An Opposition detached from the people

The SLPP is ahead of SJB in the news

Fingers have been pointed at SLPP politicians for the murder of Thajudeen for a long time,  and Vidanagamage was also killed after an explosive interview he had with a You Tuber where he severely criticised the Rajapaksas. Whatever the conspiracy theories and interpretation of these incidents were, this negative publicity seems to have given an edge for the SLPP over the SJB to be in the news.

Despite the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) having 40 seats in Parliament, the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) with only three seats seems to be the main Opposition for the past few weeks, due to the latter being in confrontation with the government than the former. 

The SLPP has caught the public eye in the recent days following the passage of the Presidents’ Entitlement (Amendment Bill) on September 10 which resulted in SLPP leader and  former President Mahinda Rajapaksa who was adamantly staying in a Rs. 3.5 billion worth state-owned bungalow being forced out from that house. 

Although other past Presidents -- Chandrika Kumaratunga, Maithripala Sirisena, Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Ranil Wickremesinghe -- were also by this amendment deprived of privileges they hitherto enjoyed, only the SLPP made a huge fuss about its leader’s privileges, making daily headlines.

Also, the SLPP drew more attention following the arrest of several underworld figures hiding in Indonesia in August, as it led to the seizure of over 50,000 kilogrammes of chemicals in a garden belonged to a local SLPP politician in Middeniya. These chemicals   later proved to be raw materials used in producing crystal methamphetamine or ICE.
 Later, the police claimed that the wife of Anura Vidanagamage, better known as Kajja has identified as her husband a person standing near a vehicle that followed ruggerite Waseem Thajudeen who was mysteriously killed in 2012. Fingers have been pointed at SLPP politicians for the murder of Thajudeen for a long time,  and Vidanagamage was also killed after an explosive interview he had with a You Tuber where he severely criticized the Rajapaksas. Whatever the conspiracy theories and interpretation of these incidents were, this negative publicity seems to have given an edge for the SLPP over the SJB to be in the news. 

The SJB has failed to address issues that affect the ordinary people. Rather,  it is running behind issues that might embarrass the leaders of the ruling National People’s Power (NPP). Although the party attempted to capitalise on several issues such as the shortage and price hikes of rice, eggs and coconuts that heavily affected people during the early months of the NPP administration, they could not make a significant impact as it was very clear that the roots of those issues could be traced back to the past. 

When the doctorate tagged to the name of NPP government’s first Speaker Asoka Ranwala was exposed to be fake, the SJB wasted weeks over it, not realising what really the people wanted. On the other hand, Ranwala tendered his resignation as Speaker on the advice of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake who did not want to defend him, in a way taking the moral high ground again. However, the damage was not totally eliminated.

The Opposition, especially the SJB,  in August handed in a no-confidence motion against the Deputy Defence Minister retired Major General Aruna Jayasekara to Speaker Dr. Jagath Wickramaratne. They claimed that during the period leading up to the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks, Aruna Jayasekara was serving as the Security Forces Eastern Province Commander, and was also accused of dereliction of duty, during related investigations. Therefore, they argued that his current role as Deputy Minister of Defence is ethically inappropriate, given the ongoing investigations into the attacks.

However, the government opposed the motion on the grounds that it is against the tradition to bring in a no-faith motion against a deputy minister and also,  deputy ministers under the NPP government have not been assigned any specific duties to influence any investigation. 

In fact, both parties played politics in this regard while people in the country expressed hardly any enthusiasm in the matter. The no-confidence motion was doomed to fail in the face of the massive Parliamentary majority of the NPP. What  the Opposition really wanted was to have something to criticise regarding the government, with substantiated or unfounded allegations, using Parliamentary privileges.

Besides, the SJB did not see any impropriety in Jayasekara’s appointment as the deputy defence minister nine months ago. The terrorists targeted mainly the tourist hotels and churches in the Western Province on the Easter Sunday in 2019 while the incidents leading up to the attacks had been reported from Eastern, Central,Sabaragamuwa and Northwestern Provinces as well. It is clear that the SJB singled out only the Commanding Officer of Eastern Province to accuse him for political reasons. 

If Jayasekara being the minister overseeing the investigations into the terrorist attacks indicates conflict of interests, the same argument should be applied to SJB General Secretary Ranjith Madduma Bandara who was in charge of the then Ministry of Law and Order which initiated investigations on the matter. Interestingly, the then Army Commander General Mahesh Senanayakehas also joined the SJB last year.

Nevertheless, the government’s contention that no confidence motions are traditionally presented only against the government, Cabinet ministers and the Opposition Leader is weak as President J.R.Jayewardene has shown that traditions can be changed by bringing in the first no-faith motion against an Opposition Leaderwho was then Appapillai Amirthalingam. 

Now, the Opposition has submitted a motion requesting the Speaker to appoint a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on the controversial release of 323 containers from the port. Although not much public interest has been drawn towards this as well, it is worth, from a security point of view, pressing the government on the matter. 

Yet, a committee appointed by President Dissanayake on the matter has submitted its report back to him. Though the President has not made the report public, SJB members quoted from it during their speeches in Parliament recently. The findings of the report, according to an article carries in the Daily Mirror, has censured the officials of the Sri Lanka Customs for releasing red-flagged containers that had been among the controversial containers. Then what is the point of demanding a time-consuming PSC instead of pressing the authorities to release the report and take action based on the findings of it?

This is another issue that has been highly politicised. First, the Opposition accused that the controversial containers were belonged to a company owned by the Western Province Governor Hanif Yusoof and then some of them attempted to connect the issue with the Middeniya drug haul.

The report says, according to the DM article, that 2218 containers had been released at 13 different times by a special team of officials without physical inspection since July last year and there had been 999 red-flagged containers among them. Then, on what basis -if not for political reasons - is the release of those red-flagged containers not questioned?