By
N Sathiya Moorthy
Cabinet spokesperson Keheliya Rambukwella’s declaration earlier in the month that incumbent Mahinda Rajapaksa would order presidential elections in the first half of January has made political parties in Sri Lanka, particularly the divided Opposition, active all over again.
The ruling combine had done it about a year ago when rumours had it that President Rajapaksa would amend the Constitution to have the polls advanced to 2014. Like this time, then again ruling party spokesmen had mentioned that astrologers had identified dates favourable to President Rajapaksa, and the latter would take the final call.
The Constitution provides for an incumbent President to order fresh elections any time after the end of four years of his six-year term. President Rajapaksa’s second term is not due to expire before November 2016. By amending the Constitution after winning similarly-advanced elections in January 2010, six months after the successful conduct of ‘Eelam War IV’ he had got Parliament to remove the two-term upper-limit for the incumbent through the controversial 18th Amendment.
A past-master at weakening political adversaries at a time of his choosing and exposing inherent differences in their collective camp, President Rajapaksa’s current efforts could still be one more of the kind. It is possible that he is also weighing the mood of the voter before taking a decision. He has limited time at his disposal to take that decision now, if he decides on early polls, but it would also ensure that the Opposition has even less time to come together and fight on a common platform. At least Minister Premajayantha has claimed now, the ruling SLFP had launched its presidential poll campaign a month ago.
The divided Opposition did come together and at a short notice in 2010, but only to lose the poll. First, the main Opposition United National Party (UNP) had to settle for an outsider as ‘common candidate’, and thus lose out on the real leadership ‘collective front’, which rested on candidate himself. The results showed that war-time army commander Sarath Fonseka could not bring in the ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ voters from President Rajapaksa’s side, as had been hoped for, if not predicted outright.
In the final analysis, Fonseka’s 40 percent vote-share comprised the acknowledged vote-shares of the ideologically-opposite UNP and the left-leaning Janatha Vimukthi Peramana (JVP). Fonseka could not manage to win his Ambalangoda town, either. After Minister Rambukwella’s announcement, Fonseka has been dis-enfranchised, based on his conviction in two court-martials, ordered after he had lost the poll – making him ineligible to contest. That he was allowed to cast his vote in the recently-held Western Provincial Council poll, without anyone challenging the same, does not seem to have weighed on the Department of Election Commission.
Why first half of January?
Talks of presidential polls in early January have also to do with the papal visit in the middle of the month. Pope Francis is scheduled to visit Sri Lanka on 13-14 January, and any election campaign during the visit would have been untenable. With President Rajapaksa’s fourth year in his second term concluding in the third week of November, he can order fresh polls then, or wait until after the papal visit.
Already, Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, the head of the Catholic Church in the country, has called upon all concerned to avoid politicising the papal visit – which includes His Holiness saying a Holy Mass in Galle Face Green in Colombo, and in the Maddu Church, which was a small but politically-significant theatre of the ‘ethnic war’ almost till the very end.
If President Rajapaksa is serious about polls ahead of the November 2016 deadline but not wanting to have it clash with the papal visit in anyway whatsoever could mean summer elections. Considering the failed rains in the past two years, any failure of the North-East monsoon this current season could be a political disaster for the incumbent, if elections were not to be advanced.
It’s for the same reason that fresh elections beyond mid-2015 is also looked up with discomfort by the ruling combine. Or, so it seems. Then there is also the lesson from the recently-held Uva Provincial poll. Though the SLFP-UPFA managed to win the PC, the resurgence of the main Opposition UNP, and the consequent closing of the faction-ridden party, seems to have bothered the ruling combine even more.
Tamils’ dilemma
Presidential polls, now or later, could put the Tamils of Sri Lanka in a fix all over again. Having got used to opposing the incumbent invariably, whoever he or she be, the Sri Lankan Tamils (SLT), both as a community and as a polity, led by the ruling Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in the Northern Province, do matter in voter-terms to the combined or divided Opposition of the day, but not otherwise.
Thus, in 2010, the TNA and the Tamils ended up voting Fonseka, the commander of the army which they otherwise dubbed ‘brutal’ and worse – against President Rajapaksa, who had lent political leadership and direction to the ‘war’ from the government side. The Tamils’ backing for Fonseka, it was argued later, might have consolidated ‘LTTE-fixated’ and other ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ voters on President Rajapaksa’s side. The latter won by a seven-plus percent margin as against half-a-percent in 2005.
