No shot-gun wedding please

PA-UNP alliance needs enlightened programme

by Kumar David

President Rajapaksa has proposed marriage to the UNP and the response has been coy but guardedly positive. So far so good, but if the two major parties do tie the knot it must be on the basis of a fitting and feasible programme of work; otherwise waiting in the wings will be nemesis, the JVP alternative government.

A PA-UNP national government, or a substantive cooperative arrangement short of an actual coalition government, cannot afford to fail. The consequences of failure will be appalling - anarchy, break-up of the sovereign state, or attempts at coups - because the last trump would have been played.

There has to be a clear and purposeful programme agreed between the two parties before they consummate the union; this is far more important than who gets which cabinet post. This article is a sketch of the essential elements of a common minimum programme for a political alliance or a national government.

The national question

There must be a firm and binding agreement on ending the festering sore of fifty years of ethnic discord and thirty years of civil war by granting a full and final dispensation to the Tamils. The terms of the proposed settlement should be the offer of an Asymmetrical Devolution package, a two-unit type of federalism, benefiting from the highly successful Scottish model in the UK. Scotland has its own Assembly and Executive, while England has, sensibly, decided that it does not need such devices.

This is intelligent tailoring of the suit to fit the needs of the body politic. In the Sri Lankan case, the flexibility that an asymmetrical arrangement permits can be exploited for a special sub-Assembly and special territorial provisions for the Muslims within the NE unit.

It is naive to expect that anything more than agreement on principle can be worked out before the liaison arrangement between the PA and the UNP goes into effect. But there absolutely must be agreement on core principles, the fundamental Southern (read PA-UNP) consensus package, that is going to be offered to the Tamil people.

No consensus on this? Then don't bother to form a national government, it will be a dead duck from birth, a stillborn infant. Offer anything less than an asymmetrical devolution package and again don't bother; forget the Tigers, the Tamil and Muslim people won't settle for less.

Well PA and UNP! Do you have the guts to reach consensus along these lines and announce it? If the two major parties stop playing opportunist partisan politics and announce this as their common position, the Sinhala South will accept it. A national government that fails to achieve a solution to the national question is like Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark - better not have it at all.

Economic development

In truth there is not much difference, only difference in emphasis, between the Ranil, Chandrika and Mahinda versions of basic economic policy; one has a bent towards Washington and the IMF, the second vacillates and lacks probity, the third is a little populist. But none of these governments have inspired development. There are, however, certain underpinnings, more fundamental than the left-right or the pro-anti globalisation divide that need attention in Sri Lanka right now.

Three basics, whether the government intends to veer to the left or the right, are indispensable to any progress; strict macro-economic management, a directed development policy and changing senior officials whose credibility has expired.

On the first point, one advantage of a PA-UNP working arrangement is that it will bring political stability and this will make rigorous macro-economic management possible - that is systematic reduction of the foreign debt, management of the budget deficit and burgeoning local debt, and inflation and interest rate management.

Secondly, the indecently open economy has failed - it has failed to diversify the economy, create employment or achieve industrialisation. The Sri Lankan entrepreneurial class has showed more interest in commerce, the import trade and the commission regime; even the UNP, surely, will agree.

Hence, the basic task of the state is to guide and direct economic policy with long-term development as a target (vide success stories such as South Korea, Taiwan, China and Vietnam) and not to excessively involve itself in the ownership and management of individual enterprises. The state has been lax in developing and using policy instruments and incentives and in directing the private sector in the national interest. This is a minimal issue on which the two parties should be able to agree without difficulty.

Finally, a new political arrangement is a good opportunity to get rid of many people whose credibility is kaput; the Governor of the Central Bank because of questionable business connections and the Treasury Secretary because of the collapse of the government's revenue collection regime, are just two high profile cases to start with. A new political regime must start with a new brush, otherwise its credibility will be compromised from day one.

Governance

OK granted, getting rid of the Executive Presidency may be too much to ask for right away, much as I think this necessary, but there is a good deal short of this that can be done. Parliament has abandoned its sacrosanct responsibility to exercise oversight of the executive; it is now a castrated entity with one side trumpeting hosannas to the incumbent powers, the other side bereft of constructive input.

My God, does anyone even remember parliament with NM and Philip, Suntheralingam, Keuneman and Colvin?

To redeem parliament, even to a degree, the all-proportional electoral system should be abandoned and replaced by a mixed constituency and proportional system. For example, 150 elected and 75 proportional seats; the latter can include provision for both district and national list based representation. A direct constituency elected member is likely to be of a higher calibre than the present lot, and will not necessarily be obliged to stooge the party secretary or higher powers. Both the PA and the UNP have made favourable noises about the need for constitutional amendments, why not grab this chance?

Indeed, this is the one opportunity we may have to amend or repeal the pernicious JR Constitution, therefore so much else can also be done. Safeguarding the public service from political interference, revisiting the Constitutional, Public Service, Police and Human Rights Commissions, doing something about the independence of the judiciary whose reputation has fallen to a nadir, and strengthening the anti-bribery and corruption administration (Hong Kong's Independent Commission Against Corruption is a superb exemplar), are all good things.

What about the size of the Cabinet fast approaching three figures? Finally let us have a charter against discrimination on grounds of gender, race, religion, caste, sexual orientation or political preference.

A national government that can fulfil even a part of this wish list is worth having. One that fails to solve the national question and achieves little on economic and governance concerns will mean Apocalypse Now!