UNP is 75 not out; Can the grand old party regain its lost glory?

The United National Party (UNP), the Sri Lankan Grand Old Party celebrated its 75th anniversary on Sunday (5) via Zoom technology. And the leader of the party and former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe put forward his parties “Greater Sri Lanka” programme based on “fourfold security” through “iron policy framework” which he said that would not change of governments.

The UNP is the third political party in Sri Lanka representing all communities and regions after Lanka Sama Samaja Party (LSSP) and the Communist Party of Ceylon which later changed its name as Communist Party of Sri Lanka (CPSL), but its predecessor, the Ceylon National Congress was the first political movement that campaigned for political reforms in the country since early 20th century. 

It is sad to see that the UNP, the most powerful party when Sri Lanka gained independence and ruled the country for more than 35 out of 73 years after that has been reduced to the level of the old leftist parties when it celebrates its 75th anniversary. That does not mean that the party had always been doing a yeomen service for the betterment of the people and the country. Even Wickremesinghe in his speech at the 75th Anniversary said that “we were on an equal footing with Japan, the leading country in Asia in 1948 but today we are ahead only of Afghanistan.” Yet, UNP cannot absolve itself from its part of responsibility to this degeneration.

Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), the first breakaway political party from the UNP is being credited to the far reaching political changes in the country such as the improvement of links with the then socialist camp in 1950s and early 1960s and severing the colonial yoke in 1972 by turning the country into a republic from the dominion state. But UNP is the party that had made the highest impact on the country’s economy. It is the party that introduced the open economy with the creation of free trade zones and launched the largest irrigation scheme, the Mahaweli development scheme constructing huge reservoirs. The country found a huge foreign exchange earner, the remittance by the migrant workers during the UNP administration of President J.R.Jayewardene. 
Based on the countries experience during the past 73 years, Wickremesinghe may be correct when he stated in his speech that only the UNP can create a united Sri Lanka that brings together all communities, Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims and Burghers, despite his party having campaigned against some peace overtures by the SLFP-led governments in the past. One can give credence to his statement as the SLFP led coalitions have a history with more attempts to scuttle peace efforts. 

However, history has given the UNP the worst shape now, and its leaders have to find out reasons to what went wrong within their ranks and not only in others’ successes. The party has to engage in a genuine self criticism and be courageous to accept the mistakes, misconceptions, miscalculations and political misbehaviour on their part that led to the current pathetic situation. They must prove to the people that they are honestly against corruption and that they have a vision and not rhetorical promises for the country. Country needs more strong democratic voices to prevent rulers from going astray or to replace them, if need arises. 

The UNP leaders must have coherent, radical policies and programmes to revive the party and resolve the issues faced by the people and to minimize corruption to the level that would not hamper those objectives, leave alone bring prosperity to the country, if they expect to replace the current administration with theirs.    

No political party currently in Sri Lanka or in any other country where people are not much conscious about their rights would succeed in infusing confidence in people on its policies, programmes and activities with a lacklustre campaigns or mere preaching. Campaigns must be capable of withstanding and defeating the counter programmes which most probably include twists, misrepresentation and mudslinging by the other parties. The situation is more challenging in a world influenced by the social media a major part of which is controlled by a cyber underworld or the fake account holders. It demands a meticulously planned aggressive campaign, which we did not see from the UNP in the recent past.