In Lanka, Left-Leaning Leader

With both the presidential and parliamentary polls held within a span of two months, Sri Lanka’s 22 million people are now in a state of anticipation as to how the new party in power will shape its policies to address their multifarious problems, especially the economy and employment. 

Relegating the traditionally big parties to the far background, National People’s Power (NPP), headed by President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, obtained a monumental mandate in the early parliamentary election held on November 14. Elected president comfortably in September, the left-leaning leader, desirous of a stronger majority in the island nation’s house, had promised corruption control, constitutional reforms and political stability to voters.

The effort paid off, securing a scintillating 70 per cent of the seats in the 225-member house for his coalition of 21 constituents, which is the largest percentage of seats in South Asia today. The main opposition, Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), has 40 MPs skippered by Sajith Premadasa. 

That leaves the left-leaning 56-year-old president with no ground for any excuse but to live up to the pledge of delivering effectively what he promised amidst the nation’s worst economy crisis since independence in 1948. 

Also known as AKD, Dissanayake was elected president in the wake of massive public anger over the island's severe 2022 economic meltdown that threw the state machinery out of gear as far as democratic governance was concerned. In a country with South Asia’s most robust economy and also leading in several other sectors and services, Sri Lankans were in an intense shock for the economic collapse.

Hopes and challenges 

Karl Marx and Che Guevara being his ideological heroes, some of the president’s opponents spawn rumours that he might push for Vietnam’s economic model. But this is something too early to predict. Bearing the banner of hammer and sickle does not automatically mean an organisation veers from ground realities. In any case, Vietnam’s economy is registering an impressive economic pace, which has attracted the attention of many capitalist countries of the Western model. For the communist state has recorded more than 6 per cent growth rate this year. International financial agencies note that the growth rate increased in the second half of the year as compared to the first half. 

The World Bank forecasts Vietnam’s economic growth rate to reach 6.5 per cent in both 2025 and 2026. Gradual political stability, visibly emerging new global order and increasing prospects of a multipolar world have contributed to the communist nation of nearly 100 million. Dissanayake needs to put the nation back on track, which calls for cracking the whip on corruption and injecting fresh initiatives in answer to the existing problems amidst acute public disenchanted.

A civil war that erupted in the 1980s when ethnic Tamil groups called for a separate state of Talim Eelam in the island country’s north-eastern region. The insurgency claimed an estimated 80,000 lives by the time it ended in 2009 after Colombo deployed the army in a major way, despite warnings and threats by some Western democracies that wanted the protracted “peaceful dialogue” to continue for resolving the armed conflict that had gone on for two and a half decades. 

NPP was also involved in a guerrilla war from 1971 until 1987 before it changed policy and joined the national political mainstream in the early 1990s. But it never came anywhere close to heading a government nor was its candidate elected as executive president. Previously, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the United National Party (UNP) held sway over majority of voters. 

Either at the helm of the state affairs on its own or as a coalition partner, the UNP was in power for 38 years since the country’s independence, that is, six months after India became independent from British rule in 1947. Today, it has two seats in the 225-member parliament elected last month. Which only shows that power is not for ever; the crucial test is to be seen as doing something substantial to deliver promises into action.

People bank on a president, who does not carry the baggage of misgovernance, to lead the country afresh in terms of democratic rule based on popular participation.  The voting pattern in NPP’s support indicates that the cross-section of Sri Lankans gave their verdict in favour of Dissanayake’s team this year.

Arduous but essential

As the turmoil over the huge protest rallies against a failed administration is on its way to settling down, Sri Lankans have their hopes high. Will the new president reaffirm the faith voters have invested in Dissanayake’s leadership? Job generation, streamlining of the administration, corruption control and a positively steady economic pace are the key issues Colombo will have to prioritise for action.

Dissanayake apologised for the violent Marxist insurrections after taking over the JVP leadership in 2014. He said: “We assure the people of Sri Lanka we will never take to arms again. During the last 25 years, the JVP was subjected to violence on numerous occasions. However, we never resorted to violence, and I assure the public that they need not have any fear: the JVP has rejected violence forever!” 

The 2022 crisis that saw President Rajapakse flee the country following public fury over the economic mess and consequent lawless conditions. Parliament elected Ranil Wickremesinghe as interim ruler. After two years as the executive head of state, Wickremesinghe resigned but not before restoring the law and order, and securing a $3.5 billion bailout package from the International Monetary Fund. 

In Japan, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has ruled for all but four years since 1955, was resoundingly defeated by a newly formed Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), many of whose senior members had deserted the long-time ruling party. Founded in 1996, the DPJ became the largest party in 2009 but its government collapsed in three years because of internal dissension. The spark of hope it had elicited in the people evaporated and it formally dissolved as a political organisation in 2016 even as the LDP bounced back to power. 

The Dissanayake-led coalition cannot be unaware of how quickly people can get disenchanted if yet another government fails and falls under the weight of non-delivery. It’s an arduous but essential task just the same.

(Professor Kharel specialises in political communication.)