Sandhya Ravishankar :
WHEN SRI Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced snap polls in November 2014, he was all set to cruise through to the finale. His third-term was taken to be a cakewalk, especially with the apex court paving the way for it. Just over a month later, the mood is one of tension within the Rajapaksa camp. They are not sure of a landslide sweep as in the previous years.
The common candidate for the Opposition Maithripala Sirisena is garnering more support as he campaigns across the length and breadth of the island nation. The polls are stacked to be neck to neck. The battle will be to the finish, say political hawks in Sri Lanka. “People want change, but what change means is not clear to them. Surveys say 17 per cent of Sri Lankans may abstain from voting,” said Sumanasiri Liyanage, academic and well-known political economist.
“People in the rural areas may go with Rajapaksa because they feel he has done a lot for them. So maybe they will give Rajapaksa another chance. We don’t know what stance Sinhala Buddhist voters will take. If more than 50 per cent vote for Rajapaksa, Sirisena doesn’t stand a chance. But if it is 50-50, then Sirisena has an edge,” he added. Srilankan Tamils in the North have thrown in their weight on the side of the Presidential hopeful with the Tamil National Alliance coming out in support of Sirisena. 11.2 per cent of the Sri Lankan population is Tamil. Muslim political outfits in the East too have ditched Rajapaksa to go with Sirisena. 9.71 per cent of the population is Muslim as per the 2012 census. These numbers appear to give Sirisena an edge over his rival.
One of the key issues in this high pitched election campaign is Rajapaksa himself. In urban areas, corruption and an iron rule by Rajapaksa’s family is an issue that people are expected to vote against. “Amongst urban voters rule of law is a big problem – a judiciary that is not independent is a big problem,” says Victor Ivan, senior political journalist. “Young people know the size of corruption and are sick of family-ruled politics. If they want a job they have to go through Namal Rajapaksa (Mahinda Rajapaksa’s son) – what is this? Even ethnic groups, Muslims, feel there needs to be a change,” he saya.
The Rajapaksas have grown in size and power within government. Mahinda’s elder brother Chamal is speaker of Parliament and younger brothers Gotabaya and Basil are Defence Secretary and Minister of Economic Development respectively. Mahinda’s son Namal Rajapaksa is a Member of Parliament, while a host of brothers in law, cousins and nephews hold key positions within government committees and state-owned banks and airlines. Allegations of corruption by the ruling family have bent the back of Rajapaksa’s campaign. Suppression of the free press too has not gone unnoticed.
In rural areas, the issues are more basic – price rise, unemployment and dispossession of land. “In rural areas of the South, most young men joined the army because they couldn’t find another job,” says trade union leader Anton Marcus. “Majority of women in rural areas were pushed to come to urban areas and work in garment factories. Now factories are not attractive because salaries are so low – US $74 per month in Sri Lanka as opposed to US $78 in other Asian countries. Conditions of work are very bad – there are 30,000 vacancies in this industry. Rural young women have been pushed to go abroad working as house maids under terrible conditions. But they prefer to go there because there are no other alternatives in the country,” he said.
As the battle for votes enters its last phase, before the country goes to polls on January 8, campaigns have deteriorated into mud-slinging rhetoric and even violence in some instances. Maithripala Sirisena’s rally in Pelmadulla was attacked with people throwing stones at him while he was speaking onstage on Friday.
The candidates themselves have not differed much in their manifestoes on the question of economic policy, although foreign policy is likely to be drastically different if the regime changes. “Both candidates’ economic policy is the same – it is a neo liberal policy,” says Sumanasiri Liyanage. “Sirisena probably would lean more towards the West than to China. Rajapaksa is very pro-Chinese. Both will keep India close due to geographical compulsions,” he said. Sirisena has announced that former President Ranil Wickremasinghe, known for his close US ties, would be his Prime Minister if elected. Sirisena, who initially promised to abolish the Executive Presidential system which gives overarching powers to the President of the country, is now seen as wavering on the issue.
“The election is happening in a crucial situation because both candidates are talking about Executive Presidency – sometimes they say they will amend, sometimes abolish, it is all very confusing,” says Anton Marcus. “Srilanka is suffering due to Executive Presidency. Using this system they have weakened Opposition and tried to get rid of trade union movement. Using Executive Presidency system the current President brought in the 18th Amendment which destroyed an independent judiciary, the police commission and human rights commissions. Due to the civil war the whole society is militarised and there is no civil society as such in Sri Lanka. We feel that there are no citizens in Sri Lanka, only subjects,” he opined.
“There is no going back from here,” says Victor Ivan. “The people have a deep understanding of what went wrong from 1948 to now. None of our politicians thought of bringing people together. Now the society understands what went wrong. They want a lot of reforms in Sri Lanka. It will be a start of a big change in Sri Lankan society,” he adds.
As the battle of the ballot enters its final phase, one thing is for sure. The victor has a plate full of reforms that need to be implemented immediately. Pro-poor economic policies, reforms in governance and de-militarisation of the North are now issues that no new leader of the Pearl in the Indian Ocean can avoid anymore.
(Sandhya Ravishankar is a freelance journalist)
