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The UNP's triumph

When he announced that direct talks between the Government and LTTE would begin in May, Professor Peiris must certainly have been aware of the historic significance of this latest episode of negotiations.

Unlike the numerous previous episodes of political negotiations between the Government and the Tamil leadership, this time round there is a new political configuration that could make all the difference between failure as in the past and momentous success. In the past, every Government that conducted negotiations did so without the involvement of the Opposition. Some Governments even found temporary success in agreement with the Tamil leadership of the time and, a joint commitment to a specific solution to the ethnic conflict. But, every one of these initiatives floundered in strident, and in some recent instances, extremely violent opposition by the main and ancillary opposition political forces.

This time, however, the people, in their exercise of the franchise, have articulated a will to political consensus and a conjunction of political forces that can only find positive meaning in joint action between Government and Opposition for peace and a lasting settlement.

The people have showed their new thinking and their new doubts about old thinking and, voted successively to retain the PA in the Presidency while electing the UNP into Government. If the record of failed peace deals has revealed the inherent systemic weakness of political partisanship, then, the way out could be a configuration of governmental power that compels inter-party collaboration and a transcendence of that partisanship.

To the UNP, the people have now turned for leadership in this new venture in joint governance and a joint peace initiative. If the careful and successful handling of the renewed peace process so far has demonstrated the UNP's capacity to fulfil that leadership role, then, the vital aspect of inter-party co-operation now awaits the urgent attention of Ranil Wickremesinghe and his colleagues. It is this, more than even the LTTE's seeming readiness to make peace, that will decide the historic success of this latest episode of negotiations.

If it is to retain the national political momentum in its hands, the UNP has to take on the leadership in making the UNP-PA 'co-habitation' in power a success. In past episodes of peace-making, governing parties provided, either through their ineptness or their vindictive attitude towards the Opposition, reasons for that Opposition to refuse to co-operate. Today, given the unique opportunity of the co-habitation, the UNP, with the greater electoral power and initiative in its hands, cannot afford to be seen to be repeating that tragic error of the past.

The President has not won any applause either for her cold-shouldering of visiting dignitaries or for her pernicious delay in setting up the Constitutional Council. While such behaviour can only detract from her and her party's political standing, of bigger concern is the effect on the peace process.

The UNP, however, in the face of such petulance, cannot think to revert to old strategies of political displacement. That only takes us back to the old vicious cycle of partisanship. Surely the past has shown repeatedly that mere parliamentary majorities, whether by five-sixths electoral majorities or by the wooing over of defectors from the Opposition, cannot make a peace agreement work. A larger parliamentary consensus - ideally a consensus that draws in groups even outside the legislature - is essential for that purpose.

The Herculean task before Prime Minister Wickremesinghe and his colleagues is to overcome the compulsions of competitive politics and to remove all obstacles from the path of the President's and PA's co-operation. Some mechanism that will enable inter-party consultation will help, no doubt. But it is to the UNP that the people look today for the initiative to take this co-habitation forward. It is through this that both the nation as well as the UNP can triumph. 

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