degenerate bloodless shell of unp

for what does united national party (unp) stand for?

unp still sits at the center of one of the two huge webs of patronage relationships that act as arteries of political life in sri lanka, but there is no blood running in those arteries. it has fallen so low that it cannot even field a candidate of its own for presidency and resort to beating up probably hostile journalists covering its meetings.

once, unp used to be a standard center right party.

but is it now?
let's examine

unp for free markets and capitalism?
in 1977, then unp administration opened the economy. some unp governments have engaged in privatizations of nationalized institutions and liberalizations of markets. all good, and in right direction imo.

however, nobody in current unp, least of all its leader ranil wickremesinghe, has the courage to stand up and defend those things, or more broadly capitalism and free markets, based on principles. there is certainly no margaret thacher in unp. at most unp will say, that we are being forced to open up markets due to globalization or that world bank/imf conditions demand that we do this or that liberalization or privatization.

nobody in unp is willing to say that free markets, open trade, and less government, are benefits in themselves and we should adopt such polices anyway without being forced to do so.

in fact last unp government (2001-2004) even implemented anti market polices, such as imposing a guaranteed price for buying paddy which led to all sorts of market distortions and over production. leading to inevitable protests (including suicides) by farmers at both harvest seasons. current non unp administration has thankfully let this policy slide out of sight. does anyone remember when the last farmers' protest was?

under imf prodding last unp government did put a blanket freeze on government hiring but did not have the courage to admit it was doing so (let alone try to reduce the number of public servants). such half baked actions only make government even more inefficient in that blanket freeze prevented needed ppl from being hired, while wasteful overstaffed departments kept on being so.

there were many such half baked actions on the part of that unp government. half baked bc they were not based on a well thought out coherent philosophy.

current administration of course is not pro liberalization. one does not expect it to be. it was elected on an anti liberalization platform. unp now in opposition, has not been able to make a coherent case opposing policies expanding government and subsidies. in fact there has been no opposition on its part to such polices.

we cannot call present unp a center right party when it comes to economic issues.

unp on national defense
on national defense unp is more akin to a loony left fringe party than a center right party (governing united people's freedom alliance(upfa) is very much to the right of unp here) .

this is the main cause of unp's unpopularity.

unp let all sri lankans down by not supporting efforts to defeat terrorist liberation tigers of tamil ealam (ltte). when terrorists deprived and threatened freedom, human rights, democracy, and justice of sri lankans of all communities, unp chose a policy of appeasement.

it adopted an immoral peacenik 'peace at any cost' position advocated by foreign (and perhaps terrorist) funded ngos wholesale, even while bloody murderous consequences of appeasing terrorists was apparent to all. it remained obstinate when government under mahinda rajapaksa showed that trying to defeat terrorists with violence, if need be, was both moral and pragmatic. instead several unp leaders tried to belittle the glorious achievements of the military. they have yet to abandon these polices or issue retractions for their statements.

public's distrust of unp position on these issues is well deserved.

ethnic grievances
unp once had a solid base among minority communities due to historical reasons, rather than bc of any credible attempt to address their (very real) grievances. rise of race/religion based parties is a telling indicator of unp's short comings in both articulating and addressing those grievances. now these (let us be frank, bordering on racist) parties (thankfully split in to factions) determine unp policy in these matters. unlike upfa, unp has been unable to stand up to more extrme demands of these parties when it needs their support. so much so that unp was unable to field candidates for jaffna and vavuniya local council elections earlier this year.

in other words, unp does not have a policy on how to address any ethnic grievances that still exist. its policy will be determined by factions of ethnic parties supporting it. pretty pathetic and not reassuring to voters (like myself) who like to see an end to race based policies of any kind.

other issues
in all other issues unp has not taken any coherent stance.

its foreign policy seems to be 'kowtow non stop to west and hope for best', rather than for a policy of building fruitful relationships in sri lankan interest in all parts of the world,esp in asia.

its corrupt politicians rail against government's corrupt politicians, not convincing anyone why we should exchange their lot for present lot.

it wants 'good governance' through implementation of 17th amendment, with its independent commissions to govern various things (public service, police etc. etc.). even though last unp government deliberately failed to implement it. (for the record, i am no fan of 17th amendment. imo it is an undemocratic, unworkable, loophole ridden, bureaucratic, money wasting monstrosity, but i better keep my thoughts on that subject for another post).

defending traditional values and culture is a staple of center right parties, but unp (or rather its leader) seem to be quite clueless about sri lankan culture or its values.

unp doesn't have a policy on various civil liberties one way or other. btw ranil who is 'gay' (i am against simple categorizations of sexual orientation hence quotation marks), as whole of sri lanka knows, doesn't have the courage to admit the fact, hiding behind an obviously fake marriage.
etc. etc.

internal democracy
not only has the party not stood up to protect sri lankan democracy, it has a deplorable record of internal democracy.

in latest example of this, last week it expelled some of the leading members from internal party positions due to their vocal opposition to unp decision to back non unp candidate general sarath foseka as presidential candidate.

as i have pointed out before, move to back fonseka benefits ranil wickremesinghe. after the almost certain defeat of general, ranil will be able to keep on as party leader till next election. (if he was the candidate and got trashed, there was a chance of him getting the boot). his association and acceptance of current unp's support and conditions will be part of the main reason why general will lose.


to conclude
ranil wickremesinghe led unp can no longer be considered a center right party with any kind of coherent philosophy. it is drifting without ideas or a vision.

this bloodless degenerate shell now function purely as a political vehicle for its leader, rather than as a living proponent of a political philosophy palatable to sri lankan voters.

of course unp still sits at the center of a web of patronage relationships, but without blood those arteries will die out eventually.

sarath fonseka's campaign (and his defeat), may transfer some blood to keep them alive for a little bit longer, but to revive the beast more direct and drastic action is needed. to start pumping blood again, at the very least, unp has to get rid of ranil, and it has to uncompromisingly stand for something that public wants (hopefully capitalism and robust protection of rights and interests of sri lankans from all threats internal or external) , rather than what its leader wants and what some of his out of touch sycophants in colombo wants.

this paralysis and inaction of almost half of sri lankan polity is bad for the country, bc upfa or its leader will not face any credible check on its/his power. it is not wise to always count on goodwill of unchecked power.

unfortunately, there is no chance of unp reviving anytime soon.

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