Way the cookie crumbles
Political instability eclipses Lanka’s economic recovery
If the President thought a new look cabinet would dim the din of the people asking him to go, he was wrong. Youthful faces cannot hide the same old Rajapaksa ideology they have been conditioned to bear in their narrow heads for political advancement. And it cut no ice with the masses.
In his indirect address to the nation, in the guise of a motivational speech to his new cabinet, sworn in this auspicious Monday, the President announced it was a ‘system change’ cabinet and expressed the hope he would thereby satisfy the protesters’ demands. If that was the last card the President had up his sleeve to play, it was no trump.
It failed to sway the people whose demand is nothing short of the Rajapaksas’ exit from office. Apart from himself as President, his brother Mahinda Rajapaksa still remains the Minister of Economic Policy and Plan Implementation, Minister of Urban Development and Housing, and Minister of Buddhasasana, Religious and Cultural Affairs. And, of course, as Prime Minister, he remains in overall charge and exerts great influence and power over the entire shoot of Government.
The President was graceful and penitent enough to accept that he was wrong to have changed the nation’s agricultural methods overnight; and that he regretted not having sought an IMF bailout much earlier. But his confessions failed to evoke the desired sympathy and failed to carry any water with the masses. With all those sins piled at his door, the people were in no mood to forgive while suffering penance beyond measure. The cry remained the same, its roar louder demanding nothing less than the end of Rajapaksa rule.
The scenes on the streets confirmed the stark message.
While the ‘Gota go home’ site on the Green continued to attract more and more crowds, an over 10,000 strong JVP-led procession marched from Beruwela to Colombo. After breaking rest at Panadura, the mass throng arrived in the city on Tuesday, roaring all the way, ‘Gota go home’. The same cry resounded on Galle Road simultaneously where over a thousand university lecturers from universities throughout the country were marching towards the Kollupitiya junction.
That evening in Rambukkana, the so far peaceful protests turned bloody after police gunfire killed a protestor and injured 24 others. The shocking incident, which has now left the Government with blood on its hands, drew widespread anger locally and was condemned by international diplomats, including the US
ambassador and UN Resident Coordinator in Lanka.
On the political front, the Rajapaksa cookie has already started to crumble. Already dissent is emerging in the rank and file. The power of the people’s protest on the street seems to have emboldened the spirit of some to stake their claim for a greater voice in the chamber.
The President’s decision to throw out the oldies opting for newbies in his cabinet was a prime cause of discontent in the ranks. There also seemed to be an attempt to cut the sod under his feet by removing the anchor of his power, Mahinda Rajapaksa as Prime Minister.
Ten SLPP backbench MPs wrote to the President to dismiss the new cabinet and appoint a new all-party government under a Prime Minister acceptable to the majority in the House. This prompted Mahinda Rajapaksa to seek revalidation by summoning all SLPP MPs to reaffirm their faith in him as Prime Minister. Only 88 turned up to raise their hands to renew their political vows.
To make matters worse, senior SLPP member and ex-cabinet minister Dulles Alahapperuma wrote to the President, stating the Prime Minister and the new Cabinet must resign and an all-party government formed.
The SLFP, accusing the President of stealing an SLFP MP -- Shantha Bandara -- and making him a state minister, crossed over to the opposition benches to sit as independents. The Wimal-Udaya handful and a few SLPP MPs also followed suit. The number was now 41. This was increased when three Muslim MPs who had turned coat and crossed over to the government to vote for the 20A, returned to the opposition fold in protest over fellow turncoat Naseer Ahamed being appointed as cabinet minister.
With his party’s once commanding majority in Parliament fast slipping away, with the prospect of his brother Mahinda Rajapaksa continuing as Prime Minister under threat, with the main opposition in parliament demanding his resignation and the people on the street roaring in one voice’ Gota go home’, hasn’t the time arrived for the President to review his determination to remain as President until the end of his constitutional tenure?
There is more bad news in the offing. More hardships, more sacrifices, more protests to come. It’s a cardinal requisite that any nation must first get its political act together before the economy can perform.
With the IMF bailout now dependent on the Government
restructuring its debts and assuring the IMF of the sustainability of its debts, more concessions will have to be made to its creditors to gain their acquiescence. China on Friday assured she will help Lanka, provided the Government fast-tracked its free trade agreement, and reduced Lanka's trade deficit with her.
But has the President the political will, the political clout to weather new political storms, has he the confidence of his people to brave taking unpopular decisions, if restructuring debts entails granting more concessions or selling more national assets?
The office of Presidency is entrusted not only with power but with responsibilities as caretaker of the nation’s assets and the people’s welfare. After having presided over the bankruptcy of the nation, can he find any justifiable reason why he should still stay?
He not only has a moral duty to account but, under Article 42, is constitutionally responsible to Parliament -- and thus to the sovereign people -- ‘for the due exercise, performance and discharge of his powers, duties and functions under the constitution.’ What happens if he transgresses? Though he may still retain the legal right to rule, the question will be whether he has lost the people’s mandate to remain?
If he is certain he still has the people’s mandate, why not lay the nation’s doubts at rest, once and for all, by subjecting it to the litmus test, available under Article 86, as suggested in last week’s Sunday Punch? Refer it to the people by way of Referendum.
In the circumstances, it may be the only viable and most expeditious constitutional option available to remove the political instability eclipsing the star of Lanka’s economic recovery.