Malik Samarawickreme was a man long identified with the UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe. In fact, all those against Wickremesinghe were opposed to Samarawickreme as well because he was thought to be one of those who had influence over Wickremesinghe. Samarawickreme is a man who has stuck by Wickremesinghe through thick and thin. Whenever a dissident movement arose within the UNP, Samarawickreme was one of the shock troopers assigned to quell the rebellion. Last year, a certain elected representative from the Galle district had gone to dissident Polonnaruwa parliamentarian Suriyararchchi’s house in the dead of night and tried to take the dissident MP with him, saying that Malik wants to talk to him.

Samarawickreme is in some senses the Basil Rajapakse of the UNP - the ‘fixer’. He would move easily between the pro-Ranil and anti-Ranil factions that keep emerging within the UNP in this capacity. But his days in this role may be numbered. The Johnston Fernando group has recorded certain things that Samarawickreme said during the meetings he had with them and are now holding out the threat of making these public.

Vajira to the rescue

Last week, Samarawickreme had a discussion with Ranil Wickremesinghe about the proposed reforms in the UNP. His functioning as an unlikely lobbyist may be due to the threat of public exposure hanging over him. The question on many people’s minds was which side was Samarawickreme actually playing for? Was he with the dissidents or is he still with Wickremesinghe? Wickremesinghe’s reply to Samarawickreme on the reforms matter was that the party reforms should be done according to the wishes of the majority in the party. His contention was that if reforms are implemented according to the needs of a vocal minority, that would put off the silent majority.

On the same day that Samarawickreme spoke to Wickremesinghe, Galle district parliamentarian Vajira Abeywardene met Wickremesinghe at his 5th lane residence and assured him of support saying that these so called reforms whereby certain people would be given newly created positions in the party was not for the benefit of the party. They would only fulfill the personal ambitions of certain individuals. Abeywardene was referring to the watered down version of the reforms that will not ask for a change in the leadership, but will have Rukman Senanayake appointed as the deputy leader and S.B.Dissanayake, Sajith Premadasa and Ravi Karunanayke appointed as assistant leaders with the party chairmanship going to Joseph Michael Perera.

It is a well known fact that Abeywardene harbours ambitions of becoming deputy leader of the party himself, but if these reforms go through and Rukman Senanyake gets the slot with the assistant leadership positions going to SB, Sajith and Ravi, that would be the end of Abeywardene’s ambitions. Hence, obviously much to Wickremesinghe’s delight, he is involved in a one man attempt to do away with the call for reforms altogether. His position is that even the watered down version of the reforms should not be acceded to by Wickremesinghe.

Abeywardene is involved in a game of eliminating possible contenders for the deputy leadership. He plays the same role that Anura Kumara Dissanayake has been accused of playing within the JVP and the end result for the UNP is going to be the same as that of the JVP. Abeywardene played a major role in creating a situation where Karu Jayasuriya’s group could not continue in the UNP. And he is now trying to push out another crop of UNP seniors so that he could make it to the top. This internal battle, within the UNP is a sign that the whole party is in an advanced state of decay.

We see in the UNP a struggle whereby one group is trying to oust the leader or at the very least introduce some collegiality in the decision making process; while another group, in order to protect their own interests, is trying their level best to prevent any reforms from taking place at all. When Vajira Abeywardene met Wickremesinghe last week, what he had told the party leader was that everybody should collectively accept the responsibility for the defeat at the PC elections.

On Tuesday last week, a meeting of all candidates at the NCP and Sabaragamuwa elections was held at party headquarters with Wickremesinghe presiding. Many of the latest crop of UNP dissidents, such as Johnston Fernando, Rukman Senanyake, Thalatha Atukorale and S.B.Dissanayake (who is not in the dissident group but has his own issues with the leadership), were present. At this meeting, one provincial councilor from Sabaragamuwa, Siripala Kiriella, had stood up and said that the responsibility for the defeat has to be taken by the electoral organizers and the candidates and that he does not want the responsibility for the defeat foisted on the party leader.

Brownie points

This is a kind of thing that keeps on recurring within the UNP. Last year, at the height of the Karu Jayasuriya led reformist drama in the UNP, a meeting of UNP local government representatives was held at the party headquarters with Wickremesinghe in the chair. Karu Jayasuriya and some of the dissident UNP parliamentarians were also present. One local government representative from the Balapitiya area stood up and quivering with pro-leadership fervour began praising the party leadership and swearing allegiance to the leader and fulminating against all those who were against him. Wickremesinghe had tried his level best to get the agitated local government representative to calm down lest he ruffles Karu’s feathers. But the man was deaf to even Wickremesinghe’s entreaties and he continued "No, nayakathumani, let me speak. This (Sirikotha) is our mahagedara. It is very rarely that we get the opportunity speak our minds at the mahagedara. So I implore you, let me speak." And he had continued his tirade against all those opposed to Wickremesinghe. With plenty of individuals available to do such servile brown-nosing, there is no limit to the manipulation that Wickremesinghe can engage in to remain in the leadership.

