Atishi announces AAP’s plan to go solo in Goa, says Cong MLAs can’t be trusted

PANAJI: Former Delhi chief minister Atishi Marlena announced on Monday that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) will go solo in the 2027 Goa assembly elections and the district panchayat (zilla parishad) and municipality polls.

Atishi, who was in Goa to inaugurate a party office in South Goa, said that the Congress could not be trusted since its MLAs have repeatedly defected to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) after getting elected.

“We are preparing to fight solo the upcoming ZP elections and municipality elections and the 2027 elections. There will be no alliance. AAP will be fighting on its own. As of now the AAP has decided that we will contest all three elections -- Zilla Parishad, municipality election and the assembly elections on our own,” Atishi said.

“It is very clear that Congress cannot be trusted. Last time (2022) 11 Congress MLAs won. Eight have gone to the BJP and only three are left and this is not the first time. Last time also I think there was only one MLA left. All went into the BJP. How can the Congress and its leadership be trusted with an alliance when Congress MLAs after winning go and join the BJP,” she added.

“AAP’s MLAs in Goa have accomplished what, perhaps, has never been achieved by MLAs in Goa before. After getting elected, everyone including pundits and commentators were saying that no one will stay in a party of two MLAs and they will join some other party or the BJP. But our MLAs have shown that they have not come here for money and power but rather to work for the people,” she also said.

“AAP has stood with the people of Goa. In 2027 we are preparing and I am hopeful that in the coming elections the AAP’s presence and performance will be better and the people of Goa will help us win even more seats,” Atishi also said.

The Congress and AAP fought the Goa Lok Sabha elections together with the alliance candidate, Capt. Viriato Fernandes of the Congress, winning the South Goa seat. Following the Lok Sabha elections, the Congress withdrew its candidate in a Zilla Parishad bye-election that helped the AAP candidate win.

AAP’s state leadership had favoured an alliance after the party’s defeat in the Delhi elections in February.

Reacting to the verdict in February when the AAP lost power in Delhi, the party’s Goa president Amit Palekar said: “It is very easy to say we don’t want an alliance, but when Congress needed our support for the Lok Sabha elections, we took a step back, and asked our candidates, who we had already declared to stand down and we probably worked harder than the Congress”.

“We are not begging for an alliance, we are competent enough to contest elections, but we have to understand that an alliance is an aspiration of the people of Goa. The people of Goa want an alliance to defeat the corrupt BJP and simple mathematics of 60-70 vote share will get split which benefits the 32% vote share of BJP,” Palekar said in February.