2001 Election-Issues

Chandrika or Ranil-the million rupee elections

By H.O.R.A..Chanda Dhamma

To lesser mortals such as myself, a public servant of sorts, it rarely makes any difference, for as we have seen since 1948 each election gives way to more robbery and more plunder followed by more snobbery and more blunder than the previous. Governments are to its people what the weather is to farmers: a cause of perpetual disgruntlement. We citizens believe each government to be worse than the last, that the present state of affairs as utterly unprecedented and the worst ever, and that our country is going or has already gone to the dogs beyond redemption. This time however, it's true. 

The Chandrika government was voted by most of us in 1994, to change a society that was aghast enveloped in 'Dhushanaya' and 'Bheeshanaya'. At least this was what we were told. As she learned to cope with the perks and the unbridled power of her position, the plethora of alarming promises she gave to win votes, fell by the way-side. Only the statistics published by the Central Bank propped up the economy. 

The oft repeated positives of Chandrika is that she is charismatic and that Ranil does not possess this. There is a magical quality to Chandrika of disarming people with a divine gift of a charming smile. The source of this aura is more in the subconscious mind of the follower than in the person of Chandrika. And further, this gift of grace is soon negated by the casual utterances she makes when you meet her regularly, exposing the shallowness of a wandering mind. Ranil on the other hand is a serious person, a man of no small-talk or gossip, a man with a goal and Ranil may sound cold to the less-than-enlightened but once acquainted, you are guaranteed that he will be predictably unpredictable. So what's so different between the two any way?

That Chandrika lacks good governance is now accepted by all the recent disclosures. They have convinced the converted. Her government is both under-led and under-managed, leading to the unfortunate distraction between management and leadership with the perverse implication that good management is somehow inferior and less important than good leadership. Not knowing how to manage, she has done much damage in the country's affairs raising expectations of our people with her promises without any ability to deliver them. The gap between theory and practice remains wide. This usually follows a stream of resentful and ill-tempered criticisms from the leader which further infuriate officials whose ominous credo then alters between managing and remaining silent. Chandrika clearly has no aptitude for tackling the nitty-gritty of actual management. 

Ranil does not pretend to be the 'know-all' and 'End-all' of all topic. Her own admission that almost all her cabinet ministers are crooks raises the many questions leaving behind a trail of 'Dushanaya' ghosts. But this only is one side of the coin.

Despite all this bad management, bad governance, chronic inability to maintain time-management, a very cocky approach to the country's mounting problems coupled with internal squabbling,why is it that a victory for the UNP is not a forgone conclusion? Arithmatically,what the UNP has won by way of the minority Tamil and Muslim parties,it has lost with the JVP.

Both,opinion polls and grass-root organisers from all parties concede that the JVP has made some advances from last year's elections thanks to a spirited performance just before the dissolution of Parliament. 

So, even if the PA drops its seat-count to below the UNP, together with the JVP and EPDP it has a chance to just pip the UNP led coalition at the post. If the PA led coalition wins a single seat majority,the CWC is bound to cross-over and strengthen it. In such a scenario,we are going back to square one, a pre-dissolution situation of a shaky government again being dictated to by a Marxist-nationalist party, inevitably going to clash with the IMF and World Bank and run down the economy even further. 

On the other hand, if the UNP led coalition wins, its going to be the minority parties dictating terms on the ethnic-northern insurgency issue. 

Either way is going to be Hobson's choice for the people of Sri Lanka.The only way out for the country will have to be a National Government, which Ranil Wickremesinghe seems willing to give a shot at, which Chandrika Kumaratunga has made very clear, will not like to do. The UNP has only itself to blame for the predicament it has got itself into.

With all the chaos this country has been thrown into by the PA Government,the UNP neglected in realising the stark reality - that two key factors have been its (UNP) undoing, and that there is no purpose in having genuine plans for the development of the country, unless you can win the elections. One such factor was, its inability to organise the party machinery at the village-level and its consequent failure to reach out with its message to the ordinary people;and two, its inept failure to use its propaganda machinery. To rely on people like G.L.Peiris as the chief spokesman displays its bankruptcy. Mr. Peiris talks to law students, not the average man. S.B.Dissanayake talks the common man's lingo, but often in bad taste alienating the massive bank of women voters. Ranil Wickremesinghe himself talks too much and too often. He is over-exposure and over-kill for a leader is not a good thing. He should limit his speeches to 10 minutes and avoid talking with his hands. His message must be short and sweet: "This Government has ruined the country. The Bandaranaikes always do that. The UNP will restore the economy, give you jobs and money to spend. We will talk to the LTTE and bring you peace. Thank you very much," should be all that he says. 

One thing politicians might do well to realise - the public has become so cynical of these bleeding heart politicians who are waiting to serve the country and her people- that the more they talk, the more they are laughed at. 

And the country seems to be laughing all the way to yet another Hung Parliament. So, what are we going to have from now on?Annual elections, or so it seems. 

Dallas: a postscript 

Seven years ago, Dallas joined a growing bandwagon of people who were aghast at the emerging political culture of corruption and violence and believed that the newly-formed Peoples' Alliance could rid the country of this cancer. That he was then a journalist, if at all, was incidental.

Elected to the legislature comfortably from the relatively rural Kamburupitiya constituency in Ruhuna the neophyte MP must have had grandiose ideas of being the ideal game manthrithuma, serving the simple village folk and bettering their lot by attending to their needs.

But seven years on Dallas Alahapperuma's dream has turned into a nightmare so much so that he has resigned from politics and vowed he would never again become part of what has become a treacherous but prosperous industry sans a conscience and principles.

It is a tragedy of our times. Dallas would have seen idealistic Parliamentarians metamorphose almost overnight into ambitious predators who survived on commissions and omissions paid for by public funds. And, he would have also seen the powers that be turn a blind eye and deaf ear to all that; it was after all the rule, not the exception. On occasion, Dallas went so far as to be publicly critical of the party he represented. Perhaps the journalist in him yearned for that freedom of expression. 

All he received in return was not a patient hearing but a frown and a warning to keep his comments within the confines of the committee meetings.

Dallas did try to swim against the tide every now and then. At the last elections, he pledged not to use polythene in his campaign and conducted joint meetings with his rival candidates on the same platform. 

For this, his colleagues scoffed at him and he barely scraped through under the manaapa system. And this did not endear him to the party hierarchy either who saw him as too naïve and nebulous for the naughty world of politics.

In a world of suspense, intrigue, divided loyalties and blatant opportunism Dallas Alahapperuma was always an outsider looking in but not liking what he saw and never willing to try his hand at it. 

His wife, popular musician Pradeepa Dharmadasa once said that she married a journalist and not a Deputy Minister and that she would dearly like to have the journalist back.

Dallas himself says "I have only J.R.Jayewardene to thank now - for my parliamentary pension. I have nothing else". It is an irony that Dallas has had to acknowledge the benevolence of a man whose principles he despised. 

So, Dallas wrote an emotional letter of resignation and left the arena. That letter, written in Sinhala by Dallas the journalist rather than Dallas the politician mirrored the anguish he endured in the last few years and makes good preparatory reading for those wanting to enter this national sport of politics.

Dallas Alahapperuma has in recent times been the boy on the burning deck. But, unlike him, Dallas has chosen to leave because the heat is now unbearable. At least, Pradeepa has got her journalist back.-(Rajiv)