Emerging Alternative President Of Sri Lanka
S. Sivathasan
Rarely in history do we see leaders of various hues seeking to fuse together for a singular purpose. Rarer still is for a very wide political spectrum to secure a Presidency through a consensus candidate only to terminate it. It is a mode chosen advisedly to obtain a mandate from the polity and to have legality in addition. Strange as it would seem, this is a course to seek and to destroy. Stranger still the endorsement will be given. Such is the level of rejection to which the Executive Presidency has been trashed by the present incumbent. He had the mandate, the authority and the goodwill to make a heaven of hell.
The President is neither angel nor brute as the people know him. “And the unfortunate thing is that he who would act the angel acts the brute”. This truth became incontrovertible and it has made abrogation inevitable.
‘Force of 9’
Five political formations, a respected monk and a former Chief Justice, all with credentials for nationwide appeal are now together and in the forefront. Two more weighty entities, Muslim and Indian Tamil may be in the process of discarding their sold away spokesmen in a bid to select responsive leaders, burn the dross and to join the new national leadership. With such solidarity the ‘Force of 9’ will be too formidable to retract at a show of force. It will be adequately powerful to galvanize the masses and to break the government’s current monopoly of the street.
The amalgam of 7 has taken about 8 months to form. The ‘Force of 9’ may take a month more. Nothing unnatural. From pollination to fruit, puny coffee takes 9 months. SWRD’s MEP took but a few months to assail and to dislodge the UNP which seemed to many to be immovable then. Sir John ridiculed the MEP as achcharu (pickle) but it gave him a good taste of resounding defeat. Just 3 months were enough for Modi to give a foretaste of his mettle in the 5 state elections. In May, 5 months of electioneering placed him in unprecedented power.
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