The National Organizer of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), Basil Rajapaksa, has broken his silence. Taking part in an interview with Derana TV, on Monday night, he spoke freely about the current political situation, what had gone wrong for the SLPP, and his party’s future plans. He fared considerably well in the interview, exuding confidence, and his answers can be thought to provide some insights into his strategic thinking.
Basil sought to make light of the fact that he could not contest elections owing to his dual citizenship, and made it clear that he would however remain active in national politics. Asked what he was doing politically at present, he said he was strengthening the SLPP electorally; popular support for the SLPP had to be turned into votes at elections, he said, likening his role to that of a cook. “There may be vegetables, fish, meat around, but there has to be a cook to knock up a meal, and that is what I am doing,” he said smilingly. This could be taken as a hint that the SLPP is preparing itself for an electoral contest.
The 21st Amendment, which bans dual citizens from holding political office, prevents Basil from contesting popular elections, and therefore some of his political rivals have sought to write him off, but others consider him to be the power behind the throne. When asked to comment on these contradictory views about his position in national politics, Basil said both were not without some truth in them. But going by the way he is controlling the SLPP, his political power is far from diminished despite his resignation from Parliament.
Asked why he had not given up his US citizenship to contest elections here, Basil said it was too early to answer that question, implying that he might consider doing so if the need for such a course of action arose. But, in the same breath, he referred to the predicament of his elder brother, Gotabaya, who had relinquished his US citizenship to become the President; Gotabaya had to resign due to public protests, and the implication of Basil’s evasive answer is that he will not make such a hasty decision. He stopped short of saying that he had tried to scuttle the 21st Amendment, which prohibits dual citizens from contesting elections, but his efforts had failed.
President Ranil Wickremesinghe seems to be doing as he pleases, but the SLPP is keeping hold of the reins of government. Basil said he had met President Wickremesinghe, a few days before over some matters; he added that he had requested the latter to continue with the measures that had been adopted to maintain law and order for the benefit of everyone, stabilize the economy without causing hardships to the public, and intervene to stop moves being made to weaken the SLPP. The President’s response had been positive, he said.
What prompted Basil to meet the President may have been to register his protest against the UNP’s alleged attempts to engineer crossovers from the SLPP parliamentary group. Some UNP seniors have hinted at the possibility of several government MPs joining the UNP, in time to come, and this may have caused serious concern to the SLPP. It is also possible that Basil makes it a point to meet the President from time to time to keep the latter reminded that he has to be mindful of the SLPP’s interests and concerns. The President with only a single UNP MP on his side is entirely dependent on the SLPP in the parliament, and has to do as the SLPP says.
Basil claimed, in answer to a question from the Derana interviewer, Sanka Amarajith, that there was no truth whatsoever in the media reports that he had intended to stay in the US until January 2023 but had cut short his stay due to some political exigencies here. He said he had not planned to stay abroad until mid-January, and he had returned to Sri Lanka after attending to some urgent matters in the US. However, the timing of his return suggests that he wanted to be here in time for the final vote on the budget 2023 to ensure that the government would have enough numbers in the House.
It is also possible that the government is not keen to go all out to postpone the Local Government (LG) elections again, because such a move is bound to be counterproductive, and Basil has come back earlier than expected to steer the SLPP’s polls campaign. The SJB, several other Opposition parties, the Nidahas Janatha Sabawa consisting of some SLPP dissidents have chosen to move the Supreme Court to direct the Election Commission to hold the LG polls without postponing them further.
That the SLPP and the UNP are trying to form an electoral alliance has now become clear. Basil corroborated the SLPP General Secretary Sagara Kariyawasam’s statement at a media briefing on Monday that the SLPP was thinking of coalescing with the UNP.
Basil said if the people wanted the SLPP to forge an alliance with the UNP, it would comply. It is not clear how he is going to ascertain public opinion on this issue.
The SLPP should not be held responsible for what the current administration is doing, Basil said in the Derana interview. This contention is puzzling. He has sought to bolster his argument by claiming that the SLPP elected Ranil Wickremesinghe as the President and is supporting him to achieve only two objectives—restoring the rule of law and putting the economy on an even keel. But the SLPP cannot absolve itself of responsibility for what the government is doing.
President alone cannot be considered the government. The party that controls the parliament runs the country for all practical purposes when the President’s party is without a parliamentary majority. The SLPP can always pull the plug on anything that President Wickremesinghe does against its wishes. All it has to do is to deprive him of a parliamentary majority and, therefore, there is no way it can claim that it should not be held responsible for what the government is doing; in fact, it itself is part of the government!
The President is constitutionally empowered to dissolve the parliament after next February and can leverage this power to tame the SLPP, but obviously he does not want to do so because the UNP is not ready to face an election anytime soon, and, above all, such a course of action could land him in a far worse situation in case of a party other than the SLPP capturing power in the parliament and placing itself on a coalition course with him. The chances of the UNP, which has only a single MP at present, obtaining 112 seats more, at a general election in the foreseeable future, to secure a working majority in the 225-member parliament, are remote. Some political commentators argue that President Wickremesinghe is likely to opt for an early presidential election, but it is too early for him to take such a huge political gamble; the UNP polled less than 250,000 votes (or less than 3% of the total number of valid votes) at the last general election.
Something that Basil said in the Derana interview on Monday is of special interest. Referring to Aragalaya, he said if the people had exercised patience, the current crisis could have bee resolved once and for all, months ago. A similar situation had arisen during the first term of Mahinda Rajapaksa, but it had been overcome as the public remained patient, he said, blaming some unnamed businessmen for having stoked the flames of public anger to advance their own agendas during Aragalaya. He rhetorically asked why the people were not protesting at present, and whether their lot had improved significantly during the past several months for them to refrain from taking to the streets.
Overall, what one has gathered from Basil’s answers to Sanka’s questions in the Derana interview is that he remains confident and optimistic that he will be able to turn the SLPP around, and he will not give up the fight; he is even ready to clear the constitutional hurdle in his path, if necessary. He seems to think that the SLPP will be able to outperform all other parties at the LG polls to be held although it may not be able to retain the same number of votes and seats. He is lying low and waiting till the time is opportune for a counterattack.
