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| Sunday, 4 July 2004 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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Crisis in the UNP by H. L. D. Mahindapala In its entire history the UNP has produced four great leaders: 1) D. S. Senanayake, 2) Dudley Senanayake, 3) Ranasinghe Premadasa, all of whom were people-oriented leaders. The people and the UNPers are still looking for the fourth one.
He tried this trick in his last term in office and went skidding until he crashed into the brick wall of the voters. He and his corrupt regime justified his illegal concessions to an implacable LTTE by claiming that he had a mandate when he was prime minister. Did he ever get a mandate to do what he did behind the backs of the people? Yes, people wanted peace but did they want it at the price he was willing to pay? In any case, if the people gave him the mandate wouldn't they have voted him back to continue the mandate that he claimed? Shouldn't Wickremesinghe have learnt a lesson from his own failed gamble? For how long can he go on believing in his fictions and deceptions? It is tragic that he stands out as the only UNP leader who has taken the party in the opposite direction of its founding fathers. What future has he, or his party if he goes down this track? How far can he take the party, founded by D. S. Senanayake, the father of the nation, down this disastrous path? Is Wickremesinghe's dream to leave behind to posterity the legacy of Don Juan Dharmapala? Political leaders in a democracy derive their legitimacy by adhering to the will of the people expressed periodically at elections. Unlike Prabhakaran, he will have to return to the voters again and again. And in the years ahead, he will have to return to a political landscape that is totally different from the two-party system. Wickremesinghe himself has conceded that the future of the UNP will depend on how well equipped it is to combat the new elements in the political arena. For better or worse, the neglected grassroot forces are abandoning the traditional two-party system and are tending increasingly to align themselves with the Third Force, the JVP. It is not only the best organised party, but also the party that has tapped into the emerging trends. While Wickremesinghe plans to sell chewing gum and computers to the villagers, the JVP is addressing their rice-and-curry issues, mixed with the hot and spicy ingredients of nationalism. While Wickremesinghe is sailing along with the forces of globalisation, deregulation and liberalisation, dressed in expensive (Hameedia? Or is it Armani?) suits, the JVP is doing their homework, penetrating into the heartland of the people dressed in plain clothes with stand-up collars. Disturbing undercurrents After the sound beating Wickremesinghe got at the last election, the party should have gone through an agonising reappraisal of its policies, programs and, above all, the leadership identified with the politics rejected by the people. There were disturbing undercurrents rising within the rank and file shortly after the elections. Wickremesinghe moved quickly to snuff it out with a declaration to reform the party. What did he do? In his usual style he appointed committees. Consider some of the key appointees who are to head these committees: National Organiser Secretary - S.B. Dissanayake, Membership Committee Chairman - Ravi Karunanayake, Private Buses, Three Wheelers Committee Chairman - John Amaratunge. Add the face of Wickremesinghe to this mob and who is going to believe that the UNP has changed for the better? Obviously, he fondly believes that giving a facelift with some cheap cosmetics is better than changing the fundamentals. Ironically, his trick worked with his gullible party men. They were naive enough to accept these appointments and some were even asking for letters of appointment in writing! Milinda Moragoda is the only one who refused to accept his appointment as Chairman of Constitutional Reform saying, quite correctly, that all this was eye-wash. Milinda was disillusioned not only with the transparent deception of Wickremesinghe, but also the lack of will and creative leadership that can take the party and the nation to a cohesive future. Milinda got the second highest vote in Colombo and Wickremesinghe knows that he is a potential rival. Ever since Gamini Dissanayake walked into Temple Trees and grabbed the leadership from Wickremesinghe he has been obsessed with a phobia to protect his back than with protecting the interests of the party or the nation. He first got rid of Sirisena Cooray, the man who made him prime minister. His last move was to ease out shadowy Tyronne Fernando who was hovering in the periphery, making not so subtle noises to convince himself, more than the others, that he has the potential to be the next prime minister. Whether Wickremesinghe will move against Milinda or not is yet to be seen. In the interim, he has withdrawn into his close circuit of old boys like Malik Samarawickrema, S.B. Dissanayake, Ravi Karunanayake, Mahinda Wijesekera and G. L. Peiris all of whom have ambitions of replacing him. This clique prefers Wickremesinghe to continue because they believe that it is better to have a weak leader whom they can overthrow at the appropriate time rather than have a strong leader who will spoil their chances of taking over. They are operating from within and Milinda is circling him from outside. The puerile game of musical chairs played by Wickremesinghe in appointing committees may carry him a short distance. Ultimately his future depends on winning the confidence of the people. His commitment to the ISGA will lead his party into greater difficulties as it is going to be the rallying point for new political alignments to come together in the near future. On June 10, Tamilnet, quoting R. Sampanthan who met the President along with TNA MPs, said that Wickremesinghe has agreed to the ISGA and it is time that the President also followed his example. So far he had shown no new initiative except to go along with the demands of Prabhakaran. On this policy can he take the JHU all the way down this track and win the day? Wickremesinghe, like the nation as a whole, needs a totally new strategy to regain peace lost to the terrorists. In the meantime, the NGO pundits have