Ground reality

Wednesday 3rd August 2022

President Ranil Wickremesinghe is scheduled to make his maiden Policy Statement in Parliament today. While he is settling in, his political enemies are regrouping. It is not clear whether the SBJ will throw its weight behind its MP Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, who wants to launch what he calls the final battle against the government on 09 August. But Fonseka is said to be determined to go ahead with his battle plan; he has vowed to oust President Wickremesinghe soon. The government has gone on the offensive and apparently put the Aragalaya activists on the defensive. But efforts to neutralise anti-government protests with the root causes of public resentment remaining unaddressed are an exercise in futility and could even boomerang.

No ruler is stronger than the people. A clay pot is no match for a bludgeon, however big it may be, as they say in this country. When a majority of people rise against any government, the ruling politicians and their hangers-on are left without any defence. Even Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a former frontline combat officer, who would bulldoze his way, had to flee the country. Wickremesinghe has a history of clinging on to posts, and is busy consolidating his power as the President, but if the government does not succeed in breaking the back of the current economic crisis soon, another mega tsunami of public anger is bound to occur.

But the question is how advisable it is to launch a mass protest to oust Ranil at this particular juncture; the nation’s priorities are different. Who would succeed Ranil if his political enemies succeeded in their endeavour? Would his successor be better than both he and Gotabaya, and would the interim President to be elected by Parliament in case of Ranil’s ouster be free from the corrupting influence of the Rajapaksa family, and equal to the task of resolving the economic crisis? Shouldn’t Ranil be given a few months to perform and prove himself, if he can, before being judged so that the country will be free from chaos for IMF assistance to be secured and the economy repaired?

One of the main reasons why Wickremesinghe failed as the de facto leader of the Yahapalana government (2015-2019) was that he had, as the members of his team, a coterie of cronies who were highly inefficient and incapable; some of them were even corrupt. He is sure to fail again if he continues to rely on these elements. They have been crawling out of the woodwork. When the discerning people see these jokers, they ask themselves the same question as the proverbial camel, which saw its dung racing past it, while it was walking down a shallow stream, and wondered: “How come what should be behind me is going ahead of me?” What the people are expecting is certainly not Part II of the failed Yahapalanaya. Besides, the aforesaid characters remind the public of the corrupt deals during the Yahapalana regime.

So, if President Wickremesinghe is to frustrate the efforts being made in some quarters to engineer a mass uprising against him, he will have to make an immediate course correction. He must stop ‘suffering’ fools and crooks loyal to him gladly, and select his team members wisely. The only thing that can be expected of a leader who handpicks jokers for his team is a vaudeville. The people are in no mood for a farce. They are struggling to keep the wolf from the door with inflation galloping.

The biggest challenge before Wickremesinghe is to become the President of the people instead of being considered a proxy of the beleaguered Rajapaksa camp. But he has the Sword of Medamulana, as it were, hanging from a threadbare saataka over his head. He has to win over the Opposition, and defuse tensions in the polity. Political witch-hunts disguised as police raids, etc., must end forthwith, for such hostile actions only provoke the Opposition activists and make the much-needed rapprochement unattainable.

President Wickremesinghe’s success hinges on his ability to learn from the blunders of his predecessor and avoid them, free himself from the clutches of the Rajapaksa family by winning over the Opposition and the public, and, above all, save himself from his cronies who are all out to make up for lost time, like a colony of leeches after a drizzle. This is a tall order, but there is no way the ground reality could be wished away. President Wickremesinghe’s role model should be D. B. Wijetunga, the interim President, who steered the country to safety during one of its worst political crises (1993-1994)

Let those who are girding up their loins to launch another protest be told that theirs is a dangerous venture, and the genie must not be let out of the bottle. What is needed urgently is to bring order out of chaos. There is absolutely no need for a mass protest every month.