News
UNP splits; both factions prepare candidate lists
In power for the past four and half years and now thrust in the opposition, the United National Party (UNP) formally split in two yesterday bringing to a close months of feuding by rival factions.
The first test of strength for both sides will come when they field candidates separately for the April 25 parliamentary elections.
Formal announcements from the two sides came yesterday after last-minute efforts at a settlement failed. The UNP General Secretary Akila Viraj Kariyawasam wrote to the National Election Commission, in keeping with a statutory requirement, that his party would field candidates for all the 22 electoral districts.
The Sajith Premadasa-led Samagi Jana Balavegaya General Secretary Ranjith Madduma Bandara told a hurriedly summoned news conference they would go it alone without the UNP. He said they would use the Telephone as their symbol.
Those declarations brought the curtain down on a prolonged political feud between UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe and his Deputy, Sajith Premadasa. It remains to be seen how many former UNP parliamentarians and prominent members would become candidates from the UNP or the Balavegaya.
Besides that, a more important matter would be the legal challenges Mr. Premadasa may face for “defying” the party leadership and opting to go with the Telephone instead of the Elephant symbol.
Since Mr. Wickremesinghe returned from an overnight trip to Dubai for a media event, different interlocutors have been shuttling between him and Mr. Premadasa. At one point yesterday, the two sides reached near accord on the Swan symbol. This was after Ravi Karunanayake agreed to ensure that symbol is given in writing by the Secretary of the Apey Jathika Peramuna, the owners of the symbol. Last ditch negotiations got further complicated on Friday when a magisterial warrant was issued for the arrest of Mr. Karunanayake and him being uncontactable thereafter.
The letter was being awaited whilst the two sides discussed modalities of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) the UNP would sign with Mr. Premadasa’s new Alliance. The Premadasa loyalists blamed Mr. Wickremesinghe for placing “condition after condition” in the proposed MoU. However, a Wickremesinghe loyalist defended the position saying “That is true. We have to ensure the standing and reputation of our party before we can come to terms”.
The split in the UNP, the country’s oldest political party launched by the late D.S. Senanayake, is a watershed in Sri Lankan’s political landscape. Whilst the Balavegaya led by Mr. Premadasa is busy preparing its list of candidates, the UNP is to embark on the task in the coming week.