The PC polls scheduled for next month have assumed the proportions of a general election. Both the government and the UNP have very high stakes in those contests and doomed will be the loser. The government has been on a winning streak all these years and losing an election at this juncture is the last thing it can afford as a loss at the provincial council level is likely to snowball into bigger defeats at future elections. The government is, therefore, all out to bag the NCP and Sabaragamuwa at any cost.

The survival of the present UNP leadership is, so to speak, in the lap of the gods, given the signs of another rebellion in that party. The recent trade union debacle of the JVP, which the UNP unnecessarily backed at the eleventh hour only to have egg on its face, has strengthened the hands of some party stalwarts calling for a leadership change. A defeat at the PC polls will, therefore, be disastrous for those at the helm of the UNP.

Both the government and the UNP find themselves in glaring contradictions as regards the manner in which they are conducting their election campaigns.

The government seems to think that 'fair is foul and foul is fair' in contesting elections. It is so desperate that it won't even hesitate to take out sledgehammers to crack nuts. It is playing politics with the security of UNP chief ministerial candidate in the NCP, former Maj. Gen. Janaka Perera, who has been warned of a high threat perception, because of his military offensives in the past which resulted in huge loss of life and material to the LTTE. The government has offered him a few policemen by way of protection. What an insult to a former General! Even the infamous cardboard warrior of the government who met his Waterloo at a TV station a few months ago has better security, doesn't he? He is protected by a posse of policemen plus the entire underworld. When he gets into trouble, high ranking police officers rush to his rescue in their numbers and whisk him away. Of what use are a handful of police bodyguards to a former warrior whom the LTTE is zeroing in on? Janaka is right in having turned down the government's offer which is preposterous to say the least.

Unfortunately, the government hasn't learnt from the mistakes of its predecessors. The Premadasa government denied adequate security to DUNF leader Lalith Athulathmudali, who was assassinated in 1993 by a gunman at a public rally. His death triggered a tumultuous process, which changed the course of Sri Lanka's political history. The Premadasa government never recovered from the impact of the political tsunami Lalith's killing unleashed. A regime change occurred as a result and some mediocre politicos got catapulted to the centre stage of national politics. The rest is history.

Janaka Perera told this newspaper on Monday that he saw eye to eye with the government on the need to crush the LTTE militarily. He said the final solution had to be political. This exactly is what President Mahinda Rajapaksa has been saying. The President reiterated on state TV the other day that after defeating the LTTE, a political solution had to be adopted.

So, the government cannot brand Janaka as a traitor and deny him security. Ironically, the government, which protects former LTTE combatants responsible for killing thousands of military and police personnel and inflicting heavy damage on state property, simply because they are now on its side, is refusing to provide proper security to a former General whose offensives accounted for thousands of LTTE combatants and, most of all, prevented the outfit from achieving its goal of dismembering the country, for he happens to be in the Opposition camp at present.

The UNP, which has made an issue of extraordinary security measures being adopted to protect those who are in charge of the present war effort which has dealt a body blow to the LTTE, is demanding that a retired General on its side be protected because of his contribution to war against terror in the past. Its stand on the war is also paradoxical. It has thrown in its lot with Janaka the hawk in the NCP, while advocating pacifism elsewhere, especially for the consumption of the international community.

UNP spokesman Lakshman Kirielle, MP had the audacity to declare the other day that any gona (bovine type) could wage war! Doesn't he think that his description applies to all heads of State and Prime Ministers of this country––both past and present? For, this war has been fought by Presidents JRJ, Premadasa, Wijetunge, Kumaratunga and Rajapaksa and Prime Ministers Wickremesinghe (1993-1994)––who is Kirielle's present boss––and Wickremenayake.

Moreover, would Kirielle use that term to describe Janaka Perera the warrior, whose election campaign he is in charge of in the Polonnaruwa District? Janaka, who is preening himself on his battlefield achievements, must be rather embarrassed by Kirielle's comment. There is hardly any difference between the president of a temperance movement investing in a liquor bar and the anti-war UNP pinning its hopes of winning an election on Janaka, who has nothing but his excellent military track record to market!

The UNP's over-dependence on Janaka Perera's popularity as hawk to defeat the UPFA and the government's efforts to counter his campaign and its military propaganda have resulted in the hustings in the NCP eclipsing those in Sabaragamuwa and the election issues being narrowed down to national security and allied matters to the neglect of the other problems of the people at the provincial level.

As of now, people seem to have been given a choice between a pacifist party which has fielded a former general who valiantly fought an unsuccessful war and a hawkish government that is fighting a successful war.