by Rajan Philips

Although it was the economy that ended Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s presidency and it was very much the main backdrop to the September presidential election, the results of the election cannot be interpreted as showing a voter preference for any particular direction for economic management. In fact, in an earlier CPA opinion poll, a good majority of the respondents in general, and especially among the Sinhalese, had indicated that they did not trust of any of three main candidates for their abilities to steer the economy out of trouble to recovery and growth.

That included Ranil Wickremesinghe who rested his whole campaign on economic stewardship and got third prize for his efforts. This is not to belittle Mr. Wickremesinghe’s achievements in restoring economic normalcy, but to highlight the fact he undermined his own economic case by trying to be too clever by half on the political front. Now that he has earned his long overdue political rest, let him finally have some quality time without too much disturbance.

Sajith Premadasa’s progressive benefactors have blamed his defeat on his alleged reliance on centre-right economists like Eran Wickramaratne and Harsha de Silva, both with background in banking and economics but stymied from contributing to their full potential first by RW and then by SP. The criticism anyway is over the top, for Sajith Premadasa’s shortcoming is the opposite of Ranil Wickremesinghe’s. If RW is prone to being clever at everything, SP has the propensity for not being clever in anything. Now SP is projecting himself as candidate to be Prime Minister while promising that as Prime Minister he will co-operate with President AKD.

As everyone else is scrambling to prepare for the parliamentary election, President Dissanayake and his NPP must be sitting pretty, savouring their prospects for November after their success in September. The quick dissolution of parliament and a virtually snap election favours the NPP more than others. They have the momentum and the machinery of victory behind them. And they have little time to seriously shoot themselves in the foot. The necessary economic condition and the political secret to win a majority of 113+ seats at the elections is not to rock the boat but to keep the prices and supplies steady.

No one is expecting economic miracles in the short term or long term from President AKD. He himself has made it clear that he is not a magician. The President’s economic challenges are likely to become more noticeable after the parliamentary election than they are now. He has announced his economic team, and the team has met with IMF delegates. There have been some indications of the new Administration’s approach to dealing with the IMF, as well as its approach to dealing with State Owned Enterprises. The Sri Lankan Airlines has reportedly been pulled back from the auction block and the search is on for a new model for improved management. Time will tell.

The government will be tested to the fullest by the approach it takes to re-negotiating the IMF deal, and restructuring the private bondholder debt of $12.5 billion out of the total foreign debt of $34 billion. The debt-restructuring deal was announced by President Wickremesinghe just days before the presidential election and it did not help him in the end, as pointed out in a scathing but responsible opinion piece in the Daily Mirror (October 3) by a group of modern-day ‘visiting economists’ (to recall an earlier generation of Visiting Economists that included the likes Nicholas Kaldor and Joan Robinson).

Before long, but mostly after the November election, the government will run into crossfire from the left and from the right. The right is already skeptical about NPP’s abilities to manage the economy. The left, on the other hand, might err oppositely by raising too many expectations and even bringing to bear too much pressure on the government. Unlike shortages of essential goods and services, there will never be any shortage in advice and opinion, more often than not unsolicited. The President’s challenge will be to be guided – on every issue and in any decision – by what is doable and what will bring the largest relief to the largest number of people looking for relief. The people should not be used as guinea pigs to prove someone’s ideology – left, right or centre.

Executive Presidency

The people might be even less concerned about the executive presidency (EP) than they are about economic philosophy. But both the President and the NPP have been more certain about what they will do about the EP than what they might do about the IMF. The certainty was confirmed the day after Anura Kumara Dissanayake was elected president by Sunil Handunnetti, NPP Polit Bureau Member and former MP, who told the media that “the nation will not see an Executive President after this presidency.” Mr. Handunnetti was also part of the President’s Economic Team that met with the IMF delegation. And PB members in an organization like the JVP/NPP do not speak out of turn in public.

