{"id":106791,"date":"2020-09-19T15:08:23","date_gmt":"2020-09-19T22:08:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=106791"},"modified":"2020-09-19T15:08:23","modified_gmt":"2020-09-19T22:08:23","slug":"empowering-president-at-the-expense-of-the-pm-helps-rajapaksa-rivals-in-the-long-run","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/09\/19\/empowering-president-at-the-expense-of-the-pm-helps-rajapaksa-rivals-in-the-long-run\/","title":{"rendered":"Empowering President at the Expense of the PM Helps Rajapaksa Rivals in the Long Run"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dilrook Kannangara<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The anti-Rajapaksa\ncamp has a distinct advantage at presidential elections than in parliamentary\nelections. On the other hand, the Rajapaksa camp has a clear advantage in\nparliamentary elections than at presidential elections. Given this fact, it is\nunwise the empower the president at the expense of the PM. What should happen\nis the opposite. The parliament and the PM must be given more powers and the\npresident less powers. Although more power to the president seems a good idea\ntoday because the president is Gotabaya, it will be a disaster for Rajapaksas\nin the long run. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

JR did the\nsame mistake in 1977 when he drafted a new Constitution with total executive\npower in the hands of the president. He expected his coterie will rule the\ncountry forever with his nephew Ranil taking over after him. But alas! Ranil\nnever became the head of state. He was defeated by Chandrika who was 16 years\nhis junior in politics and Sirisena (12 years junior in parliament). This may\nbe the fate of Gotabaya\u2019s nephews too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A careful\nlook at recent elections prove that Rajapaksas must empower the parliament and not\nthe president. Parliamentary elections give them more power while presidential\nelections give their rivals more power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rajapaksa\ncamp won 46% at the 2004 parliamentary election and their main rival UNP won\nonly 38%. However, at the presidential election a year later, Rajapaksa only\nimproved by 4% whereas the UNP improved a massive 9%. The 2010 presidential\nelection saw UNP backed candidate win 40% against Mahinda\u2019s 58%. However, at\nthe following parliamentary election UNP collapsed to a dismal 29% – that is a\ngain of 2% for Rajapaksas and a loss of 11% for the UNP. 2015 presidential\nelection was won by the UNP supported candidate with 51% while Rajapaksa\nmanaged 48%. At the following parliamentary election, UNP slid down to 45% (a\ndrop of 6%) whereas Rajapaksas despite losing the previous election also\nreduced 6%. The same pattern continued in 2019 and 2020. UNP managed to win 42%\nat the presidential election against Rajapaksa\u2019s 52%. However, UNP\/SJB\ncollapsed to a dismal 24% which is a drop of 18%! Rajapaksas on the other hand\nimproved by 7%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the past\nelection cycles, parliamentary elections favoured Rajapaksas by an average of\n3% over presidential election. But presidential elections favoured Rajapaksa\nrivals by an average of 11% over parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look at it\nanother way, Rajapaksas won on average 52% of parliamentary elections whenever\nthey contested to become PM. It was the same when they contested to become\nPresident (52%). However, they main rivals managed 45% at presidential elections\non average but only managed 34% on average at parliamentary election. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Astronomical\npopulation growth rate of minorities worsens this disparity as years pass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course,\nRajapaksas won most of these elections. However, these good times won\u2019t last\nforever. They will end most likely at a presidential election than a\nparliamentary election. That is why it is suicidal to give more power to the\npresident at the expense of the parliament. GR must not do the mistake of JR.\nTheir nephews paid\/will pay for it and their rivals will gain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dilrook Kannangara The anti-Rajapaksa camp has a distinct advantage at presidential elections than in parliamentary elections. On the other hand, the Rajapaksa camp has a clear advantage in parliamentary elections than at presidential elections. Given this fact, it is unwise the empower the president at the expense of the PM. What should happen is the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dilrook-kannangara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106791"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106791\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}