Sunday Times 2
The failed impeachment putsch against President Premadasa: The inside story
View(s):In 1989, with the Presidency already in its pocket, the UNP was well placed to emerge as the winner in the Parliamentary election. The opposition was divided and bereft of its chief vote getter Vijaya Kumaratunga who had been murdered by the JVP in 1987. The big question therefore was who was to be the Prime Minister in the forthcoming Premadasa Cabinet?
In the Presidential election Premadasa had skilfully exploited the rivalry of Gamini and Lalith by indicating that the harder campaigner between them would be considered for the post of PM. Partly for this reason, and also because they were dedicated UNPers, the two aspirants threw themselves into the presidential campaign and garnered a large number of votes in their bailiwicks for Premadasa.
They were then asked to win their electoral districts in the Parliamentary election with large majorities so as to be considered for higher office. Both undertook this task with gusto, but Lalith appeared to be leading because his base was in the Colombo district which was numerically superior to Gamini’s Nuwara Eliya district. It was at this time that Gamini decided to contest Kandy district in the future to ensure a wider support base to propel his vaulting ambition.
Author Sarath Amunugama (extreme right) with DUNF leaders Lalith Athulathmudali, Gamini Dissanayake, and other UNP dissidents
While President Premadasa shrewdly kept the younger contenders in the fight we received disconcerting news from time to time that he was also looking for other options. Before nominations were concluded he brought in DB Wijetunga, who had been relegated to the wilderness as the Governor of North Western province by JRJ, to contest from the Kandy district.
Premadasa supported Wijetunga’s campaign with enough funds and instructed him to make sure that he came first in the UNP list from Kandy come what may. Both Lalith and Gamini received secret information about these designs but there was little they could do except to exert themselves even more to gather votes to impress the new President.
Impeachment
The tale of the Premadasa impeachment has not yet been fully told. There are so many angles and versions to this episode that it has a “Rashomon” like quality with each participant presenting his own version of the event that is often at odds with the recollections of others. I will attempt to describe the evolving scenario mostly from the vantage point of Lalith and Gamini who were bamboozled by the Speaker Mohamed and had their political futures irrevocably compromised. I will narrate those events as they unfolded before my eyes.
One day in August 1991, I received an urgent telephone call from Gamini saying that he and Wickreme Weerasooria were on their way to my home in Siripa Road to discuss an important matter. Gamini had the habit of dropping in on his friends at short notice to discuss political and personal matters.
On this day we went to my office room and Gamini asked me whether in my opinion he could trust Lalith on a serious political matter. I was not taken aback since the evening before I had been with some friends at the Eighty Club and there had been whispers of a crisis in the Cabinet though nobody really knew what it was all about. I replied that Lalith was an ambitious and able politician and that it would be difficult to fight him. On the other hand if he was to be a partner in a political venture he would be an indefatigable and effective comrade in arms. This seemed to satisfy Gamini and Wickreme and they confided in me about the impeachment process that had been launched.
From then on till their betrayal by the Speaker, I was in the know of the details of the impeachment attempt which
was unique in the annals of our modern history.
Background
The background to the impeachment attempt was Premadasa’s impatience to mould the UNP into a party in his own image. This was reasonable in that he had loyally long served the party in various capacities and had saved the UNP from disaster by his heroic efforts in winning the Presidency. This was followed by the UNP victory under his leadership in the succeeding Parliamentary election. He then characteristically lost no time in attempting to make the UNP more democratic and efficient.
A long tenure since 1977 during which JRJ had permitted his MPs to earn money by way of liquor licences, permits to open petrol sheds, allocation of import quotas, allocating of lands under the Land Reform Commission and all manner of other “deals” had alienated them from their voters. The new President wanted “fresh blood”, preferably of those personally loyal to him, to come into the grass roots organisations of the party. For example under JRJ party branches could be set up only by the relevant party organiser who usually was the MP. Premadasa allowed the formation of party branches without the imprimatur of the MP cum organiser. This led to much heartburn as party branches sprang up, often times in opposition to the MP. A test case was that of the Speaker’s son Hussein Mohamed who made no attempt to nurse his electorate but depended on his father to pull his political chestnuts out of the fire. Premadasa, for whatever reason, pounced on him and wanted him removed from the organisership of the Borella electorate. In fact Lalith Athulathmudali, as district leader, was nominated to hold an inquiry into Hussein’s inefficiency and lethargy. Hussein was a bit of a joke among the party leaders due to his uncritical worship of his father. His nickname was “Daddy told” because he would begin every sentence with “Daddy told” much to the amusement of his colleagues. The bond between father and son was very strong.
