Earlier this week, the UPFA secured control of the Eastern Provincial Council (EPC) when the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) led by Rauff Hakeem decided to throw in its lot with the government as opposed to forming a provincial government with the Tamil National Alliance (TNA). The UNP had no sooner the results were announced, indicated that it would back an opposition takeover of the Eastern Province Administration, given that the UPFA had fallen to just 32% of the popular vote and had only 14 seats in the 37 member Council. Fifteen (15) if you counted in the National Freedom Front’s single member. The TNA, the SLMC and the UNP divided the other 22 seats between them. The difference in the popular vote between the UPFA and the TNA was only 6,300 in the entire province and the TNA had defeated the government in the districts of Trincomalee and Batticalo. That the TNA was able to do so well electorally, despite “all the King’s horses and all the King’s men” arrayed against it demonstrated its enduring appeal amongst the Tamil community and hence the need to seriously engage with the TNA in a credible post war reconciliation process. In contrast, the UPFA elected only a single Tamil member in the whole province, former chief minister Pilliyan, through a preference vote recount that was dubious. Read the rest of this entry »

The elections to the three provincial councils, the North Central, the Sabaragamuwa and the Eastern Provincial Council concluded over the weekend and the results provide some interesting political trends.

At the very outset, it should be recognized that the government faced and conducted these elections on a basis that was as tailor made to its agenda as possible. If the PC elections were a cricket match, you would have claimed not just that the pitch was made in a manner friendly to the home (governing side) but actually doctored to fit its own needs. Since provincial elections are not contests that can conceivably change governments, there are a myriad of factors at play. Support for an opposition is lackluster since irrespective of the outcome, it will continue as the opposition in the central government, a savvy electorate is made to understand the benefits of state patronage by the governing party and in conducting elections in only a part of the country the government gets to focus the full force and intensity of its own efforts and state resources in a very concentrated manner. Read the rest of this entry »

The LLRC report was finally made public by tabling it in Parliament in late December and the report presents the government and the Southern polity with some inconvenient truths. It mostly challenges the narrative made popular by government leaders and ideologues and ably supported by the mainstream media, that the main impediment to a solution is the TNA.

Accordingly the government spends most of its limited attention span on the ethnic issue by complaining about the TNA’s alleged intransigence, denying the existence of an ethnic problem and blaming the West for not recognizing the claimed post war economic progress in the North.
However, this Rajapaksa / UPFA narrative is not supported by the facts as largely attested by the LLRC. Read the rest of this entry »

The political drama of the past few weeks has been the leadership tussle within the opposition United National Party. The issue is of concern and relevance to not just UNP supporters but to all Sri Lankans, since the opposition in a democracy plays a crucial role as a check and balance on the government as well as presenting an alternative government when the next periodic election comes along, which in our case is the general election due in 2015. The consequences of the UNP’s internal conflict has been it inability to act as an effective check and balance on the government. Despite many issues, including corruption, poor governance and post war policies, on which the government should be held to account, the UNP has been almost solely preoccupied with its internal wrangles to the exclusion of matters of national importance. Read the rest of this entry »

The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) swept the recent local elections in the Northern Province, winning the popular vote by huge margins in all five electoral districts of the North and all the Tamil majority local council bodies baring three in the Jaffna Islets, namely Kyats, Delft and Velani. The Jaffna islands have long been a pocket borough of and tightly controlled by Minister Douglas Devananda and the islanders have consistently voted for his EPDP. The TNA electoral effort in the North was spearheaded by its stalwarts General Secretary Mavai Senathirajah and senior Member of Parliament, Suresh Premachandra.

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