Mandate for change

Last week, Sri Lanka witnessed one of its most consequential elections. A party and a leader who could hardly muster 3% of the national vote five years ago was propelled into the highest office of the land with an overwhelming approval of 43%, on the first count. Just as it is a phenomenal victory for President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, this result was also an outright rejection of mainstream politics, nepotism, and racially and religiously charged individual-centric politics that has dominated for at least the last decade.

Even with the betrayal of the once-in-a-generation mandate of 2015 for good governance and the risks and lessons of 2019 looming large with untested political entities, the electorate once again placed their hopes in a system change. President Dissanayake now has an unenviable task of delivering on this ‘change’ which is much needed and awaited.  

Despite the many efforts by the mainstream political currents to reinvent the monumental political shifts that took place during the ‘Aragalaya’ in 2022, it is clear that the silent majority had not bought into that narrative. Condescension towards the will of the people, belittling the demands for systemic change in governance, being deaf to the calls to address corruption and cronyism, and even the long unresolved ethnic problem have now delivered their most devastating rebuke to the mainstream political parties.

It is not that the leftist-Marxist political dispensation suddenly skyrocketed into political popularity from 3% to 43% in five years. Just like the Aragalaya united every shade of political colour and transcended ethnic, religious, regional and class divisions, the vote for Dissanayake also represents a multitude of stakeholders.

President Dissanayake must also be circumspect about the mandate he has received. Just as this was a victory for him it was even more a defeat of the others, and the disdain for the ‘business as usual.’ This is a cautionary tale that Maithripala Sirisena could not grasp when he received a cross-party mandate for good governance. While he cannot perform miracles and changing an entrenched system is no easy task there are things President Dissanayake must endeavour to do.

The abolition of the Executive Presidency, establishing the rule of law and addressing corruption should be among these priorities. While it was clear that the people of the North and East did not place their confidence in the new President nor did his manifesto seek to meaningfully address the ethnic issue, if President Dissanayake is to be the transformational leader he wishes to be then he must at least attempt to address these outstanding issues. They are at the core of the system change that the people have trusted him to deliver.

Many a leader who had promised the abolition of the Executive Presidency had either changed their minds after assuming office or did not have the political capital to see that promise through. President Dissanayake has only three seats in Parliament, and it may be tempting to put off such a significant change for a later date. There is little doubt that a referendum on the issue will gain widespread popular support and many of the mainstream political parties will be willing to back an abolishment now that they do not wield power at the highest level. 

President Dissanayake is now the custodian of the ‘Aragalaya’ mandate, a mandate for better governance, anti-corruption, resolution of the ethnic conflict and an overall system change. May he be able to deliver on this mandate for the sake of all.