The wave of popularity that came with the ending of the war has been sustained and easily converted into political gain by the politician that is Mahinda Rajapakse. The President has helped to sustain that popularity by calling various elections. By involving not only himself but also political heavyweights including various allies, the President has all but kicked off not only the Presidential campaign but the parliamentary elections too.

The ruling party’s seriousness of their campaign for example in the provincial elections in the Moneragala / Uva area is a case in point. The elections there are anything but provincial. A steady stream of political heavyweights have visited the area not just in support of chief ministerial aspirant Sashi Rajapakse but for electioneering in general. The list so far includes Dulles Alahapperuma, Wimal Weerawansa, Basil Rajapakse, Jagath Pushpakumara, Wijeyamuni Soysa, Duminda Dissanayaka, Rajitha Senaratna and Anura P. Yapa amongst others.

We can expect the same intensity of campaigning now that the Southern Provincial elections too have been called. And thereafter it will be the mother of all elections, the presidential followed by parliamentary polls. The next few weeks will also reveal the political path that is being custom designed for presidential off spring Namal.

It is now understood that Namal will attempt to make his way to parliament rather than from the Southern Provincial Council — the Rajapakse stronghold.

The UNP and its political allies are meanwhile discussing the formalities and modalities of the Grand Alliance. A senior member said that the presidential election in any event does not need to be called till 2011 and the likely candidate will be announced when a firm announcement has been made. The UNP may find – if they follow that line – that the President will all too easily use that to his advantage by maximising the mileage he is now getting and then announcing a date.

Too late

By that time, it may be too late for the UNP candidate. It beggars belief that they take the cue and campaign relentlessly — pocket meeting for pocket meeting — official announcements notwithstanding. Stating that the UNP was ready “at any time for elections” is not going to convince even the most diehard party supporter. The UNP leader will need to dig deeper into the kitty as it is quite clear that funds will be needed in ever increasing sums to overcome the UFPA campaign blitz. Towards this end the UNP Colombo District Leader Ravi Karunanayake kicked off his campaign on Thursday, collecting funds from the grassroots whilst enrolling new members.

UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe it appears is keen to be the party candidate at the presidential elections – whether as a common candidate or of his party. This comes as a new twist in that it was taken for granted that the leader was more prone to allow his Deputy Karu Jayasuriya to be the candidate. By doing so Wickremesinghe can control his antagonists, and preside over nominations for parliamentary and presidential elections.

Astrologically too, Wickremesinghe is predicted to have a ‘good period’ in parliament about the time polls are likely to be called. The UNP did appoint 16 new organisers and with 15 more to be appointed by September, the entire countrywide grassroot apparatus will be covered.

The UNP has for long lobbied that the sheer number of elections in this country has a serious impact: cost to taxpayers, pressure on state resources and has a huge sociological impact. As a way out they have espoused the cause of combining elections. The delay in the opposition parties formulating a common strategy has meant that the defence of their traditional voter base is at peril — and therefore compromising the chances of ensuring a powerful performance at the polls.

The UNP has this past week been attacking the government on the issue of the hedging crisis and trying to focus on the IMF loan conditions. Whilst this is welcome news from the main opposition party, the significance of their actions have not been entirely lost on the public: there has been no comment on the issues of the LMS and Sri Lanka Insurance cases, both of which are very much in the news and may even be subject of further action on the grounds that some of the judgements maybe flawed.

The paradox here is that it has been left to a Presidential adviser and political ally helped by a professional fraud investigator to uncover and bring justice to these important privatisations – carried out under the watch of then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Public interest litigation could have been a key focus for the opposition given the iniquitous and flawed nature of these transactions, to borrow a phrase from the former Chief Justice. The public was absorbed in the litigation and it demonstrated the level of national interest. It is yet another opportunity that the opposition has missed.

In a key development, the Attorney General’s attempt to strike out the actions of litigator Nihal Sri Ameresekere has had its own silver lining: had the AG been successful, the key affidavits now making its way to the Supreme Court would have been back peddled and suppressed – leaving out key information vital to the cause of saving the treasury around US$ 800 million.

Yet apart from the presence of MP Ravi Karunanayake at the Supreme Court during these hearings, the public have not credited – rightly so – the opposition for having brought these matters into focus.

