The Island Editorial

More motormouths

11 May 2017

 

Even the shadow of a doomed marriage is crooked. So goes a local saying. This is true of the fragile political marriage of convenience between the two main political parties. The SLFP’s decision to appoint a separate Cabinet spokesman (or braggart?) to represent its interests points to a severe trust deficit among the constituents of the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe coalition in spite of the yahapalana leaders’ attempts to paper over the cracks.

Ministers belonging to the SLFP and the UNP are at daggers drawn and exchange barbs and abuse at every turn, making a mockery of their much-advertised ‘unity’. UNP Minister Sarath Fonseka’s recent stream of invective against his SLFP Cabinet colleague John Seneviratne is a case in point. There have been many other instances of ministers causing affronts to the dignity of one another. UNP Ministers have gone to the extent of asking their SLFP counterparts to leave the government. The intra-coalition rivalries of the yahapalana regime have apparently come to a head. What really keeps the warring members of the SLFP and the UNP together is their fear of Mahinda Rajapaksa making a comeback. It may be recalled that the Joint Opposition’s successful May Day rally prompted President Maithripala Sirisena to consider appointing a committee to strengthen bonds between the SLFP and the UNP! In the unlikely event of Rajapaksa deciding to retire, we would witness a political version of the Night of the Long Knives in the government. (The yahapalana grandees ought to ensure Rajapaksa’s safety by increasing his security instead of pruning it, for their own sake!)

Minister Mahinda Amaraweera (SLFP) sought to hoodwink the media the other day very suavely. Asked by a journalist at an SLFP media briefing why the two Cabinet Spokesmen, Ministers Gayantha Karunatilleke and Rajitha Senaratne, could not speak for the entire government, Amaraweera claimed they did so, but the need for an SLFP Cabinet spokesman had arisen because journalists raised queries about the SLFP at Cabinet media briefings. So, it is the fault of the press!

If it is only to field questions from journalists that the SLFP needs someone to represent it at the post-Cabinet media briefings, then why should it have a separate Cabinet spokesman for that purpose? Either the current Cabinet Spokesmen can refuse to be drawn on issues concerning individual constituents of the coalition or an SLFP minister can be assigned to be present there on a weekly basis and answer questions about his party. A simple solution, isn’t it?

The SLFP should admit that its real worry is that certain statements current Cabinet Spokesmen make at press conferences are detrimental to its interests and heavily loaded in favour of the UNP. Senaratne’s recent claim that President Maithripala Sirisena was planning to assign a new role to Minister Fonseka in a bid to bring order out of chaos which trade unions were wreaking on the country has made quite a stir; it has, in fact, tarnished the image of President Sirisena, who boasts of having created democratic space for people to protest without let or hindrance.

At this rate we may have a panel of Cabinet Spokesmen as big as the jumbo Cabinet with each and every constituent of the ruling coalition wanting to have its own Cabinet spokesman. After all, a government that only talks needs more spokesmen! What the government should do is not to get more ministers to talk but prod them into serving the public in keeping with their pre-election pledges. Now that the yahapalana politicians have talked the talk for more than two years, they had better walk the walk if they are to face a future election confidently. They cannot go on postponing polls indefinitely.