The failed Opposition sinks in another crisis


"Now Wickremesinghe is left with the corrupt Queen of Theives – a title confirmed by the latest Supreme Court decision for selling crown land to her cronies at dirt cheap prices. He has been losing in whatever direction he strikes. Instead of strengthening his position Wickremesinghe has committed hara-kiri by joining the losers. Wickremesinghe has driven the party into a dead-end and the only way out of it is to either step down or to join Mahinda Rajapakse and form a national government, leaving the options open to fight another day like Attlee."
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(June 28, Melbourne, Sri Lanka Guardian) Whenever Ranil Wickemesinghe appoints a committee it means that he is in deep trouble and that he does not know how to get out of it except by appointing a do-nothing committee. This time too he is reeling under the mounting pressures of the Party to shape up or get out. All media reports indicate that he is struggling to survive in a crisis where the rebels in the party are once again questioning and threatening his leadership.

Even pro-UNP media is screaming that the crisis in the party is deepening with moves to kick him upstairs as the nominal leader of the opposition in parliament. If this happens he will be stripped of the powers wielded by the party leader to formulate policy and appoint key men in strategic places to implement his policies. Either way, whether as leader of the party or as a figure head in parliament, the UNP will remain divided with Wickremesinghe playing his usual destructive role of fragmenting the party into atomic parts, or stabbing it in the back like the way he did in appointing a total outsider like Mangala Samaraweera, a sworn enemy of the party, as the deputy prime minister in any future government, sidelining all the senior UNPers who had been loyal to him.

How can the party be loyal to him when he is not loyal to the party or even to the nation? This is another instance where his ill-conceived gambles have boomeranged on him. Wickremesinghe was hoping that Mangala Samaraweera would bring in the numbers to topple the government. Instead Samaraweera outwitted Wickremesinghe and bargained to get the No.2 position in the UNP on the false promise of triggering an avalanche in the ranks of the government. In the end Wickremesinghe has lost even the other MP who crossed over with Samaraweera. Natural causes also took away Anura Bandaranaike who crossed over to join him. It seems that neither natural causes nor political causes favour the Jonah of Sri Lankan politics.

Now Wickremesinghe is left with the corrupt Queen of Theives – a title confirmed by the latest Supreme Court decision for selling crown land to her cronies at dirt cheap prices. He has been losing in whatever direction he strikes. Instead of strengthening his position Wickremesinghe has committed hara-kiri by joining the losers. Wickremesinghe has driven the party into a dead-end and the only way out of it is to either step down or to join Mahinda Rajapakse and form a national government, leaving the options open to fight another day like Attlee.

The problem for the UNP is Wickremesighe. The electorate and the rank-and-file see him as the biggest obstacle to the future of the UNP. The people have been rejecting him from the time he took over the leadership. Then his disenchanted senior and loyal party members who were fed up with his style of leadership, crossed over to join Mahinda Rajapakse. Now a new set of rebels are making the bold move to get rid of him. All this confirms what his critics have been saying from the time he took over the reins of the Grand Old Party of Sri Lanka: he is no good to anybody – not even to himself!
Oddly enough, he is facing the charge of not devolving power to the key members who can work more efficiently than him. The concentration of too much power in his hands is seen as a structural defect that has led to the decline of the party losing 17 elections in a row. If Sanath Jayasooriya failed to score in 17 innings where would he be today? Wouldn’t he be banished to the pavillion to sit there as a permanent spectator for the rest of his life?

Excessive power in the hands of Wickremesinghe has corrupted him. Political leaders are expected use power for the good the people and the nation. Basically, if power is not productive in winning or retaining power then the wielder of power loses all credibility. Unfortunately, Wickremesinghe has a record of wielding power to protect his back and not that of the party or the nation.

Besides, disillusioned party members argue that he abuses power to exclude party loyalists and include outsiders like Mangala Samaraweera and Lasantha Wickrematunga, the part time editor of The Sunday Leader and the full-time manager of Wickremesinghe. Party insiders are concerned that Wickrematunga’s manipulations behind the scene have led the party into the mess that it is in now. One of the major criticisms against Wickremesinghe is that he does not listen to party members but is guided by interlopers like Wickrematunga who has a personal political agenda of his own – one of which is to get diplomatic jobs for his girl-friends when Wickremesinghe is in power.