come to the conclusion that going along with Prabhakaran is innovative thinking that surpasses even Einstein's E = MC 2. But to every non-NGO individual using common sense, there is nothing new, bold or creative in surrendering to the demands of an armed group. Any nincompoop, focused only on self-preservation, can do it. Great leaders outshine the weak by facing adversity with self-sacrificing courage. Int'l underwriters It is not the function of creative thinking and bold initiatives to comply with the terms dictated by the gun. In any case, can a durable peace come from the dictates of a gun, or from the expressed will of the people who will have to accept it constitutionally and live with it for the rest of their lives? Did not the people in their unambiguous declaration of their will in the last election reject the peace process pursued by Wickremesinghe and his cohorts? Besides, he is banking on the international underwriters to guarantee the future MoUs promising peace. The Sri Lankan experience has proved that even the physical presence of international monitors, supervising the MoU in every nook and corner, has not prevented the LTTE from violating 95 per cent of it, as stated by the SLMM. So who will be there to protect Wickremesinghe's borders once it is granted in the ISGA? In any case, does he care? Can anyone rely on him to protect national interests when he surreptitiously violated the provisions of the constitution by signing an illegal agreement, drafted in England by Anton Balasingham and the Norwegians, without the approval of the President, Parliament or the people? Weak leaders always become easy prey to inimical agents pursuing their foreign agendas in the name of peace, stability and progress. For instance, will any of the foreign agents allied to Wickremesinghe do what he has done in Sri Lanka? Will any of them surrender to armed groups, or even negotiate with armed groups who do not lay down their arms, or renounce violence, or refuse to respect human rights, rule of law, pluralism? Will they accept conflict resolution based on the violations of these fundamental principles? Wickremesinghe is pushing it hoping to survive on the minority votes, abandoning the interests of the majority. On this issue, old and current political alignments are most likely to come apart. Faced with escalating tensions instigated by the LTTE in the east and in the south, Wickremesinghe has no strategy to handle the impending crisis except to draw closer to Prabhakaran and the Norwegians. And the more he draws closer to them, the more he alienates the people on whom he has to depend for his future. The crisis for the UNP stems from the wishy-washy personality of the leader who is permanently in a state of denial of the new and challenging realities coming up from the grassroot forces of the Sinhala majority, the minority Muslims and the breakaway and dissident Tamils of the east and the north. Already there are signs and rumblings within his own fragile alliance that are threatening to break up his hold on the numbers in the Parliament. Unless he is prepared to reconfigure his failed past the indications are that he will be left only with the hegemonic forces of the LTTE and its proxy, the TNA. New political alliances The grassroot forces question Ranil Wickremesinghe's ability to lead and not follow sheepishly those who twist his arms. With the deepening of the crisis in the days ahead, which is bound to produce new political alliances, he will discover that he has been standing on sinking foundations laid by his own illusions. Wickremesinghe's commitment to the ISGA is a serious threat to the unity and the future electoral prospects of the UNP. Can the UNP go along with a leader who is running against the will of the people? Focusing on the simmering tensions within the UNP, the Sunday Times stated categorically: "If the UPFA Government is in trouble, the main Opposition (UNP) is much deeper in trouble". His illegal agreement with Prabhakaran (counter-signed by the Norwegians who are better known for breaking up nations than for establishing global peace), his refusal to take the people into confidence, his lack of transparency, his deception and lies, his manipulation of the pliant private media and, of course, the State media when it was in his hands, his secretive manipulations with the Norwegians, his reluctance to stand for the basic rights of the nation, his inability to take firm decisions, his tendency to pass the buck to committees that have repeatedly failed to produce any results, his evasive tendency of getting hired factotums to do the work that he should be doing, his dependence on other stooges and old boys to prop himself up, his display of the pirith noola on one hand and signing away the birthrights of the vast majority of people with the other are typical characteristics displayed by him so far. In short, he lacks the basic leadership qualities that are needed in this critical hour to guide his party and the nation. He has neither the vision nor the ability of his illustrious predecessors, or his rivals like Lalith Athulathmudali or Gamini Dissanayake. In a crisis, he lacks the ability to fight back. His tendency is to either appoint committees or surrender and claim defeat as a victory. The last time I met him was at Temple Trees when he was made Prime Minister with the backing of Sirisena Cooray. It was a critical time for him. Gamini Dissanayake was on the verge of moving in and grabbing his prime ministerial post from him. He was nervous and dithering, not knowing how to mount a campaign to counter Gamini's successful grab for power. He knew he did not have the numbers to meet Gamini's challenge. He was talking in riddles. What he told me then was, "I'll reserve that for a later date". |
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| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
This is the crisis facing the UNP: the absence of a credible and
formidable leader willing to take decisions in accordance with the will of
the people, a legitimate task assigned to leaders who function within the
democratic framework. Instead Ranil Wickremesinghe operates under the
illusion that if he aligns himself with the Bush-Blair combination he can
impose his will on the people through deceptive phrases and secretive
manipulations.
