{"id":43898,"date":"2015-05-17T00:14:30","date_gmt":"2015-05-17T07:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=43898"},"modified":"2015-05-17T00:14:30","modified_gmt":"2015-05-17T07:14:30","slug":"maithripala-blue-or-green-or-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/05\/17\/maithripala-blue-or-green-or-what\/","title":{"rendered":"Maithripala Blue or Green or what?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0 Malinda Seneviratne\u00a0Courtesy The Nation<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Sometime late last year Maithripala Sirisena effectively left the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).\u00a0\u00a0 As predicted, he was installed as the leader of the party he \u2018left\u2019 the moment he was elected President.\u00a0 He became the leader of a party whose entire membership almost campaigned against him.\u00a0 It certainly didn\u2019t make for ideal leader-follower relations.<\/p>\n

The confusion was exacerbated by the fact that not only did he appoint the leader of a party with a (relatively) paltry parliamentary presence\u00a0 as Prime Minister but a cabinet dominated by that party, the United National Party (UNP).\u00a0 Worse, he has since played a patently second-fiddle role to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in affairs of the state.<\/p>\n

This naturally made for a jittery minority Government notwithstanding its much celebrated \u2018national\u2019 status with the induction of some SLFPers into the cabinet.\u00a0 It also created an ineffective Opposition Leader.\u00a0 Nimal Siripala Silva\u2019s party leader is (still, even after the 19th Amendment) the most powerful citizen of the country and yet, it\u2019s \u2018the other guys\u2019 who call the shots; this even though the Opposition Leader has greater sway in Parliament.<\/p>\n

Where could the \u2018opposition\u2019 go under these circumstances except to the camp of the defeated?\u00a0 It is safe to say that Mahinda Rajapaksa in defeat and under severe attack on all fronts still has far greater political clout than the Opposition Leader.\u00a0 With talks between the President and his predecessor not yielding (yet) the desired party unity, it is clear that the SLFP is on a bad wicket right now.<\/p>\n

Mahinda Rajapaksa has very few options.\u00a0 It is natural to demand the maximum and settle for less. That\u2019s how one should understand him asking to be named as the SLFP\u2019s Prime Ministerial candidate.\u00a0 On the other hand, if Sirisena is not interested (and he doesn\u2019t seem to be either) what is the \u2018less\u2019 that he could settle for in a general election?<\/p>\n

If he contests on the SLFP ticket he would be just one more MP.\u00a0 There\u2019s no guarantee that the SLFP would win.\u00a0 But whether the SLFP wins or not it remains to be seen what kind of support Mahinda can obtain from the SLFPers returned by the electorate and how this support compares to Maithripals\u2019s weight as party leader and Executive President.\u00a0 If he contests separately and secures a seat then it is unlikely that he could claim the premiership unless the SLFP and (let\u2019s call it) \u2018The Mahinda Faction\u2019 can together form a government.\u00a0 Against the \u2018Maithripala Factor\u2019 will come into play.\u00a0 There are too many \u2018ifs\u2019 in these scenarios.\u00a0 These include the \u2018if\u2019 of him wanting to be just another MP after being the all powerful Executive President.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the problem with Mahinda and his backers right now is that they are trapped in a parliamentary mindset.\u00a0 If they dwell on the fact that Prabhakaran\u2019s political signature had greater relevance than that of the first four Executive Presidents in the country (in effect of course) they might consider other options.\u00a0 Mahinda could remain aloof. He could offer some supportive statements to the SLFP or be silent.\u00a0\u00a0 He can wait for the demand to come to him.\u00a0 With Maithripala playing Elephant now, playing Lion later and at times operating as though he is just that guy bringing in drinks for weary players, and with Ranil and the UNP doing what they\u2019ve always done (minoritarian politics alienating the majority, helping the filthy rich and playing slave to US interests), demand is most likely to grow even if attempts are made to trip him with investigation, litigation and incarceration.<\/p>\n

For now, though, it all depends on Maithripala Sirisena.\u00a0 If he is as blue as the leader of the SLFP ought to be, then he has to find a way of dealing with the \u2018Mahinda Factor\u2019.\u00a0 Either Mahinda has to be taken out of the political equation (a tough ask given the (deliberate?) sloth regarding prosecution on the part of the UNP) or else Maithripala has to find a way of accommodating him with a larger coalition led by the SLFP.\u00a0 We are in the early days of groups and personalities fighting for positional advantage and therefore prediction is not useful.<\/p>\n

What can be predicted is that if Maithripala Sirisena cannot unite the SLFP or if he is not interested in doing so, he is essentially paving the way for a UNP victory at the next election.\u00a0 That would make him an indisputable \u2018Green\u2019, an UNPer that is.\u00a0 De-facto, if you want to be precise about it.\u00a0\u00a0 As things stand, with minimal effort on his part to resolve what could be called the \u2018SLFP\u2019s Mahinda Dilemma\u2019 he is looking more green than blue.<\/p>\n

It is simple.\u00a0 If Sirisena is not doing his utmost to ensure an SLFP victory at the next general election then he is not fit to be the leader of the party.\u00a0 One would have to conclude that he is playing into the hands of the UNP, \u2018working for the enemy\u2019 as far as the SLFP is concerned.\u00a0 If that is the case, the honorable thing would be to state the fact, resign from the party and join the UNP or else say \u2018I am neutral, no longer interested in party politics and will retire when my term ends\u2019.\u00a0 There\u2019s no sign of his doing any of the above which leads us to question the man\u2019s integrity.\u00a0 – See more at: http:\/\/www.nation.lk\/edition\/columns\/malinda-seneviratne\/item\/40646-maithripala-blue-or-green-or-what?.html#sthash.kF26lj91.dpuf<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0 Malinda Seneviratne\u00a0Courtesy The Nation Sometime late last year Maithripala Sirisena effectively left the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).\u00a0\u00a0 As predicted, he was installed as the leader of the party he \u2018left\u2019 the moment he was elected President.\u00a0 He became the leader of a party whose entire membership almost campaigned against him.\u00a0 It certainly didn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-malinda-seneviratne"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43898","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=43898"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43898\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}