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Tough Task Ahead
The task of the new chief minister Okram Ibobi Singh has been cut out. A dawn to dusk bandh called by the All India Students Federation has greeted the swearing in ceremony of the new four party coalition headed by the Congress (I). This is not a good sign. The agitators are demanding that those involved in the mark tampering scandal in the Council of Higher Secondary Examination be punished.
The part time lecturer in Government colleges are now on cease-work strike demanding that the Government memorandum with regards to regularization of their service, which has been withdrawn by the Government be implemented in toto, besides payment of the basic pay fixed by the Supreme Court. The cease work strike has thrown college education into a complete chaos with students joining in the strike demanding resumption of normal classes.
The imbroglio is compounded further when candidates recommended by the Manipur Public Services Commission for the post of college lecturers are also mounting pressure on the Government. These candidates have withdrawn a protracted sit-in-protest only after the Government had taken a decision in their favor. While the college lecturer's impasse is a knotty issue, the immediate job of the new chief minister is to pay its nearly one lakh employees salary for the month of February.
Immediately after the oath taking ceremony Ibobi air dashed to Delhi for obvious reasons. While making his courtesy calls to the Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee the chief minister would be seeking funds to meet the immediate expense. The law and order situation is bad, killing has become the order of the day, the Government writ does not run any more in many parts of the state, the administrative machinery is rusty and it will take quite a while before putting it back on the track after oiling and above all the state coffer is empty.
It is in this backdrop that Ibobi and his team assumed the mantle of governance. But all these problems can wait as far as the chief minister is concerned, but the next expansion of the ministry cannot wait. On the first day only leaders of the legislature parties of the Front took oath. This is because constituent parties are yet to strike a deal on the number of berths to be shared by each of them. The Governor Ved Marwah has been openly telling Ibobi that the Ministry should be small in size. He told the Front to follow the example of Tamil Nadu which has only 30 ministers.
Ibobi is also reportedly not in favor of a big size ministry. But he is facing mounting heat from the other Front partners as well as his colleagues in the Congress. Distribution of the portfolios will turn out to be another tricky problem. But the real challenge will be coming from the Opposition Democratic Peoples Alliance. Although it has announced that it will be sitting in the Opposition, it will be naive to expect it to remain silent. RK Dorendro on the prowl and making things difficult for the Front alliance. It is clear that Ibobi will have to master the art of roller coaster ride.
(Courtesy: The Sangai Express)
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