Five make-or-break months for Rajapaksa regime

By Our Political Editor-Sunday, July 21, 2013

• National Collective gets support from Mahanayakes for abolition of PCs but world pressure forces Govt. to go ahead with polls
• Cracks within UPFA widen while UNP patches up splits; SLMC defies President to go it alone
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• BRITISH TAMIL CONSERVATIVES DINNER: Alastair Burt, Minister for Sri Lanka at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office talks to Callum Mcrae and Frances Harrison. Also in the dinner was Jonathan Miller who is not in the picture.

Aead of a summit of Commonwealth leaders later this year, two different campaigns gained momentum with equal vigour this week.

One is the preparation by the ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and opposition political parties for the Northern, North Western and Central Provincial Council polls. Choosing candidates has become the primary task for them. Important among the polls is the one for the Northern Provincial Council, for the first time since the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in May 1987. Last week’s events revealed that cracks have already developed within the UPFA on the issue of fielding candidates.

The other is the on-going campaign by the National Collective to abolish the Provincial Council (PC) system. Two of its constituent partners, the All Ceylon Buddhist Congress (ACBC) and the Jathika Sangha Sammalenaya (JSS), called on the country’s two leading Buddhist prelates — the Mahanayake of the Asgiriya Chapter, Most Venerable Udulagama Shri Buddharakkitha Thera and the Mahanayake of the Malwatte Chapter Most Venerable Thibattuwawe Shri Sumangala Thera — in Kandy on Wednesday. They won their support for their campaign to abolish PCs. The ACBC delegation was led by its President Jagath Sumathipala and the JSS by it secretary, Ven. Dodangoda Sarananda Thera.                                 Read More