Emperor’s New Clothes!
By Arjuna Ranawana- DEC 02 2018A proverbial term for a problem solvable only by bold action comes from the story of Alexander the Great. He was confronted with the knot in 333 BC in Gordium, the capital of Phrygia. In the popular account, Alexander sliced through the knot with his sword, but, in earlier versions, he found the ends of the rope either by cutting into the knot or by drawing out the pole.
The phrase “cutting the Gordian knot” has thus come to denote a bold solution to a complicated problem.
- Britannica.com
There is widespread anger and disgust at the political class in the country as the political crisis drags on. The wrath is directed at Maithripala Sirisena, as in his desire to stay on as President for a second term he has placed this country in a predicament that threatens the very existence of the State.
Ordinary people have been voicing their feelings in numerous demonstrations across the country. People’s organizations ranging from women’s groups, to trade unions, civil society activists and of course the three political parties opposing the President, the United National Front, the Tamil National Alliance and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna have pointed their fingers at Sirisena, castigating him for abrogating the agreement they had with him to elect him President to bring forth Good Governance and democratization. Instead they accuse him of violating the Constitution by sacking Ranil Wickremesinghe and appointing Mahinda Rajapaksa as Prime Minister.
By Monday, a month into the crisis, the President’s team and that of his chosen Prime Minister, Rajapaksa had come to the grim conclusion that the appointed Government will not be able to garner a majority in Parliament to rule the country effectively. They concluded that Sirisena’s team had failed to snag Rajapaksa a sufficient number of Members of Parliament to reach the magic 113 majority in the House according to multiple sources.
On Thursday, Parliament met yet again without the MPs from the UPFA Rajapaksa-Sirisena faction, while the UNF-TNA-JVP passed another Motion, preventing the Secretary to the Prime Minister from drawing any financial allocations for the office of the Prime Minister. The motion was carried 123 to none.
There were two major developments that day. First Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe, who left the UNF and joined the appointed Government and Independent MP Ven. Athuraliye Rathana Thera came to Parliament. The Thera sat with the UNF, while Rajapakshe sat across the aisle, the only Member seated in an otherwise empty side in the House. They were clearly emissaries of Sirisena, who called on Parliament for a solution that would involve talks between the Speaker Karu Jayasuriya and the President.
Both of them also said that whoever commanded the majority in the House should form the Government. In reply, the UNF’s Rajitha Senaratne and several other leaders said that they are agreeable to a negotiated settlement but would continue to oppose the President if he insisted on not appointing the UNF’s nominee as PM.
The other major development was the letter the TNA sent to the President informing him that their 14 MPs would support a UNF nominee for PM.This gave a boost to the UNF as it would now have a clear majority over the Rajapaksa camp. The JVP opposes Rajapaksa but will not necessarily support the UNF. The JVP says they have taken a principled stand as the sacking of Wickremesinghe and the appointment of Rajapaksa is illegal.
That evening Speaker Jayasuriya in response to the request from Parliament met Sirisena at the President’s office. At that meeting Jayasuriya told the President the country was in dire straits because of the current political impasse and that he was meeting him to find a way out of the crisis.
In a press statement Jayasuriya said Sirisena had responded positively to the Speaker’s intervention and praised him for that. The President had then pledged to meet with the TNA and UNF leaders on Friday evening to reach a solution.
On Friday evening the first to arrive at the President’s office was the TNA delegation, but Sirisena wasn’t there. He was at the Sugathadasa Stadium with Rajapaksa and Wimal Weerawansa giving letters of appointment to thousands of Samurdhi workers. He arrived at the President’s office almost an hour late and after making a vague commitment to discuss PTA detainees the meeting ended without a decision.
The UNF delegation had also been kept waiting and the discussion there too ended without a conclusion. These meetings left the TNA and the UNF with the impression that the President was not negotiating seriously but was simply buying time. Another round of meetings, have been scheduled for today.
There is widespread anger and disgust at the political class in the country as the political crisis drags on. The wrath is directed at Maithripala Sirisena, as in his desire to stay on as President for a second term he has placed this country in a predicament that threatens the very existence of the State.
Ordinary people have been voicing their feelings in numerous demonstrations across the country. People’s organizations ranging from women’s groups, to trade unions, civil society activists and of course the three political parties opposing the President, the United National Front, the Tamil National Alliance and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna have pointed their fingers at Sirisena, castigating him for abrogating the agreement they had with him to elect him President to bring forth Good Governance and democratization. Instead they accuse him of violating the Constitution by sacking Ranil Wickremesinghe and appointing Mahinda Rajapaksa as Prime Minister.
