Sri Lankan president threatens to end ruling coalition
By
K. Ratnayake
23 January 2018
Sri Lankan media outlets ran headlines last week reporting that President Maithripala Sirisena walked out of the weekly cabinet meeting last Tuesday. According to these reports, Sirisena threatened to discontinue the coalition government because some members of his main partner, the United National Party (UNP), had publicly criticised him.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and several ministers apparently persuaded Sirisena to rejoin the cabinet meeting. It appears a patch-up was made by both sides, well aware of the political consequences of the breakup of the coalition, which could lead to the government’s collapse. Wickremesinghe, who heads the UNP, warned his members of parliament not to make any criticisms of the president.
However, the president’s outburst was not just a subjective reaction. It expressed the extreme political crisis of the coalition between the UNP and Sirisena’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and of the ruling class as whole. The government has been gripped by growing class tensions, deep economic crisis and massive financial scandals.
Sirisena defected from former SLFP-led government to stand against then President Mahinda Rajapakse in the January 2015 presidential election, principally with the support of the UNP, which was then in the opposition. After taking office, Sirisena installed a minority UNP government, appointing Wickremesinghe as prime minister.
While the campaign headed by Sirisena exploited mass opposition to Rajapakse, it was a carefully prepared regime-change operation, orchestrated by Washington. Rajapakse had turned to Beijing for investment and military procurement cutting across US strategic and military moves directed against…