By. R. Senaratne from Colombo President Mahinda Rajapakse appears to be more interested in the well- being of members of the UNP than the members of his government. Whenever he hears of even the slightest friction caused by disgruntled members in the party he quickly moves into action to incite those involved to act in a manner advantageous to himself and his government.
This he had done ever since he became President and that is how he has been able to rope in fickle minded members from the UNP into his government. Little did Mahinda realise that retribution would sooner or later come for himself and his government by way of a challenge thrown by Mangala and Sripathi, two outspoken stalwarts of his party that caused severe embarrassment to him and shook the very foundations of his government.
In the case of Mangala and Sripathi, the reasons given by him and his government for their breaking ranks and aligning themselves with the UNP is that they did so because they were removed from their ministerial portfolios. Mahinda and his government have in the first place not explained why Mangala and Sripathi were removed from their portfolios.
He thinks that the people are not aware that those two members fearlessly stood up against him and his government’s dangerous extremist policies, rampant corruption, economic bungling and subversion of democracy in the country, which was the cause for an enraged President to throw them out of their portfolios.
When this happened Mangala and Sripathi had to go public with the truth about Mahinda and his government’s financial deals with the LTTE before and after the presidential election and the only option available to Mangala and Sripathi thereafter was to enter into an MOU with the UNP to work together to continue their fight against Mahinda and his government’s corrupt, repressive and extremist policies.
So after that, an embarrassed and shocked Mahinda is said to have contacted several UNP members to sow the seeds of dissension amongst them as he has done before. He is said to have expressed sympathy to those members saying they were overlooked by the party in offering a deputy prime minister’s post to Mangala in a future UNP government and had exhorted them to rise against the leadership on this issue.
The heartburn and dissension caused by Mahinda’s double standards in dealing with his own members became amply clear in this respect when he decided to side-line many of his senior members by either curtailing or depriving some of them cabinet portfolios in order to accommodate the 17 dissident UNP members who crossed over to join his government.
To sum it all, Mahinda’s hypocrisy is a reflection of his sordid leadership as president of this country and this portfolio he would have held by default the day it is proved that he along with Pirapaharan has disenfranchised several lakhs of Tamils not only in the north and east but in the south as well at the 2005 presidential election.
Post a Comment