A common candidate?

Editorial-November 10, 2013, 8:13 pm 

It has been reported that the UNP is mulling over fielding a common candidate at the next presidential election. Why it is doing so is understandable. The recent appointment of a leadership council is tantamount to an admission that it is currently without a charismatic leader equal to the task of reviving it, much less steering it to victory at a vital election. Its incumbent leader avoided the last presidential election, having lost two previously.

At the last presidential election, the joint Opposition backed Gen. Sarath Fonseka. But, the UNP and the JVP will not be able to have him as the common candidate again. All chances are that legal barriers that prevent him from contesting elections are likely to be cleared by the government in time for the next presidential election as his entry into the fray will pose a formidable challenge not so much to President Rajapaksa but the main Opposition candidate owing to a split in the anti-government vote.

It is also doubtful whether the TNA, the SLMC and the JVP will make common cause with the UNP to field a common candidate again and they, except the SLMC, are likely to enter the race separately.

UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe has checkmated Sajith Premadasa in style with the leadership council move and foiled attempts to oust him. He has drawn heavy flak for the party’s ignominious defeats all these years and even been ridiculed as a jinx of sorts, but hereafter it is the LC which will have to take the blame for the UNP’s electoral setbacks. However, Ranil will have his work cut out as regards the next presidential election. He won’t be able to avoid it and retain party leadership unless someone like Karu Jayasuriya gladly puts his head on the block.

The UNP’s strategy to defeat President Rajapaksa will require a formidable spoiler candidate capable of eating into President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s vote bank substantially. That person will have to be influential enough to cause a rift in the SLFP as well as the ruling UPFA. It is being argued in some quarters that some senior SLFPers within the government ranks are rather disgruntled, but they are not likely to go so far as to break ranks and throw in their lot with the Opposition in disarray.

However, a family member of the late Bertie Premalal Dissanayake, one of the unhappy SLFP heavyweights, went on record as saying that the terminally ill former North-Central Province Chief Minister had even tried to rise from his sickbed when former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga visited him. This nuanced statement reflects thinking of a section of the SLFP old guard, especially ministers who grumble about not having adequate budgetary allocations, job quotas etc and, above all, are jealous of turncoats and Johnnies-come-lately going places.

Resentful SLFP stalwarts may not be apoplectic and obstreperous like the UNP rebels at present, but, they have the potential to rock the boat. The late President Ranasinghe Premadasa, it may be recalled, made the mistake of ignoring his MPs’ disgruntlement and faced a mutiny. President Kumaratunga, who chose to ride roughshod over some of her party seniors after being re-elected in 1999, had a rude shock about one year later when more than a dozen of them crossed over to the UNP, bringing down her government. The recent appointment of several deputy ministers is indicative of the fact that, alive to the situation, President Rajapaksa is apparently trying to keep his parliamentary group happy. Whether such measures will help tackle the problem remains to be seen. The UNP’s intraparty crises, unless resolved soon, are likely to stand President Rajapaksa in good stead at the next presidential polls though there are bound to be unforeseen problems down the road and everything won’t be hunky-dory.

Meanwhile, the UNP’s talk of a common candidate is counterproductive in that it has betrayed the fact that it is not confident of making a comeback and being in a position to contest the next presidential election on its own in spite of the appointment of its much-touted leadership council.