There is also a bigger irony in Wickremesinghe hanging on to all constitutional powers necessary to keep him installed permanently in his presidential chair at the UNP. The irony is that he is bent on handing over the powers of the centre to provincial adminstrators without him devolving his powers to his own members. He has never been the man to lead by example. But not all the constitutional powers he has wielded so far have helped him to sit comfortably in his presidential chair. Only another loser like Lasantha Wickrematunga is standing by him.

This explains why Wickrematunga launches savage attacks on the Mahinda Rajapakse government. It is his way of proving to Wickremesinghe that he is a good and obedient boy working his butt out to pick up the pieces of fallen Humpty Dumpty who, as the rhyme goes, could not be put together again by all the king’s men and horses. Despite his unrelenting attacks on the Rajapakse government, Wickrematunga has failed to lift the UNP from the doldrums into which it had fallen ever since he became the full-time manager of Wickremesinghe. Wickrematunga is an anti-Buddhist, anti-national Christian fundamentalist aligned to NGO agents like Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu. When Wickremesinghe aligns himself with these anti-Sri Lankan self-seekers he displays not only his inability to pick the right political allies but also his abysmal failure to read the issues of the time.

The issues that these anti-national NGOs and media mudalalis promote are light years away from Sri Lanka. They have dragged naïve Wickremesinghe away from the grassroots into counter-productive politics of selling beef to the Hindus or pork to the Muslims. They could never have manipulated strong, self-confident and creative leaders like President Ranasinghe Premadasa to do their biddings. It is not surprising to read that even young Turks in the Party like Tissa Attanayake confessing that his political hero is Premadasa and not Wickremesinghe, his current leader. Even Wickremesighe’s General Secretary can see the difference!

Take the recent example of Wickremesinghe’s decision to challenge the Security Forces waging a war to restore democracy and peace. This declaration of war on the Security Forces was first announced in The Sunday Leader. It is rather difficult to understand the demonic lunacy that has gripped Wickremesinghe’s mind to oppose the war at this critical when the Security Forces are inching their way into Vanni. According to official reports, not even the latest high level deputation from India has bruited the idea of stopping the war. Diplomatic sources indicate that India does not want to be seen on the losing side of the war when the Security Forces are poised to take over Vanni sooner or later. So why has Wickremesinghe adopted the suicidal policy of opposing the war? What can he gain by opposing the war in any case?

Besides, his new spokesperson for defence, Maj-Gen (retd) Janaka Perera has told his friends in Australia in writing: “I always said and believe that the LTTE can be defeated and should be defeated. I will continue to work towards this goal.” If Wickremesinghe’s defence spokesperson is all out to defeat the Tamil Tigers (and it can be done only by waging a war against the Tamil Tigers) why is Wickremesinghe trying to stop the war?
When the defence spokesperson contradicts the leader of party whom are we to believe? Janaka Perera is known generally as the one who beat Prabhakaran in Jaffna. But his jump into the UNP camp, after strenuously denying media reports that he has joined the UNP, has disillusioned those who trusted him as a committed defender of the nation. They are asking whether he has now joined the UNP to lick the boots of Prabhakaran or has he begun his political career by under cutting his leader? Anyway, he too is in the same boat as Wickremesinghe: right in the middle of a stream heading towards a precipice without a paddle.

Above all, why has Wickremesinghe decided to throw his lot with the losers in the war? What does he stand to gain by joining Wickrematunga and NGO mudalalis like Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu? Their hand is clearly visible behind Wickremesinghe’s move to oppose the war. It appears that Wickremesinghe has lapsed into a permanent state of denial. He denied that the Security Forces won anything in the east except a patch of jungle and a hard rock. Then he went to contest the elections in this patch of jungle and rock and when he was beaten he denied that he lost.

When – O when! – is Wickremesinghe going to win anything for his party, for the nation and for himself? His latest debacle demonstrates the plight he is in. At the height of the Eastern Province elections he promised to win the GSP+ facility from the EU because he pretended that he has a bigger clout with the EU than the Mahinda Rajapakse government. This was one of the election gimmicks put to him by Lasantha
Wickrematunga, his manager, and Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu. Both are in the business of selling the sovereignty of the nation to either the Tamil Tiger terrorists or to the West.
Saravanamuttu’s Centre for Policy Alternative (CPA has never put forward an alternative to Prabhakaran though it never ceases to propose alternatives to the elected governments of the day) came up with the idea of pushing for a constitutional amendment as a quid pro quo for the GSP+ facility from the EU. After proposing it Saravanamuttu and Lasantha Wickrematunga – both partner in crime of depriving the Sri Lanka textile workers of their daily bread -- were left high and dry with no takers. They were looking for some political sucker to buy their anti-national programme and who comes along -- Wickremesinghe, of course!