The Speaker, who was a party senior and former UNP Mayor of Colombo,referred to the new President without much respect. The upshot of this hostility was that Mohamed spent time in studying the constitutional provisions regarding the impeachment of an incumbent President. This was article 38 of the Constitution which had not been studied with any enthusiasm by MPs during the JRJ Presidency.
The Constitution gave considerable discretion to the Speaker. If more than half the number of MPs supported a motion for the impeachment of the President for prescribed reasons he could launch proceedings on the lines set out culminating in the dismissal of the incumbent after an inquiry and the passage of a motion with a two third majority. Once he accepted the impeachment notice with the support of half the number of MPs the President was precluded from dissolving Parliament by article 70[i]c.
Mohamed’s first masterstroke was to draw Mrs. Bandaranaike into his grand design. She was smarting under her defeat to Premadasa who had used harsh words on her, and her son Anura, in Parliament which she found difficult to accept.
Perhaps an even more important development was that the new President had set a cracking pace after he was elected and was cutting into her electoral base. By emphasising the need to get the IPKF out of Sri Lanka he had taken over the main demand of the SLFP and the JVP. Moreover given his opposition to Indian policies from the time of JRJ he had gained credibility among the Sinhala voters who had earlier backed the SLFP.
Modus Operandi
The biggest challenge was to keep the impeachment project a secret while at the same time coopting a majority of signatories as required by law. Nihal Seneviratne who was the Secretary General to the House in his book “A Clerk Reminisces” refers to this; ‘’Anil Moonesinghe MP walked into my room and sat down. He opened his conversation by saying “Nihal, you will be at the centre of a big controversy very soon.” I was quite puzzled by this remark and asked him, “why me of all people”? Anil smiled and said, “You will know soon” and walked out of my room”. Keeping this secret was almost a superhuman effort as MPs are loose tongued and apt to run to their chiefs with the latest information to score brownie points. So it is likely that some were not told the truth before they signed the petition. The ‘’modus operandi’’ was to entrust the collection of signatures to a few trusted “conspirators” who were then to ensure that their quota of members would be roped in. The main “collectors” were Lalith and Gamini from the UNP, Anuruddha Ratwatte and Anura for the SLFP and the Speaker for the rest. It is said that the Speaker over-dramatised the situation by kissing his set of signatories on both cheeks and offering them refreshments in the Speaker’s chamber. It need hardly be said that this was not a conduct in keeping with the traditional responsibilities of a Speaker of Parliament. All the while he was egging on Lalith and Gamini by frequently telephoning them and assuring them that everything was going according to plan. Actually it was not so though the plotters were optimistic. Mrs. B gave her full support and her confidence in Gamini and Lalith was complete though they were in different parties.
Once there was panic when Stanley Tillekeratne, who was inching ever closer to Premadasa, demanded to see the petition and even wanted to take it home for further study. Mrs. B adroitly evaded the issue though Stanley had already alerted Premadasa regarding some challenge to his authority. Each conspirator had a separate sheet of paper on which their designated MPs would sign. Later many of them alleged that they were asked to sign a blank sheet in the hope that they were asking for a salary increase.
This may have been a lame excuse after their efforts failed and they had to face a future with a revengeful President. However as a friend of Gamini I shared the incoming information in “real time” which at that stage appeared to be satisfactory. Gamini was in constant touch with Lalith and Mohamed. Little did he, and by the same token we his supporters, know of what was really going on. A huge drama of intrigue and betrayal was about to begin.
Speaker’s Letter
As planned the Speaker addressed a letter to the President stating that he had accepted a motion of impeachment presented to him by more than half the number of MPs and therefore section 38 of the constitution was now brought into play. This letter was brought by the President to the Cabinet which proceeded unanimously to declare their confidence in Premadasa. At this meeting Lalith and Premachandra who were Cabinet ministers at that time had also voted in favour of a confidence vote in the President though by this time they had affixed their signatures to the motion referred to by the Speaker. Let us listen to Nihal Seneviratne to get Premadasa’s reaction;” He [the President] asked “Nihal have you seen this impeachment motion?” I replied, “which impeachment motion, Sir?” He replied saying Speaker Mohamed had sent him a few hours earlier a motion of impeachment against him. I was quite categorical and said that I had not seen it at all, which was the truth… I realised that the Speaker had sent him the motion by hand without showing it to me”.
The following day the President summoned all his party MPs to the Parliament building and spoke to them individually. Predictably most of them denied that they signed any such document or said that they were misled. Since the acceptance of the motion meant that the President was precluded from dissolving Parliament he used his right to prorogue Parliament and resummoned it at a later date [September 21st] thereby gaining time to reverse the impeachment process.
