Last week the long awaited crossover of Karu Jayasuriya finally took place. This column had been reporting for some weeks now on the developments in this regard. Hence what was surprising was not Jayasuriya’s crossover, but the fact that he went alone. That came as a surprise even to the present columnist. There were others in the UNP(D) group who were disgruntled and given that fact, we fully expected at least two or three to follow him. Jayasuriya was not really one of the disgruntled MPs and from the fact that he crossed over alone, what that clearly shows is that whatever grievances the others had was not of a magnitude to warrant a crossover.

It would appear that not one of them had been negotiating with the UNP at the same pace as Jayasuriya. Before that crucial working committee meeting last week, which reinstated Jayasuriya in the position of deputy leader, the UNP operations committee met at Sirikotha and decided to halt the disciplinary inquiry against Jayasuriya only. A little while later, the working committee met and the first item of business that Wickremesinghe brought up was to appoint Jayasuriya as the deputy leader with Rukman Senanayake as the assistant leader and Gamini Jayawickreme Perera as the party chairman.

At this, parliamentarian Dayasiri Jayasekera stood up and suggested that since several had applied for these posts, it would be best to hold an election within the working committee. Kolonnawa organizer and former minister Karunasena Kodituwakku spoke up against an election and said that this was a time when the party had to pull itself together and a contest for posts would create divisions. So it came to pass that Jayasuriya became deputy leader without a contest. In lighter vein, Palitha Range Bandara posed the question now that Karu Jayasuriya has been reinstated and the disciplinary proceedings against him dropped, would those who criticized Jayasuriya after he left the party now have to face disciplinary action? To this the party leader had jokingly replied that they would hold a disciplinary inquiry but instead of punishment, they would get a promotion.

Then Thalatha Arukorale chuckled that there was a problem in the Ratnapura district which still does not have a district leader and that either Susantha Punchinilame or Mahinda Ratnatilleke (Both of whom joined the government direct without being part of the UNP(D) group) be appointed to this post. To this the party leader had banteringly replied that could be done too.

The next person to stand up was parliamentarian Cader Hajjiar of Gampola. He said that he applied for the position of assistant leader and wanted to know whether he was overlooked because he was a member of a minority. To this Wickremesinghe had replied that Cader Hajjiar was the Muslim leader of the UNP and that they should discuss this after partaking of some of his delicious biriyani!

The working committee meeting lacked the solemnity that one would normally expect when they had just appointed the number two for the party. The disappointment of the younger MPs was almost palpable. What they had wanted in a deputy leader was a man who could compensate for what was lacking in the leader and could pave the way for the UNP to come into power. What they wanted was not a stop gap measure to keep Sajith and SB out but someone on whom some hope could be reposed.

On Wednesday the week before last, the UNP(D) group held their final meeting with Karu Jayasuriya in the chair. Speaking on this occasion, Rajitha Senaratne stated that they had left on the premise that they would not return so long as Ranil Wickremesinghe was the leader of the UNP. To this Jayasuriya had replied that they came to introduce reforms in the UNP. To this Senaratne replied that, that was not true and that their endeavour was to remove Ranil from the party. Secondly, Senaratne has continued, they wanted unity to save the country from the scourge of terrorism and that the government was now in the final stages of defeating the LTTE. In such a situation, Jayasuriya returning to the UNP alone was not good and that he had no right to do so.

Jayasuriya responded that he was going for a personal reason. Senaratne said that they had quit as a team and had made decisions together. Jayasuriya simply could not decamp citing personal reasons. However the UNP(D) group was not able to convince Jayasuriya to change his mind and at this stage the other members of the group instructed Senaratne to inform the president of this situation.

When Senaratne went to the president, Rajapaksa was not surprised. He told Senaratne that Jayasuriya had been of such a mind for a long time. When the UNP(D) group member of Polonnaruwa, C. A. Suriyarachchi, had sent people’s representatives below him to join the SLFP, Jayasuriya had found fault with Suriyarachchi. The president had then realised that Jayasuriya was going to return to the UNP sooner or later. The president stated that he did not ask people to come nor has he asked anyone to go and if Karu was going, he would wish him all the best. Karu also should think about his own future.

On Monday, the UNP working committee decided to re-appoint Jayasuriya as the deputy leader and Jaysuriya requested an appointment with the president on Tuesday to keep him posted. At this meeting with the president, he said that he is going to return to his ‘mahagedara’ and that he is grateful to the president for the manner in which he was treated from the day he joined the government, that he had been given a responsible ministry and had been allowed a free hand to work. Their friendship should continue and that he (the president) was a good hearted person and a patriot.

The president thanked Jayasuriya for having supported the government and brought 16 other UNP members to the government. He also said that when Jayasuriya joined the government, the UNP launched a mud-slinging campaign against him (Karu) and they mentioned the IOC deal, the Lanka Marine Services deal and the COPE report and called him a rogue. Rajapaksa said that he would see to it that nobody in the government slings mud at Jayasuriya when he goes back to the UNP. The president then wished Jayasuriya all the best and they parted company, after which the president went to see the other 16 members of the UNP(D) group who were waiting for him in a different room. The first thing the president told the 16 was that their leader had just spoken to him and left.

