Opinion

Constitution making:

Published

6 years ago

2020/10/3

Sahan Weerasooriya

A layman’s view

by ROHANA R. WASALA

‘At least since Rousseau’s Social Contract and the end of the divine right of kings, the state has been seen as party to a contract with the people – a contract to guarantee or supply the necessary order in society. Without the state’s soldiers, police and the apparatus of control, we are told, gangs or brigands would take over our streets. Extortion, rape, robbery and murder would rip away the last threads of the “thin veneer of civilization.”’ – Alvin Toffler, Powershift, 1990.

The late Alvin Toffler (American writer, journalist, educator, and businessman) says this while reflecting on the nature of power as one of the most basic social phenomena. ‘Power……implies a world that combines both chance, necessity, chaos and order.’ According to him, we humans ‘share an irrepressible, biologically rooted craving for a modicum of order in our daily lives, along with a hunger for novelty. It is the need for order that provides the main justification for the very existence of government’.

Sri Lankans are currently experiencing, in the raw, a taste of the evils that Toffler says the absence of order would breed, which makes constitution making interesting for them. But what is a constitution? Google offers a simple definition of the term: ‘a body of fundamental principles or established precedents according to which a state or other organization is acknowledged to be governed’.

Now, Professor Jayadeva Uyangoda (‘A very wrong approach to Constitution-making’/The Island/September 29, 2020) opines that the proposed 20A has ‘several major defects’. One key fault, according to him, is that the approach adopted for drafting the amendment is ‘very wrong’. JU offers a number of reasons to explain this alleged wrongness of the ‘approach’: the ‘sponsors and framers’ (I suppose the phrase means the politicians and the legal experts behind the drafting of 20A) refuse to learn ‘constructive lessons from past constitutional reform experiments’, but they have learned some ‘partisan, narrow-minded, politically short-sighted ones’. What he probably means by this becomes clear (not clear enough though) in the rest of his article, but it is doubtful whether his sense of right and wrong in the context is shared by many outside the now diminished anti-nationalist coterie, who occupied the parliament for four and a half years and hexed it with the controversial 19A.

It is not necessary to read further into JU’s article to be able to infer where his own inexcusable biases lie. He is obviously in favour of 13A and 19A forced on the nation from outside, and is against the present government’s sincere effort to remove the obstacles placed on its path by the departing yahapalanaya through its ill-conceived constitutional mixed bag that is 19A, where what is bad is by choice, and what is good is by chance. This is not to argue that the new 20A is perfect in comparison. I share many objections raised in different quarters against the proposed 20A, but I believe that the moot points will be satisfactorily sorted out by the present leaders before they manage to get it through parliament.

The Opposition critics of 20A quite well know that it is, after all, only a stopgap measure to clear the way for the unhindered implementation of the government’s development plans. The government will introduce a completely new Constitution within a year or two. JU’s advice as a political scientist will come in handy then.

The proposed 20A is not an arbitrary piece of legislation that the government is introducing behind the back of the people. There is considerable opposition to some of its articles even within the government ranks. Unlike in the case of 19A, the passage of 20A will be a democratic, above-board affair. The Minister of Justice on behalf of the government issued it as a draft bill for public view and review in all three languages on September 2, 2020. The document clearly specifies what is to be amended, repealed, or replaced. The yahapalana constitutional fraud in the form of 19A is not being repeated. Over this four-week period, some thirty-nine petitions have been filed challenging 20A’s constitutionality before the Supreme Court and they were being heard for the third day (October 2) by a bench of five judges, at the time of writing. The government has already declared that it will abide by the court decision by duly adjusting its response to it. JU’s alarms and warnings are uncalled for.

By the phrase ‘past constitutional reform experiments’, JU must be referring to the making of the first and second republican Constitutions (of 1972 and 1978 respectively) and the substantial number of opportune as well as ad hoc amendments introduced by successive governments since, some of them questionable and controversial, where 19A stands in a class by itself as the best example of the worst type of constitutional reform introduced in Sri Lanka to date. What prompts him to describe them as experiments is probably the fact that he is a political scientist with his indispensable toolkit of academic analysis. My interest as a lay citizen, modestly informed of the original construction and subsequent reform of a constitution, is concerned with how good it is going to be for the largest number of the people of the country, as its supreme law, in the context of the more or less stable social and political realities that are prevailing.