When the UNP political affairs committee met last week, the first matter taken up was the ways and means adopted to meet the repression launched by the government against the UNP. The party leader had delivered a lengthy speech on the repression that has been launched against the party by the government. This was obviously an effort to create the impression of a raging conflict between the government and the opposition so that the opposition will have to close ranks to face the threat posed by the government. One can’t talk of changing the leadership when faced with a common enemy. If Wickremesinghe’s aim was to stave off discussion of party reforms, that was not very successful. Johnston Fernando had walked into the meeting, and one and half hours, of no holds barred discussion on reforms had taken place.

Wickremesinghe, to his credit, had acknowledged that those who were now critical of him had stood by him in the past and that they should get together and solve this problem. A collective decision had been made that discussion of shortcomings in the leadership and the need for reforms will take place in party forums. There will be no discussion of these issues outside. Despite the free discussion, the fact is that Wickremesinghe has dug his heels in and is refusing to budge. Vajira Abeywardene had stated at the PAC that party posts should not be distributed according to the whims and fancies of certain individuals and that the majority opinion must prevail. The ‘majority opinion’ has become the latest mantra of the pro-Wickremesinghe faction – the fact being that even though a majority of the UNP parliamentarians and working committee members may be opposed to Wickremesinghe, only a few will be willing to express their disenchantment openly.

Wickremesinghe has in his characteristic way managed to render ineffective the committee of seniors appointed to look into party reforms. Last week, he presided over a meeting of this committee, with the participation of Joseph Michael Perera, Renuka Herath, Jayawickreme Perera, John Amaratunga and others. It was decided here that in giving the party a facelift with the appointment of new office bearers, ‘individual ambitions’ will be disregarded and the appointments made according to certain set criteria. So far as I can remember, this is one of the very few occasions on which Wickremesinghe presided at this committee of party seniors appointed to look into the reforms suggested by the Johnston Fernando-Lakshman Seneviratne group.

Indeed it would have been unethical and anti-democratic of him to have presided continuously over a committee that was contemplating, among others things, the option or removing him from the leadership of the party. Wickremesinghe’s presence at this committee meeting last week is an indication that he is asserting his control over the reform process. First, the committee of party seniors was told in so many words, that they could discuss any reform other than the removal of the leader and now, this power has been diluted some more with even the recommendation for office bearers now being done only according to the wishes of Wickremesinghe. This basically marks the end of the committee of party seniors.

The present columnist has repeatedly said that the president has the devil’s own luck. Last week, a prominent astrologer from the south had predicted in an interview with the Silumina, that every election held in the years to come, will be won by the UPFA. He had even said that according to the astrological chart of the UNP, based on the time of its founding, its lifetime will be limited to sixty years. According to this, the lifetime of the UNP has already expired. It was founded in 1947 and by 2007 that sixty years was up. Sure enough, after the victory of Mahinda Rajapakse, in 2005, the UNP seems to be consigned to nothing but a situation of permanent defeat. In observing the goings on within the UNP, one almost begins to believe what that astrologer from the south said about the UNP now being a spent force.

A dead horse

The main reason what the UNP has faced repeated defeats is that it has gone from one election to the next without taking any meaningful action to rectify the faults that led to its previous defeats. Repeated failure has a corrosive effect on any organization. And the first part of the organization to be affected is its leadership. Wickremesinghe has by now, lost one too many an election to have any hopes of being able to lead this country. His mere appearance on the public platform skews the result in favour of the other side. This is why the president is so devilishly lucky. What he has is the opposition of his dreams. In Britain, the Kingor Queen symbolizes the state, and the government of Great Britain is known as ‘Her Majesty’s Government’. Her Majesty is represented not only by the government but by the opposition as well in parliament because the crown is above all political differences. Hence the opposition in Britain is known as ‘Her Majesty’s Opposition’. What we have now in Sri Lanka is a similar situation.