My views on the executive presidency have had their fair share of criticisms by others who swear by it, and it is not my purpose to restart another debate, or to play an advocacy role for abolishing the EP. Instead, I will only outline what the new Administration could do to make itself the last of its kind, while being agnostic about the outcome. First, even if President AKD is vowing to make himself the last EP, he cannot do it by himself. He will need an act of parliament and a constitutional amendment that requires a two-thirds majority support in parliament.

The question is whether it will also require a referendum. Here opinions differ, and those who swear by the EP will also swear that a referendum is needed. From a political-constitutional standpoint it could be argued that which was created in 1978, through the medium of a parliamentary select committee dominated by a certain political party that has all but vanished in 2024, should not require a referendum to remove it or modify it. Also, it is not just the NPP that wants this change, but also the SJB. Between them they have more than two-thirds majority support in the country for abolishing the presidency.

From a legal-constitutional standpoint as well, there is a very plausible view that the requirement for a referendum should be limited only to amendments involving the Articles and provisions that are listed in Article 83 of the Constitution, as specifically requiring a referendum in addition to a two-thirds majority in parliament for the amendment of the said articles and provisions. Article 83 does not include any of the Articles or provisions involving the election and powers of the Executive President. The sole exception is Article 30 (2), which stipulates the length of the presidential term, and the term of office cannot be extended without a referendum per Article 83 (b). There is a discrepancy between Article 30 (2) and Article 83 (b), but that need not detain us.

Nothing else about changing the EP system should require a referendum, including its abolition. But the term abolition is overwrought and incorrect. The task really is to replace the directly elected executive president playing a double role as head of state and head of government, by an indirectly elected president to be the head of state only. The head of government role will revert back to the prime minister as part of restoring the parliamentary system of government.

The new head of state could be elected by parliament from among candidates, who are not members of parliament but are nominated by political parties represented in parliament. The powers of the new head of state could also be figured to be much less than what are allocated in the current constitution, but more than what were allocated in the 1972 constitution.

The powers so allocated should be designed to address concerns about rupturing the power link between the current EP and the Provincial Council system. In the same vein, Provincial Council members could also be brought into the process of indirectly electing the new head of state. Members of Parliament and Members of the Provincial Councils could be the evanescent ‘electoral college’ for electing the new head of state. This would be similar to the process in India for electing its president.

Getting back to the question of referendum requirement, even though it could be argued that a referendum is not required to bring about the above changes to the constitution, there is also the considered view that it is better to have a referendum and be done with it. In this view, if the NPP were to go ahead with its proposal to change the executive presidential system, it has to first get the constitutional amendment passed in parliament by two-thirds majority, and then the President would call a referendum for the people to vote on it.

That would a third national vote in as many yeas. Is there a middle way?

That would be to use the November parliamentary election as a referendum on changing the executive presidency. A question on changing the EP could be tagged on to the election ballot for the people to vote yes or no, in addition to casting their votes to elect their parliamentarians. The President has the power (Article 86) to submit a question of national importance to the people to express their preference in a referendum. But it cannot be substituted for the process for amending the constitution.

Could the President consult the Supreme Court (Article 129) to obtain its opinion whether a referendum is required to amend the constitution for changing the executive presidency; and if required, whether the parliamentary election could be used as a referendum in anticipation of a constitutional amendment in the new parliament?

That will be putting the Court on the spot, but there is reasonable justification for it, because it is not only President AKD and the NPP who are seeking to ‘abolish’ executive presidency in its current form; it is also the commitment of Sajith Premadasa and the SJB. There will also be considerable cost saving. Nothing may come out of this in the end, but the prospects of seeing an elected president living up to his promise to end it with him has never been brighter. I am only being agnostic.

