Political Column

Political Column

Kadir losing contest was Lanka's gain
By Our Political Editor
Lakshman Kadirgamar last contested an election probably fifty years ago - and won. That was when he defeated , Tony Newton (who later became a Conservative MP, Leader of the British House of Commons and now a member of the House of Lords) for the presidency of the Oxford University Union.

A fortnight ago, he arrived from what was a routine visit abroad - to attend a WIPO meeting in Rumania and then to London on transit before he was to return, back to a political storm that had been unleashed by President Chandrika Kumaratunga when she took over three key UNF ministries and suspended Parliament for good measure. Kadirgamar initially defended President Kumaratunga's surprise move, even trotting out lame excuses for the takeover of the Mass Communication Ministry but things changed when President Kumaratunga began backtracking in the face of criticism for what she had done. The fallout of the President's actions had just begun to take effect.

The international community was biting her head off for upsetting the peace process. Businessmen were crying that she had turned away tourists as the BBC, CNN etc., were showing footage of troops on the streets amidst a (non-existent) declaration of emergency. Sky TV announced a British Government (non-existent) announcement of a travel advisory against visiting Sri Lanka, and clergymen pleading with both the President and the Prime Minister for restraint and calling for cohabitation.

Amidst this confusion the Bishop of Colombo Duleep Chickera visited the President's House and told the President that what Kadirgamar said on TV clinically analysing the LTTE's ISGA proposals for a virtual separate state were true - but he should not say it so harshly. President Kumaratunga nodded her acquiescence in the presence of Kadirgamar.

During a somewhat intense discussion between the PA leaders, Kadirgamar told the President and then as if to rub salt to his wounds, she told the lawyer turned politician to go slow on the LTTE and that her Polonnaruwa MP and party secretary Maithripala Sirisena could handle matters, no problem. " There is no need to rush back " said the President to Kadirgamar. Which was an unusual thing to say to her key adviser on international affairs, including the peace process and the best man in her party when it came to understanding the LTTE's machinations.

This was the time President Kumaratunga was doing a volte-face vis-a-vis the LTTE. She wanted the ceasefire she called "illegal" to continue, the peace process she said was selling the country's sovereignty to continue under the very man she said was doing the selling - Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, the Army to co-operate with the LTTE, the state media to cancel anti-LTTE programmes, so on and so forth.

In Geneva, Kadirgamar was first tapped by African diplomats, and asked if he could throw his hat in - on their behalf - to contest the incumbent secretary-general of the 52-nation Commonwealth Secretariat former New Zealand foreign minister Don McKinnon, whom they intensely disliked. Some months earlier, the African diplomats in London had asked Sri Lanka's high commissioner in London Faiz Mustapha if Sri Lanka would throw up a candidate for this purpose. Mustapha had asked Foreign Minister Tyronne Fernando, himself by then a candidate for the UN secretary-general's job due in 2007, who had said "no".

Fernando had not bothered to consult anyone at that stage, but even if Kadirgamar was asked then, his answer would have been an emphatic "no". He was too embroiled in the local political scene to contemplate a move. From Geneva, Kadirgamar moved on to London with a thought in his swirling mind. There he received a further signal - from senior officials at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office at that - that yes, the Africans were indeed very unhappy with McKinnon's tenure, and then given a paper saying what must be done to actually apply for the job. In short, to go for it.

In Colombo, on December 1, Kadirgamar made a bee-line to President's House. Having reflected on the move, Kadirgamar had made up his mind - to quit Sri Lankan politics. President Kumaratunga had no option but to back her loyal foreign minister and international affairs adviser of nine turbulent years. She called the Prime Minister and told him to meet Kadirgamar. In a rare show of solidarity between the two warring parties, the Prime Minister immediately offered his fullest support to Kadirgamar's candidature. He called Tyronne Fernando and told him so, but both of them were concerned that Kadirgamar was not being put forward as the "stalking horse".

Kadirgamar has always been the moderating influence during sometimes heated exchanges between the President and the Prime Minister in trying to run a cohabitation government since 2001. He has more often than not been invited by both parties to sit in on the discussions, just to see that they don’t go too far in the political fisticuffs. As the week progressed, letters from the President were faxed to Commonwealth capitals, (and she made one solitary telephone call- to Indian Prime Minister). Prime Minister Wickremesinghe instructed Foreign Secretary Bernard Gunathillake to galvanise the ministry - off went Faiz Mustapha, Kshenuka Senevirata (from London), Mangala Moonasinghe (from New Delhi) to Abuja for the Kadirgamar campaign, which going by elections for coveted international postings which Sri Lankans have been contesting, apart from being the shortest campaign of all time, cost the least as well, with no travelling by either the candidate nor special envoys as in the past.

By mid this week, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe it seemed was the one who was handling the Kadirgamar campaign. Despite running a temperature which kept him from attending Parliament, he conferred with Kadirgamar at 'Temple Trees'. Both of them realised that the campaign was too short, and that Africa could break ranks. That Sri Lanka did not have the reach to lobby the Caribbean that had a crucial 12 votes. And many countries had already committed themselves to McKinnon because there was no-one else in the running a month ago. Britain, Australia and Canada together with Singapore and Malta had informed Colombo that they would support the incumbent. Nobody had really announced support for Kadirgamar, still.

The Prime Minister said that Tyronne Fernando was now winging his way to Abuja from a bi-lateral visit to Pretoria, and awaiting instructions on what to do. By the latter part of the working week, on the eve of CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Summit), Faiz Mustapha reported back that SADEK - the 14 nation African grouping was solidly backing Kadirgamar and Mbeki, the South African President had in fact made a strong statement of support as well. The Zimbabwe issue, and the decision to throw the baby with the bathwater in wanting to expel its President Robert Mugabe had overtaken events in the Commonwealth virtually turning it into a Whites vs. Blacks issue.