As a Constitution is not holy writ, it is open to appropriate amendments from time to time, in compliance with the will of the people, as and when these realities change; a constitution specifies the legal way to reform or replace it as the case may be. The current 1978 republican constitution as amended up to 2015 (Chapter XII/Articles 82-84) specifies the procedure for amending or repealing the constitution. The people whose memory of the yahapalana misadventure is still fresh are anxiously aware of the necessity of passing the 20A.

Contrary to what JU asserts, the political leaders and the legal luminaries responsible for drafting the proposed 20A, have not forgotten the constructive lessons left by their respective predecessors in the form of Sirimavo Bandaranaike and Colvin R. de Silva (1972), and J.R. Jayewardene and J.A. Wilson (1978). Both Bandaranaike and Jayewardene cared about the country, the people, and the culture. Both displayed firm leadership in governing, and a high level of intellect in statecraft. Sirimavo Bandaranaike had her native wit, and Jayewardene possessed a good education. In April 1971, Bandaranaike nipped the JVP terrorism in the bud, not without some violence, though, that she never intended. Opposition leader Jayewardene approved of her actions, saying, ‘yes, a government must rule’. For her courage, firmness, and composure, she was described then as the only male in her cabinet. The contribution of the inspiration provided by Bandaranaike’s political leadership to the making of the first Republican Constitution, the principal architect of which was de Silva, must have been immense and indispensable. Later, hadn’t Jayewardene got Wilson to write the powerful institution of executive presidency into the second republican constitution (1978) as the main anchor to the unitary state, the sovereign Sri Lankan republic that Bandaranaike and de Silva created for the people would have disintegrated and drifted into wilderness and oblivion by now.

Back to the point.

The second alleged defect that JU asserts, without any evidence to support his opinion, is that ‘the framers of the 20A are not motivated by the broader democratic interests of all Sri Lankan people, but the ‘political self-interest’ (of someone or group that JU avoids mentioning). A third defect, JU identifies the Amendment’s supposed lack of ‘a democratic formative framework relevant to our society and its own progressive-modernist legacies of constitutionalism .. (together with the fact that).. it builds itself on one or two dreadful and destructive experiments of constitution-making in the recent past’. This is as close to clear as I can get in interpreting JU here. To illustrate the ‘one or two dreadful and destructive experiments of constitution-making in the recent past’, I think, he draws upon what he, assuming a kind of arbitrary academic license, calls the ‘relatively long history of unmaking, making, and amending constitutions’ that includes the 1972 and 1978 exercises on the one hand, and the 1978C and 18A on the other. JU’s adjectives ‘dreadful and destructive’ could be justifiably applied to the passage of 19A and other such ‘experiments’ in constitutional reform, as contained, for example, in Chapter IV of the Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (As amended up to 15th May 2015) (Revised Edition – 2015) issued by the Parliamentary Secretariat. Chapter IV – Language covers Articles 18-25. One is bewildered by what the crafty, ill-meaning, ‘sponsors and framers’ have from time to time done to degrade Sinhala in its official status with the uncomprehending concurrence of some self-seeking Sinhala MPs in the House. This, of course, would be an iconic piece of constitution-making for a theorist with one’s head in the clouds.

