Gatekeeping, leadership struggles, dialectical tensions blighting political parties

By Vishvanath

Much-advertised efforts to bring the SJB and the UNP together to form an electoral alliance have failed, and the two parties are now planning to contest the upcoming local government (LG) polls separately under their own symbols. It was proposed during talks that they contest elections to the Colombo Municipal Council and other local government institutions adjacent to it, on the UNP ticket. The SJB was not amenable to the proposal. What prompted the two warring parties to try to form a coalition was their ability to defeat the ruling NPP in some cooperative society elections by joining forces; their victory has had an unsettling effect on the NPP. The Opposition held a protest in Minuwangoda, on Friday, claiming that the government had postponed the election to the cooperative society in the area for fear of suffering another defeat.

The Opposition parties naturally stand to gain when they contest elections as coalitions, for they can thereby prevent splits in the anti-government vote. They are at a disadvantage when they go it alone in elections. The ruling party gains when the Opposition parties contest elections separately. This is more so where the LG polls are concerned. In these contests, 60% of the local councilors are elected under the first-past-the-post system, and the others under the Proportional Representation system. However, there is no guarantee that the advantages gained from splits in the Opposition will help a government overcome negative consequences arising from certain factors such as the anti-incumbency sentiments among the public, unfulfilled promises, misuse of power, bad press, and adverse propaganda.

The chances of talks between the SJB and the UNP reaching fruition were remote. Not many expected the two parties to sink their differences. All issues that led to a split in the UNP in 2019 and the emergence of the SJB remain unresolved, the most important being a longstanding rivalries between UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe and his SJB counterpart Sajith Premadasa. Wickremesinghe does not want to give up the UNP leadership, much less play second fiddle to Premadasa, who is determined to lead any alliance to be formed with his party as its main constituent. However, there is the possibility of the two parties cooperating at the LG level after the polls. Many LG institutions are expected to be hung, due to the mixed representation system, and the NPP will not be able to muster the support of other parties in hung councils because it has condemned all of them as corrupt outfits.

The inner circles of Wickremesinghe and Premadasa are also not well-disposed towards the prospect of a coming together of the two parties for fear of losing their positions. They stand accused of having social media attacks carried out against the proponents of rapprochement. SJB National Organizer Tissa Attanayake pulled out of the talks on forming a grand alliance, claiming that he had become a victim of a devastating social media campaign conducted at the behest of some SJB seniors. He was referring to Premadasa’s inner circle, which is blamed for gatekeeping and toxic loyalty.

SJB MP Dr. Harsha de Silva is also reportedly unhappy because he feels undermined. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake sought to drive a wedge between SJB dissidents such as Harsha and the party leadership, during his budget speech in the parliament on Feb. 17. When Harsha said something critical of the budget, the President retorted, saying he could not grant what the former wanted. “Only Sajith can appoint the SJB’s Colombo District leader,” he said smilingly. SJB dissidents have alleged that a cabal in the party is preventing those who do not belong to it from securing key positions in the party.

Internal dynamics of political parties are known for their volatility due to ideological differences, competing ambitions, infighting, etc. They are therefore extremely difficult to manage even when political parties are ensconced in power and free from external problems.

There have been numerous instances where ruling parties imploded under the pressure of internal division. The UNP suffered a major split in 1951, when S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike left its government, sensing that Prime Minister D. S. Senanayake was grooming his son, Dudley, for the party leadership and the premiership. He formed the SLFP the following year and went on to become the Prime Minister in 1956. His party experienced crippling leadership struggles among the Bandaranaike family members subsequently, and they were responsible for the party’s prolonged stay in the political wilderness from 1977 to 1994.

In the early 1990s, the UNP government suffered a crippling split under President Ranasinghe Premadasa’s watch; a group of party heavyweights led by Lalith Athulathmudali and Gamin Dissanayake broke away and formed the Democratic United National Front, marking the beginning of the end of the UNP’s 17-year rule. The SLFP-led People’s Alliance government led by President Chandrika Kumaratunga collapsed due to an internal dispute, which led to mass crossovers in 2001. The SLFP-led UPFA government, which mustered a two-thirds majority, under President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s watch, collapsed in 2015 due to intraparty with the SLFP being split into two factions, one backing newly-elected President Sirisena and the other supporting former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The SLPP government, formed in 2020, and led by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was also weakened by an internal division even before the onset of the current economic crisis.

The JVP, too, is no stranger to internal problems and breakaways. It has suffered several debilitating splits since its inception. Even Somawansa Amerasinghe, who stepped down as the JVP leader in 2014, left the party the following year and formed the People’s Servants Party. Many prominent JVP members like Lionel Bopage, Kelly Senanayake, Wimal Weerawansa, Nandana Gunathilake, and Kumar Gunaratnam broke have with it over the years. The JVP-led NPP is believed to be experiencing dialectical tensions and ideological differences. One sees hardly any difference between the NPP’s 2025 Budget and the previous ones presented by governments led by the SLFP and the UNP, which the JVP berated as regimes that had espoused neoliberal agendas of the West. The JVP old guard has not taken kindly to this policy sea change, which is antithetical to its core Marxist ideology. The Opposition harps on this fact as part of its wedge strategy. Some political commentators have claimed that the JVP has had four of its full-time cadres appointed to each ministry to ensure that its political interests are served. Such a strategy is bound to leave the non-JVP politicians in the government resentful and have a deleterious effect on the unity of the ruling alliance.