Last week saw the passing of President D.B.Wijetunga, the last of the UNP’s heavyweights. With his demise an era ends for the UNP. His tenure as Head of State and of Government though short, was successful. The country experienced an economic boom during his term in office with the stock market rising to unprecedented levels and real estate prices going through the roof. His assumption of office also opened up democratic space in this country after years of authoritarian rule. The freedom enjoyed by the press during his tenure has not been experienced before or since. He was a democrat in the true sense of the word, and he instinctively knew how to do the right thing. The people of this country, who had basically forgotten how to respond to a benign and sensitive leader after the demise of Dudley Senanayake, failed to realize his worth. After having got used to the likes of Sirima Bandaranaike, J.R.Jayewardene and Premadasa, DB, looked like a weakling, a pushover.

After nearly a quarter of a century of authoritarian leadership under both the SLFP and the UNP, even the ordinary people of this country tended to regard DBW as a harmless old man who was no leader. It was DBW’s assumption of office after the assassination of President Premadasa that opened up the market for leaders in this country which had long been monopolized by the UNP. Both the UNP and the SLFP found new leaders during this period - Gamini Dissanayake in the case of the UNP and Chandrika Kumaratunga in the case of the SLFP/PA. The general view was that DBW was a stopgap measure, without the drive and the ambition to lead. This to some extent was true because he did not in fact have the drive and ambition that people had got used to expect in a leader. What he did bring into politics was practical good sense. President Premadasa was a man who had both drive and ambition and he had years of experience in governance. Yet he was taken for a ride by the LTTE.

Karu J’s absence

President Chandrika Kumaratunga had Premadasa’s example before her; yet she too was taken for a ride by the LTTE in almost exactly the same way. The LTTE, wanted to use and then get rid of her just as it did with Premadasa. Amidst all this costly folly and naivety, DBW stood out as a beacon of good sense. Yet in 1994, the circumstances were not ripe for the people to realize this fact. DBW was ahead of his time by more than a decade. If the people of this country had known in 1994, what they knew by 2005, the UNP would have won the 1994 election hands down even without Gamini Dissanayake. But that was not to be and the whole country was plunged into a decade long ‘dark age’ from which we are only now emerging. Looking back at the past, this writer has always considered it a great privilege to have known men like J.R.Jayewardene, Ranjan Wijeratne, Gamini Dissanayake and Lalith Athulathmudali. To that list I now add the name of President D.B.Wijetunga, the gentlest, and least ambitious of them all, yet no less successful as a holder of high office. Power sat lightly on him. May he rest in peace.

At the former president’s funeral last week, former UNP deputy leader Karu Jayasuriya who is also the Minister of Public Administration and Home Affairs, was not present as he had to undergo surgery. His absence at the funeral was being interpreted by some as having been caused by Ranil Wickremesinghe’s presence. This however is not true. It was Deputy Minister of Public Administration and Home Affairs Chandrasiri Gajadeera who quashed the rumours by revealing in the course of his funeral oration that his boss was in the intensive care unit of the Colombo South hospital after an operation. Even if Karu J and Ranil had to appear on the same platform for some reason, it is unlikely that this would result in any awkwardness as many members of the UNP dissident group have begun to regard Wickremesinghe as a political asset. If Dr Rajitha Senaratne’s public comments are anything to go by, his continuation as UNP leader is important for the UNP dissidents to continue their political futures beyond 2010 in the new elephant kraal they have found for themselves.

And if anyone was under the impression that Wickremesinghe was on the verge of throwing in the towel and retiring from a job that he has been consistently failing in, they’ll have to think again. He started the last week with a discussion with party seniors Rukman Senanayake, Joseph Michael Perera, Tissa Attanayake, Vajira Abeywardene, and others about the future course of action taken by the UNP against the government. This does not look like the actions of a man who is about to leave the political stage. By last week the rebellion against Wickremesinghe seemed to have fizzled out completely with not a whimper being heard from the rebels. This could partly be due to the fact that MP Lakshman Seneviratne is overseas at the moment and there is the possibility that the rebellion will resume once he returns. Johnston Fernando for one, does not seem to have given up completely.