In 2005, under LTTE’s strict directions and stricter enforcement – a Tamil who defied its ‘poll ban’ had his voting-hand reportedly chopped off – the Tamils had boycotted the polls. The claim at the time that UNP’s Ranil Wickremesinghe would have won had it not been for the ‘LTTE ban’ was belied in the subsequent polls of 2010. The boycott order was not without reason.
In 1995, when Prime Minister Chandrika Bandaranaike-Kumaratunga, CBK, contested, and there was no LTTE ban on Tamil voters, they went en masse and voted in her favour – thus accounting for her highest-ever 62 percent vote-share, to date. The LTTE then had a difficult terrorist-military task to have the Tamil masses change their views of both the outfit and the CBK leadership – and reverse it, too.
If anything, Fonseka in 2010 polled nearly double the number or Tamil votes in the North than the TNA would do in the subsequent parliamentary and local council polls – until last November’s Provincial Council elections reversed the trend. Considering that Fonseka lost reportedly owing to the loss of ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ votes owing to the unqualified Tamils’ backing for him, the main ‘election issue’ can be expected to play a crucial role this time too, whenever the one-man-one-vote, direct-elections to the presidency are held.
Single largest vote-getter
This time, too, the Opposition, divided or united, begins with the premise that President Rajapaksa would still be the single largest vote-getter. That is also the logic behind all of them needing/wanting to come together. Alternatively, the argument goes, they could contest alone in the first round, if someone could guarantee that President Rajapaksa would not get the mandatory 50-percent plus vote-share to win, and together support the first runner-up in the second, run-off round. Rather, the argument goes that the divided Opposition in the first round would not have a choice in the second round other than to back the runner-up. The UNP strongly believes that its nominee and its nominee alone stands the chance. Others agree, but are not so happy to support the UNP in the second round. Nor do they want to be seen in President Rajapaksa’s company. To them all, if ‘anti-incumbency’ were to impact on President Rajapaksa in a presidential poll, its effects would rub on his allies too in the parliamentary polls due in April 2015.
But any Opposition arrangement of an alliance at least for the run-off round should appeal to the JVP in particular, as the party is keen to retrieve the electoral ground that it had lost to the UNP on the one hand and President Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) on the other. The JVP has also lost a substantial number of residual voters to Fonseka’s Democratic Front (DF), as the results of the Provincial Council elections in the Sinhala-Buddhist heartland has shown since 2010. Such an arrangement might suit the TNA, too, though to a lesser degree. By fielding a candidate of its own in the first round, the party might demonstrate its hold over the Tamil masses in national elections after its sweeping victory in the PC polls last year. It can take its decision for the second round, if there is one. Such a course by the TNA could sent out a message to the SLT Diaspora and ‘Tamil nationalists’ nearer home, who are keen on re-asserting the community’s ‘separate political identity’ – if not always a ‘separatist agenda’ – whenever an opportunity presented itself. But this could also become a tactical problem for the first runner-up in the second round, if the elections were to go into the second round, and President Rajapaksa still came on the top.
Anti-incumbency and ‘Sinhala nationalism’
It is also in this background that the Opposition, divided and united at the same time, is keen to project anti-incumbency and governance issues as the mainstay of their future poll campaign under the Rajapaksa presidency. They do not seem to have faith in their ability to offset the ‘Rajapaksa popularity’ on the Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist card, or even the larger issue of ‘national security’ viz the possible revival of the LTTE.
Nor are they sure that any election hinging on the ‘ethnic issue’ or the larger/smaller ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ politics would be able to divide the ruling combine before the elections as corruption-driven anti-incumbency would do. To those parties and leaders in government desirous of getting out between now and the next round of elections, whenever and whatever held, corruption, price rise and other anti-incumbency are factors that they cannot run away from after crossing-over from the government side.
To them, if there are any in the ruling combine serious about crossing-over, ‘Executive Presidency’ would be a better bet, politically though not electorally. Other than those committed to vote against President Rajapaksa, mainly owing to their political loyalty, non-committed voters, particularly in the rural South, have no great or preferred views on the ‘Executive Presidency’. To them, however, ‘anti-incumbency’ is still a factor. Hence, there is also the continuing Opposition dilemma on deciding on key issues for the next round of polls.
