Shillong, Oct 20: United Democratic Party (UDP) leader and home minister Lahkmen Rymbui on Thursday said that the Congress may become “minus zero” after the 2023 elections due to mismanagement of the party affairs by the incumbent president Vincent H Pala.

“…due to his (Pala) own mismanagement, the party was reduced to zero and it will become minus zero after 2023 elections,” Rymbui told reporters while reacting to a recent statement made by Pala, who accused the UDP of being “coward” by running away from the problems.

He also said it is pointless to reply to Pala’s allegations because “it is like replying to a non-existent party in the state of Meghalaya”.

“For a party which has more MLAs to reply to a party which has zero MLA (or 8-0), why should I answer to zero. Let him come back with 1-4 (MLAs) then I will reply to that,” he stated.

Rymbui further asked Pala to introspect why all are running away from him. “I think he should introspect why all his colleagues are running away from him. As soon as he came to the state, the Congress lost all its MLAs,” he said.

The UDP leader further alleged that even the prospective candidates of the Congress are also running away to other parties.

Stating that it was unbecoming for the MPCC chief to make allegations without knowing the ground reality, Rymbui said, “He should introspect why the Congress, being the largest party in 2018, became zero. It becomes zero because of whom, it is because of him.”

He said it was also unbecoming of Pala to allege that he is facilitating a drugs cartel in Meghalaya. “If I say the fact of the matter is from 2010 till 2018, if you see the seizure of drugs, the arrest of drugs cartel, it is negligible but if you see the record of this government from 2018 till date, the seizure of drugs, the charge-sheet, the arrests, it is very high – so who did it. Why the Congress does not do it,” Rymbui asked.

According to him, from 2018 till date, drugs worth over Rs 105 crore have been seized while only Rs 14 crore of drugs was seized during the Congress regime from 2010-2018.