(Excerpted from Rendering Unto Caesar, autobiography of Bradman Weerakoon)

(Continued from last week)

The prime minister’s father too had been named John Kotelawela and there was always a whiff of mystery surrounding `John Sr’. There had then been rumours of high intrigue, of family feuds, contract killings and near unassailable alibis. The kavi kola karayas – the wandering minstrels who preceded the radio as purveyors of news in my childhood had sung the story in racy jingles, doubtless embellishing it as time went on. But what was spoken about in whispers was that John Sr had died in prison while awaiting trial after arrest in a foreign land for killing a brother-in-law.

But this could well be the embellishment of an overladen imagination. I would not personally subscribe to its veracity and mention it only to show how the whisper mills grind away in this country. So the son, John Lionel Kotelawela had grown up very much in the care of his dynamic mother Alice. She continued to be a strong influence throughout his life and frequently intervened to help him out of the many sticky situations his reckless tongue got him into.

Alice Kotelawela was one of the three Attygalle sisters of Madapatha who made an important impact on the political history of colonial Ceylon through their dynastic marriages. The eldest, Alice, as we have noted, married John Kotelawela Senior. Leena, the second sister married T F Jayewardene, an uncle of J R Jayewardene, the future president. The youngest, Ellen, married F R Senanayake, the elder brother of D S Senanayake, the first prime minister of independent Ceylon. The Attygalle sisters have been likened to the three Soong sisters of pre-revolutionary China who achieved fame through their marriages to leading political figures.

The Attygalle family network was indeed an impressive one. F R Senanayake’s younger brother D S and D S Senanayake’s son Dudley, were the first and second prime ministers of the country while John Kotelawala’s son Lionel (our Sir John) became the third. These family networks and the way the highest posts rotated among kinsmen led to the UNP being referred to as the ‘Uncle Nephew Party’, a sobriquet not unwarranted by the facts. Political analysts observing this trend being repeated later on in the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), and by contagion in the neighbouring countries as well, were to refer to the phenomenon rather grandly, I think, as dynastic democracy, a typically South Asian variant.

Sir John’s entrance to the office of prime minister on October 12, 1953 was according to him delayed and long over-due. As he perceived it, he should by right and by seniority in the Party, have been appointed by the Governor -General Lord Soulbury to fill the vacancy caused by the death of D S on March 22, 1952. t was a climactic moment in the life of the new nation as D S, like other new leaders who had managed the transition from colony to free state, had been like a father figure.

Sir John Kotelawela

The question before the leading politicians of the government as D S lay dying – and also the choice being theirs, was, “Who will now be prime minister?” S W R D Bandaranaike, a likely successor, had put himself outside contention by his resignation from the government and the UNP on July 12. 1951, a full eight months before D S’ death. What would have been the country’s future had he continued in the UNP of which he had been a founding member in 1946, and been chosen to succeed? This was to become an often-asked question but I always thought it was irrelevant considering the profound differences in policy and direction between himself and D S.

On crossing the floor’ in a memorable speech he had expressed his frustration at not being able to make the regime implement the progressive reform agenda he had submitted. There was no doubt that after much reflection he had left the government to form his own Party since he was convinced that forces within the UNP would never allow him to succeed D S. With S W R D Bandaranaike out of the way the leading contender was Sir John. He had held ministerial rank since 1936, was now deputy leader, held the portfolio of minister of transport and works and was leader of the house. The other possible candidates were Dudley, D S’s son, and J R Jayewardene who was also a distant relative of the Senanayake’s.

Dudley had been in the Cabinet for less than five years and held the important portfolio of Agriculture and Lands. But he was much younger, relatively inexperienced and had shown no great enthusiasm for the rough and tumble of politics. J R Jayewardene was minister of finance and had earned a reputation as a political strategist but his stand on the language issue – official status for Sinhala – and his penchant for the national dress did not commend him to the old guard of the UNP for the leadership position.

It looked obvious to Sir John and his followers that he would be next in line. But it was not to be. Apparently the late prime minister, since he was in poor health, had advised Lord Soulbury that if anything untoward happened to him he should ask Dudley to form a government. Soulbury was out of the country at the time but had flown back on March 26 and with the minimum of consultation invited Dudley to do so. Dudley was then 41 years old and thus became the youngest prime minister in the Commonwealth.