Opposed

Internationally the British and US governments both opposed the granting of the IMF facility to Sri Lanka, citing what they perceive to be Sri Lanka’s inaction on various matters. Much to the delight of the government in Colombo, however, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF Managing Director, said this week that the lender had agreed preliminary terms with the Sri Lankan Government after four months of talks.

The $2.5 billion agreed is $600 million more than Sri Lanka originally asked for and US$ 322 million was released immediately leading to speculation amongst the financial community whether the nation’s balance of payments were in more serious trouble than publicised. Yet the government was hard pressed and had to bite the bitter pill and agree to conditions laid down by the IMF.

It was Ravi Karunanayake who held a press conference at Cambridge Terrace to explain the ground realities of the IMF conditions. “The IMF loan is to be given in tranches because the Fund would monitor tri-monthly, the progress and the compliance of the conditions agreed to,” he said. “We said that borrowing on commercial terms to boost local political mileage will not do and to go to traditional lenders such as the IMF. Now the government has been forced to do so which is good but within the next 20 months Sri Lanka cannot borrow more than Rs 1750 billion, to use funding for specified purposes in addition to turning Petroleum Corporation and the CEB into profit making ventures. As a result prices of petrol and power to consumers will be increased drastically after all the elections,” he added.

Meanwhile 26 ambassadors including those from the European nations met with UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe and Karunanayake on Thursday at his private office. The discussion centred around the views of the opposition on the political proposals in relation to the IDPs and the confrontational stand of the government towards the West in addition to lawyers being threatened through official web sites. Dr Jayalath Jayawardena said that lawyers appearing for him too were under threat.

Not since President D.B. Wijetunga who hailed from Kandy has a president spent so much time continuously in the Central Province. Countering perhaps charges that development is mainly in the south, the President last week spent a number of days in Kandy. Why playing host to many a political event, he also found time to showcase some of the ongoing development work in the province.

The opening of a new bridge in Katugastota saw the easing of severe congestion in that part of Kandy. The foundation stone was laid by Rajapakse when he was a minister in the Kumaratunga administration and much ado was made on its opening by the Chief Executive.

In an interesting twist in the political arena former UNP Chairman and Ranil confidant Malik Samarawickrema had a one on one meeting with the President at his official residence in Kandy last Sunday. Malik drove in by himself without so much as a security check for a two hour private tete a tete. “It was a discussion centred around rugby, GSP + and nothing more,” said Samarawickrema to this column.

Speculation

Be that as it may, speculation was rife for had any other UNPer met with the President, particularly one of Malik Samarawickrema’s ranking in the UNP a mini war would have erupted and rumour would have abounded on the possibility of another crossover in the offing. Though Malik Samarawickrema is not an active politician, he is regarded in the UNP as one of the closest to Ranil Wickremesinghe’s Think Tank. Was there more to this meeting than meets the eye?

The President meantime continued to attract many pledges of support from a cross section of the public. Various artistes including Saman de Silva who was a former UNP candidate has pledged support for the President. Chandralekha and Rukantha Gunathilaka have returned from the US but have made no attempt to sight the UNP headquarters or its leader who was a fan of theirs.

The nightingale of cinema, Malini Fonseka has been seen at various functions attended by the President as has Latha Walpola and the voice modulation trainer Anoja Weerasingha, who is said to be more into meditation now.

Japanese envoy the former Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda arrived in Colombo to represent the Japanese government at the opening of the Sigiriya Museum built with Japanese funds. His visit is an important one with Japan being one of the largest donors to Sri Lanka. At a dinner to felicitate Fukuda, amongst the guests were Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, Rohitha Bogollagama, and G.L. Peiris. Not far from them seated in cosy conversation were senior members of the judiciary including Justice Balapatabendi. Others present included Upul  Jayasuriya, Wijedasa Rajapaksa and Ronald Perera.

State visit

The Prime Minister of Bahrain Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa, paid a state visit and kept hopes of greater bonds of friendship alive by signing a number of MOUs. The State of Bahrain is set to assist Sri Lanka in a variety of ways. Significantly the Bahraini Prime Minister spoke of the need to have skilled labour in place. In view of the schedule of some members of Cabinet the weekly meeting was postponed to Thursday.

