Kohima, Dec. 3: Having drawn flak for his reported statements about ‘unrecognized nongovernmental organizations becoming more powerful’ at a recent NPF meeting in Kohima, Minister for National Highways and Mechanical & Elections Nuklutoshi has pitched what he has implied to be an oversight.
On Saturday, the minister clarified that ‘due to the short time slot allotted for him’ for speech at the meeting, he could not elaborate and “may have missed something” when making his statements.
The minister sought to explain his statement about “unrecognized organizations” and linking it to the ACAUT and a youth group in Mokokchung, the Mokokchung Town Lanur Telongjem (MTLT). The minister said to have pointed out that newer organizations (such as the ACAUT and the MTLT) were becoming more active and ‘powerful’ than ‘prominent NGOs.’ Hence, those organizations that were not active should be derecognized, he said.
“My actual intention was to encourage civil societies to be more active in our society because we have so much division amongst us,” Nuklutoshi asserted, addressing a press conference this evening in Kohima town.
“I said ACAUT and MTLT are more active and more powerful. I did not mean to put them down,” he added.
On the MTLT demanding that the minister mention instances as and when the forum had functioned ‘more powerful than the Naga Hoho,’ Nuklutoshi said he did not compare the MTLT to the Naga Hoho or any other organization; he had mentioned ‘in general, the bigger, more prominent and more recognized civil societies’. He explained that he had actually meant “prominent and recognized” organizations such as the Ao Senden and the Ao students’ organization ‘should be more active.'
“I’m not against MTLT. In fact, I appreciate what they are doing,” he asserted. He said to have wanted to convey that ‘prominent organizations should be more active.’
However, ‘due to time constraint,’ he could not explain further. The minister also blamed ‘the language factor,’ saying ‘If a punctuation is inserted or removed in a sentence, then the entire meaning of the sentence changes.’
About the statement against the governor’s ‘spontaneous visit to various villages,’ the minister said he was not retracting the statements but made it clear that he was also not against the governor ‘checking corruption.’
“If he is going to visit villages and trying to find out the grievances of the people, that is good but there is a certain protocol for a governor’s movement,” he said. “I want our governor to be the best governor, but the movement of a governor should follow protocol.”
When asked to elaborate, Nuklutoshi pointed out that the governor’s movement was ‘very costly because all the state and district machineries and civil societies are alert and engaged.’ The chief minister’s office should be informed about when and where the governor goes; the MLA of the district would then be notified for further preparation, he implied.
The minister reiterated that ‘wherever the governor wants to go, being the head of the state, he can, but he should not go uninvited.’