To the Opposition, present and prospective partners, if at all any, the ‘abolition of Executive Presidency’ as a poll issue has as much tactical need as the real concerns that it may have flagged over the past decades. They all keep the Tamils’ concerns and aspirations out of the national discourse and debate in any election, at the same time ensuring that the Tamils voted with them.
In their calculations, the Tamils’ vote would continue to be a ‘decisive factor’ in this election, too. However, hey are also equally unclear about explaining the Tamils’ contribution or otherwise to the defeat of the present-day Opposition in the past two rounds of presidential elections. These calculations are equally confusing for the Tamil polity, particularly the TNA leadership, for them to decide on a ‘win-win strategy’. This time, the TNA at least cannot escape a pre-poll commitment from the rest of the Opposition on the specifics of a post-poll ‘political solution’ for the ethnic issue ‘within a united Sri Lanka’.
Blowing hot and cold
It is also for this reason, apart from the legitimate concerns of the Sri Lankan State machinery that he now heads, the ruling combine under President Rajapaksa – particularly his SLFP and the Sinhala-Buddhist Jatiha Hela Uramaya (JHU) and Wimal Weerawansa’s National Freedom Front (NFF) – would like the ‘LTTE bogey’ and the ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalism’ to hang in the midst.
Among them however the JHU has been blowing hot and cold at the same time. Since the peak of the ‘ethnic war’ involving the LTTE, the JHU had backed President Rajapaksa without question, projecting it as the single largest national issue of the greatest concern. It was then willing to put off for another day, issues of governance, particularly charges of corruption that the Opposition was levelling against the ruling combine, particularly the Rajapaksa leadership and family members in the government and outside.
Now with memories of war and victory far behind, the JHU is unable to convince itself that ‘governance issues’ of the kind are non-existent or less important. It may feel even more threatened by the sudden emergence of the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS), which is as rightist as the JHU – and far removed from the left-leaning JVP and breakaway NFF, but with the same ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ platform and constituency.
As a religion-centred party with Buddhist monks as among its leaders — like the BBS after it, and unlike the JVP and the NFF — the JHU seems to feel that its moral base and constituency may be slipping away on to the side of the BBS. More than any other party or leader, possibly including the Muslims being targeted by the BBS, the JHU would be terrified if the BBS were to enter the electoral way. Among other calculations, the JHU’s problems also lie with the party’s acceptance-level if it were to cross over and charge the Rajapaksa leadership on the governance front, after partnering it and benefitting from it for close to a decade.
Parties like the JHU are also possibly unsure about the ability of a common and the least controversial of election issues in the abolition of the Executive Presidency appealing to the committed UNP constituencies outside of urban Colombo. To them, the ‘Sinhala-Buddhist constituency’ vote continues to belong to President Rajapaksa. They also seem unsure about the ability of a seasoned Buddhist monk Sobita Thero to swing those voters away, considering that in 2010, the Sinhalas preferred an incumbent politician to an aspirant president in ex-army chief, Fonseka.
It is thus likely that the JHU’s new call for restoring the unworkable and hence untried 17th Amendment to the Constitution – and thus overthrow the superseding 18-A, without acknowledging as much – is more about throwing up a new election issue on which it could make common cause with the present-day Opposition without electorally having to target ‘Executive Presidency’, from which it had benefited in political terms over the past decade. It’s still one thing for the party to declare withdrawing support to President Rajapaksa if a modified version of 17-A is not restored, but it’s another for it to conclude that the loss would be more for the incumbent than the JHU, particularly if it were to confuse/conclude that it would be ‘welcomed’ with an open hand to the Opposition combine.
It is in this background and with the ‘Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist’ voters, particularly from the deep South, in mind that UNP’s prime ministerial aspirant, Sajith Premadasa (if he could be described so), seems to have told Parliament that his party was ready to support a bi-partisan call for the European Union to reconsider the EU Court order lifting the ban on the LTTE, recently. In this, UNP supporters of Sajith P seem to have concluded that for a united Opposition to win the presidency at present, he alone would be able to attract the non-urban, non-elite rural voters, who have become non-traditional party-backers to after the exit of his slain President-father, Ranasinghe Premadasa.
