By
C.A.Chandraprema
The long awaited dissolution of parliament has taken place at last. After the executive presidency was established, parliamentary elections generally lost their importance and became the legislative extension of the presidential election. Since 1978, it was always the presidential election that would determine which side has won and would be calling the shots. An exception to this was the parliamentary election of August 1994 which ended the 17 year rule of the UNP. That was the only occasion in which a parliamentary election determined which way the cookie would crumble. However, even the August 1994 parliamentary election was only a stepping stone to the presidency a couple of months later and CBK ruled the country as president.
The 2001 December parliamentary election also saw political power changing hands but, unlike in 1994, the change of government of December 2001 did not translate into a stable UNP government. Even though the UNP did form a government in December 2001, they lost the parliamentary election of April 2004. So what we had was a 30-month blip in the two decade long rule of the PA and UPFA. Thus we may say that with the single exception of 1994, a parliamentary election has never resulted in a decisive shift of power from one party to another after the executive residency was installed. The parliamentary election that has now been announced however may well be the most important parliamentary election since 1977. Even though the executive presidency has not been abolished, for the first time since 1978, the prime minister has a defined role in the constitution.
According to the 19th Amendment, the cabinet of ministers will be charged with the direction and control of the government. When deciding on the subjects to be assigned to the various ministers, the president may, if he deems it necessary, consult the prime minister. Once the ministries have been decided on, the president will have to appoint parliamentarians to those ministries on the advice of the prime minister. The word used here is ‘shall’ which denotes a mandatory requirement. The president may at anytime change the assignment of functions to ministers (which is to say that he can reshuffle the cabinet that he appoints on the advice of the prime minister.) These provisions may not amount to much, but earlier, the prime minister did not have any role at all. And in the event that the president and prime minister are from different political parties, these provisions will be very useful to the party that holds parliamentary power.
What makes this election the most important parliamentary election since 1977 is that whoever gets a majority in parliament this time will rule the country. Maithripala Sirisena was not elected by the people as a president to rule the country. He was supposed to be the president who ends the executive presidency and hands over power to the prime minister and cabinet and then steps down. After being elected into power, however he changed his mind and tried to consolidate himself by taking over the SLFP (which was offered unsolicited to him by MR and the party hierarchy) but that attempt failed miserably. Thus we have a president who is nominally the head of the SLFP but who does not have the allegiance of his party. In fact the only visible opposition to the government formed by Sirisena comes from within the party which he is supposed to be leading. It is this clearly visible but still unnamed opposition force and the UNP led coalition that will be battling it out for supremacy in parliament.
As revealed in the media already, there had in fact been a one to one meeting between President Maithripala Sirisena and former president Mahinda Rajapaksa on Thursday night at a location down Jawatte Road though both sides denied the story. MS had informed MR that he would be dissolving parliament before the weekend and wanted to know what he plans to do in the event of an election. MR had told him that he would be standing for election though he had earlier wanted to retire from politics. He had explained to MS that given the public demand on the one hand and the harassment and victimization that he and all his supporters have had to face from the government, retirement is not an option. The mere fact that this meeting took place at all has generated hopes in some quarters that the UPFA would be able to face the election in one piece. A great deal now hinges on the secretary of the SLFP Anura Priyadarshana Yapa and the secretary of the UPFA Susil Premajayantha.
If they put their feet down and say in one voice that MR has to be declared the PM candidate, MS may not have any option but to fall in line. But then again, one wonders whether there would be any point in contesting together unless there is genuine reconciliation. We saw Premadasa, Lalith Athulathmidali and Gamini Dissanayake all contesting together and then forming a bickering government – a process that finally destroyed the UNP. The better option for the MR group would perhaps be to go their separate way at this stage and form a united government or a united opposition as the case may be. If the yahapalana example is anything to go by, enemies getting together without reconciliation simply to bring down someone else, is not a good idea.
MR group has a head start
The UNP and its traditional allies who contest on the UNP list like Mano Ganesan, P.Digambaram, and the SLMC will be alone this time without the votes of the TNA and the JVP and the Democratic Party led by Sarath Fonseka. It is unlikely that Fonseka with his ego issues will be able to fit into the UNP setup and he may contest alone or with the SLFP rump led by Maithripala Sirisena if there is a split in the SLFP. The SLFP rump led by Sirisena had placed their hopes on getting the 20th Amendment passed and marginalizing the Mahinda group by reintroducing the first past the post system. They were really hoping to blackmail Mahinda into not fielding separate candidates in the electorates as that would take votes away from the SLFP candidate and result in the victory of the UNP candidate.
