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The actions of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe left sections of their own Parliamentary Groups humiliated during this week’s Budget debate.

On Tuesday (12), Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa and other leaders of the “Joint Opposition” in the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) were left red-faced after a group of Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) MPs failed to show up during the vote on the Budget’s second reading. The decision by the SLFP to abstain came during a Parliamentary Group meeting held with President Sirisena earlier in the day. However, four SLFP MPs allied to President Sirisena defied this decision, joining their UPFA colleagues to vote against the Budget.

Those absent when the vote was taken included party heavyweights Chief Opposition Whip Mahinda Amaraweera, SLFP General Secretary Dayasiri Jayasekara, Nimal Siripala De Silva, Duminda Dissanayake, S.B. Dissanayake and Thilanga Sumathipala. Also absent was Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) Leader Douglas Devananda. In their absence, the UPFA could only muster 70 of the 76 votes that were cast against the Second Reading. A group of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) MPs including its leader R. Sampanthan, joined the Government in voting for the motion. They were joined by the two MPs from the Ceylon Workers’ Congress (CWC) including party leader Arumugam Thondaman.

The absence of the SLFP came against the backdrop of a sustained push by a group of United National Party (UNP) backbenchers to defeat the Expenditure Head of the President. Speaking to journalists after Tuesday’s vote, Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa said that he believed the SLFP had abstained because of the threat by the UNP backbenchers. “Perhaps they believed that the situation would be avoided by them not turning up today,” he said.

Unsurprisingly, Government MPs couldn’t contain their glee. Participating in the first day of the Committee Stage Debate on Wednesday (13), Prime Minister Wickremesinghe quipped that a group that could not even muster 1/3 of the numbers required to form a Government were trying to seize power.

Despite his jovial mood in the morning, when evening came, Mr Wickremesinghe moved swiftly and sternly to thwart attempts by backbenchers from his own party to force a vote on the President’s Expenditure Head.

Speaking during the debate earlier in the day, UNP MPs including Chaminda Wijesiri, Hesha Withanage and Hirunika Premachandra severely criticized the President, urging the party leadership to allow a vote on his Expenditure Head. PM Wickremesinghe and Leader of the House Lakshman Kiriella though, ensured that this would not happen when they moved quickly to block a request by MP Wijesiri to Speaker Karu Jayasuriya asking for a vote. With both the Premier and the Leader of the House insisting that a vote was not required, the President’s Expenditure Head was passed unanimously, though the House recorded MP Wijesiri’s protest.

Some of the strongest criticism directed at the President however, came from JVP Leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake. The MP used his speech to launch a withering attack on the Executive, alleging that the President had repeatedly violated the Constitution in recent times.

“The Constitution is the fundamental legal document that signifies the bond between the President and the people. If a President continues to violate that fundamental document, we have no right to ask any citizen of this country to act according to the Constitution or even common law,” he observed, adding that they could not justify allocating so much of public funds for the President in light of this.

During the Committee Stage Debate on the Ministry of Education on Friday (15), JVP MP Bimal Rathnayake stressed that though the Government came to power promising to allocate 6% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for state education, its record of cutting down allocations for education is even worse than that of the Rajapaksa Government. This has been revealed by the report prepared by Parliament’s own Committee on Public Finance, he observed. During the Rajapaksa Government, allocations for state education had been reduced steadily to about 1.7% of GDP. However, under the new Government, allocations for state education were just 1.04% of GDP in 2016, 1.34% in 2017 and 1.27% in 2018.

He further noted that according to the committee’s report, the Government was actually spending far less on education than even from the amounts that had been allocated.

A total of 22 Heads of Expenditure were passed unanimously on Wednesday. They included those of the President, Office of the Prime Minister, Judges of the Superior Courts, Office of the Cabinet of Ministers and independent commissions such as the Public Service Commission, National Police Commission, Elections Commission and the Human Rights Commission.

The Expenditure Heads of the Ministries of National Policies, Economic Affairs, Resettlement and Rehabilitation, Northern Province Development, Vocational Training and Skills Development and Youth Affairs were passed without a vote on Thursday. The subjects all come under the purview of the PM.

The Expenditure Heads of the Ministries of Education, City Planning, Water Supply and Higher Education, along with the Ministry of Buddhasasana & Wayamba Development and the Ministry of Housing, Construction and Cultural Affairs were also passed this week.

The Committee Stage Debate of the Budget will continue till April 5. A final vote on the Third Reading will be held on the same day.