Opposition’s game bared

The United National Party (UNP) and the People’s Liberation Front (JVP) have been making a big hue and cry ever since Sarath Fonseka’s crushing defeat at last month’s Presidential elections.

The Opposition was dumbfounded after President Mahinda Rajapaksa registered a landslide victory with a thumping majority of over 1.8 million votes. Opposition politicians such as Somawansa Amarasinghe, Anura Kumara Dissanayake, Rauf Hakeem, Mangala Samaraweera, Mano Ganeshan and Karu Jayasuriya who were under an illusion, were confident that their candidate Fonseka would emerge victorious.

Fonseka and the parties which supported his candidacy failed miserably to understand the pulse of the people and made all the assumptions on earth. Fonseka, who was indeed a novice in the political arena, also went by the crowds at his political meetings and inferred that all those who attended the meetings would vote for him.

On the other hand, the so-called media experts such as Samaraweera and Anura Kumara gave extensive publicity to various political surveys which predicted that Fonseka would win easily. However, Fonseka and his confidants were not aware that all such surveys had been concocted to boost the morale of the Fonseka camp and their supporters.

This was the reason all Opposition politicians who were extremely confident of a regime change, had a nasty shock when the final result was announced by the Commissioner of Elections on January 27 evening. Various excuses were trotted out thereafter as Opposition politicians made desperate attempts to cover their shame and underestimate President Rajapaksa’s convincing victory.

One of the main charges made by the Opposition was that the Government had manipulated the election results by tampering with the computer network at the presidential elections. Bankrupt Opposition politicians such as Mangala Samaraweera, Somawansa Amarasinghe and Tissa Attanayake made such allegations repeatedly to mislead the public.

When Fonseka was arrested under the law of the land to be court-martialled for offences he had committed and for the controversial statements he had made, the Opposition said the Government was trying to prevent them from filing an election petition. But the Government showed its transparency by allowing Fonseka to ink the Presidential election petition which was submitted to the Supreme Court last week.

But the public were really baffled as to why the election petition filed by Fonseka failed to include the alleged computer fraud which the joint Opposition charged was the main reason for the defeat of their candidate at the January 26 poll.

Samaraweera, who was the chief election strategist of Fonseka’s unsuccessful campaign, in an interview with a weekend newspaper described the result as the first ever hi-tech election fraud in the world.

JVP leader Somawansa Amarasinghe also joined the bandwagon by summoning a press conference to reveal what he called a ‘computer gilmaat’ that robbed their candidate of victory. But this so-called vital piece of evidence was conveniently dropped in their election petition.

Instead, the Opposition opted to include a series of incidents and alleged acts of bribery, corruption and intimidation which the petitioner will have to prove with solid evidence. We do not wish to make any comment as the matter is now before the courts.

Nevertheless, the manner in which the Opposition, especially the political leaders such as Somawansa, Samaraweera, Attanayake and Jayasuriya conducted themselves was rather disappointing and to say the least disgraceful. They attempted to paint a gloomy picture on the conduct of the election and the Elections Department to woo public sympathy. They made a futile effort to take the voters and the public for a good ride.

They even went to the extent of misleading the International Community. Fonseka himself declared that he was the actual winner and that the UPFA had robbed him of his victory. Though Fonseka polled only four million votes against President Rajapaksa’s record six million, he repeatedly claimed that he had actually polled over 5.5 million votes.

In doing so, Fonseka showed that he was trapped in his 40-day political fantasy, even after the Commissioner of Elections Dayananda Dissanayake announced the final official result.

Now that the matter is before the Supreme Court, Fonseka would eventually learn the bitter truth.

As predicted by many die-hard UNPers, the eventual winner in the Opposition was none other than its leader Ranil Wickremesinghe. Being a mature politician and one who has lost no less than 23 elections under his tottering leadership, Wickremesinghe knew only too well that he could not defeat President Rajapaksa.

Wickremesinghe did not want to add to his ‘unique record’ of defeats - by losing his third successive presidential election. He strove to secure his position as the leader of the UNP and that of the Opposition. This was the sole reason Wickremesinghe opted not to contest the Presidential poll and keep the Elephant symbol out of a major election for the first time in 62 years.

Thanks to the excellent political lessons he had learnt under his maternal uncle and former President J.R. Jayewardene, Wickremesinghe measured the outcome of the elections. This is exactly why he jumped at the idea of supporting Fonseka and played the role of King Vessanthara.

Wickremesinghe’s far-reaching decision to suit his personal goals enabled him to continue as the party leader and play a different melody at the general election. Now that Wickremesinghe has achieved his goal of evading the Presidential election, the UNP leader has reverted to the Elephant symbol, abandoning Fonseka and Somawansa in the political wilderness.

Fonseka and the JVP, who are running short of options in the backdrop of Wickremesinghe’s selfish decision, had little or no choice but to join hands to contest the forthcoming general election. Since Samaraweera, Ganeshan and Hakeem also don’t have a considerable vote base, they too have opted to team up with the UNP.

These Opposition politicians would not stand a ghost of a chance to hoodwink the public in future. People are acutely aware of the mandate obtained by President Rajapaksa and would undoubtedly ensure a two-third majority for the UPFA at the forthcoming general elections.