Daunting challenges with elections round the corner
View(s):On Monday April 12, a 3-wheeler parked outside a 40-year old apartment complex at Narahenpita in Colombo was doing brisk business selling Avurudu sweetmeats.
Loaded with kavum, kokkis and other traditional food including the ubiquitous plantain stacked in corrugated biscuit boxes, a couple peruses a list of orders and goes round delivering the goods to flat dwellers. There is plenty to go around for everyone – setting the tone for another good Avurudu festival.
On Wednesday, at the branch of a government bank just outside Colombo, customers are greeted with the oil anointing ceremony – applying oil on their heads – and plenty of ‘kame’.
The 4th floor canteen of the bank is filled with kiribath with lunu miris and seeni sambal, kavun, kokkis, bananas, milk toffee, aasmi, and cutlets (which is actually an alien food) – and customers were given a splendid treat. The usual Avurudu ganu denu is also performed by families on the day after the New Year dawns (April 15).
Across the country, the Sinhala and Hindu New Year is celebrated widely with the usual cultural traditions and rituals. The long holiday – Saturday April 12 to April 14 with many offices and shops also closed on Wednesday April 15 – resulted in many visits between families and their relatives.
These celebrations and the care-free attitude of Sri Lankans during this period mask the reality of elections in June and another bout of uncertainty that many people are now familiar with.
Uncertainty for business, in fact, has been written on most of the faces of the captains of industry in Sri Lanka’s business community since November 2014 when Maithripala Sirisena surprised most Sri Lankans, and shocked his party leader (Mahinda Rajapaksa), announcing that he would be contesting the January presidential elections as a common candidate.
The rest is history but the script hasn’t turned out exactly the way President Sirisena, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and former President Chandrika Kumaratunga – the triumvirate that combined to defeat the powerful Rajapaksa regime – would have wanted it to happen.
There have been stops and starts, ups and downs. While the 100 day programme has had its fair share of success, there have also been the disappointments, mainly the delay from the receipt of dozens of complaints of fraud, abuse of power and mismanagement by politicians, officials and business cronies and filing action in court. Except for a few cases, the bigger fish are still at large, alive and kicking with confidence that their godfathers would return to parliament at the next poll.
Opinion polls by the Business Times in collaboration with polling partner, the Research and Consultancy Bureau (RCB) held every month since February tracking the progress of the new administration have reflected the uncertainty of the minority (United National Party/UNP)-led government. Praise in many areas – reduced abuse of power and restoration of the rule of law for example – has however been overwhelmed by the lack of progress on action against corrupt persons in the former regime.
Business sentiment ratings by other research agencies in conjunction with media have also reflected uncertainties. “There is no serious business or serious foreign investment as things are uncertain with an election in two months. It’s a watch-and-wait period,” said one business leader, who added that there is a perceived lack of direction in policy.
Ministers, from the UNP, have said that most of the promises in the 100-day programme have been delivered or will happen in the next few days like for example the 19th Amendment to the Constitution clipping the powers of the President and electoral reforms.Both these crucial reforms are expected to be debated to a finish in Parliament this week which will then be dissolved, the date of which is yet to be announced. However it is certain that elections would be held in mid to late June.
How the political landscape will evolve after parliament is dissolved remains to be seen. But these developments would be closely followed by the business community for forward planning and future, decision-making. A critical area of concern is whether another mini budget would be presented by a new administration that emerges after the election.
As far as the politics is concerned, only the future of the UNP is clear while the coalition UPFA is in tatters. The main Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) is heading for a collision of sorts with at least three groups within pulling in different directions and within these groups too, a level of confusion. President Sirisena and Ms. Kumaratunga are leading one group, Opposition Leader Nimal Siripala de Silva is in another group – however more affiliated to the President – and the third group is the faction backing Mahinda Rajapaksa. Remnants of the UPFA – Wimal Weerawansa, Udaya Gammanpila and Vasudeva Nanayakkara – are running a separate campaign to position Mahinda Rajapaksa as the anti-UNP prime ministerial-candidate.
Conflicts within the SLFP and its coalition partners –UPFA – must be sweet music to the UNP which is desperately seeking a parliamentary majority at the poll. The UPFA is the largest coalition group in the current parliament and whether they can continue their grip on power under President Sirisena or whether the conflicts will pave the way for the UNP to become the largest party in parliament remains uncertain.
Where does that leave the voter and the choice to be made at the polls? Confusion … given the split in the SLFP. The continuation of a national or coalition government also hangs in the balance and these are all daunting challenges to Sri Lankans hoping to pick the right people to parliament.