Lord Soulbury whose appointment to office had been recommended by D S had paid off his debt, but as far as Sir John was concerned he had gained a mortal foe. Indeed Sir John had written a curt letter6 to Soulbury about the breach of British parliamentary convention to which the governor-general had not deigned to respond. It was soon also apparent that a majority of members of the parliamentary group had favoured Dudley over Sir John, who with his characteristic impulsiveness was more than likely to get them all into trouble.

After some days of sulking and denunciation of all the ‘plotters’ from his home at Kandawala Sir John had been persuaded to serve in Dudley’s cabinet, taking up his old portfolio which had been kept vacant. S W R D Bandaranaike watching these goings on from the sidelines was to describe this in his usual pithy terminology as “the culmination of a long, shabby and discreditable intrigue”.’

However, Sir John’s fury at being, as he perceived it, ‘double crossed’ was not to be pacified by ministerial office alone. He had to get it off his chest and he did so in his usual scathing style in a document widely circulated without any authorship, which gave a blow by blow account of how the deed was done. This was the famous The Premier Stakes . As usual his wayward tongue landed him in a heap of trouble. He was in the US on his way to Canada on an official visit when the story broke. Let me record the sequence of the events in his own words. The extract is from his An Asian Prime Minister’s Story.

‘Premier Dudley was prevailed upon to send me this message by cable: “The publication of the The Premier Stakes in 1952 has created a situation which makes it impossible for me to retain you as a member of my Cabinet. I shall, therefore, be glad if you will hand in your resignation by top secret telegram through our Embassy in Washington.”

‘The message was delivered to me with the utmost formality by an official of the Embassy who was very correctly dressed for the occasion, in tails and black tie. His instructions were that I should read it myself. When I had digested the contents of the cabled message which had been sent in code I asked him whether he would send a reply in plain English signed Kotelawala. He said that he certainly would. The reply I dictated made our uneasy diplomat shrink from its emphatic and rudely specific terms. The prime minister was to be asked to thrust the message he sent me into the place where I thought it belonged. Needless to say no reply was sent to Ceylon in these terms through the prescribed channels.’

However, Sir John was advised by many friends to go back to Ceylon and make up with Dudley. Then followed one of those diplomatic denials sometimes euphemistically described as being ‘economical with the truth’ which I was to encounter again and again in my career with top people. It was agreed, as Sir John later wrote, that everything should be forgiven and forgotten. In writing he solemnly asserted that he had nothing to do with the publication of the The Premier Stakes and denied the truth of the statements attributed to him in the document. Dudley accepted the explanation and all was well that ended well.

Blood in the country’s politics has always been thicker than water. Sir John’s mother Alice and Sir Oliver Goonetilleke, who was also an expert at patching up other peoples’ quarrels, then a cabinet minister and later the next governor-general recommended by Sir John, were said to be the prime actors in this charade.

Overlooked in 1952 for the premiership and now more than ever before the heir-apparent, Sir John did not have to wait too long for the prize he was seeking. Dudley as everyone expected called for an early election influenced by two main considerations. One obviously was to take advantage of the considerable sympathy vote following the death of his father. The other was to pre-empt the rising influence of S W R D Bandaranaike, who after the inauguration of the SLFP in September 1951 was seen to be making strong inroads into the traditional rural vote base of the UNP with a highly populist agenda.

But Dudley’s spell of office, after comfortably winning the elections of 1952, was short. Plagued by ill-health and indecisiveness, Dudley resigned on the October 12, 1953, following the widespread hartal (general strike) in August brought about by the government’s abrupt reduction of the subsidized rice ration. Finally Sir John’s perseverance and tenacity had paid off His reputation for being strong-minded and resolute made him the man of the hour within the Party and there was virtually no opposition to his taking over as prime minister.

