No partner can blackmail us, we have majority in Goa: Parrikar

Panaji: Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Saturday said no alliance partner can blackmail BJP in Goa as the party enjoys absolute majority in the Assembly.

“Some people started speaking against the Chief Minister. They were ministers in our government,” Parrikar said at a rally at Taleigao, referring to the rift with the ally MGP.

“If these ministers had difference of opinion, they should not have stayed in the cabinet. They were not speaking about thousands of things done by the government but complaining about one or two things government didn’t do,” Parrikar said.

“We will not tolerate blackmailing. We need not tolerate them as we enjoy majority on the floor of the House. We could remove them because we had majority,” he said.

BJP has 21 MLAs in the 40-member Assembly. “If we had 18-19 legislators then we would have had to tolerate them. So we are appealing you all to give us a super majority in the coming election,” he said.

Goa Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar recently sacked MGP ministers Sudin Dhavalikar and Dipak Dhavalikar after they criticised the BJP-led government and Parsekar in particular.

PTI