11-07-2003, 03:47 PM
Date:06/11/2003 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2003/11/06/stories...10600761000.htm
Opinion - Editorials
SRI LANKA IN CRISIS AGAIN
SRI LANKA's TWO-year-old cohabitation experiment now stands at the edge of collapse. The responsibility for precipitating the crisis lies not with President Chandrika Kumaratunga, as Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has alleged, but with his Government's adventurist move to impeach, first, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and, then, the President herself. In dismissing three senior Ministers of Mr. Wickremesinghe's United National Front Government, including the Defence Minister, in proroguing Parliament for two weeks, and in bringing on an Emergency, President Kumaratunga was reacting in the main to an offensive launched by the UNF to get her out of the way against the grim backdrop of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam unfurling proposals for a de facto separate state.
Since the beginning of their uneasy partnership in December 2001, the UNF Government has been trying to divest Ms. Kumaratunga of the executive role granted to her office by the 1978 Constitution and to turn her into a lame duck President. Ms. Kumaratunga's position as commander-in-chief of the armed forces has been especially contentious as it has given her leeway to intervene in the Norway-assisted peace process with the LTTE much more than Mr. Wickremesinghe, or for that matter the LTTE, wants. Several times, the President has raised objections to the conduct of the LTTE during the ceasefire where the UNF Government has been prepared to overlook such conduct. On Tuesday, in response to two sensitive questions referred to it by the President under its consultative jurisdiction, the Supreme Court gave an opinion affirming the President's "plenary executive power" in matters relating to defence. The UNF had planned to pre-empt this opinion by initiating a move to impeach the Chief Justice who was considered close to the President. By proroguing Parliament, President Kumaratunga has blocked that move, and by taking control of three Ministries, she has asserted the executive powers that are constitutionally hers. Were these moves too hasty or were they unavoidable? They have certainly pitted Ms. Kumaratunga in open confrontation with the UNF Government. From here on, cohabitation no longer seems a viable option. In fact, there appears to be no serious option except the dissolution of Parliament and a third election in four years. With the public mood all for the negative peace that the UNF-engineered ceasefire has ushered in and at the same time appreciative of the President's wariness of the LTTE, another election may not result in any substantive change in Sri Lanka's political landscape. It will only muddy the waters further.
All in all, the present situation is a mess Sri Lanka could have done without at this stage. Both President Kumaratunga and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe have had a rare, if unwitting, meeting of minds on the proposals presented by the LTTE for an interim administration. Both have found the proposals unacceptable but have said the way forward is through negotiations. Under other circumstances, such convergence of views might have enabled the two sides to present a united response to the LTTE. The present disarray is the Sri Lankan Tamil stereotype of Sinhala politicians come true. It will give the LTTE an opportunity to make yet another case for the secession of North-East Sri Lanka by arguing that the divisions among Sinhalese politicians run so deep that they will never come to an agreement on the resolution of the Tamil question. When Sri Lanka voted in the UNF in 2001, there were two ways of looking at the mandate. One was to see it as a vote against Ms. Kumaratunga's governance. The other was to see it as a verdict to force both sides of the divided polity to work together. Sri Lanka's salvation still lies in the second interpretation. Neither President Kumaratunga nor the UNF Government should hesitate to roll back their actions of the last few days, if there is even a ghost of a chance.
© Copyright 2000 - 2003 The Hindu
Opinion - Editorials
SRI LANKA IN CRISIS AGAIN
SRI LANKA's TWO-year-old cohabitation experiment now stands at the edge of collapse. The responsibility for precipitating the crisis lies not with President Chandrika Kumaratunga, as Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has alleged, but with his Government's adventurist move to impeach, first, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and, then, the President herself. In dismissing three senior Ministers of Mr. Wickremesinghe's United National Front Government, including the Defence Minister, in proroguing Parliament for two weeks, and in bringing on an Emergency, President Kumaratunga was reacting in the main to an offensive launched by the UNF to get her out of the way against the grim backdrop of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam unfurling proposals for a de facto separate state.
Since the beginning of their uneasy partnership in December 2001, the UNF Government has been trying to divest Ms. Kumaratunga of the executive role granted to her office by the 1978 Constitution and to turn her into a lame duck President. Ms. Kumaratunga's position as commander-in-chief of the armed forces has been especially contentious as it has given her leeway to intervene in the Norway-assisted peace process with the LTTE much more than Mr. Wickremesinghe, or for that matter the LTTE, wants. Several times, the President has raised objections to the conduct of the LTTE during the ceasefire where the UNF Government has been prepared to overlook such conduct. On Tuesday, in response to two sensitive questions referred to it by the President under its consultative jurisdiction, the Supreme Court gave an opinion affirming the President's "plenary executive power" in matters relating to defence. The UNF had planned to pre-empt this opinion by initiating a move to impeach the Chief Justice who was considered close to the President. By proroguing Parliament, President Kumaratunga has blocked that move, and by taking control of three Ministries, she has asserted the executive powers that are constitutionally hers. Were these moves too hasty or were they unavoidable? They have certainly pitted Ms. Kumaratunga in open confrontation with the UNF Government. From here on, cohabitation no longer seems a viable option. In fact, there appears to be no serious option except the dissolution of Parliament and a third election in four years. With the public mood all for the negative peace that the UNF-engineered ceasefire has ushered in and at the same time appreciative of the President's wariness of the LTTE, another election may not result in any substantive change in Sri Lanka's political landscape. It will only muddy the waters further.
All in all, the present situation is a mess Sri Lanka could have done without at this stage. Both President Kumaratunga and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe have had a rare, if unwitting, meeting of minds on the proposals presented by the LTTE for an interim administration. Both have found the proposals unacceptable but have said the way forward is through negotiations. Under other circumstances, such convergence of views might have enabled the two sides to present a united response to the LTTE. The present disarray is the Sri Lankan Tamil stereotype of Sinhala politicians come true. It will give the LTTE an opportunity to make yet another case for the secession of North-East Sri Lanka by arguing that the divisions among Sinhalese politicians run so deep that they will never come to an agreement on the resolution of the Tamil question. When Sri Lanka voted in the UNF in 2001, there were two ways of looking at the mandate. One was to see it as a vote against Ms. Kumaratunga's governance. The other was to see it as a verdict to force both sides of the divided polity to work together. Sri Lanka's salvation still lies in the second interpretation. Neither President Kumaratunga nor the UNF Government should hesitate to roll back their actions of the last few days, if there is even a ghost of a chance.
© Copyright 2000 - 2003 The Hindu