{"id":44838,"date":"2015-06-20T21:07:40","date_gmt":"2015-06-21T03:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=44838"},"modified":"2015-06-20T08:23:45","modified_gmt":"2015-06-20T15:23:45","slug":"president-sirisena-must-fear-lucky-ranil-for-very-good-reasons-not-mahinda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/06\/20\/president-sirisena-must-fear-lucky-ranil-for-very-good-reasons-not-mahinda\/","title":{"rendered":"President Sirisena Must Fear Lucky Ranil for Very Good Reasons, Not Mahinda"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Who is the most frustrated politician in the island today having lost\u00a0so many\u00a0elections? And why that person is desperate after the 19th<\/sup> Amendment was diluted by SLFP MPs? What if the decoy works? A news item was floated by pro-UNP websites of a purported conversation President Maithripala had with his party stalwarts. He did have such a conversation but the issues disclosed in that website didn\u2019t occur according to credible newspapers in circulation. According to Maithripala, the former president Mahinda cannot be made the prime minister at the moment primarily because he is not a parliamentarian. Secondly because he has not joined Maithripala\u2019s coalition despite having two face to face meetings. It is not because he might grab power by unscrupulous means. This is a decoy spread by pro-UNP media outlets. Why would they spread such well concocted lies?<\/p>\n

Did anyone notice how the international tide turned against Maithripala lately? Well, it did. Making statements, USA and India expressed doubts as to the genuineness of the Maithripala government to \u2018resolve the ethnic problem\u2019 said to exist in the country. It follows the president\u2019s appreciation that the Sri Lankan economy cannot continue without China and paying a high level visit to China. The West and India see him following on the footsteps of Mahinda. Banning a popular herbicide from an extremely influential corporation by Maithripala (following Mahinda) is another concern for them. Attempts to restart the stalled Colombo Port City project is another concern. They know for sure that Maithripala will give the green light to the project soon. Simply the West and India have now given up on Maithripala. They now openly support Ranil who has shown his strong western connections following on the footsteps of his uncle who was a very strong western ally.<\/p>\n

Ranil is also frustrated as SLFP MPs diluted the 19th<\/sup> amendment in the eleventh hour. Powers the prime minister was supposed to get under the original 19th<\/sup> amendment were removed by these changes. As prime minister, he is not entitled to the powers he was promised before the election. There is only one way he can enjoy those promised powers he so desires; to become the president. And that is the wish of the West and India too.<\/p>\n

His dictatorial conduct and desire for power was on display in parliament when he tried to shut up veteran parliamentarian Vasudeva in parliament. Silencing of hundreds of political activists in Batalanda in 1989 who opposed him is not forgotten. Over 500 youth were tortured and killed. So is the Liyanarachchi episode when the outspoken critic of Ranil was killed in 1988. His famous association with an infamous underworld figure in the 1980s is also very well known.<\/p>\n

How come a political rookie with just 16 years\u2019 experience became the UNP leader in 1993? It was thanks to a series of strange events that happened. Within the course of a month, the UNP leader who was also the president and the potential UNP leader (who rebelled against the party but would have returned) were killed supposedly by the LTTE. As an inheritance from a deceased relative no one knew existed, Ranil became the prime minister. Let us call it his exceptional luck.<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

His luck continued as Gamini\u2019s takeover of the UNP leadership swiftly ended thanks to similar circumstances. Ranil who was expelled as the UNP leader in August 1994 reclaimed the throne just 2 months later thanks to Gamini\u2019s assassination.<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Another similar event befell President Kumaratunga in 1999 but she survived. Had she died, the president would be Ranil. Luck seems to be shining on him again.<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

If what happened in 1993 were to happen again, who will be the president? It is none other than Ranil who became prime minister under similar circumstances.\u00a0<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Therefore it is futile trying to point to a red herring as a decoy to take public attention away from historical truths. Those who spread these diversion stories are aware people have forgotten history and those who forget history are condemned to witness its repetition. President Maithripala must see through this ploy of the west, India and some lucky locals. He must immediately appoint a trustworthy prime minister from his own party. His current prime minister is extremely ambitious apart from being lucky that his previous three superiors got assassinated.<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

He has lost two presidential elections, four general elections and countless other elections but still remains the UNP leader which hints at his craving for power. On two occasions he became prime minister out of a total of three bypassing the ballot (1993 and 2015). President Maithripala must be wary of his extremely ambitious and lucky prime minister who has shown elections are an excess, not a necessity, to gain power.<\/p>\n

President Sirisena has more to fear from Ranil and nothing to fear from Mahinda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dilrook Kannangara Who is the most frustrated politician in the island today having lost\u00a0so many\u00a0elections? And why that person is desperate after the 19th Amendment was diluted by SLFP MPs? What if the decoy works? A news item was floated by pro-UNP websites of a purported conversation President Maithripala had with his party stalwarts. He […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44838","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\/44838","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=44838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44838\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}