomenclature of the United Democratic Alliance for the opposition-less government in the state. The NDPP, BJP and the NPF had adopted a joint resolution to form an opposition-less government on August 11 and 13 respectively.

Now, it would be really interesting to see if the NDPP agrees to the proposal of NPF. But, all eyes would be set on as to what strategy will the BJP adopt, which has a strength of 12 MLAs in the 60-member Nagaland assembly. While, the NPF has a strength of 25 MLAs, the NDPP has 21 MLAs in the House.