Former Anakapalle MP Sabbam Hari is known for making political somersaults according to his convenience. From Congress to YSR Congress and from there to Telugu Desam Party, Sabbam had changed his coats as it suited him.
Suddenly, Sabbam has now started singing “local” tune in the ongoing elections to urban local bodies. On Wednesday, he issued huge advertisement in a prominent news daily calling upon the voters to vote for a local leader who can solve their issues, instead of non-local leaders who are trying to encroach upon Visakhapatnam.
No doubt, Sabbam is a local in Visakhapatnam city as he was the Mayor of Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation in the past and is a resident of Seethammadhara in the city. It is a different matter that he had represented Anakapalle parliamentary constituency in the past.
But one wonders why Sabbam did not raise this “local issue” when several other non-locals like T Subbarami Reddy, M V V S Murthy, D Purandeshwari, Nedurumalli Janardhan Reddy, Ganta Srinivasa Rao, Velagapudi Ramakrishna Babu, former CBI joint director V V Lakshminarayana, Pawan Kalyan and Bharat contested the elections.
Now, with YSRC has taken the municipal election seriously and party leaders like V Vijay Sai Reddy is camping in Visakhapatnam, Sabbam suddenly remembered that the YSRC leaders are non-locals.
Since the TDP in Visakhapatnam is also dominated by the non-locals, the party leaders did not raise this issue in the past. Now, they are using Sabbam Hari to attack the “non-locals,” a strategy which they ha adopted when YSRC president Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy’s mother Vijayalakshmi contested the Lok Sabha elections.
Now, the TDP leaders are firing at YSRC from the shoulders of Sabbam, saying the ruling party leaders were bringing in Kadapa goondas and factionists into electioneering.
All these days, Vijayawada politics and business had been under the control of one community. By instigating Sabbam to raise the local and non-local issues in Visakhapatnam municipal polls, the TDP leaders are trying to retain their domination.
This community has several non-locals controlling the economy of Visakhapatnam. Can Sabbam Hari say whether he would still talk about local-non local issue if he defect to another party?