The major national political parties of the country- the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), the Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB), the United National Party (UNP) and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) will have differing objectives as the 2020 General Election campaign enters its final weeks.
The past week has seen a spiralling of coronavirus infections which now stand at over 2,600 and UNP leader and former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has even called for a review of the polling date, but it is certain that the election will go ahead as scheduled on August 5.
For the ruling SLPP, the objective is very clear: it is seeking a two-thirds majority. This is to enact sweeping constitutional reforms. Although the primary objective would be to repeal the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, some stalwarts in the SLPP are even considering the prospect of promulgating a new Constitution altogether. The latter prospect is however less likely.
Public support
It is true that the ruling party still enjoys considerable public support, still being in the first few months of the Presidency of Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Even so, obtaining a two-thirds majority- 150 seats in the 225-member legislature- is no easy task. It will be recalled that in 2010, then President Mahinda Rajapaksa, basking in the immediate afterglow of the victory in the Eelam war, was unable to secure that magic number, ending with only 144 seats.
Such a scenario is likely again, with the SLPP securing a clear absolute majority but falling short of a two-thirds majority. It should be noted that in 2010, the lack of a two-thirds majority did not deter the Mahinda Rajapaksa government from enacting constitutional changes. It engineered cross-overs from the UNP, mustered a two-thirds majority and went on to introduce the 18th Amendment to the Constitution.
The SLPP hierarchy is very mindful of the possibility of falling short of a two-thirds majority at the election but equally alive to the fact that, given the intense infighting between the UNP and the SJB, some of their elected members may wish to cast their lot with the Government, rather than languishing in the Opposition benches for at least five more years.
In the SLFP camp, the aim of this election is simple. It will decide whether it survives as a major political party. There is severe competition between SLFP and SLPP candidates for preference votes in most districts and the SLPP has made it known that it prefers its candidates to be elected, even over and above senior SLFP stalwarts.
If the SLFP is reduced to a handful of Parliamentarians after the election, its status as a major political party will disintegrate. Polling at the last major national election- the local government polls held in February 2018- indicated such a trend. Therefore, it is the very future of the SLFP that is at stake at the forthcoming general election.
An interesting dimension was added to this scenario this week when Minister Mahinda Amaraweera declared that Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa may assume the mantle of SLFP leadership after the General Election, with former President Maithripala Sirisena opting to relinquish his leadership.
“He has the blessings and co-operation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to become the SLFP leader once again. If the Premier is appointed the SLFP leader, I doubt any one will be opposing or challenging it. The SLFP has been led by strong leaders like him since its inception in 1952,” Amaraweera said.
It is interesting that this statement should come from Amaraweera who is seen as a staunch loyalist of former President Sirisena. Amaraweera is also the General Secretary of the United Peoples’ Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and was appointed to that post by then President Sirisena, when he had significant differences of opinion with Mahinda Rajapaksa.
Mahinda Rajapaksa began his career as a parliamentarian fifty years ago in the SLFP and has been with the party all his political life barring the past four years when the SLPP was created to prevent his marginalisation from the domestic political arena. During those difficult days he delayed joining the SLPP formally even after it was formed because he saw himself as a ‘hardcore’ SLFPer.
Covid-19 pandemic
For the SJB, the issues at stake at this election are very different. It is a new political party but has been handicapped by the fact that its birth was overshadowed by the Covid-19 pandemic. Any new political party needs the opportunity to campaign freely to get its message across to the public and the SJB has been hamstrung in its efforts by the current stifling health environment and resultant restrictions.
It will be buoyed by being able to obtain the support of the vast majority of former UNP Parliamentarians with only a handful of them opting to remain with the mainstream party and its leader Ranil Wickremesinghe. However, whether the fledgling party has inspired sufficient confidence to translate this into votes- and seats- at the General Election remains to be seen.
It is noteworthy that one of the campaign slogans of the SJB has been that, after the election, it will capture ‘Sirikotha’, the UNP party headquarters. That may indeed be a possibility if the SJB manages to secure a sizeable number of seats and the UNP is reduced to an appallingly low number of Parliamentarians.
However, that wouldn’t still be easy for the SJB because it is presently locked in several legal tussles with the UNP and there is a small but influential group of MPs in the UNP headed by Ravi Karunanayake who will do their utmost to resist such a ‘takeover’, if only to secure their own political futures.
The UNP finds itself in a fate similar to that of the SLFP, with its very political future at stake. With party leader Ranil Wickremesinghe setting his sights on remaining in that post until 2025 and the majority of former MPs deserting the party in favour of the SJB a rout of the UNP has become a distinct possibility, because the failures of its 2015-2019 Yahapalana Government are still fresh in the minds of the public.
If that does occur and the UNP is reduced to just a few seats in the new Parliament there are two possible fallouts: either the party could sink their differences with SJB, appoint Sajith Premadasa as the leader and form a moderately strong opposition or alternatively, linger in the opposition as a spent political force with Wickremesinghe still at its helm.
The possibility that some UNP MPs will be vulnerable to being ‘poached’ by the SLPP in the aftermath of the General Election to secure a two-thirds majority always exists. It has also been suggested that a shrunken UNP could even bolster a SLPP led Government, forming yet another National Government and giving the SLPP a two-thirds majority.
For the leftist JVP too, contesting the General Election as the National Peoples’ Power (NPP) movement, the 2020 General Election will be challenging in a different way. For the past few decades, there have been signs that voters are fatigued by the cycle of election rhetoric followed by broken promises made in what is essentially a two-party system.
In the aftermath of the 2018 Constitutional crisis and the disgraceful behaviour of some Parliamentarians at that time, there was a call to reject all 225 Members of Parliament and have a set of fresh faces in the Legislature. Such was the discontent with the established political system. Despite this and despite its members not being accused of corruption, the JVP has not been able to attract a sizeable slice of the popular vote.
JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake has been in charge of the party for six years now. At the last presidential election, he polled just 3 per cent of the vote. This suggests that, despite the perceived unpopularity of politicians from the two-party system, the JVP has failed to carve a niche for itself among the Sri Lankan voter. It needs to ask itself why and review its policies which haven’t changed much from the days when Rohana Wijeweera was its leader.
Yet another defeat and being relegated to a few seats in Parliament will only further diminish the JVP’s stature in the local political landscape and question its very relevance and utility in the Lankan political system where voters may eventually opt to discard the party altogether.
The General Election on August 5 will be an election like no other in this country, if only because of the health precautions that will be in operation at the poll. It will also be a poll like no other for another reason- the futures of so many political parties will be hanging in the balance at this election.
from daily news