Party that promised to rid rot in system folds
Morung Express New
Dimapur | July 10
Another Nagaland-based political party is set to fold and subsumed by the Neiphiu Rio-led Naga People’s Front (NPF). As per reports, the Rising People’s Party (RPP) en masse is going to merge into the folds of the NPF.
RPP President Joel Naga was out of reach but a senior member of the party — launched with much promise — confirmed to The Morung Express the official merger programme will take place in Kohima, on July 11. The reason for the folding was reportedly disillusionment over the lack of support from the people despite a party ideology that waved the flag of transparency and accountability, while promising an alternative to an existing “rot in the system.”
Talks for the merger had reportedly been on for some time with serious discussions beginning in June.
Ridding the electoral system of money and muscle power, while bringing about an “electoral revolution” was one of the professed agenda of the party.
The RPP member said that the party leadership was disappointed with the lack of enthusiasm towards the party and its ideology. “There are people who understand the ideology but don’t want to come forward. They feel that it is too ideological,” he said. He said that they thus decided that they might as well join the system and give it a fight.
A former RPP member said that the RPP, with all its conceptual and ideological beauty, failed to connect with an electorate conditioned to a system of governance dictated by corrupt means.
“We have a dream, we have a vision for the Naga people. We want to bring in real change. It is not rhetoric, it is an ideal which we have prepared to sacrifice for,” declared RPP president, and a former anti-corruption activist, Joel Naga, at a press conference in July 2021. He declared that the RPP provides an alternative for the emergence of a new social order, based on justice and equality, and governance that would not confine itself to disbursing monthly salary alone. Joel Naga went on to unsuccessfully contest the 2023 Assembly polls.