This was the most civilized parting of ways that had taken place in local politics in recent times. In late 2001, when the UNP was negotiating with potential crossovers from the PA government, it was done in the utmost secrecy. Most of the time negotiations were carried out inside vehicles with Gamini Atukorale driving and Karu Jayasuriya seated in front with Rajitha Senaratne and the jittery potential crossover sitting uneasily in the rear seat. The discussions were carried out with the vehicle parked in the dark and the negotiators would not use the same mobile phone twice – so great was the need for secrecy because the crossovers feared for their very lives.

But Jayasuriya’s impending crossover was discussed for weeks in the press without any threats being directed at him. And the government has shown no interest in slinging mud at him either. That shows how times have changed. When Karu J joined the government less than two years ago, parliament resounded to cries of ‘hora’ aimed at Jayasuriya and the story floated by the UNP was that he joined the government to escape prosecution over the Lanka Marine Services deal which was exposed by COPE. That too shows how times have changed. When a group of UNPers among whom were Dr Sarath Amunugama, Wijepala Mendis, Dr Stanley Kalpage and others joined the government, in 1999, at the height of Chandrika Kumaratunga’s power, the UNP uttered not a word against them.

It must of course be said that from the day he crossed over, Jayasuriya was consistent in one thing and that was that he was not going to join the SLFP. When the president invited members of the UNP(D) group to become SLFP organizers and start work, there was no response from Jayasuriya so his crossover could not have come as a surprise to the president. Jayasuriya too for his part made it an amicable parting by voting with the government at the budget one last time before he left. After Jayasuriya left the government, the UNP put out a letter of resignation purported to be written by Jayasuriya which said among other things that he was leaving the government because the only person who can uplift the economy of the country was Ranil wickremesinghe. When news about this began to circulate, the president called Jayasuriya and asked him about this purported letter of resignation and Jayasuriya’s reply was that he knew nothing about it and that it could be a gimmick of the UNP media unit.

How Karu Jayasuriya is going to fare in the UNP is the million dollar question. Today, he has been taken back to the UNP as deputy leader in order to thwart S. B. Dissanayake and Sajith Premadasa who were both eying that post. In fact for Wickremesinghe, it was providential that Jayasuriya returned at the time that he did because the week before last, three parliamentarians had come forward and recommended Sajith Premadasa’s name in writing for the position of deputy leader. S.B.Dissanayake had announced his own candidature and asked for a secret ballot within the working committee and some other parliamentarians had suggested Vajira Abeywardene’s name and the battle lines were drawn. If Wickremesinghe did not fill those posts quickly, matters would have come to a head and Wickremesinghe would have been compelled to allow a vote within the working committee to select a deputy leader. As this column has pointed out on numerous occasions, Wickremesinghe would not wish the appointment of a deputy leader to slip from his hands because that would be the beginning of the end as far as his hold over the UNP was concerned.

Sajith Premadasa, one of the key contenders for the post, was present at last week’s working committee meeting which decided to re-appoint Karu Jayasuriya but he did not say a word. S. B. Dissanayake the other key contender was not present at all because he would have wanted to avoid saying either yes or no to Karu J if a vote was taken in the working committee on the matter. To many in the UNP working committee his re-appointment was a joke. The banter and sarcastic cross talk was such that it can be said that there was not the solemnity to be seen when such important appointments are made. Things may be quiet for the moment, but the present columnist would confidently predict that after the Central Province and Wayamba elections are over, the UNP will begin discussing this appointment anew.

Jayasuriya was never taken seriously by Wickremesinghe’s inner circle even in the best of times. If one peruses past issues of the most pro-UNP newspapers during the UNP regime of 2001-2004, one will come across many uncomplimentary things said about Jayasuriya when he was a senior minister in the UNP government and the deputy leader of the party getting over a quarter of a million preference votes at the elections. To give just one example of how he was treated at the height of the UNP’s power, there was a meeting of the UNP government’s cost of living committee sometime in late 2002. Karu Jayasuriya was chairing the meeting and Charitha Ratwatte the then Secretary of the Treasury and Ministers, S.B.Dissanayake, Bandula Gunawardene and Milinda Moragoda among others were present.

Jayasuriya told Ratwatte who is a close Wickremsinghe protégé, that the cost of living has to be brought down. Pat came the answer from Ratwatte that there is a way to do it. Jayasuriya asked how and Ratwatte said that allocations to his ministry could be cut and the monies saved could be utilized to subsidize essential commodities. Jayasuriya, who is usually slow on the uptake in such matters, had naively asked by what percentage his allocations needed to be cut and Ratwatte’s triumphant answer was one hundred percent!