The practical reality is that the operative meaning of any Article (whether this is legally contested or not) is implicitly embodied in the English text (though, according to the present constitution Sinhala and Tamil are both official languages, while English is the link language.). So, it is vitally important to translate the draft document that is the Constitution into precise, unambiguous, formal and legally acceptable and uncontestable Sinhala and Tamil. I detected a couple of stark discrepancies between the original English draft and the Sinhala translation (not relating to the particular context – Chapter IV – mentioned above) when I made a very random comparison between the two versions while researching an article at the time, but I don’t remember whether I dwelt on the subject long enough for it to be taken notice of by the reader as something important, though beyond the central scope of that article. Apart from this, those sufficiently informed did not fail to see how some Tamil lawmakers wanted to openly hoodwink the Sinhalas with the word ‘akeeya’ stripped of its intended original meaning of unitary, but falsely insisting that the English term ‘unitary’ was not its equivalent and was not suitable as a translation, and started talking about an ‘Orumiththa Nadu’, reminiscent of Tamil Nadu. How the question which version should prevail in case of an incongruence between the Sinhala and Tamil texts should be resolved, I can’t remember having been discussed. But the last item (58) of the published draft of 20A runs: ‘In the event of any inconsistency between the Sinhala and Tamil texts of this Act, the Sinhala text shall prevail.’

Having outlined the lessons to be learnt from constitution-making, -unmaking, and -reforming exercises up to 18A, JU moves on to the many lessons that he thinks may be drawn from the ‘much maligned’ 19A. He identifies four key lessons. The first lesson he mentions is that wide public consultation is useful, and helps ‘improve the level of democratic health in the polity’. I cannot agree with him that this was true about the drafting of 19A. It was claimed that the constitutional experts including Jayampathy Wickremaratne, presumably its principal drafter, toured the country meeting with individuals and representatives of many minority civil groups during a short period of two or three months. They had to rush the job, they said, as they were in a hurry to finish it within a stipulated time frame. About two thousand people were consulted nevertheless, they claimed. It was obvious that they roamed the country making it their main aim to pay more attention to the minorities that they had decided were discriminated against by the majority Sinhalese, as they wanted the meddling foreign powers to believe in order to justify their interventionist excesses in the internal and external politics of the country. Meanwhile they paid only symbolic attention to the Sinhalese majority. Wickremaratne, the chief architect of the fraudulent document, is now rumoured/reported to have found or is seeking political asylum in Australia or somewhere (though there is absolutely no possibility of his being targeted for persecution in Sri Lanka). He has reportedly admitted that 19A is problematic.

The second lesson that JU asserts he can learn from the making of 19A is that it is ‘better to build consensus across all political parties in Parliament for a major amendment or a new Constitution’. If he means that 19A set a negative example of that principle, then he has a case. But in actuality, 19A destroyed the burgeoning interparty consensus in Parliament and the growing intercommunal goodwill in the broader society that the MR government achieved in the wake of victory over terrorism. It was because of this that ‘for partisan political reasons, some might later withdraw from the consensus’ as JU laments.

I agree with JU on the third lesson he derives from his seemingly iconic amendment, which is that ‘If the consultation and consensus-building in constitution-making is not politically managed with clarity of purpose, the overall goals of the constitutional compromise may run the risk of producing a constitutional scheme with potentially harmful internal anomalies and contradictions’. Yes, in other words, 19A is a very good illustration of a very bad constitutional amendment.

The fourth lesson that 19A offers, according to JU, is that ‘a democratic constitution-making exercise today needs, more than ever, an unwavering political leadership to champion it through to the end by innovative and imaginative democratic means’. In my opinion, this is what the pre-2015 government achieved. 19A, by dismantling it, demonstrated how ill the nation fared in the absence of such unwavering, innovative, and democratic leadership. Then, JU starts chewing his own tail, by suggesting a ‘paradoxical’ reason: ‘Alternatives to democracy are also competing with democracy, with enormous material resources, to gain popular support and loyalty through democratic means. In this age of right-wing populism, media-manufactured popular consent and manipulation of public perceptions through information pollution, post-democratic alternatives tend to gain easy currency and public legitimacy’. Frankly, I can’t make head or tail of this, but it makes me wonder whether JU is trying to make light of the very real persecution of the majority community that is hardly recognized by most mainstream politicians, who feel obliged to find refuge behind political correctness.

