{"id":51191,"date":"2016-01-18T19:05:54","date_gmt":"2016-01-19T01:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=51191"},"modified":"2016-01-18T12:01:03","modified_gmt":"2016-01-18T19:01:03","slug":"joint-opposition-alliance-now-or-never","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/01\/18\/joint-opposition-alliance-now-or-never\/","title":{"rendered":"JOINT OPPOSITION ALLIANCE –\u00a0 NOW OR NEVER"},"content":{"rendered":"

By M D P DISSANAYAKE<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

The\u00a0\u00a0 members of SLFP are concerned about losing their seats in the Parliament if they shift to a new political alliance of the opposition.\u00a0 This fear is clearly the main reason for the delay in the\u00a0 formation of a new Alliance. The President Mahinda Rajapakse was intentionally mislead\u00a0\u00a0 again by President Sirisena<\/strong>\u00a0 when MR was indirectly coerced in\u00a0 forming his own political machine prior to the General Election in August 2015 at a time MR\u00a0 was not a sitting member of the parliament.\u00a0 This was the first major setback for MR camp since losing power.\u00a0 John F Kennedy said: “<\/strong>Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

The SLFP members of parliament, who are currently supportive of the Pro-MR camp have been clearly identified.\u00a0 Yet, as a test case, the SLFP members of parliament who voted against the Budget in 2015 were Rohitha Abeygunawardana, Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, Dallas Alahapperuma and\u00a0 Mahindananda Aluthgamage.\u00a0 All other SLFP group of members of parliament who were in the MR camp, abstained from voting or did not attend.\u00a0 So far the four members who voted against the budget, have not been replaced by the next in line in the order of preferential votes<\/strong> gained by the party<\/strong>. In reality, well over 40 SLFP members were in MR camp at that time and now on the hindsight it may be argued that the entire block of those 40 SLFP members should have voted against the budget, with the MPs of the parties of MEP, NFF, PHU,\u00a0 etc.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This was the second set back for MR camp for missing out on another\u00a0 golden opportunity. Winston Churchill said: ” A<\/strong> pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>
\n<\/strong>The dangers of exposing SLFP members are understood.\u00a0 As an alternative, MEP, NFF, PHU,\u00a0 etc can forge an alliance without any further delay.\u00a0 The habit of making announcements through a temple at the Narahenpita will not create an awareness of the Joint Opposition.<\/p>\n

The next best opportunity available is to form the Alliance immediately, without waiting for local government elections.\u00a0\u00a0 The nation need to be educated by the opposition from village to village, explaining the dangers of the policies of the government.\u00a0 New leaders must be found from the grass root levels, set up branches, district committees to take the message in a robust manner.<\/p>\n

Now there are indications of a series of planned meetings between\u00a0 President Maithreepala Sirisena and President Mahinda Rajapakse.\u00a0 President Sirisena is upholding what Abraham Lincoln said: ” I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.”<\/p>\n

The Joint Opposition has so far failed to provide a forum for the general public to provide hope and future.\u00a0 The public\u00a0 is fully aware that MR and GR\u00a0 will come to their salvation, their absence from active participation from the Joint Opposition campaigns will not be a deterrent.\u00a0 The general public is always intelligent,<\/strong> but they need a clear vision and an action plan from those who are planning to succeed.<\/p>\n

“Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes”.\u00a0 Management Guru Prof. Peter Drucker<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By M D P DISSANAYAKE The\u00a0\u00a0 members of SLFP are concerned about losing their seats in the Parliament if they shift to a new political alliance of the opposition.\u00a0 This fear is clearly the main reason for the delay in the\u00a0 formation of a new Alliance. The President Mahinda Rajapakse was intentionally mislead\u00a0\u00a0 again by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dr-m-d-p-dissanayake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51191","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=51191"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51191\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}