Shillong Aug 29: The Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) government will finalise its candidate for the post of Assembly Speaker two days before the commencement of the Autumn Session.

The Assembly’s Autumn Session will be held for six days from September 6 to 13, but the MDA will meet on September 4 to finalise its consensus candidate for the election to the post of Speaker.

The Speaker’s election may be held on September 10 or 13.

After the meeting of the Core Committee of the MDA government on Thursday to discuss about probable names for the Speaker’s post, Deputy Chief Minister, Prestone Tynsong who is the chairman of the Core Committee said that the Committee would again meet on September 4.

“On the same day (September), the name of a consensus candidate would be recommended to the MDA and the same will be approved in the MDA meeting,” Tynsong said, adding that the MDA meeting will be held on September 4 at 7 pm.

The meeting on Thursday was attended by Health Minister, A L Hek, Tourism minister, Metbah Lyngdoh, and Sports Minister, Banteidor Lyngdoh who are members of the Core Committee.

According to Tynsong, partners of the MDA government are still consulting among them probable names for the Speaker’s post.

The election of new Speaker is necessitated following the death of Speaker and veteran MLA from Shella Constituency, Dr Donkupar Roy Dkhar on July 28.

Dr Donkupar who was the president of the United Democratic Party (UDP), was elected to the post of Speaker on March 12, 2018.