On your marks, get set, go

By a gazette notification issued on Friday, the Election Commission of Sri Lanka declared that the much awaited presidential election will be held on Saturday, September 21 and nominations will be received on Thursday, August 15. Why the Election Commission, constitutionally empowered to set the dates since July 17, dragged its feet this long despite speculation and allegations swirling countrywide that the Ranil Wickremesinghe government was looking for a way to put off the election is anybody’s guess. The government, of course, denied these allegations by opposition leaders and other activists. The ‘coming coming’ game has finally ended as far as the Election Commission is concerned but other pots are merrily bubbling on the fire.

Among these is the Supreme Court’s interim order that IGP Deshabandu Tennekoon not function in that office until nine pending Fundamental Rights applications challenging his appointment are concluded. The next date when the court will take this up will be after the forthcoming presidential election is concluded. This can mean the incumbent IGP cannot head the Police Department during the election period. Predictably, the government reacted negatively to this order with Prime Minister Dinesh Gunawardena making its position clear in a statement on the floor of the House on Friday morning. He stressed that the question of Tennekoon’s appointment was not a matter for the court but concerned the legislature. In effect, he was saying there will be no implementation of the court ruling.

A game of buck passing has now begun over the contentious IGP issue. The president does not wish to appoint an acting IGP or make a new appointment to conform with the election law that kicked in on Friday. This wide ranging law imposes a variety of prohibitions including appointments, transfers and other matters on candidates. The prime minister in his speech on Friday wanted the speaker to handle the hot potato. But that worthy has already drawn much flak upon himself by exercising a tie-breaking casting vote after counting two abstentions as votes against the motion to carry the resolution approving Tennekoon’s appointment. He ducked the instant issue piously professing that he always did the right thing and asked anybody with a problem with that to go to the Supreme Court. Back to square one!

There has been an emerging trend of differences between the three pillars of the State – the executive, the legislature and the judiciary. Their powers and functions must be clearly separate for the functioning of a healthy democracy. It was not long ago that President Ranil Wickremesinghe used two loaded words, “judicial cannibalism,” in reference to a court determination on the recently enacted Gender Equality Bill. He was not happy with a court pronouncement on that matter and candidly expressed his views taking care to say that he was not in any way promoting the summoning of judges before a proposed Parliamentary Select Committee. Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe too recently made some strongly critical remarks about a few judges whose conduct, he said, tainted the entire judiciary.

The Prince of Denmark aka Ranil Wickremesinghe had not formally declared his candidature for the presidential election until Friday morning. But once the election was declared, his deposit had been paid to run as an independent candidate. Most observers believed that he awaited word from the Rajapaksa party on whether or not the pohottuwa will back him before declaring his candidature. It was reported that Wickremesinghe last week had two meetings with the SLPP’s founder and chief strategist, Basil Rajapaksa, on this matter. It is common knowledge that the SLPP had for the past several weeks been stridently proclaiming it will field a candidate at the big election but stopped short of naming him/her. Equally well known is the fact that Wickremesinghe would not run under the UNP’s green banner and elephant symbol. In addition to poaching the support of SLPP MPs, he has also been making deals and sending out feelers elsewhere to forge a broad alliance to back him.

How that picture will eventually unfold remains to be seen as the campaign gathers momentum. For the time being, according to Basil R, there are two views within the SLPP on whether to or not to back Wickremesinghe. This would have hardly been news to the president. The big question is whether the pohottuwa will play a spoiler role and run at an election it will surely lose – 2022 and he aragalaya was not that long ago – or back Wickremesinghe who, to all intents and purposes has taken care of the former first family during his present tenure. There has been talk of the prime ministry under a Wickremesinghe presidency for the SLPP. Dhammika Perera is maintaining his television presence and Namal baby would not be averse to the number two slot. The picture will surely be clearer by nomination day.

The declared candidates as this is written are Wickremesinghe (on the basis of his deposit being paid), Sajith Premadasa and Anura Kumara Dissanayake whose hats have long been in the ring and last week’s formal entrants, Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka and Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe. The latter is on record claiming that there is no barrier to his remaining in the cabinet as President Wickremesinghe’s justice minister and running against his boss at an election. There will be other candidates – proxies, vote breakers and those seeking to mark a presence in anticipation of the parliamentary election next year. The starter’s gun has now been fired and the race has begun.