By Monday, a month into the crisis, the President’s team and that of his chosen Prime Minister, Rajapaksa had come to the grim conclusion that the appointed Government will not be able to garner a majority in Parliament to rule the country effectively. They concluded that Sirisena’s team had failed to snag Rajapaksa a sufficient number of Members of Parliament to reach the magic 113 majority in the House according to multiple sources.
On Thursday, Parliament met yet again without the MPs from the UPFA Rajapaksa-Sirisena faction, while the UNF-TNA-JVP passed another Motion, preventing the Secretary to the Prime Minister from drawing any financial allocations for the office of the Prime Minister. The motion was carried 123 to none.
There were two major developments that day. First Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe, who left the UNF and joined the appointed Government and Independent MP Ven. Athuraliye Rathana Thera came to Parliament. The Thera sat with the UNF, while Rajapakshe sat across the aisle, the only Member seated in an otherwise empty side in the House. They were clearly emissaries of Sirisena, who called on Parliament for a solution that would involve talks between the Speaker Karu Jayasuriya and the President.
Both of them also said that whoever commanded the majority in the House should form the Government. In reply, the UNF’s Rajitha Senaratne and several other leaders said that they are agreeable to a negotiated settlement but would continue to oppose the President if he insisted on not appointing the UNF’s nominee as PM.
The other major development was the letter the TNA sent to the President informing him that their 14 MPs would support a UNF nominee for PM.This gave a boost to the UNF as it would now have a clear majority over the Rajapaksa camp. The JVP opposes Rajapaksa but will not necessarily support the UNF. The JVP says they have taken a principled stand as the sacking of Wickremesinghe and the appointment of Rajapaksa is illegal.
That evening Speaker Jayasuriya in response to the request from Parliament met Sirisena at the President’s office. At that meeting Jayasuriya told the President the country was in dire straits because of the current political impasse and that he was meeting him to find a way out of the crisis. In a press statement Jayasuriya said Sirisena had responded positively to the Speaker’s intervention and praised him for that. The President had then pledged to meet with the TNA and UNF leaders on Friday evening to reach a solution.
On Friday evening the first to arrive at the President’s office was the TNA delegation, but Sirisena wasn’t there. He was at the Sugathadasa Stadium with Rajapaksa and Wimal Weerawansa giving letters of appointment to thousands of Samurdhi workers. He arrived at the President’s office almost an hour late and after making a vague commitment to discuss PTA detainees the meeting ended without a decision.
The UNF delegation had also been kept waiting and the discussion there too ended without a conclusion. These meetings left the TNA and the UNF with the impression that the President was not negotiating seriously but was simply buying time. Another round of meetings, have been scheduled for today.
Rajapaksa-Wickremesinghe
meeting
The most interesting development of the day was a thirty-minute meeting between Rajapaksa and Wickremesinghe which took place in the Parliament Library earlier in the day. Away from prying eyes the two leaders discussed the holding of future elections which Rajapaksa has been agitating for.
Wickremesinghe had told Rajapaksa that it is important for the status quo to be restored. “We have been wronged and that has to be corrected first of all,” he had said, according to informed sources. Once that has been rectified, the Parliamentary party leaders could agree on a course of action that would lead to a future election he had said.
This crisis is testing the Government machinery after the 19th Amendment to the Constitution strengthened the Judiciary and the Parliament and the independent Commissions which made the Public Service, particularly the Police and other agencies bolder. Rajapaksa has pressured Sirisena to transfer out at least one Police officer who conducted investigations into some of the allegations against key supporters. But a free media and officials have resisted that and the Sirisena-Rajapaksa combine had to backtrack.
The big change was evident when on Wednesday the highest ranking military officer in the country, Rear Admiral Ravindra Wijeguneratne, Chief of Defence Staff was named a suspect in the case where eleven young men were allegedly kidnaped for ransom and have since disappeared. He was remanded until next week. Several men, allegedly Wijegunaratne’s bodyguards in civilian clothes, who assaulted media men outside the courts were immediately arrested by police and charged.
Sirisena appointed Rajapaksa as PM because of his desire to seek a second term as President. He has realized that the UNF coalition that backed him in 2015 will not do so come 2020. His relationship with Wickremesinghe and the UNF began to deteriorate after his party, the SLFP, came in a poor third in the Local Government elections held in February which was comprehensively won by Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) with the UNF being placed second. He turned to Rajapaksa in the hope that the former strongman would back his bid for a second term.