The difference between Sri Lanka and Great Britain however is that here the head of state is not a monarch who stands above both the government and the opposition and symbolizes the state; but a politician who leads a political party, and has to win elections in order to stay in power. There is absolutely no doubt about the fact that life has been made much easier for President Rajapakse by Ranil Wickremesinghe’s continuation in politics. Had he resigned after the 2005 presidential elections, as would be customary in any democratic country, by now, the UNP would have a new leadership and the party would have been rejuvenated and become a challenge to the president.

But now, with no change in the UNP, Rajapakse is having a free run. There are two points that the UNP has to realize. An entire generation has grown up in this country and has entered the voting population without seeing anything but defeat for Wickremesinghe. Even with regard to the single election that the UNP won in 2001, (The local government election of 2002 cannot be counted because it followed too close on the heels of the 2001 parliamentary election.) the young people of this country have nothing but bitter memories of the UNP government that was formed in that ill fated year. In fact, it may be correct to say that the election of 2001 was a turning point in the way the youth of this country viewed politics. At the 2001 elections, every UNP candidate had a huge following of young people and the youth were a prominent part of the election campaign. But after the way these young people were treated by that government, the youth of this country simply abandoned politics altogether and what we have now is a largely apolitical younger generation.

Whether the neglect and indifference of the UNP government of 2001-2004, was responsible for the youth of this country dropping out of politics is not clear. But certainly there has been a cataclysmic change in the attitudes of young people to politics during the past few years. Till 2001, the UNP had a younger generation that believed the UNP could deliver. Likewise, the JVP was also on the ascendant, with unprecedented numbers voting for them. The pre 2001 era was also the golden era for the LTTE when they scored the most significant military victories in battles reminiscent of World War two. But in the years following 2001, a huge change has come about in the attitudes of young people. Today the LTTE has no recruits, the JVP has no cadres or voters and the UNP does not have a youth following worth talking about. From where did this dynamic originate that took the younger generation of this country out of politics? Even though the UNP did not have any control over Tamil youth living under the LTTE, this change of attitude seems to have spread to them as well.

Pro-Ranil equals pro-Rajapakse

Be that as it may, this combination of an apolitical attitude on the part of the younger generation and the fact that they have not seen anything but defeat for Wickremesinghe during their lifetimes is not going to inspire any of them to vote for the UNP.

This thing of having been defeated one too many times is also a factor that will put off the floating voter. Another issue for the floating voter is that the policies of the UNP has seen no change at all over the past many years - mainly because the leadership has not changed. On this front, it should be noted that the UPFA has effected changes in both its leadership – Mahinda replaced CBK - and its policies.. So what we have is a dynamic government which changes its leaders and policies in accordance with the times and moves forward.

Against that there is a moribund, static, frozen opposition party that is averse to change. Given these circumstances it is hardly surprising that the floating voter has been voting for the government in their numbers in election after election. If the UNP is ever to raise its head again, there has to be a radical change. Its leadership has to change and its policies have to change. But there are no signs of this happening and the president is set to continue his comfortable run. What is clearly to the president’s advantage is to have the status quo in the UNP continue for as long as possible.

Whether one likes it or not, those who are pro-Ranil are unwittingly pro-Rajapakse as well because what they are doing, in fact, is protecting the president’s golden goose. Wickremesinghe’s continuation as party leader has helped swell the ranks of the government in parliament and the president has a comfortable majority which will help him continue without a parliamentary election until 2010. Rajapakse, no doubt, is beholden to Wickremesinghe for sending so many capable people onto his side. One of the reasons for the dynamism of this government, is because of this infusion of fresh blood from the UNP. One should never underestimate this factor.

If we go back in time to the year 1991, when the UNP completed 14 years in office, the party was in an advanced state of decay. That was the year that the UNP split, with Gamini Dissanayake and Lalith Athulathmudali going their separate ways. This is one of the main reasons for the downfall of the UNP government of 1977-94. Had that process been reversed, with the best in the SLFP joining the UNP, that would have enabled the UNP to continue in power beyond 1994. What we now see happening is that many important people, who have made a name for themselves in the UNP, are abandoning the party and joining President Rajapakse whose hand, naturally, is strengthened. The result is a virile and rejuvenated government.

This mixed government of the PA and dissidents from the UNP is one reason why opposition to the Rajapakse regime is not what it should be in the 14th year of a government. While on the one hand the young voters and the floating vote has abandoned the UNP, even the frustrations of the die hard UNP support base have been allayed somewhat because of the UNP dissidents serving in the government. All these UNP dissidents still maintain close contact with their UNP supporters. And in every district, there is at least one UNP minister whom UNP supporters can approach to get various favours done.