Common Candidate Club And The Era Of Transformation

By Jude Fernando -December 8, 2014

“The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class shall represent and repress them in parliament” — V.I. Lenin, 1917.

“The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom. Freedom would require them to reject this image and replace it with autonomy and responsibility. Freedom is acquired by conquest, not by gift. It must is not an ideal located outside of man; nor is it an idea which becomes myth. It is rather the indispensable condition for the quest for human completion” — Paulo Freire, 1993.

The Common Candidate Club’s (CCC’s) choice of Maithripala Sirisena to challenge President Mahinda Rajapaksa is undoubtedly prudent. Maithripala’s 100-day national government promises to revitalise the political culture that has lost its resilience and failed to counter the country’s slide towards plutocracy, and if permitted stratocracy, under an autocratic executive presidency. The CCC should not presume its position resonates enough with the majority population to muster sufficient votes to defeat Rajapaksa. It comprises strange bedfellows united primarily in response to the country’s miserable state that they primarily attribute to the autocratic Presidency. None has established ‘populist credentials’ sufficient to match those of the Rajapaksa’s. Sirisena’s victory is not assured. Could we expect a change in the current obstreperous political culture under the Rajapaksa regime?Read More