Hanging Together to Govern Together?

As suspected, at least by some, the two main partners of the coalition government are pledged to stick together till the next election in 2020. The chief argument advanced is stability to ensure investor confidence and the governance reform project to redeem the pledges made to the electorate in the two national elections in 2015. 

Underlying this commitment to each other is also a political interdependence, an acknowledgement that they need each other to secure the basic political objective of staying in power and holding onto it thereafter. The partnership in operation has not been ideal, worked some of the time and seemed not to at others. Some still insist that partnership is a misnomer – politics is a zero-sum game and in this alliance one side is bound to come out better off than the other. There are those who contend that the SLFP has got a better deal as far as the ministries are concerned – ironical, since the references to the government as a UNP- dominated one are more frequent – and those who warn that the continuation of the partnership would result in the SLFP being swallowed up by the UNP or in the perception of the public, changed beyond recognition and core beliefs.   

Hanging together is probably the choice of the country at large – an intuitive sense, with some evidence, that the excesses and obstinacy of one side could well be tempered by the better judgement and political beliefs of the other and vice versa. The point though is that the argument of stability and of commitment to the reform project of 2015, will be a lot more convincing if the two come out clearly and coherently with their vision for the next four years and beyond to cement the alliance in the minds of all national stakeholders and international investors alike.   

Think ahead and there are challenges – not just on the horizon but imminent. Constitutional reform, transitional justice, economic reform, local elections and the continuing saga of the fight over the heart and soul of the SLFP, the next phase of which will be tomorrow’s Pada Yathra.   

Whilst the general secretaries of the two main parties have publicly committed to their partnership in government till the next election, a section of the SLFP are to march with the rest of the joint opposition from Kandy to Colombo to demonstrate their opposition to government policies. Media reports indicate that the President is both upset and angry, but at the same time according to some joint opposition MPs with whom he has discussed the issue, does not object to the Pada Yathra as long as the participants do not criticize the SLFP. The UNP and the government apparently are fair game and if these reports are correct, with effective presidential permission. Remember the BMICH event on foreign policy.   

His Excellency appears to have ducked the issue and not so deftly. SLFPers in the joint opposition who owe their allegiance to his predecessor seem to be able to operate with impunity despite even threats of disciplinary action against them. 

As for the public at large and investors abroad, do they need a primer in political science to acquaint themselves with the concept of collective responsibility to realise that one part of the government or a part of a part of it, are out on the road criticizing the other part. 

We know of differences between the President and the Foreign Minister on the Geneva resolution and foreign judges and from media reports on how the Central Bank issue played out, but frequent, public opposition of this kind as par for the course will take some getting used to as merely the exercise of a democratic right, freedom of expression and association. The joint opposition after all will not be calling for support of the government, even reform? Surely it will be for change?   

Perhaps there is a convoluted strategy of attrition towards the SLFPers in the joint opposition, which would be lauded as a sophisticated one, if and when their ranks deplete and they return home, happy and contented to the party led by His Excellency. Until that happens, there is the danger of their actions reinforcing public disaffection against the government of His Excellency. Party and government are not at one – a false dichotomy some may aver, but one that the president has given credence to.   

The prioritization of keeping the SLFP ostensibly together over the policy coherence and political unity and purpose of the government of the day could play out in respect of constitutional reform – a new constitution versus piecemeal constitutional reform, leading with electoral reform; retention of the executive presidency in some shape and form and as a counterpoint to marginal increases in devolution. It will most surely resurface in respect of foreign judges and the accountability mechanism, not to mention the flak that the draft legislation on the Office of Missing Persons is coming under, despite the opinion that it is the best legislation of its kind.   

Is it too much to ask, too much of a hostage to political fortune to ask of the two main parties to come out with a statement of common policy objectives that will see them through their partnership in government? What is to be prioritized? What is the agreed sequence of reform? Or is it to be muddling through, spats, disagreements, dissent, delays, distractions and all. Not so much a “kohedayanne, malle pol” but more of a “ehemethamai; varadak ne; poddak evasanna”.    Much can happen in four years. Much, must, of that which was promised.