Mahinda's race for life is with the media
Last week two members of the Lankan Diaspora made their appearance at a Colombo social event where I was present. This duo stands for bhikkhus in politics, screaming that "it is stated in the Mahawamsa tradition'' (!), and think anybody being a Catholic for instance commits a sin worthy of banishment. They are a couple as intolerant in their behaviour as they are in their views on society.

They believe that "dialogue'' means the two of them should harangue the rest -- and one of them actually gets up like a jack-in-the-box from his chair when a valid point is made by some other interlocutor on tolerance and civility.

These prize boors say this is the way that a Mahinda Rajapakse society should take shape. Mahinda Rajapakse wouldn't touch these types certainly with a bargepole, but their buffoonery indicates the kind of dross that Mahinda Rajapakse collected along the campaign trail. It's like he asked for men with a sense of history in his campaign, and got dinosaurs and a tyrannosaurus appearing at his doorstep.

These Jurassic characters are threatening to take his campaign into pre history, which means Rajapakse will end up as a footnote in Sri Lanka's long electoral saga. (At this point Mangala Samaraweera will probably see Mahinda peeping through the weavings in his famous "dustbin of history.'')

Rajapakse knows that before the 17th of November he needs to dissociate his campaign from this kind of Jurassic liabilities - and the only way he can do it is by manipulating the perceptions. That means he has to use the media to undo the calamity, the "hurricane Katrina'' of his initial campaign, when he basically gave the minorities the message that they should go drown in a well.

So he finds himself saying that his opposition is casting him as a racist and a bigot. That would be true, only if he considers himself as his primary opposition. He created the perceptions of bigotry and racism all by himself by being loud and shrill on the unitary concept for example.
People took him on first impressions, and to the minorities, it was a hate at first sight, as it was love at first sight for the swooning bhikkhus.

Now, Rajapakse is in the peculiar position that he is becoming desperate, to the point where his handlers might advise him that he and not Ranil should wear the black coat and tie along with the bellbottomed denim for the evening outing. Now they want Mahinda to speak a little more English, claim that his wife is a Catholic - which she happens to be -- and buy a little more into Ranil's image as a thuppahi cross-bred.

But Rajapakse cannot thuppahify himself even if his presidency depended on it, which means he has chosen to attack as defense. He says from every microphone that the opposition is grafting images of racism and bigotry onto him, while he is in reality the man who wants to protect all minorities within the folds of his kurrakan shawl.

This is what happens when there is a campaign throwback into two thousand years of culture. Campaigners have to manage that historical image in a 21st century medium such as multi-media television.

Rajapakse has to excite the middle ground and swing voters into thinking that a vote for his kurrakan shawl doesn't mean that his bhikkhu companions will make Buddhism the state religion, outlaw private schools and ban any future visits from the new pope Benedict.
When Rajapakse tries to explain some of these things on television, to partially disown the monks, he appears either too slick or too confusing. Too slick, because saying that he will be Christian-friendly with fast-unto-death monks in his following, appears to be too much of a stretch.
In reality, Mahinda Rajapakse's wife is Catholic, he sent his sons to S. Thomas' College, and he is such an opportunistic - - oops expedient --- politician, that the Christians have no real danger of seeing him coming to power and banning beef or wine.

But, on the idiot box, it's the perception that matter, and reality is in the image -- not the substance. When Ranil Wickremesinghe runs an advertisement which shows a mother not having five rupees to buy milk for her starving child, it is pre supposed that a mother who doesn't have the 'thuttu deka' to buy milk, has a state of the art colour television set to see this masterful advertisement.

But, though the thuttu deke mama may not have the TV to see the commercial, the urban professional with the Nokia phone eating the buth packet for lunch will see the advertisement anyway, and spread the message that Ranil Wickremesinghe is prepared to help the poor, which means that the Nokia-holding middle class which is also long-suffering, can apply for some redress incidentally.

At least that's the way Ranil Wickremesinghe's strategists analyze it. They think its is a matter of creating perceptions, so hang the real 'thuttu deke mama' who can't afford a little milk for her child, because it is almost certain that she will not own a television to see this advertisement.

On perceptions on economy, both sides have almost outdone each other, with pledges for benefits that are so preposterous that even those who do not know the first thing about economics will soon know that these are promises and not deliveries. People have already figured out that each candidate would be able to deliver perhaps a tenth maybe of what his manifesto pledges.

This packaged and advertised pledge-making gives the election its surreal quality of being entirely media managed. The whole campaign becomes something like the marriage broker's ploy --- show off the younger sister, and palm off the elder and the ugly.

But votes will depend however on how well the younger sister is showed off i.e: how well the candidates manipulate public perception, particularly now that posters are outlawed.

Both candidates use the fact that this is the era of bluff-perceptions. A promise in private life is still a promise. But in the public domain, a promise is not a promise at all, it's only a rough statement that delivers about a tenth of what is actually on offer.

When the European Union says that LTTE delegations are banned, we have learnt that the LTTE can continue to have tamashas in Brussels. But at least we learn that the words are important. No matter that the EU has not in practice banned LTTE delegations in Brussels and other European capitals, we can at least do the hula-hula by merely hearing the EU stating that the LTTE delegations are banned.

So, promises these days are lines drawn in water, and it's a matter of buying votes through sound bytes and corny radio spots. When people get the newspapers into their hands, they have already made their decisions by seeing the television commercials and the evening news.

In such a race of perceptions, Mahinda Rajapakse finds it very difficult to ditch the image that he is the champion of those Jurassic types, the kind of freaks described at the beginning of this article. He might have to ditch all self-respect and wear pants and a beatles haircut to prove to the contrary - along with a crucifix on a chain hanging from his neck. He may lose if he can't do such a silly thing……and lose if he can too, of course.

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