Mara Maha Yuddaya cartoon

There were many urgent things to be done; the pre-eminent need being that of getting the strikers off the streets and back to work. There was also the official visit of the Queen which was pending and which Sir John was determined would be an unqualified success.

Sir John, as usual when he undertook a project, took a very personal interest in planning the Queen’s visit. In addition to the customary address to Parliament by the monarch – she was still the nominal head of the government and appointed the governor-general – there was a grand reception at Temple Trees and a special train assembled to take her to Kandy and then on to Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura, the popular ‘ruined city’ tour.

The massive file on Her Majesty’s visit, which I saw soon after I entered the prime minister’s office, attested to the care and attention which the Railway had paid to the decor of the toilets attached to the Royal carriage and the refurbishment of the master bedroom at the picturesque Polonnaruwa Rest-house on the banks of Parakrama Samudraya tank where the Queen spent one night. For years afterwards locals were wont to make a special effort when staying at Polonnaruwa to ask for the Queen’s bedroom and relate with some awe the experience of having slept in the Queen’s bed.

The visit to Sigiriya was a highlight of the journey. It was breezy at the Lion’s Paw and the young queen had quite a time keeping in place the light cotton dress she had chosen for the hot morning climb. As a sudden gust of wind caused a momentary lifting of the Queen’s dress the irrepressible Sir John shouted “ganing yakko ganing’ to his official photographer Rienzie Wijeratne. The shot was not among the carefully selected album of photographs ceremonially presented to the Royal guest on departure.

A few months after I entered the prime minister’s office, the coming general elections in April of 1956 began to dominate all our work. In February of that decisive year, and more than 14 months earlier than was statutorily necessary, Sir John had advised the governor-general, Sir Oliver Goonetilleke, to dissolve the Parliament. The reason for this was not immediately clear to us.

Ceylon was to celebrate the long awaited 2,500th anniversary of the birth of Gautama Buddha at the full moon (Vesak Poya) in the month of May of 1956. This had been termed Buddha Jayanthi –an event of the highest importance to Buddhists not only in the country but all over the world. Preparations were in hand for the historic occasion and an array of leaders of countries where Buddhism was being practised, including King Mahendra of Nepal were to visit the island on and around the event.

Moreover, Ceylon along with some other countries which had been knocking on the door, had been admitted into the United Nations in December 1955 in a package deal and this was deemed a major diplomatic coup. Past efforts had proved fruitless on account of a continuing Soviet veto. It had been alleged that Ceylon with British bases at Trincomalee and Katunayake was not yet an independent nation. However, these seemingly positive factors notwithstanding, the decision had been taken to go for an early election.

We surmised later that the reason may have been to pre-empt the growing popularity of S W R D Bandaranaike and the formidable coalition, the Mahajana Eksath Peramuna (“MEP”) that he had succeeded in mobilizing. There was also the extraordinary rumour that Dudley Senanayake who had apparently resigned from politics completely, was now thinking of forming a ‘third force’ to contest both Sir John and Bandaranaike, taking away from the UNP some of his former loyalists.

So it was that dissolution of Parliament was fixed for February 18 and after due consultations with the then court astrologer, three days in April just before the Sinhalese and Tamil New Year, auspicious to Sir John – the 5th, 7th and 10th were chosen for the general elections. At the time the practice was to conduct the voting over a few days on the ostensible grounds that elections staffing and security considerations – police at polling booths – would not allow for island-wide elections on a single day.

The real reason, however, was different. Staggered elections were expected to provide for the ‘swing’ to take effect. Government campaign managers usually put up all the strong candidates on the first day so that the voters on the subsequent days could be suitably impressed and influenced by how well the government was doing and would vote accordingly. As it turned out, the results of the first day, April 5 belied all the expectations of Sir John and his advisers.