Thursday saw the President in the Chair at the Cabinet meeting. He immediately brought his colleagues up to speed on the IMF loan. Giving details on how the voting went, he said that Sweden had openly said that despite the incident involving the non-issuance of a visa for their Foreign Minister, they were voting for Sri Lanka. The Netherlands wished to voice no opinion saying if they did they would be unable to abstain; Japan and the United Kingdom vehemently opposed the loan; the United States had two schools of thought: the State Department saying that despite various issues Sri Lanka merited having the loan and the US Treasury saying no, so the USA abstained.

India was most vociferous in its support. Sri Lanka, Mother India has said, simply must be given this loan – if Sri Lanka was not they (the Indians) would have to start talking from Red Indian times till now and went on to say that if this loan was not given then India would have to extend the same loan to Sri Lanka.

Proposal

Thereafter the Cabinet discussed a paper on fishing. A foreign company wished to carry out slicing fish and then to export as well as retail into the local market. The President wished to know if the company was going to fish just internationally or also locally. Felix Perera assured him it was internationally. The President however wanted his Minister to undertake a study as to what the cross benefits were, to compare the revenue this company would generate for Sri Lanka and compare the malnutrition levels and the cost of that.

The President did not wish for this company to fish on such an extensive scale that there would be a scarcity of fish for the local market driving up the prices and the exercise would be counter productive. The President also told his colleagues that in Aceh, Indonesia the government did not permit any international fishing companies as they were worried about the malnutrition and opportunities for the local people. The President appeared to have been well briefed perhaps by the Basil Rajapakse – Dhammika Perera duo, who as we revealed some weeks ago, visited Aceh together.

They then discussed a paper on material for school uniforms. The President said that it was essential that there is uniformity and that it would not do for the contract to be given to two parties. He suggested that Kumar Welgama negotiate with the group of locals doing this business to reduce the price to keep in line with the price that can be got direct from the Chinese Embassy.

At this point Dr. Rajitha Senaratna wished to be excused from the meeting as he wanted to attend an event in Beruwela. The President promptly cautioned all that the security situation is still very much alive and that quantities of arms and weapons have been found and urged ministers not to travel at night. The President however, also spoke about the international community’s condemnation of activities in the last stages of the war, including allegations that LTTE cadres were killed when trying to surrender.

He told the ministers that Thirunavakarasu who was now writing from India on the ‘Final Days of Prabhakaran,’ had debated with Prabhakaran about the issue of surrender. Prabhakaran had told him that if people didn’t wish to fight they could go back but he would not be surrendering and that this in itself was proof that the LTTE did not wish to surrender but wished to continue the war to a conclusion.

According to the President, a TNA MP who was given leave by parliament was responsible for trying to patch up the feud between the LTTE’s chief weapons supplier KP and Castro.

To add to Minister Fowzie’s woes was the trouble in Beruwela amongst Islamic factions. The entire village had given themselves up to the police in an attempt to show solidarity with their own leader who had been arrested, causing chaos due to the sheer numbers. Fowzie had tried to mediate and the factions after having a meal with Fowzie and listening to his ‘stern directives’ to allow each man to practise his own faith, have not returned to take up his offer to appoint a committee comprising all sides.

Report

Diplomatic observers were abuzz over a newspaper report (not this newspaper) that current High Commissioner for India in Sri Lanka Alok Prasad would be leaving his substantive post prematurely. Speaking to this column High Commissioner Prasad said “I am unaware of any such move.”

Tourism and the Hikkaduwa Beach Festival were in the news even before the event got started. With Mangala Samaraweera making overtures about the government ban on ‘Adult Only’ films, he wished to know from the Media Minister what exactly his stand was – stating that not since the Taliban had such draconian measures come into force. Samaraweera voiced fears that Sri Lanka would dip into an abyss of fundamentalism.

The Media Minister clarified his stance saying this was not a blanket ban as such. Hikkaduwa though refused to come away from the news. The event is keenly looked forward to by the youth of this country not just from Colombo but from places as far away as Tangalle and Trincomalee too. And this in itself lends some credence to charges that the Ministry has not looked into the complaints of drug usage, sex and nudity on the beaches from last year.

Minister Mustapha was in the thick of things with a local alcohol license holder threatening dire consequences as he was not amongst the chosen few this year and that the alcohol concession had been granted to someone other than the local licence holder. So much so that the Cabinet Minister did not even attend the opening event. Trouble is never far away when sun, sand, song and sex beckons.