For Rajapaksa, it was an opportunity to seize power once again, and use that position to delay or obstruct investigations and prosecutions that are ongoing, against members of his family and supporters.
Sirisena shed light on how he takes his decisions at a press conference with the Foreign Correspondents Association in Colombo and in an interview with this newspaper. He revealed that he had not asked the Supreme Court for an opinion whether he had the Constitutional authority to sack the sitting PM and appoint a replacement as well as dissolve Parliament and call for fresh General Elections. Instead he said had relied on his own advisers.
This is disturbing, as the picture emerges of a President who is making decisions which are impetuous and ill-advised. Now, the dissolution order is before the Supreme Court, and another petition has been filed challenging Wickremesinghe’s dismissal. In the meantime the Rajapaksa faction will likely boycott Parliament until the Supreme Court decision is reached regarding the dissolution, next week. Rajapaksa also told a Colombo English daily newspaper that he will show a majority in Parliament after the Supreme Court decision on the dissolution is announced. Parliament was adjourned on Friday until December 5th.
The Supreme Court will hear arguments on the petition against dissolution this week and the order is due December on 7th, though, now with a seven judge bench, in case there is a disagreement this may take longer.
While these legal arguments are made, Sirisena is under pressure to find a solution. If the SC rules that the dissolution is Constitutional, then we will have a General Election early next year. If in case the SC rules otherwise the current stalemate in Parliament will continue, and we can expect the Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa discussion that took place on Friday to be made public.
Sirisena’s motive for taking this precipitous actionas indicated earlier is to win a second term. If he accepts that the UNF has the majority in Parliament and then removes Rajapaksa, he will not get the support of either of the two main political forces in the country to back him.
His own SLFP has been seriously affected by defections to the SLPP led by Rajapaksa. Whoever remains in the SLFP may not support him as no one wants a losing captain. If he insists on continuing with Rajapaksa’s appointed minority Government, there will be further instability as it will not be able to get a budget passed and the Cabinet will be dissolved. Even if he sticks with Rajapaksa, he cannot be certain of the Rajapaksa team supporting him as their Presidential candidate, in that election which is due in a year or so.
There is also another issue. He has told our News Editor Gagani Weerakoon whose exclusive interview with him appears on pages 10 and 11 of this newspaper that he would expect Rajapaksa to step down if he cannot command the majority. “I expect him to do the right thing,” he said. Rajapaksa told reporters he will not step down indicating that “the person who appointed me has to remove me.
” Sirisena has also time and time again said he will not appoint Wickremesinghe. “Anybody from the UNF but Ranil,” has been his refrain.
But the UNF Parliamentary group has unanimously voted that Wickremesinghe would be their preferred candidate. That puts Sirisena between a rock and a hard place.
Our Journalist Weerakoon’s impression of Sirisena during her interview was that he appears blithely untroubled by the huge mess he has created. That is not the case for the rest of the country. While the Chief Executive stubbornly insists on having his own way, the citizens are angry by his total disregard of safeguarding democracy, and his inaction as the country hurtles towards economic ruin.
It is indeed a Gordian knot and like Alexander, it is time Sirisena shows the courage to slice through it and stop the ruin of our country.
It is time he stopped thinking of himself and put the country’s wellbeing first. After all, that is what he has been preaching about ad nauseam, and accusing others of not safeguarding Sri Lanka’s economy and culture. Today his actions are the subject of mockery amongst the people.
Perhaps it’s time someone told him the story about the Emperor’s New Clothes!
The most interesting development of the day was a thirty-minute meeting between Rajapaksa and Wickremesinghe which took place in the Parliament Library earlier in the day. Away from prying eyes the two leaders discussed the holding of future elections which Rajapaksa has been agitating for.
Wickremesinghe had told Rajapaksa that it is important for the status quo to be restored. “We have been wronged and that has to be corrected first of all,” he had said, according to informed sources. Once that has been rectified, the Parliamentary party leaders could agree on a course of action that would lead to a future election he had said.
This crisis is testing the Government machinery after the 19th Amendment to the Constitution strengthened the Judiciary and the Parliament and the independent Commissions which made the Public Service, particularly the Police and other agencies bolder. Rajapaksa has pressured Sirisena to transfer out at least one Police officer who conducted investigations into some of the allegations against key supporters. But a free media and officials have resisted that and the Sirisena-Rajapaksa combine had to backtrack.
