Last Wednesday, President Ranil Wickremesinghe had a dialogue with the country’s young legal professionals to discuss much required legal reforms to the country.
In his speech, the President had made a noteworthy comment about the country’s situation at the end of the Aragalaya. After President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa left the country and resigned from the presidency, Ranil Wickremesinghe had to face pressure from the protesters as well as from some people demanding that he should also resign as the Premier.
Referring to the situation during the final days of the Aragalaya, the President addressing the youth said: “When President Rajapaksa left for Trincomalee on a ship, some people urged me to resign from my post as the Prime Minister. But I told them that I could only resign if there was a person with a parliamentary majority. If I had written my resignation letter, I have to hand it over to the President but I couldn’t do so because the President was on a ship and had already left the shores to reach the Maldives. Even if I had resigned due to some one’s pressure or as they have burnt my house, someone out of the democratic process would have come into power”.
I cannot imagine the situation of the country would have been today, if President Wickremesinghe had not accepted the challenge and assumed as the Prime Minister and become the acting President at a time when others refused to accept the premiership.
When he was the acting President, except the Parliament, the President’s Office, the Presidential Residence, the Prime Minister’s Office and the Prime Minister’s Residence were occupied and controlled by the protesters. At that time, a Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)-led group, including Sunil Handunnetti and K.D. Lalkantha were provoking people to rush to Parliament and take it over. If that attempt was not controlled to protect the Parliament and the protesters were not removed from State administrative nerve centres, the democratic governance system of this country would definitely have collapsed.
Narrow escape
If Wickremesinghe was not there then, where would the candidates running for the presidential election be today? Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) and the Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa had a narrow escape from the protesters. National People’s Power (NPP) Leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake also had to face a similar situation. But, I do not think that they can blow their trumpets and become presidential candidates in the upcoming presidential polls, if Wickremesinghe had not taken over the country, which was in a chaotic situation.
By protecting the Parliament and ending the struggle and rescuing the country from the state of anarchy, Parliament was entrusted to appoint a member of the Parliament for the vacant presidency. There, Anura Kumara Dissanayake, the leader of the JVP, who instigated the move to capture Parliament, came forward to take over the presidency.
Dallas Alahapperuma, who had held several rounds of talks with protesters, was also ready to take over the presidency and had plans to appoint Premadasa as the Prime Minister. But Wickremesinghe became the President of this country with the majority votes of the members of the Parliament and the country’s democratic system of governance was restored.
Although Wickremesinghe became the Leader of the United National Party (UNP) in 1994, he was not given the candidacy for the presidential election in 2019. Instead, Premadasa was chosen as the party candidate but he could not win the presidency. In the next parliamentary elections, Premadasa split the UNP and formed the SJB with those UNPers who left Wickremesinghe.
But he led the UNP alone. Premadasa could not win the majority in the parliamentary elections. Wickremesinghe who could not secure a single seat, became the only UNP member of the Parliament but within two-years he became the President of this country by bringing presidency to the UNP.
Fine reply
Finally, Wickremesinghe has given a fine reply to the people, who joined the UNP saying that he could not lead the UNP for a victory to secure power. Therefore, one can now think why those who have left the party continue to stay with the SJB? Is it because they want to field a candidate from the SJB against the UNP’s President?
On April 12, 2022, Sri Lanka was declared a bankrupt country. Wickremesinghe took over that country as the President. Sri Lanka was in a situation where it was unable to find even a few million dollars to pay for gas and fuel ships that arrived at the Colombo Port.
There is no need to mention in length about the hardships suffered by the public due to queues to get fuel and gas while having shortages of food and medicine and followed by recurrent power cuts. It will be possible to understand the difference by comparing the difficulties faced by the public exactly two years ago with the present status of the country. What would have happened to Sri Lanka if Wickremesinghe had not taken over the presidency from the former President Rajapaksa?
The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), founded in 2017, created a significant impact in the country’s political history. It was able to win the Local Government elections that it contested for the first time. When the Opposition got 5.5 million votes, the SLPP was able to secure 6.9 million votes and elect its candidate as the President. In the parliamentary elections held after that, they were able to record a victory by winning 2/3 for the first time under the 1978 Constitution.
But on May 9, 2022, the SLPP had to witness how their party members who arrived in Colombo were being thrown to the Beira Lake and the buses in which their party members arrived in Colombo were set on fire at various places.
They also witnessed hundreds of houses belonging to SLPP ministers and local leaders were set on fire while some were being killed and badly assaulted.
If Wickremesinghe had not taken over the presidency and did not provide security to SLPPers and the entire country, we couldn’t imagine who else would restore normalcy while guaranteeing the people’s right to live and also the protection of SLPPers.
There is no other leader like President Wickremesinghe, who is genuinely committed to fulfill the grievances of all communities of this country. Tamil and Muslim political parties, who worked closely together with former President Mahinda Rajapaksa for a long time, joined the UNP in 2015 and formed a coalition Government.
Abandoning the leader
The conflict between Wickremesinghe and Premadasa was an internal issue of the party. But when Premadasa formed the SJB parliamentarians like Rauff Hakeem, Rishad Bathiudeen and P. Thigambaram joined the new coalition. Many were surprised by their stance to join a brand new party by abandoning the leader who has made such a commitment for the betterment of the minorities in this country.
There has hardly been a matured politician like President Wickremesinghe, who has made a significant commitment to protect minorities and their rights, especially in recent times. It was clearly evident during the Easter attacks in 2019.
There was no conflict in the country when even hundreds of innocent civilians were killed in a series of bomb attacks carried out by the Islamic extremists. Although some segments with ulterior motives tried to create a conflict between the Sinhalese and Muslims, Wickremesignhe did not leave space for such attempts. If he had not been there, the situation would have been completely different.
He was able to prevent such an unfortunate situation to protect the country’s Muslim community. But some Muslim politicians left Wickremesignhe, who was a true crusader for ethnic harmony, to form alliances with other political parties.
Today, when the presidential polls are around the corner, many people are thinking what would have happened to the country if President Wickremesinghe had not been there during those days.
