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Out
of a hung Parliament The end result - a split nation, a hung Parliament and a minority government. Just as we thought and as our pollsters said last week. The conduct of the election itself, at long last, has been exemplary and four reasons have been attributed for it. - that political power at the centre was shared between the two main parties ( a plus-point for cohabitation government), the independent Police Commission, the greater powers vested with the Elections Commission and voter-fatigue. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's United National Front has clearly lost the election in the south. Their vote from the last election has eroded by quite a large chunk of votes. He is however entitled to see if he can garner the support from the minority parties and have an effective majority in Parliament, however workable or otherwise it's going to be. This will no doubt be resisted by the President and her Alliance which has won more seats in the 'south', but Sri Lanka is not just the 'south' and the President has upto April 22 to call upon the MP whom she thinks can muster the majority of the Sri Lanka Parliament and ask him or her to be the Prime Minister. Unfortunately for the incumbent Prime Minister he was unable to market his achievements, but also, his government's insensitivity to the needs of the common voter, catering to the many corrupt fat cats of business playing both sides of the field, hoping that they could deliver the goods through a trickle down effect. No doubt President Kumaratunga robbed him and his government of a six-year mandate and this will be another chapter written into the country's history. The Prime Minister's long-term interests in the economy, in peace with the separatists, and in the country in general have been sacrificed at the altar of the President's political expediency. The President staked her political future in calling for this election. And she has, in a sense, made matters worse confounded in so far as political stability goes. Having successfully wiped out the UNF's absolute majority in the old Parliament, she has been unable to win an absolute majority herself in the new Parliament. As we predicted last week, the backstage negotiations had already begun from the early hours of last morning even as the results were still pouring in. Promises of support and inducements of a varied nature were on offer to all and sundry, especially in the smaller parties, just to string together a majority in Parliament and a Government that will be wobbly as ever. The Buddhist monks have crashed into the political arena with a bang riding on a wave of voter disillusion with both major coalitions, a sad and telling indictment by itself. Out of this pot-pourri emerges a familiar call, ignored by the political leaders of our times. The need is for the major parties to get together. For what we have inherited from this election is a hung Parliament and the Premier trying suicidally to form a Government with the minorities and the President to form a minority Government. |
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