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THILAK KARUNARATNE SAYS IT IS AN INSULT TO THE UNP TO EQUATE THE PARTY WITH THAT OF MANGALA SAMARAWEERA

By Walter Jayawardhana

Calling the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (People’s Wing) leader Mangala Samaraweera a political leader not worthy of the name United National Party’s (UNP) former treasurer Tilak Karunaratne said it was an insult that UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe had equated the leadership of the party with that of Samaraweera.

“The UNP is the biggest political party of the country. It is an insult to equate the leadership of the party with a ‘political dud note’” , said Karunaratne in an interview with the state run Sinhalese weekly newspaper, The Silumina.Karunaratne further said that he did not even like to mention the name SLFP-M since it had only Mangala and Sripathy in it. He asked how one equates a jumbo sized political party with such a pygmy of a political entity.

Vehemently opposing the agreement between Ranil and Mangala under that instrument, the former treasurer of the party said, an election is fought under the direction of UNP’s Rukman Senananyaka and Sripathy Sooriyaarchchi . He said , Rukman is the President of the UNP and who is Sripathy? Karunaratne queried whether there is any justification in equating the two individuals. Karunaratne said the final nomination board is going to be consisting of Ranil and Mangala . The coalesced entity of the two parties will be 98 % of UNPers. But the decisions are going to be taken by these two individuals, he charged. He asked whether two people are capable of taking any decisions and pointed out that it is highly impractical.

When the newspaper said some people have already gone into litigation over the matter Karunaratne said that no authority of the party had granted any power to the party leader to take such far reaching decisions. He said not a single word has been uttered about this agreement to the party working committee. He said the party leader has definitely exceeded the powers bestowed on him.
Reminding that the UNP is a party receiving the support of different communities of the country the former party office holder said due to such agreements in the past the CWC and Chandrasekeran won with the help of the UNP and joined any government they liked. Due to this the UNP had lost, he said, its leadership among the plantation workers. The party had been always powerful in the Eastern Province. And due to agreements signed with Ashroffs and Hakeems it had also lost its leadership in the Eastern Province. He said from the 11 parliamentarians appointed from the UNP national list only Choksey remained with the party.

Karunaratne said the SLFP Mahajana Wing is a ridiculous party and the outcome would result in a similar situation of what had happened to the party in the Eastern Province. If it goes at this rate, karunaratne warned in a matter of 30 to 40 years they would be left only with the sign of the party.
Karunaratne also expressed his displeasure about Ranil Wickremesinghe’s recent utterances about purported corrupt conduct or “Dussila Buddhist monks. He said if there were shortcomings in the Sangha of the Buddhist monks like using luxury vehicles or anything else those have got to be reformed by the Buddhist monks themselves. For insulting a respected monk like Venerable Ellawela Medhananda even the Mahanayaka Thero of Malwatte has expressed his displeasure. Ours is a society that respects Buddhist monks. Since days of immemorial the whole society respects them as protectors of the dhamma, he said.

Karunaratne said when one calls Thoppigala simply a forest of so many trees it hints an insult to the armed forces who captured it. He said during the time of President Wijetunga General Lucky Algama with Janka Perera and STF captured the same province and it was due to the folly of Anuruddha Ratwatte it was re-captured by the LTTE. “It should not be forgotten that 60% of the available land for development in the Eastern Province is in the Ampara District, he said.
The former official of the UNP said after tendering the resignation Ranil Wickremesinghe met him for a one and half hour discussion and asked him to withdraw the letter with the hope of settling the differences amicably.

Tilak Karunaratne said he cannot live against his conscious but was still remaining as a member of the party to right those wrongs.

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