Bizarre Political Crisis In Sri Lanka

Former Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa was sworn in as Prime Minister on Friday by his betenoire President Maithripala Sirisena. Ever since the inexplicable turn of events in Sri Lanka is keeping the region on the edge. To make matters more confusing, Sri Lanka has two Prime Ministers currently. The high-level political drama which unfolded over the weekend casts doubts on its foreign policy and its delicate balancing with India and China. 

The unmissable, uncanny resemblances between Sri Lanka’s political turmoil and Maldivian political crisis in February purportedly point to an Indo-China inclement competition in the region. Maldivian President Yameen imposed emergency to overturn an unfavourable Supreme Court order much against Constitutional edicts. He later suspended Parliament to have an unrestrained access to power. Similarly, President Sirisena ousted Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, suspended the cabinet and appointed former President Rajapaksa unconstitutionally. Before the constitutional authorities could even question Sirisena, he suspended Parliament for fifteen days. Defiant Wickremesinghe refused to bow down, he refused to vacate the official Temple Greens. He asserted that he had majority and should be allowed to prove his strength on the floor the parliament when it reconvenes. Even speaker Karu Jayasuriya supported Wickremesinghe’s stand who refused to vacate from Temple Greens. He apprised United States, Britain of the current developments in the country. Sirisena’s sudden move surprised New Delhi which fostered the opposition coalition, between leaders-Sirisena and Wickremesinghe for the 2015 Presidential Elections.

As of now, the combined numbers of Sirisena and Rajapaksa in the parliament have just 98 seats well short of the half way mark of 225 to form a new government. Towards the end of 2014, Sirisena who was health minister in Rajapaksa’s cabinet resigned and stealthily jumped into the opposition camp. He formed an electoral coalition with Wickremesinghe with a poll plank of investigating war crimes, corruption charges against Rajapaksa and contested Presidential elections. The coalition promised to renegotiate Chinese contracts and won by a slim majority. Rajapaksa who was in power from 2005-2015 successfully defeated LTTE and put an end to decades long civil war raging in the island.  He crushed the Tamil Elams with iron-hand. His brazen human rights violation is a matter of intense debate in the UN and the Western countries castigated him for this brutal oppression. At the height of international censure, Rajapaksa intensified engagement with China which hardly bothered about human rights. Beijing invested heavily in Sri Lanka since 2008. Rajapaksa and his three brothers in the cabinet who held the plum post of finance, defence, ports and economy facilitated unabated flow of Chinese funds and inundated the island with Chinese conglomerates and workers. Nascent fears of Chinese penetration in almost all sectors made people wary of growing Dragon’s influence in the region. The impact of the Chinese investments precipitated by the end 2014 when Sri Lanka’s debts began to mount, economy began to reel under the pressure of debt servicing.

The supposedly Pro-Indian Unity coalition romped home victory in Presidential elections on anti-China campaign and kept the influence of Rajapaksa and his family at bay. For the first two years in power, the leaders Sirisena of Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and Wickremesinghe of United National Party (UNP), shared good relations and made some efforts to stall the Chinese juggernaut. Internal fissures within the United government began to appear in 2017. They began to slowly give in to Chinese pressure tactics and eventually handed over Hambantota port on a 99-year lease to mitigate the debt crisis paving way for Chinese consolidation in the island.

Since 2015, both leaders made number of visits to India which promised necessary developmental assistance and agreed to initiate program for rebuilding North Sri Lanka badly affected by the Civil war. Expressing firm faith and trust in the new leadership, Prime Minister Modi visited Sri Lanka months after Sirisena assumed Presidentship. Indo-Sri Lankan relations appeared to be treading on an even keel when the supposedly pro-India government, in April 2017, held back on number of agreements like rebuilding Trincomalee Oil fields made in 2015. Though upset with Sri Lanka, invoking thousands of years of strong religious, cultural and linguistic connect, Modi attended prayers at Kandy on the eve of International Day of Vesak in May 2017. He even visited Sri Lankan Tamil communities. During this time, Sri Lanka agreed to be part of the BRI (Belt Road Initiative) following which China agreed to lend $24 billion loan in addition to the $8 billion loan earlier. Soon China pushed Sri Lanka to be part of its Geo-positioning System (Beidou). Notwithstanding India’s concerns, Sirisena revisited and restarted the construction of Colombo port city project on the reclaimed 249 acres of land over which China has claim to a 99-year lease. Slowly, Sirisena government began to warm up to China.

