The campaign for Presidential election
Rajiva Wijesinha-2016-04-19
Mahinda Rajapaksa contributed to this by luring away the General Secretary of the UNP, Tissa Attanayake. He was replaced by Kabir Hashim who applied himself with dedication to the campaign, and ensured that public meetings were effective. The President would have done better to have allowed Attanayake to stay on in the UNP for, even without actually engaging in sabotage, he would have achieved nothing like what Kabir, working closely with other individuals and parties, managed to do. Ironically, the main charge made against the former President soon after he lost the election was that he had bribed Attanayake to cross over by making him a minister.
I have never seen myself as a platform speaker, and my principal contribution to the campaign was through articles in the papers plus some television appearances. I made sure that the descriptions of all Seven Dwarfs appeared in one paper or website or another, my main outlet being Ceylon Today. That was owned by Tiran Alles, who was supportive of the President, but the paper was given a free hand and had over the previous year published much of my criticism of the way the government was functioning.
Postal voting
I did speak at a couple of meetings in the North however, since there were few speakers familiar with the area who went up for the meetings in the district capitals. And I also went up to monitor the postal voting, for I realized that nothing had been arranged about that by the campaign office. It had been decided early on that this should be done since we felt that public servants were likely to vote for Maithripala but they might be subject to pressures. This was more than likely to be the case with the forces, whereas there too we anticipated more support than the government imagined.
The day before the voting however, I found that nothing had been arranged for the North, so I volunteered to go up myself and persuaded Vasantha too to accompany me. The UNP sent a couple of youngsters to accompany us and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) arranged for a couple of lawyers from Jaffna too to meet us there and go with us to the various polling stations. It was good to have them around, but they were not especially familiar with the areas we had to go to, and in the end Vasantha and I had to decide on arrangements pretty much by ourselves.
As it turned out however, there was no need to worry for there were no signs of any problems anywhere. We were also heartened by the warm welcome we received practically everywhere, not only from the people of the area, but also from many members of the forces. The sentry at one of the navy camps was almost ecstatic when he found out that we were supporting the opposition candidate, which was most heartening. It was also nice to see some of my former students from the Military Academy now senior enough to act as Returning Officers for the poll.
LTTE stooge
On my second visit to the North I renewed acquaintance with the Bishop of Mannar, who I had got along with well even though some in the government had seen him as a stooge of the LTTE while the war was on. At my first meeting with him however, while critical of what he saw as government excesses, he had also been harsh about the LTTE, though clutching my hand at the end to say that I should not reveal anything of that publicly.
On this occasion he seemed very pleased to see me, and before the rest came – as usual the main speakers including the President were running late – I addressed the clergy, some of whom I knew from the Divisional Reconciliation meetings where they had been generally most helpful. It was interesting too to see the Bishop dealing with Rishard Bathiudeen, who had by this stage come over to the opposition side.
Earlier it had been indicated that he would not be welcome at Bishop's House, for there had been bitter animosity between him and the Bishop over the preceding years. But Rishard turned up and the Bishop was suitably gracious.
All this, as well as the ecstatic crowd in Jaffna, seemed to bode well for the campaign. But there were still worries about the lack of support from the old Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). Asoka Abeygunawardena has written about this at length, and also mentioned my own role in what I think was the last attempt to get someone over.
UPFA campaign
This was Dayasiri Jayasekara, who had in fact crossed over from the UNP the previous year in order to head the UPFA campaign for the Wayamba Provincial Council. He had done extremely well, and was now Chief Minister of the Province. He had however come into politics initially through the SLFP, being one of the bright youngsters whom G. L. Pieris had taken onto his staff when, having resigned from the position of Vice-Chancellor of Colombo University, he went into politics.
He had joined G. L. in the UNP when the latter had crossed over to bring down Chandrika Kumaratunga's government at the end of 2001, but he had then remained there and was seen as one of its brightest prospects. But he felt he had not been treated well by Ranil Wickremesinghe, so he had joined the United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA), and received solid support from its old leadership during the Provincial Council election. This was because his internal rival for the post of Chief Minister was the son of someone else who had crossed over from the UNP and was seen as one of those who was a malign influence on the President.
I was rung up early morning on 1 January when I was on my way back from the Jaffna trip (I had spent New Year's eve with my aunt Ena de Silva at Aluwihare after the trip to Jaffna). It was Karu Paranavitane whom I had known as a bright young SLFP stalwart. He had been appointed to the Rupavahini Corporation as Director General, and done his best to promote a pluralistic outlook, but had made little headway against the chauvinists who dominated the place.
Collection of poetry
The President had then sent him as Consul General to Canada, where he had helped with the launch of my collection of Sri Lankan poetry, Sinhalese and Tamil and English, which the National Book Trust of India had published under the title Mirrored Images. Not surprisingly, he had been one of the first to support Maithripala Sirisena, and was seen as a close confidante.
I met him at Maithripala's residence and he told me that Dayasiri was willing to join the campaign but wanted a seat in Parliament afterwards. I was asked if I was willing to resign to create a vacancy. He said Maithripala had been hesitant about asking me since it would be a great sacrifice, but I had no hesitation in agreeing, because I too thought it vital to get someone else over from the SLFP. This was not only to boost the campaign, but to work towards a coalition government if Maithripala won, not one dominated by the UNP.
Karu was profuse in his thanks and said what he termed was my willing sacrifice would not be forgotten. I told him that I made no conditions, but in case Maithripala won, I hoped that I would be able to work in education. The manifesto indicated – without my having suggested it - that the Cabinet of the new President would consist of representatives of all political parties in Parliament, so I assumed I would be part of it.
Commitment
That promise was not kept, and I do not suppose Karu reminded the President about it later. Perhaps it was felt that, since Dayasiri changed his mind, the matter could be forgotten. I was touched therefore that Asoka mentioned it so appreciatively in his book – "Karu Paranavithana spoke to Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha and he agreed to step down from the national list to make way for Dayasiri. Here I would like to honourably mention the commitment of the new State Minister for Eduction Dr. Rajiva Wijesinhge in this matter."
When the country went to the polls on 8 January Maithripala Sirisena won quite comfortably, including in several districts where the Sinhalese were in the majority. This made it clear that it was not only because of the minorities that the incumbent had been defeated. After results in favour of Maithripala began flowing in early morning on 9 January there was a hiatus and all sorts of rumours spread, that Mahinda Rajapaksa was seeking a way of subverting the result. Unfortunately, the incumbent Chief Justice was with him at the time, and it was claimed that he had advised on a possible strategy to prevent the new President being declared elected. Whether or not this was true, and it was other officials who held the line, cannot be said for certain.
Misunderstandings
I know that the former Army Commander, by then Chief of the General Staff, came to see me a few days later to indicate how misunderstandings had arisen, whereas his point was that nothing sinister had been planned, the incumbent President had simply wanted to ensure that there would be no violence or humiliation when the results were announced. For that purpose Ranil had been called to President's House and, with the required assurances given, Mahinda left for his home down south and Maithripala Sirisena was declared elected President.
