2018 coup should not be forgotten

This week is the fourth-year anniversary of the ending of the constitutional coup which marked one of the most shameful episodes in Sri Lanka’s 90-year democratic history. President Maithripala Sirisena, elected on an unprecedented platform with a mandate for democratic reform, betrayed all those who had entrusted him with the task, and illegally appointed former President, Mahinda Rajapaksa as “prime minister” on 26 October 2018. The constitutional coup which President Sirisena’s desperate attempt to hold on to the presidency he had pledged to abolish was defeated by an unprecedented movement of civil action.

His unceremonious removal of a Prime Minister who enjoyed the confidence of Parliament led to 52 days of turmoil and State sector paralysis. MPs were bought and sold like commodities, while others oscillated between loyalty and principle – and often made the wrong choice. In the end, a series of historic events, including crucial interventions by Chief Justice Nalin Perera and his Judiciary, and the extraordinary courage of then Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, reversed the trajectory of the illegal power grab and delivered a people’s victory. One year later, the people voted the coup-plotters into power again. Today, all the players of the coup, the plotters, enablers and the victims are all in the same camp. The main victim of the 2018 coup, then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is the President of the country, not through a people’s mandate but through various machinations of those who ousted him through undemocratic means in 2018.

The defeat of the coup could have been a turning point in Sri Lanka’s contemporary history. It was a moment for jubilation for the triumph of democracy and rule of law over unconstitutional power grabs, corrupt horse trading of people’s mandate and individual political agendas. This is not to be. Those who fought for the preservation of democracy have been forgotten and the country reverted to the same broken political client system.

Even amidst the long-term failure to reform the State and deliver a better governance system that suits the aspirations of the people of Sri Lanka it is necessary to remember those who stood for a principle greater than themselves during those dark 52 days. Top of that list is undoubtedly former Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, who showed the country the soldier he was during three crucial days in Parliament in November 2018 that stripped the de facto prime minister of his legitimacy to govern. The image of the octogenarian Speaker, marching into Parliament beside a human wall of unarmed policemen to protect him from chairs, books and chili powder being hurled at his head, and huddled in a corner bringing the House to order to hold a vote of no confidence is an enduring testament to Jayasuriya’s courage under fire and unswerving commitment to uphold democracy.

The other battle against the attempted coup was waged in the courts of law, as a legion of senior counsel petitioned the country’s highest courts against the President’s unconstitutional actions. Chief Justice Nalin Silva delivered a historic judgment ending the constitutional coup on 14 December 2018 after stopping it in its tracks a month earlier in what senior lawyers called the most consequential Supreme Court order in their lifetimes. He has since retired and the Attorney General who argued on behalf of the President’s illegal actions is Chief Justice today. The hooligan MPs who sat on the Speaker’s chair and hurled projectiles in the Chamber are part of the Ranil Wickremesinghe government. Such is the cruel irony of history.

The biggest losers, however, are the people, who stood up to be counted during the 52-day power grab. As the defeat of the 2018 constitutional coup and the people’s “Aragalaya” this year to oust president Gotabaya Rajapaksa demonstrates, the people of Sri Lanka still have the power to fight for Asia’s oldest continuous democracy even while their elected leaders continue to undermine its very foundations.