Lo and behold, Wickremesinghe writes to the EU Commissioner (reproducing the copy written by Saravanamuttu and Wickrematunga) promising his fellow-members in the International Democratic Union – the exclusive Western club -- to provide the necessary votes in the House to push the constitional amendment that would give more room for the Western agents to manipulate Sri Lankan politics. He was posing as the great champion of human rights, liberty, freedom and all that jazz, hoping to convince the EU that he is their man in Sri Lanka willing to do their biddings. Wickrematunga and Saravanamuttu also believed that it was a smart move to boost the fading fortunes of Wickremesinghe which, in turn, would boost their fortunes too. As everyone knows now Wickremesinghe came back empty handed. So much for the brilliance of the Saravanamuttus and Wickrematungas who are making Wickremesinghe dance on their puppet strings!
With everything going against him he has decided to take on “onah ekak” (any mother’s son) single-handed. He has even decided to abandon his “juck-muck-toot-toot politics” in favour of his latest bullock cart, Janatha Sandeshaya (Peoples Petition). Desperate Wickremesinghe is even ready to stop campaigning from the back seat of his car, surrounded by Security Forces, to do a Mahatma Gandhi or a Martin Luther King on the streets. He has suddenly discovered that people need protection even though the sensible people have been telling him bluntly that they need protection from him and his misguided policies.

So can he ever be a Mahatma Gandhi or a Martin Luther King? Who will believe that he will give up his coat and tie in exchange for the lungi of the “half-naked fakir”? Or who will believe him when he adopts the inspiring lines of Martin Luther and declare: “I have a dream of following Saravanamuttu, Wickrematunga and the Queen of Thieves! I have no army but Maj-Gen. (retd) Janaka Perera has joined me now to lead the nation to another major disaster and a general mess! Though I failed the last time I will never give up that dream of handing over the whole nation to Prabhakaran – and Maj-Gen (retd) Perera is firmly behind me …….” etc.

It’s time that Wickremesinghe got down to earth from his cuckoo land. He knows that he must change course. He knows that his past alliances are not going to pay him dividends. He knows that he is getting more and more isolated by sticking to his failed past. He knows that the crisis faced by the nation can be guided to a successful conclusion ony if he joins the forces that are winning – and they are not in the NGOs or in The Sunday Leader. He knows that he cannot win even in the remote eventuality of winning power because the nationalist -- and perhaps even the armed -- forces will not allow him to reverse the gains achieved by President Mahinda Rajapakse.

He also should know that it is not only the government that must act responsibly but also the opposition. With his knowledge of history he should know that there is more to gain by playing the role of Clement Attlee in World War II than being the front man for Prabhakaran. He also may remember the time when his uncle, J. R. Jayewardene, supported Mrs. Bandaranaike in quelling the JVP. If he can’t grasp the inescapable reality that it is only the collective action of the major parties than can solve the crisis then he must certainly get out of politics. The days when he burnt the Kumaratunga-Neelan proposals in parliament and then proceeded to sign the Ceasefire Agreement are over.
Wickremesinghe can be rescued only if he has the courage and the vision to adopt this constructive role. Playing the old games of divisive and partisan politics to enjoy the perks of office may please him temporarily but not all the pomp and glory that goes with winning will solve the problems of the nation. He will sink deeper and deeper with the UNP being dragged into a dead-end. In this setting he will end up as another Don Juan Dharmapala whose last act will probably be to extend an invitation to Prabhakaran (a la the Portuguese Prime Minister) to join him in celeberating the next anniversary of the Ceasefire Agreement.

(H.L.D.Mahindapala: Editor, Sunday and Daily Observer (1990 – 1994). President, Sri Lanka Working Journalists’ Association (1991 -1993). Secretary-General, South Asia Media Association (1993 -1994). He has been featured as a political commentator in Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Special Broadcasting Services and other mainstream TV and radio stations in Australia. He is Sri Lanka’s most senior journalist working in the English medium. He read for his degree at Melbourne University and resides in Melbourne, Australia.)
- Sri Lanka Guardian