All News Advertisement

Opinion

University admission crisis: Academics must lead the way

Published

9 hours ago

2026/04/8

Sahan Weerasooriya

130,000 students are left out each year—academics hold the key

Each year, Sri Lanka’s G.C.E. Advanced Level examination produces a wave of hope—this year, nearly 175,000 students qualified for university entrance. Yet only 45,000 will be admitted to state universities. That leaves more than 130,000 young people stranded—qualified, ambitious, but excluded. This is not just a statistic; it is a national crisis. And while policymakers debate infrastructure and funding, the country’s academics must step forward as catalysts of change.

Beyond the Numbers: A National Responsibility

Education is the backbone of Sri Lanka’s development. Denying access to tens of thousands of qualified students risks wasting talent, fueling inequality, and undermining national progress. The gap is not simply about seats in lecture halls—it is about the future of a generation. Academics, as custodians of knowledge, cannot remain passive observers. They must reimagine the delivery of higher education to ensure opportunity is not a privilege for the few.

Expanding Pathways, Not Just Campuses

The traditional model of four-year degrees in brick-and-mortar universities cannot absorb the demand. Academics can design short-term diplomas and certificate programmes that provide immediate access to learning. These programmes, focused on employable skills, would allow thousands to continue their education while easing pressure on degree programmes. Equally important is the digital transformation of education. Online and blended learning modules can extend access to rural students, breaking the monopoly of physical campuses. With academic leadership, Sri Lanka can build a reliable system of credit transfers, enabling students to begin their studies at affiliated institutions and later transfer to state universities.

Partnerships That Protect Quality

Private universities and vocational institutes already absorb many students who miss out on state admissions. But concerns about quality and recognition persist. Academics can bridge this divide by providing quality assurance and standardised curricula, supervising joint degree programmes, and expanding the Open University system. These partnerships would ensure that students outside the state system receive affordable, credible, and internationally recognised education.

Research and Advocacy: Shaping Policy

Academics are not only teachers—they are researchers and thought leaders. By conducting labour market studies, they can align higher education expansion with employability. Evidence-based recommendations to the University Grants Commission (UGC) can guide strategic intake increases, regional university expansion, and government investment in digital infrastructure. In this way, academics can ensure reforms are not reactive, but visionary.

Industry Engagement: Learning Beyond the Classroom

Sri Lanka’s universities must become entrepreneurship hubs and innovation labs. Academics can design programmes that connect students directly with industries, offering internship-based learning and applied research opportunities. This approach reduces reliance on classroom capacity while equipping students with practical skills. It also reframes education as a partnership between universities and the economy, rather than a closed system.

Making the Most of What We Have

Even within existing constraints, academics can expand capacity. Training junior lecturers and adjunct faculty, sharing facilities across universities, and building international collaborations for joint programmes and scholarships are practical steps. These measures maximise resources while opening new avenues for students.

A Call to Action

Sri Lanka’s university admission crisis is not just about numbers—it is about fairness, opportunity, and national development. Academics must lead the way in transforming exclusion into empowerment. By expanding pathways, strengthening partnerships, advocating for policy reform, engaging with industry, and optimizing resources, they can ensure that qualified students are not left behind.

“Education for all, not just the fortunate few.”

Dr. Arosh Bandula (Ph.D. Nottingham), Senior Lecturer, Department of Agricultural Economics & Agribusiness, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Ruhuna

by Dr. Arosh Bandula

Opinion

Post-Easter Sri Lanka: Between memory, narrative, and National security

Published

1 day ago

2026/04/7

Sahan Weerasooriya

As Sri Lanka approaches the seventh commemoration of the Easter Sunday attacks, the national mood is once again marked by grief, reflection, and an enduring sense of incompleteness. Nearly seven years later, the tragedy continues to cast a long shadow not only over the victims and their families, but over the institutions and narratives that have since emerged.

Commemoration, however, must go beyond ritual. It must be anchored in clarity, accountability, and restraint. What is increasingly evident in the post-Easter landscape is not merely a search for truth, but a contest over how that truth is framed, interpreted, and presented to the public.