In the meanwhile he, with his usual thoroughness, identified Mohamed as the “brains” behind the move and began a series of behind the scenes activities to “torpedo” the motion. According to Nihal Seneviratne he [the President] is even believed to have advised a royal dignitary in the Middle East to refrain from supporting some of the Islam-related projects that the Speaker was sponsoring here. The Speakers family was also known to have owned a company importing motor cars from India.
It was believed that the President had asked the Inland Revenue department to check and scrutinise all documents pertaining to that business. Perhaps all this was in progress when the Speaker announced a more nuanced position to Parliament that ‘‘I wish to inform the House that I have been given notice of a resolution under article 38[2] of the constitution. Having satisfied myself that the resolution is in order I decided to entertain it. Subsequently written and oral representations have been made to me questioning the validity of the signatures on the resolution. I am looking into this matter at present. My decision will be conveyed to the House soon”.
Even at this time Lalith and Gamini had faith in the Speaker because he was sending message after message to them that he was standing unequivocally with them. But at the same time we were receiving information that Mohamed was changing horses in midstream. Gamini was for trusting the Speaker but Lalith was beginning to have doubts as there was a flow of information–some from the Speakers household itself–that a “conspiracy was afoot”. Seneviratne refers to Lalith’s consternation; I asked him Lalith, “why are you rocking the boat?” His instant reply was, “don’t ask me that question. Address it to your Speaker. I was surprised but remained silent.”
In the meanwhile the Speaker made ready to visit New Delhi for a meeting of the Inter Parliamentary Union. This naturally added to the tension as both parties were now depending on him to make the next move. If the conspirators were more perceptive they would have been suspicious with a development that Seneviratne describes thus; “We [the Speaker included] had not received permission from the President to leave the country. Soon after, the President rang me and said to inform the Speaker and members of the delegation that he had given permission for the delegation to proceed to India which we did”.The plotters should have smelt a rat because usually Premadasa was very vindictive in his responses to his opponents. But Gamini, in my presence,spoke several times to Mohamed by phone and appeared to be satisfied that the impeachment was on track.
Enter Thondaman
But as Gamini learned later to his cost, Mohamed had already succumbed to Premadasa before he emplaned for Delhi though he kept it a secret and was giving assurances to the contrary to the conspirators. I can now reveal that this “volte face”was engineered by Thondaman, the leader of the Ceylon Workers Congress in order to strengthen his alliance with the President. No doubt the inquiries about Mohamed’s business dealings had softened him up but it was Thondaman’s arguments that had clinched the deal.
The leader of the upcountry Tamils had pointed out that both he and Mohamed represented ethnic minorities which could not alienate the head of state, and certainly not a head like Premadasa,who enjoyed the confidence of the Sangha and the majority of Buddhist voters.
An infuriated President, argued Thondaman, could unleash a pogrom against the Muslims and Tamils if they were perceived as the leaders of an attempt to eliminate a Buddhist head of state. Whether he bought this argument or not Mohamed, whose electoral strength in his Borella constituency was in the hands of the Salagama caste members of Wanathamulla with whom Premadasa claimed kinship, yielded to Thondaman’s entreaties and agreed to switch sides.
To be fair by Mohamed he was also beginning to have doubts about the veracity of the numbers and signatures as provided to him by the sponsors, mainly Lalith and Gamini. He began, with increasing urgency,to demand the final list of sponsoring MPs even though he had gone out on a limb by accepting the motion and informing the President of its acceptance by him. Without the numbers his hands were tied and a constitutional crisis could have erupted adding to the strength of Thondaman’s doomsday scenario.
| Sarath Amunugama Autobiography
This installment delves into Amunugama’s experiences as a politician, providing a remarkably detailed and personal account of his times. Both scholars and general readers will find themselves engrossed by the key events described within, presented with Amunugama’s characteristic lucidity, provocative insights, and engaging wit. Having previously been at the nexus of significant historical moments as a university teacher, civil servant, and senior UNESCO official in Paris, Amunugama now turns his discerning eye to the political arena. Among the candid revelations, Amunugama recounts a particularly telling incident: “A series of blunders by CBK and MR, principally by appointing DM Jayaratne as a long-time agricultural minister, led to a reversal of all possibilities of food security in the country. When CBK proposed that he be moved to another ministry, Jayaratne threatened to jump out of the top story of the Presidential Palace. CBK gave in at the last moment and revised her list of Cabinet assignments.” This anecdote is just one example of the captivating, unvarnished perspectives that make this volume an essential read for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of Sri Lanka’s recent past. The Sunday Times publishes today excerpts from Chapter 3 that gives an indepth account on the impeachment crisis that shook the Premadasa presidency. | |
In the highly anticipated third volume of his memoirs, following “The Kandy Man” and “To Paris and Back,” Sarath Amunugama offers Sri Lankan readers an unparalleled “insider’s view” into a pivotal era of the island’s political history.