Political Column

Political Column

Polls: now we have to factor in the Karuna factor
By Our Political Editor
Karuna
At least the man will be known for stealing the thunder from the Sri Lankan election campaign. His mutiny in the ranks is now in full spate, and the repercussions from it are causing all kinds of discomfiture, particularly to the Norwegians.

Karuna's ego may be big or even bigger than Prabhakaran's, it is now clear. Karuna has set up his separate Eastern command, and he is now poised for a showdown not just with Prabhakaran but also with the Norwegians and others who do not want to see their precious Sri Lankan peace process torn apart.

The Wanni high command was in the meanwhile, blaming anyone but themselves for the LTTE's new predicament. There has been a full level effort to determine the "hidden hand'' behind Karuna's audacious bid to go it on his own.

But the LTTE may know better than anyone else that Karuna was becoming difficult. His feelings towards Pottu Amman, the LTTE's chief assassin, have been known for a long time now. Karuna disliked him to the point of wanting him removed, which put LTTE leader Prabhakaran in a very awkward situation. All those who watched Prabhakaran's 2002 April press conference on television could not have missed his direct reference to Karuna when he was asked about his most memorable military successes. He referred to Karuna as his best military man, and said that the campaigns that Karuna waged were among the most successful in the LTTE's long history of armed struggle against Sri Lankan government forces.

But from that point, analysts have been pointing to the fact that Karuna Amman was somebody that Prabhakarn had to treat differently from his other run of the mill LTTE men. He was a person in his own right, and there is no such thing in the LTTE.

But it’s Karuna's so called RAW connection that has intrigued analysts for a long time now. Not that there is any direct evidence to link him to the clandestine Indian intelligence operation. But anyone with an eye on the East was capable of seeing that Karuna was a leader who could stand on his own as a separate entity from the rest of the LTTE's leadership cabal.

But the general rule of thumb about an organisation such as the LTTE is that it is dependent on one charismatic leader. There would have been no Cuban revolution without Castro, no People's Republic of China without Chairman Mao.

We have heard many a time that the LTTE was equivalent to a personality cult. Prabhakaran was the cult's godhead. It was figured that if Prabhakaran is somehow eliminated, the LTTE will gradually become moribund and die. This is the syndrome of the cult leader. When Wijeweera was eliminated, the JVP's armed insurrection against the state petered out and the State's strongmen such as Ranjan Wijeratne bluntly called what was left of the JVP a mere "second eleven.''

If so, is Karuna' s challenge to Prabhakaran a mere second eleven challenge? Or does it signify the beginning of the end for Prabhkaran's personality cult?

Alternately, one can say Prabhakaran's personality cult is already over. One should see the dissent in the East today to believe this. From intellectual to tailor to man on the street, there is a massive upsurge of opinion against Prabhakran and for Karuna. The Eastern University is supposed to be the hotbed for this ferment.

But, the cadres, particularly the female cadres, are open in their pledge of allegiance to Karuna. This strikes at the core of the Karuna phenomenon. Karuna is a politician. He is a Gorbachev to Prabhakaran's Stalin.

What is of more immediate concern to the South today is the outcome of the April 2nd elections. Come election time, Karuna could easily scuttle that election. He could use his heft to ensure that the LTTE backed TNA does not secure any seats in his part of the territory. This could spell disaster for the UNF's governing ambition with a capital D. It means that the UNF will not have the TNA to ally with to cobble together a government if the alliance wins more seats at the election.

Those men who emerge winners on the TNA ticket on the other hand may be loyal to Karuna. With these few, Karuna could support a probable Alliance government. For Prabhakaran this is almost unthinkable. But Karuna's political mind might not be embarrassed about such a combination. Therefore, with Athaullah now firmly in the Alliance saddle, the whole of the East could deliver a happy result for the Alliance. That will make Chandrika Kumaratunga very happy indeed. So happy that everybody is wondering how this chain of events began in the first place.

First there is a UNF government, sailing prettily. Then there is an Interim Administration proposal put forward by the LTTE. Two days later, the President takes over three Ministries including that of Defence. Then, she forms an alliance with the JVP, and dissolves parliament. Now the UNF's boat is not just in choppy waters but is in a political maelstrom which threatens to capsize it. It is the quickest recorded decline for any Sri Lankan government in power. But this decline will only be a momentary one if the UNF is somehow able to form a government, even through a cobbled together coalition after the April 2nd election. In other words, the whole string of events described above becomes just blip, an accident.

The only way to make this chain of events logically meaningful is if it follows the pattern of dealing a defeat to the UNF's forces. If somebody badly wanted to change Sri Lanka's government which it feared was arriving at a dangerous pact with the LTTE, then it is unlikely that this somebody will leave his/her work half done.

