Common forums are usually an opportunity for the candidates to visit every gewog in their districts, meeting the people in person and announcing their pledges. At Lunana Gewog in Gasa, due to bad weather, the district’s National Council candidates took this opportunity, virtually. The election officials and candidates could not visit the gewog because of heavy snow. The only means of transportation is using the helicopter service but due to its unavailability and bad weather, officials couldn’t make use of it.
With the Returning Officer flanked by the two candidates inside Gasa Dzong, they connected with the voters in Lunana on computer screens. However, only 17 out of over 500 registered voters in Thangza-Toenchoe, Tshozhong, Lhedi and Shang-Threlga-Wachey Chiwogs showed up at the virtual meeting conducted at Lunana Gewog Centre on Sunday.
According to one of the Chiwog Tshogpas in Lunana, most of the people could not attend the virtual meeting as people were engaged in their seasonal agricultural activities. Moreover, some live quite far from the Gewog office while others were discouraged by the poor weather condition in the gewog.
“When the forum is conducted virtually, there is no dialogue. We can only listen to what the candidates have to say and there is no room for sharing our opinions on important activities that are not included in their pledges. That way people who attended the session were not pleased with the arrangement,” said Gyempo Tshering, Tshozhong Tshogpa.
According to the incumbent NC candidate Dorji Khandu, despite not being able to meet the people personally, the virtual common forum was an economically effective alternative.
However, the district’s other candidate, Tshering says he is not satisfied with the virtual forum as the number of attendants was too less and he could not meet most of the people in the gewog.
According to the district’s Returning Officer, the arrangement was made after consulting both the candidates, as there was no possibility of reaching the gewog on foot. It takes around nine days to reach Lunana from Gasa on foot.
Changa Dorji, Gasa
Edited by Kipchu