The big change was evident when on Wednesday the highest ranking military officer in the country, Rear Admiral Ravindra Wijeguneratne, Chief of Defence Staff was named a suspect in the case where eleven young men were allegedly kidnaped for ransom and have since disappeared. He was remanded until next week. Several men, allegedly Wijegunaratne’s bodyguards in civilian clothes, who assaulted media men outside the courts were immediately arrested by police and charged.
Sirisena appointed Rajapaksa as PM because of his desire to seek a second term as President. He has realized that the UNF coalition that backed him in 2015 will not do so come 2020. His relationship with Wickremesinghe and the UNF began to deteriorate after his party, the SLFP, came in a poor third in the Local Government elections held in February which was comprehensively won by Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) with the UNF being placed second. He turned to Rajapaksa in the hope that the former strongman would back his bid for a second term.
For Rajapaksa, it was an opportunity to seize power once again, and use that position to delay or obstruct investigations and prosecutions that are ongoing, against members of his family and supporters.
Sirisena shed light on how he takes his decisions at a press conference with the Foreign Correspondents Association in Colombo and in an interview with this newspaper. He revealed that he had not asked the Supreme Court for an opinion whether he had the Constitutional authority to sack the sitting PM and appoint a replacement as well as dissolve Parliament and call for fresh General Elections. Instead he said had relied on his own
advisers.
This is disturbing, as the picture emerges of a President who is making decisions which are impetuous and ill-advised. Now, the dissolution order is before the Supreme Court, and another petition has been filed challenging Wickremesinghe’s dismissal.
In the meantime the Rajapaksa faction will likely boycott Parliament until the Supreme Court decision is reached regarding the dissolution, next week. Rajapaksa also told a Colombo English daily newspaper that he will show a majority in Parliament after the Supreme Court decision on the dissolution is announced. Parliament was adjourned on Friday until December 5th.
The Supreme Court will hear arguments on the petition against dissolution this week and the order is due December on 7th, though, now with a seven judge bench, in case there is a disagreement this may take longer.
While these legal arguments are made, Sirisena is under pressure to find a solution. If the SC rules that the dissolution is Constitutional, then we will have a General Election early next year. If in case the SC rules otherwise the current stalemate in Parliament will continue, and we can expect the Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa discussion that took place on Friday to be made public.
Sirisena’s motive for taking this precipitous actionas indicated earlier is to win a second term. If he accepts that the UNF has the majority in Parliament and then removes Rajapaksa, he will not get the support of either of the two main political forces in the country to back him. His own SLFP has been seriously affected by defections to the SLPP led by Rajapaksa. Whoever remains in the SLFP may not support him as no one wants a losing captain.
If he insists on continuing with Rajapaksa’s appointed minority Government, there will be further instability as it will not be able to get a budget passed and the Cabinet will be dissolved. Even if he sticks with Rajapaksa, he cannot be certain of the Rajapaksa team supporting him as their Presidential candidate, in that election which is due in a year or so.
There is also another issue. He has told our News Editor Gagani Weerakoon whose exclusive interview with him appears on pages 10 and 11 of this newspaper that he would expect Rajapaksa to step down if he cannot command the majority. “I expect him to do the right thing,” he said.
Rajapaksa told reporters he will not step down indicating that “the person who appointed me has to remove me.” Sirisena has also time and time again said he will not appoint Wickremesinghe. “Anybody from the UNF but Ranil,” has been his refrain. But the UNF Parliamentary group has unanimously voted that Wickremesinghe would be their preferred candidate. That puts Sirisena between a rock and a hard place.
Our Journalist Weerakoon’s impression of Sirisena during her interview was that he appears blithely untroubled by the huge mess he has created.
That is not the case for the rest of the country. While the Chief Executive stubbornly insists on having his own way, the citizens are angry by his total disregard of safeguarding democracy, and his inaction as the country hurtles towards economic ruin.
It is indeed a Gordian knot and like Alexander, it is time Sirisena shows the courage to slice through it and stop the ruin of our country.
It is time he stopped thinking of himself and put the country’s wellbeing first. After all, that is what he has been preaching about ad nauseam, and accusing others of not safeguarding Sri Lanka’s economy and culture. Today his actions are the subject of mockery amongst the people.
Perhaps it’s time someone told him the story about the Emperor’s New Clothes!