Now that there is no 20th Amendment the election will be held according to the present proportional representation system which certainly works to the advantage of the MR group which will be contesting as a separate entity. They can now simply sail in and grab as much of the vote in the various districts as possible, without being blackmailed about taking votes away from the SLFP. The MR group would prefer the proportional representation system at least at this initial stage for the same reason that the UNP prefers it. Under the first past the post system, you have to worry about the votes as well as the electorates. But under the proportional representation system, you can forget about the electorates and concentrate on the votes. Many of the SLFP/UPFA politicians who support MR are very popular politicians who can easily carry their electorates.
However in the battle to win the electorate in a first past the post system, even a popular politician would have been under some pressure when contesting outside the framework and the names of the two main political parties. If supporters of the MR group were to contest outside the SLFP and the UPFA, there would always be the doubt that another candidate fielded by those who have control of the SLFP name and symbol may take a significant number of vote away from the candidate which may make him lose the electorate. The possibility of this happening would have placed immense pressure on the contestants from the MR camp. Now however with that pressure taken off and the only requirement being to get as many votes as possible, stalwarts of the MR group will have a relaxed and easy election campaign.
In fact the MR group has virtually been on the campaign trail since mid-February when the Nugegoda meeting was held. If we go back further, one may even say that the bring back Mahinda campaign started on the very day the results of the presidential election were announced with the spontaneous crowds that thronged to see the defeated president and to call for his return to power. With that spontaneous public show of support as a launching pad, the pro-Mahinda group has been on the offensive for the past several months. From the time the Nugegoda meeting was held, the MR group has been gathering momentum and this dissolution comes just two weeks after the hugely successful Matara rally. If any party hits the ground running in this election campaign, it’s the MR group. They don’t really have to do anything special except to continue what they had been doing all along but with perhaps added intensity.
Sirisena supporters left in the lurch
The dissolution of parliament would certainly come as a great relief to the UNP which has been demanding an early dissolution for months. It was in fact becoming almost embarrassing to see UNP politicians confidently predicting dissolution only to find that nothing happens. Any political party that gets it’s foot in through the door by winning a presidential election would stand to benefit by going in for parliamentary elections as soon as possible so as to consolidate their hold on power. The UNP’s need for an early election may not have been all that urgent if a UNP president had been elected in January. In this case, the election of Maithripala Sirisena as president was quite literally only a foot in the door because Sirisena is not a UNP president. (Quite on the contrary after getting into power largely on UNP votes he claims to be an SLFP president.) The UNP is now faced with the battle of being able to get enough seats to be able to form a government with its traditional minority community allies.
One of the reasons why the dissolution of parliament was delayed for so long was because of the problem that Champika Ranawaka and members of Sirisena’s faction of the SLFP including Rajitha Senaratne, Duminda Dissanayake and M.K.D.S Gunawardene would have in getting re-elected to parliament. These are all people who left the SLFP along with Sirisena and thereby earned the wrath of the average SLFP voter who remained loyal to Mahinda. The attacks on the leadership of the SLFP and the UPFA directed by Champika Ranawaka and Rajitha Senaratne did not contribute to increasing their popularity among SLFP voters. Their rhetoric about saving the SLFP from the Rajapaksas did not gain much traction because most SLFP voters obviously did not want to be saved from the Rajapaksas.
After successfully dislodging the Rajapaksas and forming a UNP led government, this group around Sirisena antagonized the UNP as well by whittling down the 19th Amendment which was brought to abolish the executive presidency. Largely due to the efforts of Champika Ranawaka and Rajitha Senaratne, the powers of the executive presidency are still almost completely intact despite the 19th Amendment. So the UNP too is displeased with them. The only alternative left for this group which is closest to Sirisena will be to contest through the SLFP rump led by Sirisena which does not have much of a chance of getting that many votes. Even if this group manages to get enough votes to win a seat or two, there is no guarantee at all that the individuals concerned will get enough preference votes to get elected because of the deep seated resentment against them among SLFP voters. Though some SLFP loyalists may tolerate Sirisena because he holds the position of party leader, that does not mean that they will look upon Sirisena’s buddies in the same light.
By dissolving parliament at this stage, Sirisena may have in fact signed the political death warrants of virtually all the politicians who left the SLFP with him. From news coming down the grape vine Sirisena has pledged to help these people at the parliamentary election. But what is Sirisena’s help worth in electoral terms? Is there really a constituency that sees Sirisena as a leader and is willing to vote for the candidates he recommends? If people like Champika Ranawaka, Rajitha Senaratne, M.K.D.S Gunawardene and Duminda Dissanayake fail to get elected at this parliamentary election, that will be the third great betrayal of Sirisena. He first betrayed Mahinda Rajapaksa then he betrayed the UNP by not abolishing the executive presidency as promised. Now by dissolving parliament, he may have betrayed his closest colleagues who antagonized both the SLFP and the UNP by pulling Srisena’s chestnuts out of the fire for him.