Johnston’s trump card

When the UNP seniors met last week, John Amaratunga raised the question that in the guise of talking about reforms Johnston Fernando had give an interview to a weekend newspaper criticizing the party and the party leader and that some disciplinary action has to be taken against him. This matter was however not further discussed in the seniors committee. Wickremesinghe, it would appear, was not too keen on pursuing the matter as a disciplinary inquiry could be used as a platform by the dissidents to release their document containing108 charges against Wickremesinghe. Such a document figuring at an intra-party disciplinary inquiry will do irreparable damage to Wickremesinghe’s standing in the international community because this won’t be mud slung at him by the government but charges brought against him by members of his own party and by those who were close and loyal to him to boot.

The sudden and unceremonious ejection of President Mbeki of South Africa due to an rebellion within the ruling party has focused the attention of the world as never before, into the internal workings of political parties in the democratic world. Up to now, the unwritten rule was that one spoke of democracy with a country, but not of democracy within the political parties that rule that country. A Conservative government in Britain or a Labour government in Australia may express concern about human rights violations by a UNP led government in Sri Lanka, but they would not go to the extent of questioning the internal workings of the ruling party or the main opposition party. That was an unexpressed no go zone. But Mbeki’s departure from the world stage has extended scrutiny from the country to the party as well. Wickremesinghe will have to tread carefully so as not to draw the attention of the international community to the goings on in the UNP.

When the UNP parliamentary group met last Monday, Chief Opposition Whip Joseph Michael Perera presented the report of the party seniors committee on reforms on appointing a shadow cabinet from among opposition MPs. No sooner had Perera finished speaking, Kurunegala District MP Dayasiri Jayasekera had stood up and posed the vital question whether the subject assigned to them as members of the shadow cabinet will be given to them once they are in power. To this Wickremesinghe had replied, "Let’s first win power, then I’ll decide based on the manner in which each individual goes about his work". The suspicion working in most UNPers minds is that if the UNP wins power under Wickremesinghe’s leadership, it will not necessarily be those who draw water and hew wood for the party who are rewarded with the plum offices but those who tickle the fancy of the leader.

This rankling suspicion in the minds of the MPs, will act as a dampener when it comes to fulfilling their roles properly. He who gets a good portfolio in the shadow cabinet will have no guarantee of getting the same portfolio or even a portfolio of comparable importance if the UNP comes into power. The position in the shadow cabinet is not something that any UNP parliamentarian will want to talk to his constituents about because if he does not get the subject he covers, that would be a serious loss of face. Even if this shadow cabinet suggestion sees the light of day, we are going to see the most unpretentious, unassuming and even bashful shadow cabinet ever seen in this country. In the early 1990s, it was Nimal Siripala de Silva who spoke most in parliament on matters relating to defense. At that time, he was the Borella organizer of the SLFP and a Colombo district MP. At the 1994 parliamentary election, de Silva put up posters asking the people of the Colombo district to cast a preference vote for the next defense minister. We are not going to see anything of that sort with regard to the UNP.

Hobbies for MPs

The manner in which the UNP’s shadow cabinet will be selected is indicative of the low status it will be accorded. At last week’s parliamentary group meeting, Wickremesinghe had asked the MPs present to send him a chit with three subjects that they like, and he would make the selection on that basis! Hence this appointment of a shadow cabinet will be nothing but an opportunity for UNP parliamentarians to ride their favourite hobby horse for the remainder of this parliament’s term. It would not be a case of the party leader appointing a shadow cabinet based on his judgment as to who was most suitable for a given subject but the MP’s themselves requesting portfolios to cover based on their personal likes and dislikes. Thus the assignment of a portfolio in the shadow cabinet will not be binding on Wickremesinghe in any way. The UNP never had a shadow cabinet and the reason why they are trying to have one now is to give the MPs something to keep them happy and to contain the rebellion that is still simmering under the ashes.

This is thus, nothing more than a palliative for the general illness affecting the party. But even that palliative is to be given only in half measures. A genuine palliative would have been for Wickremesinghe to appoint a shadow cabinet at his own discretion thus giving the remaining MPs in the UNP some hope for the future. But now, at the very outset, after turning the shadow cabinet into nothing but a hobbies club, any palliative effect that it may have had has been vitiated.

The UNP’s committee of party seniors which is now openly being led and manipulated by Wickremesinghe met last week under his chairmanship and took the momentous decision that in choosing a deputy leader and an assistant leader the main criteria applied will be party seniority and seniority in parliament. This basically eliminates both S.B.Dissanayake and Sajith Premadasa from the running. SB has the seniority in parliament having been an MP since 1989 but he lacks seniority in the UNP having joined the party only in 2001. Sajith Premadasa has some seniority in the party, having become politically active in 1994, but he lacks seniority in parliament having become an MP in 2000. Obviously, what the committee of party seniors had in mind, when they spoke of ‘seniority’ is not seven years in the party and eight years in parliament. There are many more who have been in both for much longer than that. We predicted in this column that if a deputy leader and assistant leader is appointed, Wickremesinghe will ensure that the two individuals appointed are such that he will look dynamic in comparison.