As caretaker prime minister, Sir John embarked on an elaborate and gruelling 18-hours -a- day programme of meetings and election rallies. The concept of `caretaker’ was taken seriously in those days and as far as possible major policy decisions with large financial implications were postponed. However, in a significant change of policy to counter the ‘Sinhala Only in 24 hours’ slogan of Mr Bandaranaike and his hastily assembled coalition, the UNP leadership too decided to fight the election on the language issue.

The UNP departed from its long held position of parity of status for Sinhala and Tamil as official languages and had adopted the proposal that “Sinhalese alone should be the state language of Ceylon and that immediate action be taken to implement the decision”. The effect of this was that seven Tamil MPs who were UNP members resigned in protest. However, the timing of the change of policy gave the show away and it was perceived by the mass of the electorate as an election stunt. Clearly a case of too little, too late.

Public cynicism had too been growing over the UNP’s alleged misuse of political power. There was a widespread belief that funds were being collected for the Party through the sale of Honours and citizenship rights. Sir John’s impatience with discussion and the image he strove to propagate as a man of action caused irritation.

I personally recalled his peremptory treatment of a body of monks without hearing them out, who had called over at Temple Trees to demand the postponement of the elections. Soon afterwards he threatened to tar-brush the monks who were duseela and took part in politics.

The thoughts of some of us in the prime minister’s office were now turning to the man who was leading the campaign on the other side. The media by and large were hoping for and predicting a UNP victory but there was a low rumble from below that all was not going well with the UNP campaign and that the MEP was gaining ground. Among those who thought so was an American professor of political science whose acquaintance I had made and who seemed confident that Mr Bandaranaike would do very well especially in the rural electorates.

But my feedback to Nadesan and the prime minister was discounted on the grounds that information coming in through police intelligence showed that the UNP was going to win. This total variation between what official intelligence was coming up with – perhaps mostly fulfillment – and the reality on the ground, was something I was to encounter over and over again as I worked with other administrators each time election day, verily the day of reckoning, drew near.

The final nail in Sir John’s coffin was a stunning poster devised by a Bhikku working for the Eksath Bhikku Peramuna (EBP) which was called the “mara yuddhaya.” It depicted Sir John on an elephant (the UNP symbol) at the head of a long parade of girl friends, ballroom dancers, Tamils and champagne drinkers, holding a spear pointed at the heart of a Buddha statue under the Bo tree. The symbolism was plain for all to see. To rescue the religion, the race and the country from the forces of evil, the devil had to be defeated.

Sir John’s supporters, who were quite sure of a UNP victory, had planned a celebratory champagne party for the evening of the last day of polling. Food and drink had been ordered from Victoria’s the official caterers and even the giant flamboyant trees in the beautiful back lawn of Temple Trees, the prime minister’s official residence, were being festooned, as on festive days with myriads of coloured electric bulbs. But as the first night wore on and more and more stalwarts of the UNP bit the dust, Sir John angrily called the ‘victory’ reception off.

Nadesan was quite certain Mr Bandaranaike would not want him to stay on. He had endeared himself to Sir John when the latter was minister of transport in D S Senanayake’s administration and Sir John had brought him in when he himself became prime minister in 1953.

Nadesan was a facile writer and it was reported, had ghost written the An Asian Prime Minister’s Story in addition to compiling an euphoric collection of essays on Sir John entitled ‘This Man Kotelawala’. But what would Mr Bandaranaike do with me? Would it be Siberia for having associated with the enemy? I was ready for anything but I had just got engaged to Damayanthi and our wedding had been planned for August that year.

“It doesn’t matter whether a cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice – Deng Xiaoping”

By S.A.C.M. Zuhyle

As a concerned citizen of Sri Lanka, I have closely observed the early days of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s (AKD) tenure. Elected on a platform of reform, transparency, and merit-based governance, his recent appointments to key government positions have sparked debate. Some argue that these choices contradict the very principles AKD campaigned on. However, a closer look reveals a more nuanced and pragmatic approach to governance that prioritises results and effective leadership.