By 2017, internal fissures between Sirisena and Wickremesinghe began to widen after Sirisena began to oppose economic reforms initiated by finance minister Wickremesinghe. As per insiders account, Rajapaksa exploited these internal differences and drove a wedge between them. The rifts in the government took toll on governance and sectarian strife reappeared. Expressing their discontent people chose Rajapaksa over Sirisena and Wickremesinghe in February local elections. Enthused by these results, Rajapaksa began to mull a serious come back to national polity. In the meanwhile, toning down his anti-India stance, Rajapaksa visited India on Subramanian Swamy’s invitation in September and interacted with Indian leaders. In the meanwhile, Sirisena’s disenchantment with India reached a crescendo with his allegations of RAW planning to assassinate him though Modi is unaware of it. This statement created ripples in diplomatic circles. Though this controversy did die own as quickly as it hit headlines after leaders of both countries spoke over phone, this marked the beginning of the blood-less coup which was about to unfold.

Days after this allegation, Wickremesinghe visited India on a three-day visit on Oct 18^th and called for boosting of ties especially in areas of trade, investment and maritime security. Ahead of Wickremesinghe’s visit, Sri Lanka overturned a housing contract worth $300 million awarded to Chinese company in favour of an Indian conglomerate in North Jaffna region. Wickremesinghe even held talks with Prime Minister Modi. Modi expressed “deep disappointment over delays in commencement of India-assisted development projects”. Barely a week after his visit, Sirisena ousted Wickremesinghe who supported Sirisena as President after 2015 elections. Voicing concerns over the unconstitutional removal of Prime Minister Wickremesinghe, US urged Sirisena to “immediately reconvene the parliament” and asked them “to refrain from intimidation and violence”. Sirisena even removed several people from various constitutional positions casting them as loyalists of Wickremesinghe. Sirisena’s betrayal sparked anger in Sri Lanka who took to streets and in police firing on sunday one person was killed.

Unlike China, India observed restraint and MEA issued a statement on Sunday, “India is closely following the recent political developments in Sri Lanka. As a democracy and close friendly neighbour, we hope that democratic values and the constitutional process will be respected. We will continue to extend our developmental assistance to the friendly people of Sri Lanka”. On the contrary, China’s Sri Lankan ambassador Cheng Xueyuang met the newly-appointed prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday and conveyed congratulatory message of President Xi Jinping. Over the weekend supporters of Rajapaksa stormed into state broadcaster’s office and blacked out live telecasts. Ever since there has been worst showdown of power with allegations and counter allegations flying high. President Sirisena alleged that Wickremesinghe is trying to assassinate him and former defence secretary, brother of Rajapaksa. On Monday, making his intentions clear, Sirisena inducted a new cabinet with Rajapaksa as the finance minister.

After the Presidential elections in 2015, Sri Lanka amended the constitution overturning President’s authority to remove the Prime Minister and bestowed Parliament with the powers to do so. By violating the 19^th amendment Sirisena has triggered a crisis. While judiciary can offer some recourse, the courts infiltrated by Rajapaksa loyalists can hardly rule any case against him. Since 2008, after Rajapaksa’s shift towards China, Sri Lanka has become centre of Indo-China rivalry.

Going by the quick turn of events in Sri Lanka it is amply clear that Chinese diplomacy is at play and clearly Chinese generous funds are doing the magic. To evade the Sri Lankan scrutiny into undeniable evidence of China funding Rajapaksa’s election campaign financially in 2014, President Xi has gifted $2 billion Yuan to President Sirisena for any project of his choice and promised to build largest kidney hospital of South Asia in his home province. India and the West have promised assistance to Sri Lanka and have been rallying to pursue charges against Rajapaksa. But the new government is drifting away since Chinese deep pockets continued to make irresistible financial offers. With the removal of pro-India leader Wickremesinghe it is advantage China in Sri Lanka. India Ocean region has become turf of growing Indo-Chinese rivalry. Advancing its India’s encirclement policy, China has been targeting India’s immediate neighbours. By successfully installing a leftist government in Nepal and inking transit agreement, China has tried to severe Indo-Nepalese relations. Soon it turned its attention to strategically important Maldives and Sri Lanka. Unexpected electoral loss of Pro-Chinese Maldivian President Yameen has left China fuming. Since then, China must have supposedly moved its pawns tactically to topple the coalition believed to be favoured by India. Unprecedented constitutional crisis in Sri Lanka hints at an invisible China’s hand at play. Thanks to Sirisena’s blatant betrayal and Rajapaksa’s astute political opportunism, Chinese stars will continue to shine in Sri Lankan skies.

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