NPP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong today said that sympathy does not work in elections.
He was speaking at a rally to welcome Mawphlang MDC Lamphrang Blah into the party. Blah who has resigned from Congress will contest the upcoming Assembly by-elections from Mawphlang seat on NPP ticket.
Blah is pitted against noted footballer Eugeneson Lyngdoh of UDP and former MLA Kennedy Khyriem of Congress.
Taking a dig at Lyngdoh for banking on sympathy votes after the recent death of his father Syntar Klas Sun who is the sitting MLA of the constituency, Tynsong said, “There is no such thing as sympathy in elections.”
“In the recent Assembly session, an MLA had suggested that somebody from the family of late Sun should be allowed to get elected uncontested. That is wrong since the Constitution of India allows anybody to contest,” Tynsong said.
He also said that people of Mawphlang constituency should not be misled by sympathy.
“Don’t go by sympathy. You should elect an MLA who already has experience in politics. Don’t not vote for a person who is inexperienced. Blah has been an MLA since 2004 the same year when I also got elected first to KHADC. I have known him from head to toe. He has held many posts in KHADC and so he is fully experienced,” Tynsong said.
“If you elect an inexperienced person in this by-election, by the time he gets to know the ins and outs of how to bring development to your constituency, the general elections are back and so the loss will be on the people of the constituency,” he added.
