Victory in the face of tremendous odds

The margin of victory is not very much. Yet it was a great victory scored under tremendous odds.

After 17 years in power the UNP was defeated in 1994. At that time the stalwarts of the party, Ranasinghe Premadasa, Lalith Athulathmudali, Gamini Dissanayake had all fallen victims to terrorists. Those immediately after them in the party hierarchy such as three general secretaries, Harsha Abeygunawardene, Nandalal Fernando and Ranjan Wijeratne too had fallen victims to Wijeweera’s and Prabhakaran’s bombs and bullets. Many of those in the middle rungs too had been killed by the terrorists. The party had lost the presidential and general elections and only the bare skeleton remained. It was at this stage that the comparatively young Ranil Wickremasinghe took over the leadership of the party.

The old war horses remaining in the party did not see eye-to-eye with young Wickremasinghe and the inevitable intra party confrontations happened. While the party bickering went on, there came the string of nine defeats.

To be defeated fairly and squarely is bad enough but to be defeated on nine consecutive occasions in the most unfair manner and illegally at that, where state resources were abused, policemen were deployed as political goons is to drive the defeated to the limits of despair. Ranil Wickremasinghe, however, held on with grit and determination to lead the party to this convincing electoral victory. He deserves all the credit because within the ranks of his party there were those who were openly saying that he was too weak a leader to defeat the rumbustious Chandrika Kumaratunga.

During the election campaign there were statements made that irrespective of whether the UNP wins the election or not, Chandrika Kumaratunga will remain as president and with her executive presidential powers she could stall any moves by the UNP to form a government. It was said that she could call upon any member of parliament, who in her opinion could form a government, to do so; appoint ministers of her choice and prorogue parliament if she wanted to. While according to Westminster traditions the monarch (in our case the president) can call upon any member of parliament who in her opinion can form a government, it is quite obvious that that person should be a member of a party that has a clear majority in the House or be able to rally the required majority to carry on a government. The results of the election have put this issue beyond question.

With regard to appointment of ministers, it is obvious that the UNP leader will have to choose his own cabinet and he could not have nominees of President Kumaratunga. Since this situation of having an executive president who is not from the same governing party is new; it calls for compromises to be made if the paralysis of government machinery is to be avoided. Mr. Wickremasinghe has already written to President Kumaratunga-on the eve of the election-calling for co-operation and ending confrontationist politics.

President Kumaratunga is well aware of this necessity because unless parliament approves the budget, even her presidential secretariat will be starved of funds. A live-and-let-live policy has become imperative, which will be very much for the betterment of the country.

What Mr. Wickremasinghe can do in his first flush of victory is to try and break down the tense, bitter and acrimonious relations that exist between different political parties. The scenes that have been enacted in parliament in recent years are a disgrace to the entire nation. He can make his mark as an effective party leader by making MPs behave in a manner expected of them.

On this occasion, The Island, wishes to apologise to the voters whom we have been referring to in not very complimentary terms. We have described the masses as asses because of their tolerance of a government that rigged elections and flagrantly violated not only election laws but also the basic laws of the land. Finally, on Wednesday a substantial proportion of the electorate decided that enough is enough. It all goes to prove the truism of the saying: ‘You can fool some people, some of the time; all the people some of the time but not all the people all of the time’.

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