By Shenali D. Waduge in The Sunday Morning, Aug 27, 2023
A Presidential and Parliamentary Election are due. People are also eagerly awaiting their chance to cast their vote. Most citizens simply want an election. They are clueless as to who should come to power and which team can truly solve the problem. They have been indoctrinated into thinking that the next Parliament will solve all problems.
The concern is that the problem is defined differently by different segments of people. There is no identified common national problem for the nation to focus on and solve. This is the problem Sri Lanka faces.
Confounding matters further is the inability of the leaders to identify friends from foes and them turning foes into friends and vice versa, thus isolating ourselves for no reason. The biggest problem is the inability to understand how geopolitics influences Sri Lanka’s affairs and devising ways and means to deal with that first.
Sri Lanka is in a catch-22 situation. We cannot trust most parliamentarians; a majority have disappointed us and the few good men in Parliament are kept silent or sidelined.
Musical chairs in Parliament
We saw an elected President resign suddenly. His replacement will probably enter the Guinness Book of Records for the manner in which he finally ended up on the throne that had eluded him for almost 30 years. This is where he finds himself in a predicament.
With Presidential and Parliamentary Elections due in 2024/2025, everyone is wondering when the elections will be, while a handful of savvy political analysts are wondering if there will be an election at all.
The former President’s silence on any matter is affecting the people’s trust in the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), while party stalwarts are busy wondering which party they should cross over to in order to stand a better chance of returning to power. This appears to be the newest form of musical chairs going on in Parliament at present.
The lone elephant is now being wooed from all quarters. The mathematics looks simple; with the breakaway SLPP/Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) converging, the prenuptial agreement has been entered into to justify minority parties joining to form one grand alliance.
The 13th Amendment chorus is that justification. How far that will impact minority votes is questionable. It all looks hunky-dory numbers-wise, but does it mean the people will vote for them? If the Aragalaya slogan of ‘no to all 225’ holds true, then these deals are worth nothing.
Then there is the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), National People’s Power (NPP), and the Frontline Socialist Party (FSP), divided within by ideology but united to remain in the Opposition and enjoy the perks of functioning as troublemakers as well as taking on contracts to carry out political attacks on anyone.
Unfortunately, this entity is propped up by former comrades now happily living on Western shores, pumping money into their parties to ruin the lives of the youth in Sri Lanka. Foreign intelligence handouts cannot be ruled out either.
Delaying tactics
While the President may be calculating his odds, he is unlikely to want to face an embarrassing defeat now that luck and regime change have brought him to the highest position in Sri Lanka. His uncle, facing a similar situation, decided not to hold elections and held a referendum and extended the parliamentary term of office. However, he came to power with a five-sixth mandate.
There is a possibility that with the economic situation likely to deteriorate from the honeymoon stage it is artificially enjoying at present, the odds of an election will go against the sitting President. In such a scenario, most leaders have a habit of creating artificial protests and anarchy and then using that to justify delaying elections. This option is likely to be on the cards as well.
Another option is the experiment during the Yahapalana Government, of turning the entire Parliament into a merry home, with a majority of MPs happy to continue in power, knowing that voters are unlikely to wish to vote them back into Parliament. Accordingly, their preferred option is to enjoy the perks while they can, whichever party they are able to cross into.
These are the lowlifes who are in Parliament today. How many have a semblance of integrity or wish to honour the mandate given to them and protect the nation and its heritage?
None of the parties have an economic plan for the nation and are only too happy to be taking any amount of loans and dumping the repayment and interest on the public. The ignorant public, or even the literate, fail to see the dangers of not having a national policy plan and keeping to that plan. This is primarily due to a handful always wanting to enjoy perks and privileges, regardless of the party that comes to power, by helping to fund these parties.
System change
The corporates, the academia, and the media magnates who prop up unsavoury individuals into power have much to answer for.
The parliamentary debates and decisions are nothing to be happy about – syphoning assets and resources even to LTTE funders and leasing out land for 100 years leaves little hope for the people of this generation to take back what belongs to the State. How far these investments have really benefited the Treasury is another investigative exercise.
What we should understand is that of these 225 MPs, 99% are only interested in themselves, not even concerned about maintaining the vision or mission of their party. All parties have sacrificed their party ideology. This is one more reason to reject the parliamentary system and open public debate to introduce a new system of governance altogether.
The parliamentary system currently in practice is an utter failure, similar to the Provincial Council system as a result of the Indo-Lanka Accord. None of the amendments have served the people or the nation.
Therefore, any new constitution must change the existing corrupt parliamentary system; the system of governance needs to change completely. It must be simplified and be pro-development oriented, capitalising on what is suited for our terrain and what our people are good at.
We do not need 225 MPs and the current corrupt cadre of 1.4 million public service officials should undergo reforms and be placed in areas where the new national economic plan can make optimum use of them. The 13th Amendment must be removed in its entirety.
The defence services should remain unchanged, since no nation should compromise on national security while a bloated foreign service is unnecessary if the minister only travels and returns, bringing a bagful of ‘assurances or promises’ which is not worth the expense of travel.
The people are to blame as well. They have cast votes for the same corrupt candidates who bounce from one party to the next. This is because all candidates have a habit of making promises they do not intend to keep.
If candidates come with goody bags, take them (these are probably syphoned wealth from the State), but don’t vote for them. Apart from a handful of MPs, all others should be rejected at a future election.
https://www.themorning.lk/articles/5Qoh7fQ7lTuK7tPpFN3a
