Drawing the electoral battle-lines

General elections loom. Although there are hurdles that need to be overcome prior to the actual dissolution of Parliament, the past week has seen the country’s two major political parties taking crucial decisions about their electoral strategies.

Firstly, the SLFP seems to be slowly ridding itself of the image of a party seriously divided. After various internal negotiations, the leadership under President Maithripala Sirisena has indicated that the party is consolidating around him. Efforts by the pro-Mahinda camp within the UPFA to shore up the former President as a kind of ‘counter-leader’ to Maithripala seem to have come to nought with the firm rejection of any specific role for the former President other than as an important campaigner for the party.

It has never been clear if Mahinda Rajapaksa himself wanted to be the prime ministerial candidate of the SLFP. He has never explicitly indicated it as his personal ambition but has, instead, passed that buck to his supporters. The fact that he has never actually climbed the stage at his supporters’ political rallies – whether or not due to astrological advice – seems to hint at a personal hesitation, if not a clear-cut strategy. Now, the former President has been challenged to give his full support to his party as a major political figure who could help win votes rather than as a parliamentary candidate himself.

Of course, Mahinda is a doughty fighter and may choose to strike out on his own either on the advice of his closest allies or his astrologers or, both. However, both astrologers, as well as those party loyalists who remain with him, may advise that he remains loyal to his party which he had led for long. Increasingly, it is those few non-SLFP UPFA politicos who seem to be crowding round him for political leadership – perhaps more out of their political self-interest.

Meanwhile, the United National Party has also announced its parliamentary electoral strategy: the grand old party will go it alone at the hustings. Coming from a party that for over a decade has not held governmental power at national but also at provincial and local levels, this announcement evidences a new-found confidence which will surely make all rivals sit up and take notice.

That all those parties currently sharing governmental power would have the flexibility to devise their own parliamentary electoral strategies was mapped out in the larger political strategy outlined in the program presented to the voters at the presidential election on January 8. Sri Lankans voted Maithripala Sirisena in to presidential office with the full knowledge that it was the UNP that was bearing the main load of that historic presidential election campaign and, that Sirisena would have Ranil Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister.

The voters were also informed that the new President would work with his coalition government led by the UNP to begin the process of radical constitutional reform – a process now well under way – so awaited and would quickly dissolve Parliament to enable the new electoral trend to be further taken forward via general elections. The Sirisena manifesto also promised that after the general elections, a new coalition government would be formed by all those parties already committed to joint action for a renewal of Sri Lankan democracy as well as Sri Lankan social development.

There was - and yet is – an understanding among the current governing coalition that, after the various political formations had received a new mandate from voters at a general election, the renewed coalition would be formed on the basis of the new parliamentary configuration that distributed electoral power among these various parties. Thus, whoever gets the largest number of seats in the legislature can expect to take the premiership and the lead in government. All parties in the current coalition remain committed to this form of intended ‘national government’. This is not a ‘fracturing’ as some would like to see it but a congruence of parallel strategies.

Such a long term commitment is the most refreshing fillip to all who seek not the mere stability enforced by the gun and thug but rather the far more resilient stability of intelligent governance, systematic planning and long term elaborate visions for the country and society as a whole. From the average citizen to the richest business person, it is this kind of stability that is hoped for as we wait to see election dates set.

Hi Dad!

Today, essentially following Western fashion, we celebrate something called ‘Father’s Day’. As the rush of advertising indicates, the ‘Day’, itself, is mostly promoted by the commercial world for the purpose of merchandising. Just a few weeks ago we celebrated ‘Mother’s Day’, also lavishly encouraged by the merchandising world.

How important is Dad these days? In what way? Is Dad’s importance something that is independent of Mom’s or, is it ancillary or complementary to Mom’s?

As prehistoric archaeology tells us, ‘Earth-Mother’ was an important societal figure and an all-powerful deity in prehistoric times. But in the entirety of the subsequent human social evolution, it is Dad who seems to have called the shots, from his role as ‘head of the household’ and head of the family, to his leadership in religion and community and, also, industry and, overwhelmingly, in politics.

But increasingly, as even some advertising indicates, both mothers and fathers nowadays seem to share in their various roles, at least, in the Family and Household. Insurance adverts, for example, have thought fit to show dads cradling babies and putting them to bed, functions that Moms fulfilled entirely in earlier times. Future Dads take note!

Clearly, post-modern industrial society is transforming families in ways that even the ‘head of the household’ is a role either shared by Mom and Dad and sometimes with the Mom in the lead. This is especially to be seen in tragically war-affected societies such as ours.