S.Lanka political showdown overshadows civil war ( 2003-11-08 14:40) (Agencies)
When President
Chandrika Kumaratunga sits down at the weekly meeting of the cabinet she heads,
she sees at the end of the table her biggest political foe -- Prime Minister
Ranil Wickremesinghe.
Even though the two have known each other almost all their lives, there
is little they can agree on -- least of all a peace process with Tamil Tiger
rebels who have been fighting for a separate homeland for minority Tamils since
1983.
The animosity between Kumaratunga and Wickremesinghe has so
destabilised domestic politics for nearly a decade that some in Sri Lanka say
peace between the two is more important than peace with the Tigers.
It is a clash of personality, ego and vastly different political
backgrounds. It's also a battle for power, prestige, control and recognition.
"They are like two children, fighting for the attention of the country
and sometimes even each other," said a businessman, who asked not to be named.
As a daughter of two former prime ministers, Kumaratunga is a proud
inheritor of a political dynasty that ruled Sri Lanka for many years.
Wickremesinghe represents the urban rich, the business that has always backed
his United National Party (UNP).
Kumaratunga and her ministers have squabbled over whether she should
bring her dog to cabinet meetings. Some ministers have accused her of carrying a
secret video camera in her handbag.
She has called Wickremesinghe a prime minister "without a backbone" and
accused him of trying to assassinate her.
The two have also fought over who should represent Sri Lanka at
meetings of the United Nations.
But it was the peace bid with Tamil Tiger rebels that finally broke the
straw.
Kumaratunga used her wide constitutional powers to sack three ministers
and suspend parliament while Wickremesinghe was on an official trip to
Washington, saying he was giving away too much to the Tigers and the country's
security was at risk.
On Friday, the stakes were raised further after the prime minister,
fresh from a successful meeting with US President George W. Bush, returned home
to a rapturous welcome by tens of thousands of his supporters.
Kumaratunga, who was seriously wounded by a rebel suicide bomber in
1999, came out fighting and said that while a Norwegian-brokered ceasefire would
hold, Norway's role in the peace bid needed a closer look.
She asked all parties to join her to form a "grand alliance...with the
objective of forming a government of national reconciliation".
What the two failed to say was if or when they planned to meet.
NINE-YEAR-OLD BATTLE
The trouble between the two began in 1994 when Kumaratunga's party won
parliamentary elections to end the UNP's 17-year rule. Wickremesinghe was then
prime minister.
"That was the first direct confrontation. It happened soon after
Ranil's advent as the leader of the United National Party, which was in
opposition," said Irwin Weerackody, a member of the working committee of the
UNP.
Kumaratunga's popularity rose sharply after that and she won the
presidential election a few months later. She began peace talks with the Tamil
rebels, which ended in the eruption of some of most bloodiest fighting in the
country's history.
This week's showdown, which has rattled donor nations, investors and
the markets, has been looming since Wickremesinghe won parliamentary elections
in 2001, campaigning on a platform of pursuing peace with the Tigers to defeat
Kumaratunga's party.
Since then, many Sri Lankans have been on the edge -- wondering whether
the political battle would be prolonged and foreshadow a return to the days of
bombs, assassinations and howling ambulances bringing back dead and wounded from
the war front.
"It is obvious that the issues at the heart of the present political
crisis pertain principally to power, prestige and control," the state-run Daily
News said in an editorial. "The parties to the conflict need to pause a while to
ascertain whether they intend placing power over the well-being of the
country."
