The UNP's wrath, and Ranil's minority government
For the fortieth time, despite what has now become the routine nature of the exercise, some Sri Lankan political pundits had to be reminded what a minority government is. It is a single party, which cannot command a majority in the House in its own right. Minority governments are ones, which have to depend on coalition partners for their majority. Therefore definitely, the last Wickremesinghe UNF government was a minority government having 109 seats in its own right.

The rationale for the definition of "minority government'' as above, is that such a single party can be subject to the party whip, and therefore, at voting time will presumably vote together to ensure a majority of votes in the House. This ensures stability of government. Ranil Wickremesinghe's government did not have such a majority as a single party. Therefore, Ranil Wickremesinghe's TV appearance in which he sounded a piquant warning about the poor prospects for peace with a new "minority government" was funny. His government, which did two years of time, recently, was also one of those.

Clearly, neither Ranil Wickremesinghe nor a great many of his backers want to offer the new government any kind of honeymoon. Hence this kind of philippic on 'minority government,' conveniently forgetting his own. One reason for the denial of a honeymoon of course is that the UNF backers are angry. They feel their legitimate right to govern for six years, was curtailed unfairly by Executive fiat.

But that apart, what's also being seen, is the natural tendency of the mass of pro-Western liberal opinion going against a government which is clearly not of their own ideological persuasion. Translation: Most elite, particularly in Colombo, do not like any government which is not UNP.

This wrenching cry about a "minority'' government being unable to deliver the goods, or to create stability and continuity which is a precursor for peace, is symptomatic of such dislike. Minority governments may be more prone to instability, that's true. But with the last minority government being a UNP one, and all governments being minority governments since 1989, this can hardly be a grand tectonic shift in the national condition.

Most of the Colombo pundits have (wrongly) claimed that the last UNF government had an absolute majority. What they were in fact trying to say was that these minority governments such as the last UNP government, had coalitions which gave them an appearance of a majority.

But, such coalitions do not make a minority government a majority government, any more than any amount of writing by the Colombo elite does not change the definition of "minority government'' My last column also had something on these lines, but in the continuing trend, this certainly needs to be rubbed into Colombo's disappointed UNP sympathisers. (Caution: This is not to say I am a UPFA backer. This article is only an objective analysis.)

When the UNP government had a coalition arrangement with the SLMC to obtain a majority on any vote, this minority UNP government for all practical purposes was making use of a coalition partner to govern. Such a coalition partner can sit in the government benches or the opposition benches -- it does not make the slightest difference to the outcome. The fact that the SLMC sat with the UNF as a coalition partner did not give the UNF government an absolute majority.

The fact that the Jathika Hela Urumaya sits in the opposition and pledges to support the UPFA government does not give the UPFA government an absolute majority either -- but if their support is forthcoming, its the same as having the SLMC in government benches supporting the UNF to make up the numbers for a majority. For the fact is, the SLMC can quit the government it supports anytime - despite any formal arrangements to the contrary, as it once did with the PA government in 2001.

For practical purposes, such coalition arrangements though not changing the minority status of the government, pretend to have some hold on the collation partner because the coalition partners are given the inducement of Cabinet portfolios to encourage their staying in government. But as Hakeem proved in 2001, Cabinet portfolio or not, he can walk out of such a government -- and indeed he threatened to do so several times with the last Ranil Wickremesinghe government hence almost demolishing his much ballyhooed "majority'' (..which fact of course proves there is no such thing - its is only a minority that Wickremesinghe had.)

So, that nails the myth of "absolute majority.'' The people have exchanged one minority government for another at this election, despite Ranil Wickremesinghe's rather top-heavy verbiage to the contrary. What's important is to ensure these minority governments are able to obtain the support of their backers be they be sitting in government benches or in opposition benches. To this end, this government will have to appease the JHU monks and incorporate their policy, just as much as the previous government appeased the SLMC, and incorporated their policy. The UPFA's success will depend on how successfully this can be done -- to maintain their "majority'' in parliament.

Since some kind of understanding is developing between these two entities (UPFA and JHU) this may not be too difficult. What amazes this writer is the vehemence with which the Colombo pro Western liberal agit-prop machine is going on the attack, not being mindful of the kind of effect this would have on perceptions with regard to business and economy. Panic mongering can easily have a run on business and entrepreneurial capital. This is perhaps exactly what these pro UNP cabals want.

To point to the reality and by so doing to discount this panic as I do, is not to hold a brief for this government. It is to extend to this government at least the courtesy of its honeymoon. Second, and much more importantly, it is to say: come off it, there may be more good than bad in this change, if one has the magnanimity and the prescience to look for the good instead of the bad.

Tisaranee Gunasekera writes in the Island that part of the reason for the Wickremesinghe UNP's downfall was its mistake in forgetting the microeconomic welfare measures of previous UNP governments. This is a correct analysis - - and the present government has promised to kick-start welfare, and put more money in people's pockets.

Now, all this may go contrary to the IMF and World Bank diktat, which Wickremesinghe and his rich boys club followed like the pro American pro Bretton Woods poodles they were. (Imagine Moragoda saying so much as boo to the pro American, World Bank synthesised, neo-Liberal dominant ideology of the day?) But going contrary to the IMF diktat is not bad for the economy. It can be good on the contrary -- as leaders such as Mahathir Mohamed have shown with the courage of their actions.

How wrong the IMF and World Bank policies can be, is for this writer at least, best ascertained in the words of economist John Kenneth Galbraith. Writes Galbraith "the people of numerous poor countries have frequently heard from their presumptively more advanced mentors in economically more advanced lands that they should be patient about social reform, with all its disturbing and even revolutionary implications, and concentrate on increasing production. It can be remarkably inappropriate advice. Reform is not something that can be made to wait on productive advance. It may be a prerequisite to such advance.''

Galbraith explains that the conventional wisdom of the liberals of enriching the capitalists while neglecting the worker never worked, leading to greater reformist measures which eventually put money in people's pockets and therefore moved markets, increased production and made the economy jump. But, now we have the neo-liberals, the IMF and the World Bank Brahmins, who want to stop all welfare, and impose more taxes on the poor presumably as a spur to production.

The answer: more social unrest, and less production, and more unemployment, as Galbraith explains. It is a good idea, therefore if Colombo's Cassandras headed by Jayadeva Uyangoda himself, forget their pro Western Liberal panaceas and help achieve a consensus in society, by (a) not writing off the new government (b) maybe helping its reformist initiatives such as better social welfare and a new constitution, by encouraging consensus building on such issues with the UNP.

As Galbraith states also, people time and again changed governments when their economic mentors said the best systems were those that increase production by concentrating capital in the hands of a few. This people's resistance led to reform - and welfare, which in turn led incrementally to a rise in production and to the remarkable affluence achieved in the developed world.

If this government turns its back on neo liberalism, particularly the Moragoda-type rich man's neo-liberalism, business should cheer them on. Contrary to conventional wisdom such polices will increase production -- which will make all businessmen deliriously happy. But for this happy outcome, they should give the government a fair chance.

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