This is why it now appears that Karuna's mutiny was more than just a regular coincidence. It is why it is also felt now that Karuna may hold the final key in his hands to ensure a UNF debacle at the elections -- a guarantee that the UNF even if it wins less seats than the Alliance will not be able to form a government.

Watching all of this somebody might say that the UNF got a raw deal. One answer to that may be that they ain't seen nothing yet. The 'internal' reading of events is that the Karuna-Prabhakaran rift was a long time in the making and that Karuna pre empted Prabhakaran when Prabhakaran had sent Pottu Amman and his men to close in on Karuna and eliminate him. But that reading does not take into account the fact that there is an election happening in the melee. Will Prabhakarna want to face-off with one of his military commanders when there is a vital election in the East? Unless of course he had information that Karuna was trying to engineer that election in a way that Prabhakaran does not want? Who killed the two UNF candidates? Was it really Pottu Amman's men or Karuna's men?

There are more questions here than answers. But all that can be said at the moment is that there is more to all of this probably than just meets the eye. So, after April 2nd, it might be said that it is Karuna who finally decided who is going to form Sri Lanka's government. He may not be a cult figure -- but that does not make him a half bad politician.

Hidden Files in FA elections manifesto
By Harinda Ranura Vidanage
The SLFI auditorium was converted into an ultra modern surrounding by a PR organization assigned to spearhead the Freedom Alliance elections campaign for the launch of its election manifesto. Though drafted simultaneously with the MOU that was signed between the SLFP and the JVP on 20 January, this document was kept as a top-secret document till last week. Though the document carried more rhetoric than realistic approaches as many election manifestoes have done in our country, there are certain factors, which may affect the already ailing democratic design of the state.

In lighter vein it is quite interesting to highlight the paradoxical setting of the modern physical background of the launch in the form of SLFI arrangement, against the quite backward content of the manifesto. As people were entering there were two red and blue Sari clad girls giving the traditional welcome but as it came to the seating suddenly mini skirt clad girls were assigned to do the ushering in. They were given specific lists of names to attend to. But some of them even didn't recognize Wimal Weerawansa.

The JVP propaganda secretary who always wanted to be a striking figure with a militant attitude and aspiring to be the minister of cultural affairs in the new FA government was also seen to be blushing at this sight. One wily mouthed friend of Wimal had asked him pointing at these new ushers "Mewata Wagakiyanne Kauda?" (Who will be responsible for these?), imitating the campaign advertisement carried in the media sponsored by the Alliance.

Looking at more serious matters the election manifesto released amid these settings is more a short-term tactical guide than any document seeking the development of the nation. It is based on the mechanism of changing the constitution to bring back President Chandrika Kumaratunga into parliament and establish ground conditions conducive to take over full control. It seeks a mandate to convene a constituent assembly empowered to amend the constitution. But the hidden factor is the decision to draft an interim constitution through the constituent assembly then convene the parliament and go for the desired constitutional revolution.

The constitutional experts who were brought down from both India and France have recommended this. This was the system that was experimented in South Africa in the power transition from the apartheid regime to the Mandela's ANZ dominated new government. Along with that the reference of pre conditions for negotiations for the resolution of the ethnic conflict has been drafted in. This document gives a vague picture on tackling the ethnic issue. But it clearly denies the concept of Tamil Homeland.

As Dayan Jayatilleke former Minister, North East Provincial Council and Senior Lecturer in Political Science at University of Colombo says, " The rejection of the concept of a Tamil Homeland in the alliance election manifesto puts the clock back to the pre 1987 because firstly the cornerstone of the Indo- Lanka accord was the recognition of the 'areas of historical habitation' of the Tamil people and secondly the homeland concept was the Thimpu 1985 bottom line. The alliance says that Sri Lanka is the homeland of all communities, but using the accurate assertion to reject a Tamil Homeland is similar to saying that because a home belongs to the entire family, no one is entitled to a room of his or her own"

Meanwhile President Kumaratunga has directly ordered all state media heads to down play most of the developments in the North East. This has been in reference to the internal revolt within the LTTE. The Alliance has decided to take a neutral stance on the rivalry between Prabhakaran and a renegade chief of the LTTE Eastern command in Karuna Amman.

The internal rivalries within the Alliance are still brewing, as Alawi Mowlana has been overlooked for Zuhair for the national list. The SLFP old timers are questioning the systematic execution of its old guard from the political scene by elements who see a new red blue SLFP.

Such contradictions have led to the establishment of two elections monitoring units for the Alliance. As the internal bosses competed for the ownership of the 'PollsWatch' the PA elections monitoring agency, Mangala Samaraweera and Wimal Weerawansa has formed a new agency under Sunil Watawala and Sena Sooriyapperuma.

As such issues surface continuously demonstrating the volatility of political alliances that are drawn between political parties with incompatible configurations. The alliance is now functioning like a personal computer running on the option called "Safe Mode", using the minimum resource facilities as anything else would create a system conflict and lead to a total crash of the machine.

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