A doddering deputy

And that seems to be the direction in which things are heading. In this, it is safe to assume that Wickremesinghe has got the fullest cooperation of the committee of party seniors. The seniors obviously would not object when seniority is made the main criteria for anything. Seniority is what they have in abundance and if two among them are appointed to the positions of deputy leader or assistant leader, it’s unlikely that any of them would turn it down. The example of D.B.Wijetunga may be flashing through their minds already - he was brought back from retirement by President Premadasa to contest the 1989 parliamentary elections and was appointed prime minister, ending up as president after the assassination of Premadasa. Ultimately, it was not J.R.Jayawardene’s young Turks who made it to the top in the UNP but the patient senior. Who are they, the members of the UNP seniors committee must be thinking, to turn down the gifts that fate bestows on them? It’s not just in the UNP that there are examples like this. Even in the SLFP/PA/UPFA, it was the senior and elderly Ratnasiri Wickremenayake who was appointed prime minister by both Chandrika Kumaratunga and Mahinda Rajapakse. With all these examples before them, it would not be surprising if the UNP’s seniors begin to think of the party deputy leadership and assistant leadership as their birthright.

If one really thinks about it, if a man of Ratnasiri Wickremenayake’s vintage can be prime minister, why can’t his counterpart in the UNP be a man of comparable age and seniority? Besides, no one in the UNP will really be able to oppose a party senior being appointed to the position of deputy leader just as Lalith Athulathmudali and Gamini Dissanayake were not able to object when DBW was made prime minister. So that seems to be the way things are headed in the UNP. It should be noted that neither ‘ability’ nor ‘popularity’ has been mooted as criteria for appointment to the UNP’s deputy leadership. Popularity and ability can be subjective but seniority is objective, the main consideration being the number of years one has been around. This will not be the first time that Wickremesinghe used the argument of seniority to keep out the young and ambitious. In 2001, when he appointed several young and ambitious parliamentarians like Rajitha Senaratne, Ravi Karunanayake, Milinda Moragoda, Hemakumara Nanayakkara and others as non-cabinet ministers, the excuse was that precedence had to be given to the seniors in making appointments.

The 17th amendment

Thus all the drawing of water and hewing of wood has to be done by the young and ambitious for the cautious old veterans to enjoy the plums of office. Under such a regime, will there be any incentive for the youthful ambition to put its best foot forward is the question that the UNP will have to grapple with in the coming days. As in the case of the appointment of a shadow cabinet, this appointment of a deputy leader and an assistant leader was also as a palliative to the demand for a change in leadership. But even this palliative will be administered only in half measures. The whole idea behind asking for a deputy leader and an assistant leader was to offset the shortcomings of the leader. The last time there was a deputy leader and an assistant leader in the UNP, they did in fact compensate for the shortcomings of the leader.

The UNP’s victory in 2001 was largely due to the efforts of Gamini Atukorale, Karu Jayasuriya, Rajitha Senaratne and others in negotiating defections from the ruling PA. Even though they compensated for his shortcomings in this manner, the downside was that they became alternative centers of power within the UNP with people looking to them for leadership resulting in Wickremesinghe almost being ousted. He would want to avoid a similar situation from building up again by appointing SB and Sajith as deputy leader and assistant leader – both of them being more popular among the party rank and file than Wickremesinghe.

With Sajith and SB being eliminated from the race in this manner, the ambitious MP from Galle, Vajira Abeywardene, will not be able to make his debut as an ‘also ran’ in the deputy leadership stakes. He has found other things to do. Abeywardene has raised objections to the 17th amendment in the petitions committee in parliament saying that parliament has supervisory powers over both the president and the chief justice and the legislature has final control over both the executive and the judiciary through the impeachment process. But the 17th amendment has taken away the supervisory role of parliament with regard to the independent commissions that will be established under its provisions. Abeywardene holds that if the supervisory powers of parliament are removed with regard to these independent commissions, parliament will not have the power to examine petitions from the pubic against these commissions whereas they will have the power to examine petitions against both the executive and the judiciary.