Is Sajith or Anura the Common Enemy of the Opposition..?

When Chandrika Kumaratunga’s government was defeated at the 2001 General Election and Ranil formed the government, the position of Opposition Leader went to the SLFP. Chandrika appointed Ratnasiri Wickremanayake as Opposition Leader. At the time, voices emerged claiming that Ratnasiri Wickremanayake was unsuitable for the position. A section of the SLFP demanded that Mahinda Rajapaksa be appointed Opposition Leader.

However, Chandrika and the Chandrika loyalists within the party did not favour this, nor did the JVP, which had won the second-highest number of seats after the SLFP-led People’s Alliance.

In any event, Mahinda, while keeping Ratnasiri in Bangkok, secured the support of then Prime Minister Ranil and Speaker Joseph Michael Perera and obtained the position of Opposition Leader through a political game.

From then onwards, Chandrika loyalists within the SLFP, the JVP, and the left-wing parties within the SLFP-led People’s Alliance began claiming that Ranil had made Mahinda the Opposition Leader and that there was a deal between Mahinda and Ranil.

“The Opposition Leader is sabotaging opposition protests inside Parliament. He is informing Prime Minister Ranil about the opposition’s plans.”

This was publicly stated at the time by JVP Propaganda Secretary Wimal Weerawansa. It was not only Wimal. JVP leader Somawansa Amarasinghe, Secretary Tilvin Silva, and JVP MPs such as Lal Kantha, Vijitha Herath and Anura Kumara Dissanayake also repeated this narrative like a mantra.

Mahinda endured all these allegations. Eventually, it was Mahinda who defeated Ranil and the UNP and brought the presidency back to the SLFP. He did so by bringing around him the Chandrika loyalists and the JVP who had previously called him Ranil’s pawn.

Isn’t Sajith Being Attacked Today with the Same Mud Thrown at Mahinda Then..?

Sajith became Opposition Leader not with the support of the government, as Mahinda did, but through a public mandate. The people made him Opposition Leader in both 2020 and 2024.

From the day he became Opposition Leader in 2020, it was Ranil, the UNP and the JVP who began attacking him with claims that “Sajith is weak” and that “Sajith has a deal with President Gotabaya.”

This narrative was brought forward from within the Samagi Jana Balawegaya by Champika Ranawaka. He contested the 2020 election from the Samagi Jana Balawegaya and became an MP, after which he sought a senior position within the party.

At a meeting of SJB MPs, they said that if Champika was to be given a position, he should dissolve his own party and join the SJB. Sajith also approved this.

Although Sajith offered Champika the position of Deputy Chairman of the party, Champika did not accept it. From that point onwards, Champika began attacking Sajith and the Samagi Jana Balawegaya.

By this time, several Sajith loyalists who had been on the SJB National List but had not received National List MP positions also began attacking Sajith and the SJB continuously, joining forces with Champika out of their disappointment at not receiving National List positions.

For Ranil, who was waiting to finish Sajith politically, this was like being handed a gift. National List candidates who had previously opposed Ranil but later became Sajith supporters, together with Champika, met Ranil and strengthened the alliance against Sajith.

The biggest allegation they levelled against Sajith was that he had failed to attend a meeting convened in Kollupitiya by Father Julian Patrick to find the mastermind behind the Easter Sunday attacks, and that he had told then-SJB MPs Harin and Manusha not to attend.

Their intention was to portray this as evidence of a deal between Sajith and Gotabaya to conceal the mastermind behind the attacks. However, Father Julian Patrick stated that he had not invited Sajith to the meeting.

Recently, Champika made a public statement saying that the Easter bombing was the work of Zahran and that he had spoken about a mastermind because Shani and Ravi Seneviratne had misled him.

Yet Sajith continues to maintain the position that the mastermind behind the Easter attacks must be identified.

Eventually, Harin and Manusha, who had accused Sajith of having a deal with Gotabaya, joined Gotabaya’s government. Ranil, who had accused Sajith of having a deal with Gotabaya, became Prime Minister in order to save Gotabaya and the Rajapaksas from the Aragalaya.

When Gotabaya invited Sajith, who had been accused of having a deal with him, to accept the premiership, Sajith imposed the condition that Gotabaya must relinquish executive power if he was to accept the position.

Sajith did not hold secret discussions with Gotabaya. He publicly corresponded with Gotabaya and presented his conditions for accepting the premiership.

When Ranil became President, Champika was the first to present his party’s policy manifesto to President Ranil. Champika accused Sajith and Gotabaya of having a deal at a time when Champika himself did not hold a significant position within the SJB.

Fonseka, who was then Chairman of the party, called Sajith weak only after learning that he would not receive the SJB’s presidential candidacy.

The same Fonseka, who accused Sajith of not attacking Gotabaya strongly enough, eventually held discussions with Gotabaya about obtaining the premiership.

The Outcome of the Power Struggle: Clearing the Path for Anura

The reason Sajith lost the 2024 presidential election was the mudslinging by Ranil, Champika, Anura and the JVP, and Fonseka, who portrayed Sajith as a deal-maker and a weak politician.

Although Champika came forward near the presidential election to support Sajith’s victory, by then he could not undo the damage he had caused to Sajith.

Although Sajith lost the presidential election, the people appointed him Opposition Leader through the 2024 General Election. Unable to accept Sajith becoming Opposition Leader again, Ranil and Champika once again began attacking Sajith from a new angle.

Namall and the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna also joined this alliance attacking Sajith, presenting Namal as the Opposition Leader outside Parliament.

During the Aragalaya, Gotabaya agreed to Sajith’s conditions and agreed to appoint him Prime Minister. The Rajapaksa family calculated that if Sajith became Prime Minister, Namal’s political future would be finished. They therefore disrupted that possibility and had Ranil appointed Prime Minister in an effort to finish Sajith.

When Gotabaya informed the Speaker that he was prepared to step down from the presidency, an all-party discussion was held to make the Speaker President and appoint Sajith as Prime Minister.

That discussion was disrupted by Wimal and the Rajapaksa family. At that point, Ranil did not resign as Prime Minister, claiming that there was no all-party agreement to appoint Sajith as Prime Minister.

The Rajapaksa family then appointed Ranil as Acting President. Had Wimal and others agreed at that time, the Rajapaksa family would have been left helpless and Sajith might have become Prime Minister.

What ultimately happened was that Ranil became President, thereby clearing the path for Anura to become President. Ranil, the Rajapaksas, Champika and Wimal are not prepared to acknowledge that, in attempting to block Sajith’s path, they ultimately opened the path for Anura to become President.

Even Today, Their Common Enemy Is Sajith, Not Anura

“There is a deal between Anura and Sajith.”

By repeatedly saying this, they are not destroying Anura. They are destroying Sajith.

Yet he is the Opposition Leader. Apart from Anura, Sajith has the largest voter base. Whatever the talk about deals may be, the parliamentary opposition to the government over the 22nd Amendment demonstrated that Sajith and the SJB are capable of bringing opposition to the government onto the streets.

“Do Ranil, the Rajapaksas, Champika and Wimal want to repeat the mistake they made in 2024 and once again help Anura win in 2029?”

Only they know the answer.

But Ranil, Namal and Champika are all struggling to demonstrate that they, rather than Sajith, are the real Opposition Leader. In this contest for the position of Opposition Leader, it is Anura who wins.

(Upul Joseph Fernando)

— Mawarata—