The western press indicated that Kadirgamar's candidature was part and parcel of a bigger scheme of things to wrest the Commonwealth from 'white-domination'. But little did they know what really compelled the sensitive Sri Lankan non-politician to throw his hat in the first place.

The LTTE got into the act, and supported McKinnon's candidature. So did the TNA. Some PA MPs launched into a signature campaign to see that Kadirgamar does not quit politics, and Nationalist groups feared this to be a conspiracy between the President and the Prime Minister who were waiting to gift the LTTE a virtual separate state, wanting Kadirgamar, an obstacle in that exercise, out of the way. Eventually, Kadirgamar ended with more votes than a Sri Lankan candidate for such international postings had got before, but he lost nevertheless. As a sportsman he should know that it is not whether you won or lost that matters at the end of the day, but how you played the game - and we can take the defeat in the spirit that the Commonwealth's loss, is Sri Lanka's gain.

India makes strategic move in Lankan affairs
By Harinda Ranura Vidanage
As the political crisis in the country approached to a level of a mutually hurting stalemate for both the super powers in politics it has become increasingly difficult to find a political track that could lead them out of this mess.

The President for many is the chief architect in the current complication of affairs in the country. Yet she seems to be adopting a more defensive but a more intriguing advance in her game plan. Officials attached to the President's house desperately tried to display the success behind the Mano - Malik talks. But the true nature of the talks were revealed by President Kumaratunga amazingly at a meeting with the JVP in which she had been continuing a love -hate relationship.

The SLFP-JVP meeting held last Monday was a very significant one as the President handled it more like a strict high school teacher. It was a lecture more than a meeting. The radical red students famous for their vociferous appetite who used the best of their vocal chords in political song had been virtually pinned to silent mode.
But the reds who always took what the President said very cautiously were taking this lecture differently. Though they doubted her most of the time she reassured her commitment to the final effort of forging an alliance with the JVP. As the President began addressing the JVP delegation it became quite clear that Presidential sanction for the alliance had become a reality.

But the core content of her speech showed that it was an indirect hit at the UNP as she clearly spoke of SLFP-UNP national consensus based on configuration created through a SLFP-JVP alliance. As she spoke of the tactical importance of the SLFP-JVP discussions the hidden reality could be unearthed. The unravelling came while the President was strategically drifting towards the alliance with the reds. She used the committee based discussions with the UNF as a tactical ploy.

Though various elements pushed for a national government type structure as a break -through to the current political impasse, the more dominant ideology in the SLFP camp was able to push the President to siding with the reds. The best example comes in the form of the suddenly subdued Mangala Samaraweera who totally changed his battle plan for pushing the alliance through.

Mr. Samaraweera realized that his hard pitching for the alliance was met with fire by the President. He used a more deadly strategy by opting himself out of many crucial SLFP meetings and even limited his presence in Parliament. The strategy worked out and the SLFP once again came under the stranglehold of the elite eight led by Mr. Samaraweera.

The elite eight was strengthened by the inclusion of a new member to the team. The Samaraweera group found their super weapon in the form of Anuruddha Ratwatte. The former deputy defence minister after a silence of two long years, lengthy jail term is quickly recovering and is poised to strike.

Ratwatte last Thursday organized a private function to which he invited a very limited number of SLFP MPs and a group of trusted lawyers. Surprisingly the SLFP MPs represented the Mangala Samaraweera clique. Present was Dilan Perera, Pavithra Wanniarachchi, Vijithamuni Soyza and Managala Samaraweera himself. The most surprising element of presence was one time greatest rival to the old uncle Anura Bandaranaike himself.

Ratwatte made it an occasion first to call a truce on the intense rivalry that continued between the two relatives and secondly to show allegiance to a more distinct camp in the SLFP. He had selected the pro-JVP camp. Anuruddha Ratwatte did not want to side with the Mahinda Rajapakse - Sirisena camp and especially he had recently made very critical remarks on the SLFP general secretary Maithripala Sirisena.
Mahinda-Maithri group began feeling the heat from the guns that were pointed at them in parliament. The JVP MPs have been passing remarks of the future functioning of the new red blue apparatus.

The group members began hearing chilling statements in parliament. The JVP had already declared a proxy war against the anti-JVP league in the SLFP. The gist of the threat was in "future we will only support SLFP members who supported the SLFP-JVP alliance in parliament."

The more important political development during the week came in the form of a seminar organized by the Banadaranaike Centre for International relations in collaboration with the Delhi based Centre for the Strategic Studies. As influential Indian intellectuals and former politicians gave presentations, two documents released by two top Indian officials again reminded all in the political arena that India cannot be or will not be forgotten in this difficult time.

The First report was submitted by M.K. Rasgotra, a top Indian official highly respected and noted as one of the oldest living diplomats in India. His analysis of the LTTE threat and especially the proposal of Joint Naval exercise between the Sri Lankan and Indian Navies made many in the local defence system think again.
This was followed by the report submitted by Vice Admiral Das former Director General of Indian Defence planning staff and former commander of the Eastern naval command showing the intense threat to India of the existence of a Sea Tiger arm. The significance of the Indian approach, the Indian thinking and the Indian strategic insight should be a factor that all the political parties and other groups with vested political interests cannot ignore or avoid.

As myopia settles in on the local political chaos. The Sri Lankan state should not see through this obscured domestic lense. What ever the outcome of the current political struggle, the serious implications of a stalled peace process is a more significant and critical element in designing the future of a nation state shattered by war misled by lies and destabilised by petty political strife.

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