Kohima: The opposition party in Nagaland, the Naga People’s Front (NPF) on Sunday extended their support to the party Legislature Wing representation submitted to the Governor seeking an independent inquiry by a Central investigating agency into the “misappropriation and embezzling of public funds” by the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) led Peoples’ Democratic Alliance (PDA) Government.
In a press communiqué the Press Bureau of NPF headquarters in Kohima said that the party has endorsed the points raised by its Legislature Wing supplemented “some of the points.” On the sanction of Rs 30 crores to a private hospital for developing a makeshift COVID hospital, NPF pointed out that while the free of cost, 30 years lease of the land and buildings given to private entity needs to be thoroughly probed, pumping an additional amount to develop the hospital is appalling.
It stated that the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between three party that is CMC Vellore, Government of Nagaland and Emmanuel Hospital Association in 2005, “when the incumbent Chief Minister was at the helm of affairs, does not speculate in any of the clauses that the Government of Nagaland is obligated to make any investment during the lease period.”
It said that the State Government has magnanimously given away land and build-up structures to a private party for free, while there are no visible profitable returns for the state and its people, it added. When the other hospitals in Nagaland are hardly running due to resource crunch, NPF alleged, “the Government of the day has the audacity to willfully neglect them and reward a private entity for whatever reasons was best known to the PDA Government.” This sort of rampant misuse of public funds by Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio headed Government needs to be dealt appropriately by law enforcing agency, it said. When the state is reeling under health emergence, NPF said that equal importance should be accorded to all the District Hospitals, health centres and sufficient funds and manpower should be prioritized.
