From The Bullet To The Ballot: Can AKD Become The Sri Lankan Lee Kuan Yew? – OpEd

By Seevali Abeysekera*

All my previous posts pertaining to Sri Lankan politics written over the last decade or so have had one primary theme, namely that Sri Lankan politics was merely an extension of a culture based on false values which had created and promoted inept, incompetent and semi-literate leaders who had led the country to bankruptcy.

Never did I envisage a day, certainly not in my lifetime, when large sections, let alone the majority of the electorate, would reach a point where they could contemplate a paradigm shift in terms of leadership and thinking which would result in the political equivalence of the shifting of the earth’s tectonic plates which result in huge tsunami’s.

Much to my astonishment and joy, that day did happen and what appears to be a new political dawn has broken.

For a candidate to increase his share of the vote from 3% to 42% in little over five years was either a case of him transforming himself into a near messianic figure or a set of factors that made his message or brand of politics suddenly very appealing and necessary.

In other words, the perfect storm when all the elements and stars aligned themselves in his favour.

The newly-elected President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s (AKD) vision of a society that treated each citizen as equal within a meritocracy was essentially a complete culture change in a country whose practices and values are best described as feudal, familial and patriarchal.

Those values were reflected in the political leadership that was either based on delusional “old boy” networks which promoted abject mediocrity or on nepotism which championed idiocy.

The country had a leadership group that were either arrogant delusional old age pensioners or the offspring of previous leaders whose primary modus operandi and contributions to the betterment of the nation was industrial scale corruption and theft from the national treasury.

Little did I appreciate just how angry the people were with the existing status quo that they were prepared to put their trust in a man whose political party was commonly referred to by many less than a decade ago as ” Che Guevara’s ” or “terrorists “.

Desperation

Such was the desperation for change that 39% of the electorate, that had very different views about AKD in 2019, put their future and salvation in his hands. It is one of those remarkable outcomes where it was not the policies of the winner that won him the victory but the very resentment of and anger against all those who stood against him.

Such was the enormous degree of bitterness towards the traditional “rinse and repeat” system of governance that had destroyed the country and brought it to its knees.

AKD will need to lead from the front and build a team around him that are above all competent, honest and truthful to the electorate. Appointments will need to be based on merit and not on the traditional system of appointing sycophantic nodding ponies. Sri Lanka boasts a very high level of literacy and therefore it will be interesting to see just how able and competent his non-political appointees will be.

To ensure the reintroduction of checks and balances that have been so visibly absent in Sri Lanka since the eradication of the Ceylon Civil Service (CCS), those who are appointed to non-political but vital civil service posts need to be the right calibre and competence.

Integrity thus becomes a vital aspect to AKD’s governance for it is very easy to pontificate about integrity when outside of government but very difficult to practice integrity from within.

In order for AKD to succeed he needs to ensure that the rule of law is sacrosanct. It remains to be seen just how he goes about changing a system that is akin to a legalised mafia operation whose primary objective appears to be the enrichment of those within it at the expense of the public.

Multiple challenges

He will no doubt face multiple challenges from those who have vested interests in maintaining the status quo.

Like Lee Kuan Yew (LKW), AKD needs to ensure that those responsible for civil and corporate crimes against the nation have the full force of the legal system applied against them. How he does that within the framework of a legal system that ironically will be fearful how the rule of law applies to them, remains to be seen.

These challenges could potentially even put his Presidency at risk for the vested interests will fight any change that negates their impunity and omnipotence.

Those who bankrupted the economy have lauded the previous president for keeping the SL Titanic from sinking in 2022 but they are actually thanking him for saving their hides and for ensuring they retain the ability to do what they have always done – enriching themselves at the expense of the masses.

As someone who I assume believes in the equal distribution of wealth, it will be fascinating to observe how AKD goes about enabling the 95% who have next to nothing gain access to the obscene riches that are concentrated amongst a small elite who retain 95% of the country ‘s wealth.

Those who have acquired wealth through legitimate means and pay their taxes should encourage AKD to take punitive actions against those whose actions have left the government coffers empty.

As part of his resignation speech, the previous president referred to the Sri Lankan foreign exchange reserves being down to USD 20 million when he took office. The irony of that statement being that many lamenting his demise probably had multiples of that in their personal bank accounts at the time!

Naturally, none of these “patriots” considered lending the Central Bank any of their funds in order to enable the country to pay for basic essentials during those desperate days in 2022. For a start, that would have opened them to far too much scrutiny.

Far better to borrow even more billions from foreign lenders!

AKD needs to be mindful that 58% of the electorate did not vote for him and contained within that are those with enormous wealth, economic leverage and perhaps more real power than he has. If they turn hostile, his presidency could be both perilous and potentially short lived.

In order for AKD to consolidate power and follow through with his mandate and policies, he needs many more representatives of his party in parliament. The new parliamentary elections that he has called for in November will be the real test as to whether the electorate truly believes that Sri Lanka needs a dramatic change in the direction of political travel or if his election was merely a protest vote by those whose core values are still enshrined within the failed feudal faux democracy that has existed since independence.

Stated objective

Ironically, AKD’s stated objective of wanting to dissolve the executive presidency which bestows so much power in a single individual with little or no checks and balances can only be achieved by two thirds of MPs voting to abolish the post.

Until now it has not happened because the vast majority of MPs in Sri Lanka have benefitted from having an executive presidency—irrespective of which political party they belong to. A classic case of Turkey’s not wanting to vote for Christmas!

Therefore, how the electorate votes on 14 November will be as important, if not even more important, than the votes they cast on 21 September.

There is also the small matter of a national language. it was very encouraging to note that the election for the Presidency did not see any communal or race-based narratives used by any candidates. That too was a welcome paradigm change.

It has always been my view that Sri Lanka can only progress as a united nation if a common language is used by all. Language, by default, unites. That single language needs to be English which then becomes the language of learning.

The same foresight Lee Kuan Yew had when he made English the national language of Singapore. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to see the remarkable results and rewards of that brave vision.

If the electorate can enable AKD consolidate his victory by providing him with the tools to govern, then how he navigates the various perilous minefields described above will define his presidency and the future prosperity of Sri Lanka.

In the end, it will be his internal battles with these vested domestic interests, not the foreign debtors or the regional geopolitics, that will dictate whether the tectonic shift in his election as a very different type of President of Sri Lanka will truly define the country’s future.

Can AKD be the local version of LKY that the country has desperately needed since 1948?

• Seevali Abeysekera is a retired businessman based in London.