A horrified Jayasuriya had exclaimed, "How can you do that?" S.B.Dissanayake, who had been listening to this exchange between Jayasuriya and Ratwatte, unable to bear the presumptuous attitude of the Treasury Secretary, had pitched into Ratwatte reminding him that he was only an official and that everybody else present were ministers. He should remember that he was talking to the deputy leader of the UNP and a senior minister. Dissanayake, true to form, had then proceeded to give Ratwatte a mighty dressing down questioning among other things, even his educational qualifications, with Dissanayake stating that he has a ‘class’ (meaning that he passed his degree with merit) whereas Ratwatte has nothing of the sort. It was Dissanayake who rescued Jayasuriya that day from the bullying of a Wickremesinghe protégé. Thus ended the UNP’s cost of living cabinet sub-committee.

When R. Premadasa was the second in command of the UNP, no official would have dared to talk to him like that and when Ranil Wickremesinghe was the second in command of the D.B.Wijetunga government, no official would have dared to talk like that to him either.

That was when Jayasuriya was riding high. But now that he has returned to the party after having defected to the government and lost much of his credibility in the process of switching sides, how he will be treated is a moot point. What we can say about this whole sorry episode is that all this is the result of promoting non-politicians to political posts. Jayasuriya was one of the first such appointments that Wickremesinghe made. When people are catapulted to positions in that manner, it is not long before they begin to think of themselves differently. Jayasuriya became Mayor of Colombo in 1997. By 2001, he had become deputy leader of the party and was declaring during a meeting convened at Ravi Karunanayke’s house that D.S.Senanayake had appeared to him in a dream and told him to take over the party! Jaysuriya was always a nice man even before he entered politics and nobody has a bad word against him. But leadership is not his forte. He took 17 people out of the UNP and returned alone – that’s not leadership!

When Chandrika Kumaratunga left the SLFP in 1984 and returned around 1993, she brought back not only those who had left, but many more besides. When she came back, she was leading a splinter group the Bahujana Nidahas Peramuna. But the leader of the BNP became president and she made the deputy leader of this splinter group Ratnasiri Wickremenayake the prime minister and all other office bearers of her tiny party became ministers under her. It was with her that the LSSP and the CP in addition to one faction of the SLMP came back to the SLFP. That was leadership.

It’s a tragedy that political animals like Rajitha Senaratne who have been in politics from their students days and in the Janawegaya group of the SLFP have had to be under the leadership of political newcomers like Jayasuriya. Such things can happen only within the UNP. It’s unthinkable for even Harry Jayawardene who has for long been associated with the SLFP to solemnly declare to an audience of SLFP parliamentarians that either Mrs Sirima Bandaranaike or S.W.R.D.Bandaranaike appeared to him in a dream and wanted him to take over the party.

When the JVP politburo met last week, the first topic taken up for discussion was the crossover of Jayasuriya to the UNP. Commenting on this, JVP parliamentary group leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake said that Karu Jayasuriya was going back to the UNP and that the true colours of those who joined the government to strengthen the hands of the president was only now becoming evident. Parliamentarian K.D.Lal Kantha said that this government was a bundle of contradictions, with theoreticians of the open economy and advocates of a national economy and committed federalists and vehement anti-terrorism activists all sitting together. This was not a government that had come together on a matter of principle. Vijitha Herath said that this government was like a flock of birds sitting on the same branch and any bird was free to fly off to another branch at any moment. Anura Dissanayake said that Karu has no shame, the government has no shame, Ranil has no shame, and what this episode shows is the absolute shamelessness of all these people.

Lal Kantha said that some government big shots were talking nonsense by saying that they were not going in for a parliamentary election at this stage in order to help the JVP. This was a joke in the context where the government failed to adhere to even basic political courtesies with regard to the parliamentary seat vacated by Wasantha Samarasinghe. This was a reference to the comments made at the last meeting of the government parliamentary group by the president saying that he had been helped by the JVP to come into power and that if he dissolves parliament at this time, the JVP stands to lose many of the parliamentary seats they have at the moment and also the sitting MPs would not qualify for a pension. Therefore he had to wait at least until April 2009 before going for a dissolution of parliament.

Parliamentarian Vijitha Herath presented the interim report of the parliamentary select committee on non-governmental organizations to the politburo and said that many NGOs had done things inimical to national security and that there were serious financial irregularities in some organizations. Herath reported that they had suggested that a presidential commission be appointed to look into the activities of NGOs. He stated that there was the possibility of this report also being swept under the carpet like the COPE report and that the JVP should build up public opinion to prevent such a thing from happening.

Last Monday morning, when the JNP (Weerawansa faction) parliamentary group met in parliament, they were aware that Karu Jayasuriya was on the verge of re-joining the UNP and they decided to vote for the budget. The JNP pointes out that had they not voted for the budget, the 126 votes received by the government would have gone down to 114 and had Jayasuriya voted against the budget, it would have gone down to 113 and this would have given ideas to those within the government who want to see the UNP back in power. When the JNP politburo met last week, the main topic once again was Jayasuriya’s crossover.