Elections from the lens of the Kadirgamar friends
Angela Merkel will be the German Chancellor at the end of a typically German angst ridden election. The unglamorous woman from the former communist east has finally ascended the post.

That's roughly the equivalent of Thamilselvan becoming the Sri Lankan President twenty years from now -- and declaring himself dedicated to the cause of Sri Lankan national unification. Merkel's East Germany was in the past imagined by the West as home to spooky communist spies or poor eccentric Marxists - - or both.

But, this kind of change happens in Germany almost without a blip.
The German lifestyle - - zingiest if you will -- is not all politics. Zeitgeist in Sri Lanka is in contrast politics and politics alone.

Germans did not live on a diet of Merkel, or have Merkel induced adrenaline bursts before they elevated that woman to the chancellorship. But, in Sri Lanka, there is no other life than the demonization of Ranil and the canonization of Mahinda - - and vice versa -- before the November elections. There is another life of course. People eat drink and have babies, but that's all in a technical sense. Technically, there are no tsunami victims. There are only election candidates - - and just two of them at that.

Politics as an end in itself, that's our zeitgeist. Last week, Lakshman Kadirgamar was commemorated at the BMICH, with a Sri Lankan display of non-consensus. There was nobody present from the UNP to befriend the national icon at least in death, though Kadrigamar was now gone and not a threat to anybody in any direct sense. Commemoration is like a class thing therefore; it happens not for the primary purpose of appreciating a man's worth, but for the secondary one of enacting a political campaign from beyond his grave.

Boycotting the Kadirgamar commemoration hence became a political campaign for the UNP. It was waged by the fact of their absence at the ceremonies. In the abstract, the UNP took stock of Kadirgamar's iconic and heroic role, but in the concrete he was still the late and arch SLFP villain.

We search for a rationale for such boorishness.
Could they have argued that the SLFP or more so the JVP is using Kadirgamar in death, that they are commemorating him to ignite his memory to catch some votes?

Some in the government may have been doing just that. If they did, it proved that the man was worth a national fortune in votes, which was due to his being a national hero beyond partisan politics, and a hero beyond the grave. Acknowledging that, if the UNP had to play politics, the party could have participated in the commemoration, and qualified for some of the Kadirgamar's friends' votes. Or, the UNP could have qualified for some non-committal votes from its own vote block, just by being decent.

But the UNP elite sees a SLFP that's smitten with Kadirgamar. This UNP elite is so deracinated and divorced from the reality to think that the people don’t care for Kadirgamar's abilities and his contribution to history.

Therefore, a national hero gets honoured on party lines. It's the inversion of the Angela Merkel syndrome. In Germany, Germans make the least noise as possible, but come up with some startling political reconciliations, such as getting a former commie East German woman to take over the chancellorship. In Sri Lanka, a big noise is made. Yet, the polity divides on party lines concerning an event where obvious reconciliation is called for, considering the dead man's service to the nation.

Secretly, among themselves and in conclave, the UNP inner-sanctum still think of Kadirgamar as enemy - their enemy, therefore the national enemy. In this country, the lines blur. Prabhakaran, a foe, can be seen as an asset, if politically he is an enemy of the main enemy, which is the other political party. So, quintessentially and in conclave, to the deracinated Colombo UNP, Prabhakaran is a friend and Kadirgamar is an enemy, to the grave and beyond even…..

"A whole nation cried out in joy when one man was killed'', went a quote from an alleged Tiger communication intercept when Kadirgamar was shot dead. Whatever the nation the Tiger was exulting about, it wasn't the Sri Lankan nation. It's this other nation the deracinated UNP gets a kick out of imagining as 'our nation'.

Under the circumstances, it suits the SLFP and the JVP's heat seeking political firebrands to frame the oncoming presidential election as a machete-contest between one nation -- the Sri Lankan nation -- and the 'other nation', backed by minority political parties and their respective vote banks.

That's why Wimal Weerawansa frames the poll as one that will end the nation as we know it or let it survive. Politicians frame the campaign issues, but people, when they dispose of their votes, do so with a smirk of contempt on their faces for all transient forces. Who cares who frames the debate, the people always voted with a certain street smartness collected from constantly voting governments in and governments out.

So, it’s likely that they will listen with contempt to the deracinated UNP - - but some of them will vote for the UNP anyway. As an atheist once said, 'you must listen to the bishops before you ignore them.'
For the larger UNP, the deracinated UNP leadership of today is only a passing transient phase of weirdness. They will probably repose their faith in the bigger broader UNP, which cannot be hijacked for the season by Moragoda or a rootless twin of his.

In the end the people will frame this election not as one between one nation and another nation, but as one between two leaderships that they - - the people - - can mould. The franchise exists for the people, the folks who live and breathe politics, to give some direction to the leadership to determine their long-term political alignments. Those who frame the election as one between 'one nation' and the 'other nation' therefore may be trying a short-term gambit. The people are however in it for the long haul, and will not allow a leadership to dilute one land into two nations - even if they might in the end elect the party that is most likely to do it.

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