In all this, the UNP’s poll performance since the mid-Nineties (post-JRJ, post-Premadasa, Sr) could continue to give credence to the second part of their argument. In between, the perceived inability of the rest of the UNP leadership to convince this substantial voter-population on the party’s ‘Sinhala/Sri Lankan nationalist’ commitment seems to have given hopes to the Rajapaksa camp – and at the same time, confuse the latter’s committed allies from the past like the JHU and the ‘traditional left’, too.
Muslim predicament
The common Sinhala voters’ concerns about the revival of the deadly LTTE are as real as the continuing Tamil concerns about ‘militarisation’, ‘accountability issues’ and the like. It goes beyond theoretical constructs that see ‘Sinhala-Buddhists’ as dominating the politics and society across the country, and/or their apprehensions that the community only has Sri Lanka to call their own, whereas the Tamils have India, and the Muslims the whole of the Gulf-Arab world.
It is in this background that the recent anti-Muslim BBS attacks and the perceived silence of the Government and its mainstay polity is seen in some circles. All Muslim parties in the country are now a part of the Government, and they too are left with hard choices to make ahead of the presidential election, particularly if it’s to be advanced to 2015 from the scheduled 2016.
It’s not enough they continue in the Government, they also need to carry their voters with them. Such is also the case with the ‘traditional left’, which is there in the Government, not because they have a large vote-base but because their leaders still command respect across the polity and society. Their problem relates to the continuance of the Executive Presidency, which has all but burnt out as an election issue already. It will require greater effort to revive the issue, and even more to add substantial number of additional votes in its name, going beyond what is already in the Opposition kitty.
India’s concerns
In all this, the question remains where India’s priorities and concerns are focussed. For long since the exit of the IPKF, India has been working with the governments in Sri Lanka that the people there elect. It is how Indians have also wanted other countries, starting with the West, to approach India.
In context, the current Indian priorities on Sri Lanka are broadly two-pronged. On the domestic Sri Lankan political side, India is concerned about an early political solution to the ‘ethnic issue’ within a united Sri Lanka. Included in the list are also the Indian concerns about 13-A, and on the ‘accountability issues’ flowing from ‘Eelam War IV’.
On 13-A, India has not seen any positive movement since the conclusion of the war, as promised by President Rajapaksa – and also every President before him, as enshrined in the nation’s Constitution for long. On ‘accountability issues’, the Indian support for the current Sri Lankan position, which pertains to ‘sovereignty’ issues, could be remain, irrespective of any domestic change in Sri Lankan polity.
On the India-centric concerns pertaining to shared security in the Indian Ocean – read: ‘Keep China away’ – has had quantifiable resonance in Sri Lanka, again irrespective of the government in power. The lack of clarity on large-scale Chinese investments in Sri Lanka, and the possible inability of a Sri Lankan Government (whoever is in power) to resist Chinese demands for military facility of whatever kind, particularly viz India, is however of continuing concern to the strategic community in India. This needs to be addressed, now and later.
A January elections in Sri Lanka would come ahead of the crucial March session of the UNHRC, where the report – full or partial – of the mandate probe into ‘accountability issues’ in the country will be laid on the table. The Rajapaksa campaign can count on not only their political adversaries nearer home – starting with the TNA – but also sections of the international community to come up with off-the-cuff comments that can be interpreted as against the interest of Sri Lanka and the Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist cause, nearer home.
For India, which has now won a second term as a UNHRC voting-member with the highest number of votes in the Asia-Pacific region, fresh pressure will mount, for it to side with what is essentially a western view of things. That India will not be returning to the UNHRC voting council until the second session of the year in September 2015 would be a saving grace of sorts.
With orchestrated pressure from southern Tamil Nadu mounting on the eve of every recent UNHRC session, presidential polls in the early part of 2015 would give an indication as to which way the domestic wind was swaying in Sri Lanka. But on all issues of Indian concern, that would not have changed the larger Indian perspective or decision(s). Just as it would not have changed the tone and tenor of policies in Sri Lanka on the domestic, diplomatic and security fronts, whoever wins or whoever loses the presidential polls.
(The writer is a Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation, Chennai Chapter)