In recent times, public discourse has been shaped by book launches, panel discussions, and media interventions that claim to offer new insights into the attacks. While such contributions are not inherently problematic, the manner in which certain narratives are advanced raises legitimate concerns. The selective disclosure of information particularly when it touches on intelligence operations demands careful scrutiny.

Sri Lanka’s legal and institutional framework is clear on the sensitivity of such matters. The Official Secrets Act (No. 32 of 1955) places strict obligations on the handling of information related to national security. Similarly, the Police Ordinance and internal administrative regulations governing intelligence units emphasize confidentiality, chain of command, and the responsible use of information. These are not mere formalities; they exist to safeguard both operational integrity and national interest.

When individual particularly those with prior access to intelligence structures enter the public domain with claims that are not subject to verification, it raises critical questions. Are these disclosures contributing to justice and accountability, or are they inadvertently compromising institutional credibility and future operational capacity?

The challenge lies in distinguishing between constructive transparency and selective exposure.

The Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Easter Sunday Attacks provided one of the most comprehensive official examinations of the attacks. Its findings highlighted a complex web of failures: lapses in intelligence sharing, breakdowns in inter-agency coordination, and serious deficiencies in political oversight. Importantly, it underscored that the attacks were not the result of a single point of failure, but a systemic collapse across multiple levels of governance.

Yet, despite the existence of such detailed institutional findings, public discourse often gravitates toward simplified narratives. There is a tendency to identify singular “masterminds” or to attribute responsibility in ways that align with prevailing political or ideological positions. While such narratives may be compelling, they risk obscuring the deeper structural issues that enabled the attacks to occur.

Equally significant is the broader socio-political context in which these narratives are unfolding. Sri Lanka today remains a society marked by fragile intercommunal relations. The aftermath of the Easter attacks saw heightened suspicion, polarisation, and, in some instances, collective blame directed at entire communities. Although there have been efforts toward reconciliation, these fault lines have not entirely disappeared.

In this environment, the language and tone of public discourse carry immense weight. The framing of terrorism whether as a localized phenomenon or as part of a broader ideological construct must be handled with precision and responsibility. Overgeneralization or the uncritical use of labels can have far-reaching consequences, including the marginalization of communities and the erosion of social cohesion.

At the same time, it is essential to acknowledge that the global discourse on terrorism is itself contested. Competing narratives, geopolitical interests, and selective historiography often shape how events are interpreted. For Sri Lanka, the challenge is to avoid becoming a passive recipient of external frameworks that may not fully reflect its own realities.

A professional and unbiased approach requires a commitment to evidence-based analysis. This includes:

· Engaging with primary sources, including official reports and judicial findings
·

· Cross-referencing claims with verifiable data
·

· Recognizing the limits of publicly available information, particularly in intelligence matters

It also requires intellectual discipline the willingness to question assumptions, to resist convenient conclusions, and to remain open to complexity.

The role of former officials and subject-matter experts in this discourse is particularly important. Their experience can provide valuable insights, but it also carries a responsibility. Public interventions must be guided by professional ethics, respect for institutional boundaries, and an awareness of the potential impact on national security.

There is a fine balance to be maintained. On one hand, democratic societies require transparency and accountability. On the other, the premature or uncontextualized release of sensitive information can undermine the very systems that are meant to protect the public.

As Sri Lanka reflects on the events of April 2019, it must resist the temptation to reduce a national tragedy into competing narratives or political instruments. The pursuit of truth must be methodical, inclusive, and grounded in law.

Easter is not only a moment of remembrance. It is a test of institutional maturity and societal resilience.

The real question is not whether new narratives will emerge they inevitably will. The question is whether Sri Lanka has the capacity to engage with them critically, responsibly, and in a manner that strengthens, rather than weakens, the foundations of its national security and social harmony.

In the end, justice is not served by noise or conjecture. It is served by patience, rigor, and an unwavering commitment to truth.