UNP govt.’s one colossal mistake
If one asks this writer what was the single biggest mistake that the UNP made after forming a government in January, it is the formation of Gestapo like investigation units. (We are here talking of the mistake that the UNP made as a government not as a political party – the latter will have to be dealt with separately.) The UNP is now going in for an election which it has no guarantee of winning. Can one even imagine what is going to happen if the UNP fails to cobble together a government? In the very week that parliament was dissolved, the FCID questioned Mahindananda Aluthgamage, T.B.Ekanayake and filed action against Prasanna Ranatunga. If one asks oneself the question whether anyone other than a member of the Mahinda Rajapaksa faction of the UPFA has been hauled up before the FCID, the answer that one comes up with will be negative. Indeed there is some justification for the Rajapaksa faction’s description of this outfit as the UNP’s Gestapo. To go for an election with such an outfit still in existence is nothing but insanity.
Those of our generation recall the “Lawrence mafia” that functioned under President Premadasa. Even though this so called ‘Lawrence mafia’ was not a formal set up and only a collection of retired policemen under retired DIG Lawrence to whom Premadasa gave various assignments to investigate this or that, it acquired a very sinister reputation and when the Sunday Times ran a story about this unit after Premadasa’s assassination, Lawrence himself had come to the Sunday Times office in a panic and pleaded his cause saying that he was an ‘innocent and harmless person like a kitten’ (mama poospetiyek wage ahinsaka minihek). The Lawrence mafia was at best like a private detective service and nothing more.
The FCID has however gone far beyond that. It is a formal police division set up by gazette notification and operates under a cabinet sub-committee headed by the prime minister himself. This would have been an anomaly even during the Premadasa era. But in today’s environment when everybody talks of an ‘independent police service’ such a police unit is nothing less than a scandal. The FCID is being referred to as a Gestapo and indeed that is what it resembles. The day the present government falls, the police officers serving in this unit will end up like Lawrence after President Premadasa’s assassination, running from one media organization to the next to plead their innocence. The UNP itself has been placed in a dangerously vulnerable position because of this police unit.
It should be recalled that when the Rajapaksa government fell on January 8, it was the UNP that ensured a smooth transition of power whereas the JHU and the JVP ran amok, raiding premises supposed to contain evidence of Rajapaksa corruption and going in processions to the bribery commission to make complaints etc. The UNP’s participation in the mayhem of the first few weeks was minimal. In the months since the change of government, the UNP as a political party has not done anything to disturb the peace. UNP supporters at the village level have never gone on the rampage against members of the UPFA. Even the MPs and regional politicians of the UNP have not been harassing or victimizing their counterparts in the UPFA. In that respect the situation is far better than it was after 1994 when UNP politicians even at the village level were terrorized by their counterparts in the PA.
But the UNP made a big mistake by firstly, appointing a new director-general to the Bribery Commission to ‘expedite’ investigations and then by setting up the FCID. Assigning John Amaratunga to run the police was the other big mistake that the UNP made. His pronouncements have created needless tension in the country. The removal of the serving director general of the Bribery Commission and the appointment of a nominee of the new government with the expressly stated aim of ‘expediting’ investigations unnecessarily politicized the activities of an institution which should not only be above politics but also appear to be so. The sacking of one director-general and the appointment of another was touted as the removal of an inefficient official and the appointment of an efficient one. But when this occurs just after an election, it appears to be motivated more by politics than administrative exigencies.
The new director-general for her part, confirmed this impression of politicization of the Bribery Commission when she tried to obtain a statement from former president Mahinda Rajapaksa on the allegation that appointing Tissa Attanayake to the then vacant position of Minister of Health was a ‘bribe’. Then the FCID remanded Basil Rajapaksa under the public property act for having distributed a cabinet approved housing grant to Divineguma recipients. Johnston Fernando was jailed for having taken goods on credit from Sathosa and then settled the bill. All of this happened quite a while after the original disturbers of the peace the JHU and the JVP had tactically retreated with the change in the mood in the country. Now when that turbulence is continued through the formal channels established by the UNP, it is the latter that will be left bearing the responsibility for all that happened since the Rajapaksa government fell.
The Chandrika Kumaratunga government harassed the UNP no end for six years from 1994 to 2000. The harassment peaked in the year 2000 when CBK tried to win the parliamentary election of that year by arresting Ranil Wickremesinghe just before dissolving parliament. The attempt did not succeed and when she knew she had failed, she backed off and for the rest of the one year that she would hold power till December 2001 she did not try any such tricks. There was a clear de-escalation of tensions and this is what helped Ranil Wickremesinghe to be magnanimous when he won power in December 2001. The appointment of handpicked officers to the Bribery Commission and the setting up of the FCID are colossal mistakes that the UNP made. Like CBK, they should have de-escalated tensions before the elections. But they did not. The UNP is making a bad mistake by going for the next election with this poison in the air.
Courtesy:Sunday Island