While the president pledged to appoint individuals based on merit, it’s crucial to recognise that merit isn’t restricted to long-standing public officials. Sri Lanka’s history has shown that some of the most effective public servants have come from non-traditional backgrounds. One such example is Mr W.M.P.B. Menikdiwela, who served as the Secretary to President J.R. Jayewardene. Though from the top ranks of the Sri Lanka Administrative Service, Menikdiwela’s success was attributed to his administrative capability, strategic vision, and reformist mindset, which aligned well with Jayewardene’s goals.

AKD’s recent appointments reflect a similar thought process. The selection of Dr Nandika Sanath Kumanayake as the new Presidential Secretary may appear unconventional to critics accustomed to more traditional choices. However, AKD’s intention is clear – he seeks to break away from bureaucratic stagnation and inject new thinking into governance. By bringing in individuals from diverse professional backgrounds, AKD aims to rejuvenate a system often weighed down by entrenched bureaucracy.

A particularly bold move was AKD’s decision to appoint nine new provincial governors, bringing in a diverse array of expertise and experience. One of the standout choices is Mr Hanif Yusoof, appointed as the Governor of the Western Province. Mr Yusoof is a highly successful entrepreneur and co-founder of Expolanka Holdings, a company he transformed into a global leader in logistics. His extensive business experience and international exposure uniquely position him to drive economic growth in a region that serves as a hub for major investments, including the Port City and Board of Investment (BOI) projects. Mr Yusoof’s visionary leadership is expected to further AKD’s vision of integrating private-sector dynamism into public-sector reforms, making him a key figure in fostering business partnerships and attracting investments to the region.

The other newly appointed governors include Mr Sarath Bandara Samarasinghe Abayakon (Central Province), Mr Bandula Harischandra (Southern Province), Mr Tissa Kumarasiri Warnasuriya (North Western Province), Mr Wasantha Kumara Wimalasiri (North Central Province), Mr Nagalingam Chetanayahan (Northern Province), Mr Jayantha Lal Ratnasekara (Eastern Province), Mrs Champa Janaki Rajaratne (Sabaragamuwa Province), and Mr Kapila Jayasekara (Uva Province). Each of these appointments reflects AKD’s strategy of leveraging a broad spectrum of expertise to support his reformist agenda.

Governance, after all, is about execution. It requires individuals who not only have the necessary expertise but also share the leadership’s vision and can act decisively in implementing policy. The appointments of officials such as the Defence Secretary and the Secretary to the Ministry of Public Security have been scrutinised, but they appear to have been chosen based on their deep understanding of national security and ability to align with AKD’s broader goals. Prior involvement in the political campaign does not detract from their qualifications but reinforces their commitment to the administration’s objectives.

It’s understandable that these appointments might appear to contradict AKD’s election promise of selecting professionals based purely on qualifications and impartiality. However, his definition of merit extends beyond academic credentials or seniority, focusing instead on individuals’ ability to drive meaningful change. Many of these appointees may have supported the president during his campaign or held positions of trust, but this should not be mistaken for cronyism. Instead, it is about ensuring that the right individuals, who understand the president’s vision, are placed in positions where they can deliver results.

In a country that has suffered from decades of bureaucratic inefficiency and governance failures, AKD’s approach reflects a shift towards a more pragmatic and results-driven model. While some may see these decisions as unconventional, they are consistent with the broader promise of reform, efficiency, and responsive governance. As Deng Xiaoping famously remarked during China’s economic reforms, “It doesn’t matter whether a cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice” This quote epitomises AKD’s strategy of prioritising effective governance over strict adherence to tradition.

These appointments should not be judged solely on traditional metrics. Instead, it is essential to assess whether these individuals can achieve the transformative changes the country desperately needs. As a citizen, I remain optimistic that this shift towards pragmatic governance will set the stage for real progress. It is time for us to focus on the bigger picture – how these individuals will help steer Sri Lanka towards a more efficient, transparent, and prosperous future.