Mahil Dole is a former senior law enforcement officer and national security analyst, with over four decades of experience in policing and intelligence, including serving as Head of Counter-Intelligence at the State Intelligence Service of Sri Lanka and a graduate of the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawai, USA.

by Mahil Dole
Former Senior Law Enforcement Officer National Security Analyst; Former Head of Counter-Intelligence, State Intelligence Service)

Opinion

Need to consult, compromise and reach optimal common ground on critical issues of national interest

Published

2 days ago

2026/04/6

Thilina Walpola

Delivering the keynote address at the 54th Memorial of the late Minister Philip Gunawardena, former Foreign Secretary HMGS Palihakkara, called for a culture of consensus on key public policy issues in the country as the way forward from recovery to sustainable growth in a world of deepening violence and diminishing cooperation.

Excerpts.

Today, we gather to honour and remember the late Hon. Philip Gunawardena—virtually a household name to my generation, fondly known to the ordinary folks just as Philip ‘Mathithuma’- a leader whose life was woven into the very fabric of Sri Lanka’s struggle for justice, dignity, and independence.

Philip Gunawardena was not merely a political leader; he was a visionary, a reformer, and a fearless voice for the common people. While he was an iconic figure and a staunch socialist, he remained a pragmatic modernist as well. This, obviously, is quite a complex and difficult political binary to maintain. As history has it, he did acquit himself doing it. At a time when speaking truth to power demanded immense courage, he stood unwavering. He believed deeply that a nation’s strength lies not in privilege, but in equality—in uplifting farmers, workers, and the forgotten voices of society. The famous Paddy Land Act and the concept of Apex Cooperative Bank which later transformed into the present-day Peoples Bank and many other public policy and institutional creations are emblematic of his deep knowledge of the economic challenges and his holistic approach to development.

On the other hand, others saw Philip demonstrating hard-nosed pragmatism, not a naïve ideological bent.

Dr. Sarath Amunugama, a friend and a public servant turned politician said of Philip:

“On Socialism itself Philip had a different perspective – You talk of Socialism. You cannot socialise poverty. You can only socialise plenty. And if people cannot work, if they cannot produce, you cannot have Socialism.” *

The volume being launched today contains Philip Gunawardena’s speeches and initiatives, documents in great detail the drive and substance he deployed to deliver social justice and economic outcomes to those working classes.

He was aptly called the “Father of Socialism” in Sri Lanka, even lionised as the Boralugoda Sinhaya. But titles and appellations alone cannot capture the spirit of the man. People were captivated not only by the inimitable force of his articulation and commitment but perhaps equally or even more, by substance and cogency of his argument.

He was a bridge between the ideal and the actionable.

In my official work overlap with his capacity as the Minister of Industries in the 1960s, I personally experienced Minister Philip’s ability to refurbish concepts in relation to ground realities. His work in land reform and his commitment to social justice were not abstract ideas—they were real, tangible efforts to improve lives and reshape the nation’s future. The analysis Philip presented and prescriptions he passionately advocated, in both legislative and policy realms, are touched upon in good detail here in this book being launched today. I must say it is a trove for a researcher.

Beyond his public life, Philip Gunawardena was a man of conviction and principle. He carried with him a profound sense of responsibility to his people, and he never wavered from his beliefs, even when it came at great personal cost. That is a legacy not easily measured, but deeply felt.

Today, as we reflect on his life, we are reminded that true leadership is not about power, but about purpose. It is about working tirelessly for the greater good of the Nation State and its people while standing firm in one’s values

Philip’s words -more importantly his deed- brought into sharp relief a truism prevalent in divisive politics

esp. here in Sri Lanka. It is that while blinkered politicians build opinions, only true leaders can build consensus. The former does it for parochial transactional gain the latter does it for strategic and sustainable national gain.

Philip of course was emblematic of the latter.

