Mahinda Rajapakse Bounces Back

After months of negotiation and show of strength, former President Mahinda Rajapakse was finally given a ticket to contest by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) which is part of the United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA), a conglomerate of around sixteen parties. Few of its constituents had left UPFA before the presidential election. General Secretary of the UPFA, Susil Premajayantha, who is also a supporter of Rajapakse, said that President Sirisena has finally approved his candidature to contest the election from Hambantota constituency and rejected three other proposals which were proposed to him during a meeting of the UPFA of which he is the Chairman. The other three proposals that President Sirisena rejected were concerning the prime ministerial post for Mahinda Rajapakse, to give him leadership of the election committee and of the nomination board. The question is: why did President Sirisena, who had earlier rejected the proposal to make Rajapakse the prime ministerial candidate, even entertain the idea of giving him a ticket from the Party? Without his approval, this would not have been possible.

First, over the period of time, Rajapakse has tried to build his constituency within the SLFP – especially with the support those MPs who benefitted immensely from the last regime in terms of power and economic gains. They felt marginalised after Ranil Wickramasinghe was chosen as the Prime Minister as per the manifesto of the Common Opposition Parties that had made Sirisena their presidential candidate and ensured his victory. While Sirisena's party was the opposition in the Parliament, many of the MPs from the party also became ministers as part of forming a post-election national government to bring changes to the constitution. Rajapakse supporters organised rallies based on the theme of "bring back Mahinda" like the Nugegoda rally of February 18, rally in Kandy on March 7, rally in Ratnapura on March 26, May rally in Kurunegala and the June 12 Matara rally demonstrating that Rajapakse continues to enjoy popular support. In fact, these shows of strength were projected as popular demand for Rajapakse to make a comeback to politics as he said "people's requests asking me to contest cannot be ignored." Many of the SLFP members who had supported Sirisena in the last election felt that since he received nearly 48 percent of votes, mostly in the Sinhala constituency in the south in the last election, his candidature can only be ignored at the peril of the SLFP.

Second, unlike the last presidential election, the parliamentary election is going to be a contest between the SLFP and the UNP and their allies. Thus battle lines will be drawn between these two political parties and their ideological differences. Many in the SLFP thought that the only way to defeat the UNP would be to bring Rajapakse back to the electoral scene. It was generally believed that the UNP had a fair chance to win the forthcoming parliamentary election. Ranil Wickramasinghe had successfully capitalised on the disaffection for the Rajapakse regime by putting a common presidential candidate in which the dominant minorities' parties, i.e. the Tamils and Muslims, whole-heartedly supported Sirisena. The voting pattern in the last presidential election showed that in case the SLFP votes are split and if Rajapakse decides to contest outside UPFA in case he's denied nomination from the party, then Wickramasinghe would surely win the election. Thus pro-Rajapakse factions along with other SLFP members put pressure on Sirisena to accept Rajapakse's nomination. 

Third, President Sirisena may have calculated that nominating Rajapakse as a candidate is not a bad option. After all, the President still retains the power to appoint the Prime Minister after the election. Moreover, under the constitution the president continues to enjoy vast powers. The 19th amendment which was introduced to correct the lopsided balance of power that was in favour of the President and attempted to transfer some of these powers to the Parliament did not succeed in bringing major changes. Sri Lanka's Supreme Court ruled out major changes and clearly mentioned that any fundamental changes to the power balance would require a referendum as per article 123 of the Sri Lankan constitution. However, it remains to be seen how many of Rajapakse's loyalists are going to retain their seats in the next parliamentary election to pressurise Sirisena to nominate Rajapakse as Prime Minister after election.

In the context of Rajapakse's decision to contest in the election, one perceives a significant consolidation of the minority votes. Though the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and the Sri Lankan Muslim Congress (SLMC) have announced that they will contest the election separately, it is likely that these two parties will be able to get most of the seats in the North and the East. The Tamils have not forgotten the kind of state surveillance that was carried out when Rajapakse was in power and how the Northern Provincial Council was reduced to a non-entity. Tamils' political grievances were securitised under the UPFA regime. Similarly, the Muslims suffered a number of attacks orchestrated by the Bodu Bala Sena, an outfit patronised by Gotabhaya Rajapakse, Mahinda Rajapakse's brother and the dreaded former Defence Secretary. It is also likely that Rajapakse will up the ante by bringing in the Tamil issue to the electoral politics. He will play on people's fear that under Wickramasinghe's 150-day regime the LTTE regrouped and strengthened, thereby making the war victory meaningless. Of course, it would be difficult for him to blame Wickramasinghe alone without bringing in the role of President Sirisena. Moreover, corruption and misuse of power by the Rajapakse regime would also dominate the electoral politics and this election may not be a cakewalk for him.

Sirisena's approval of Rajapakse's nomination has certainly disheartened the Sinhala liberal constituency that suffered in the hand of the Rajapakse regime. Many journalists were tortured, some of them went missing while a few fled the country. The authoritarian tendencies of the last UPFA regime dismantled all independent constitutional bodies and made a mockery of the state institution. As was reported, out of the Rs 1.7 trillion budget of Sri Lanka, Rs 1.2 trillion was controlled by the Rajapakse family. Many perceive Sirisena's approval of Rajapakse's nomination to be a betrayal of the mandate that people had given to him by voting for him overwhelmingly with the only hope that he would put democracy back on track. Only time will prove how prudent Sirisena's politics is.

The writer is a political and security analyst.