The high power committee (HPC) of the United Democratic Front (UDF) is meeting here on Wednesday to discuss a formula that will get it back into agitation mode post-Onam and recapture the confrontation mood that marked the conclusion of last month’s Assembly session.
But rather than the main agenda, the ongoing debate related to the leadership issue in the UDF, triggered off by the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) State secretary A.A. Azeez is sure to dominate discussions.
Mr. Azeez had made a comparison between former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and Ramesh Chennithala in the role of Leader of the Opposition and expressed his preference for the former.
Senior Congress leaders are not exactly happy at the manner in which Mr. Azeez expressed his opinion and its timing. A section in the Congress considered this as an attempt to deprecate Leader of the Opposition Ramesh Chennithala and has blamed Mr. Azeez for unnecessarily initiating a debate at an importune time when the Congress party was itself in the midst of reorganisation process and has to travel quite a distance before completing it and installing a KPCC president.
Mr. Azeez has since corrected his stand, but the RSP leadership would have to do a lot of explaining at the meeting for the confusion the remarks had created, according to UDF sources. Senior UDF leaders maintained that the issue of leadership change was a non-issue at this point of time.
The issue of Janata Dal (United) over continuing in the UDF is sure to figure at the meeting, The JD(U) has been going through a churn after Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar joined the NDA camp. Even though the Kerala unit led by M.P. Veerendrakumar has distanced itself from Nitish Kumar, the Congress leaders in the State want him to take a strong stand against the Bharatiya Janata Party even if it meant losing his Rajya Sabha seat.
The Congress leaders in the State and national levels have repeatedly declared that there was no compromise in its fight against the BJP and expect the JD(U) to reflect this line. The JD(U) is also split on whether it should continue in the UDF. The Janata Dal (S), which was rewarded handsomely for staying put in the Left Democratic Front and did well in the Assembly elections when compared to its rival, has been baiting the second rung of the JD(U) leadership. Mr. Veerendrakumar’s recent meeting with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also created a flutter.
The UDF will have to sort out these issues before it can get into agitation mode and recapture the pre-Onam mood, that saw the Assembly session ending on a note of confrontation with the Opposition coalition demanding Health Minister K.K. Shylaja’s resignation for messing up admissions to the private self-financing medical colleges and her alleged interference in the appointments to the Child Rights Commission. But these issues are no longer current and the attempt would be to focus on the LDF government’s liberal liquor policy.