The decision by Philip to join the ‘National Govt’ of Dudley Senanayake was a much debated but little understood affair. – Optics were basically reduced to a celebrated Socialist icon joining a gentle Capitalist to form a

National Government. It was inevitably a controversial move. Equally, it was also a bold manifestation of that consensus building spirit. More so because his decision was predicated on his unwavering support for a fundamental human right- the freedom of expression, and opposition to nationalisation of the free press- a fundamental tenet of the democratic-socialist binary. Leave aside the unfinished or open-ended debate about democracy or socialism. Philip was signalling that consensual statecraft is the way forward for the nation’s progress and prosperity of its people. The motto was that what is best ideologically should not stand in the way of what is consensually good for the nation and the common man. When Philip famously said that I will work with the ‘Devil or even his grandmother if that brings about common good’, he in a way articulated the inherent quality of consensus on key public policy matters like the press freedom and other foundational things.

That certainly is the interpretation in my Book!

Consensus is not about making any or all contending parties absolutely happy about the issue at hand- it is about dispensing managed unhappiness among all parties in order to advance a common cause benefitting the people at large. It is the ‘equitable distribution of reasonable unhappiness’ among all parties concerned. When that occurs, consensus happens. It is the most potent algorithm to produce win-win solutions in human relations within or among states.

This is a great lesson in statecraft and public policy making for present day politicians in our country who seem to quarrel like street vendors on a rainy day, on all issues. They have thus reduced the grave responsibility of democratic governance to a trivial zero-sum formula of the Government proposing and the Opposition opposing most of the time- if not all the time! They are either unable or unwilling to explore and reach a consensual middle ground to advance the national interests on a host of public policy issues ranging from economic reforms, security and foreign policies, the rule of law, accountability, reconciliation and so on.

All issues are thus a game for the govt toppling game.

This is a lesson for some of the current crop of politicians in this country who easily conflate polemics with substance and verbiage with eloquence.

All this ignores the national interest of building consensus as opposed to building polarisation for vote winning.

May I express the hope that all of us, especially those involved in that dreadful art form called politics in this country, revisit the thought processes of Philip Gunawardena documented in this volume to understand that compromise and consensus is possible in this country- especially on key public policy issues that profoundly touch our fundamental national interests.

Speaking of a culture of consensus the likes of Philip Gunawardena advocated in eloquent words and courageous deeds more than half a century ago, let me conclude with a brief comment on their relevance and resonance with the inventory of sri Lanka’s foreign policy and diplomacy challenges.

We all know that Sri Lanka’s overriding national priority in recent times was and remains the process of recovery from a crippling economic crisis and dovetailing it into a sustainable growth pathway. For this we must carefully prepare ourselves to prudently navigate the critical gauntlet of 2028 when we have to resume debt repayment- a challenge looming larger and larger every single day. Especially so in a world convulsed by violent conflict and economic and financial disruption like what is unfolding in West Asia right now. The violent spiral that has peaked there now will impact our foreign relations and recovery effort in most profound ways. If one is serious about making our recovery and growth stable and sustainable in this volatility, it must therefore be firmly anchored in a domestic political consensus on economic reform and foreign policy framework that is programmed towards three things:

– first, liberate the indispensable economic reforms from the destructive politics of government toppling,

– second, insulate us from the adversities of the ongoing geopolitical violence,

-third, guide us towards securing opportunities for our economic interests in this evolving geopolitical vortex.

Of course, the ‘prime-mover’ responsibility of this common ground building process lies with the government which has an unprecedented and strong voter’ mandate to do it. It must therefore stop acting as if it is still in an election campaign mode and must take cognizance of the fact that they are governing now. The Opposition must understand too that their job is not to oppose everything that the govt proposes and that they are the ‘shadow govt.,’ in the best traditions of parliamentary democracy. They must therefore stop acting like a shadow of the Opposition bent on Govt toppling game 24/7 but behave like a true ‘shadow government’ promoting consensus until the voters in due course do the regime change, when necessary.

Both sides should therefore consult, compromise and reach optimal common ground on critical issues of vital national interest. If our politicians don’t embrace a culture of consensus on such public policy issues of foundational importance, yet another crisis will embrace us in due course, perhaps sooner than they expect. Templates of statesmanship provided by the likes of Philip to reach consensual grounds through informed and timely compromises shedding ideological or parochial interests, might come in handy here.

In memoriam of PHILIP GUNAWARDENA, 26 March 2026. National Library Auditorium