Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) rose up in arms in 1971 with the intention of capturing state power. Although they aimed at capturing power by a simultaneous attack on all the police stations in the Sinhala areas they failed to achieve their aim. The Sirimavo Bandaranaike government of the day was able to defeat that infan- tile rebellion in a few short days.
Once again, 17 years later, they rose up ferociously. That rebellion adopted a brutal policy of killing off the political opponents mercilessly and was on the verge of capturing state power by benumbing the whole society through fear, but at the last moment, the Premadasa government which was in power, was able to defeat that rebellion too in a terrible manner.
The process in which the JVP bade farewell after 1994 to the path of armed rebellion, entered parliamentary poli- tics in 2001, and thereafter commenced the program of a Privasa government after the ousting of the UNP, which had been in power, and formed an Alliance government, may be considered a project implemented by the JVP for the purpose of accomplishing the ambition of capturing state power. This ambition the JVP had failed to attain by two previous rebellions. Still, they are only a respectable partner in a government in power. Their aim is to form a government in which they can be in full control, and to turn the Alliance government into a bridge by which they can attain that aim.
Although their third attempt, at which they were able partially to capture power (formation of the Alliance government), was not an armed rebellion, it may be defined as an unorthodox capture of power through an unorthodox framework in a sense.
It was the JVP who had persuaded the President to take over three ministries and thereafter to dissolve parliament using her executive powers. This is in spite of the fact that the UNP had a majority in parliament and in spite of a clear promise the President had made that she would not dissolve parliament as long as that party had a majority in it. Although the President was well aware that contesting a parliamentary election in alliance with the JVP would do great damage to her own party, she fell in line with the unorthodox program of the JVP as she honestly believed that such a step would prevent her own annulment. There is no doubt that she believed it would be possible to erase the damage caused by her entering into an alliance with the JVP, if she could attain her own aim.
At that election too, the JVP did not hesitate to embark on an unorthodox program for the purpose of winning the election. That party followed a policy of using the power of the state (and specially the state media) to the maximum and in violation of the law in order to win the election.
The Alliance was able to win the election but failed to gain a clear majority. So the JVP functioned as an enthu- siastic partner in a program for obtaining the additional parliamentary votes necessary for a majority.
The President seemed to think that it would be pos- sible to get the JVP to soften their firm socialist and com- munalist policies after them entering the power of govern- ance, but they did not agree to be obedient to the extent she expected.
The President’s strategy was to use the JVP for her own purposes. The JVP’s aim was to use the Presi- dent for their own purposes. However, neither of the par- ties was agreeable to be used totally by the other for the other’s purpose, although each might have been willing to be used to some extent. Consequently each party is dis- content with the other. However, the JVP cannot leave the government at this moment, nor can the President sack the JVP. Thus each party has had to put up with the dis- courtesies on the part of the other and at the same time, for the sake of its own credibility, each party has had to ridicule the other.
At the last election, the President converted the JVP’s program into the program of the Alliance. Accordingly, in the Alliance philosophy, there is no room for an interim administration or a common mechanism for the northeast. There is also no room in it for privatization. It is, like the program of the United Front government of 1970, a pro- gram that gives weight to the state sector, to self-reliance and to a mixed economy.
Although there was space for such a program in the world then, there is no space for one today. Although the government agreed to such a program against its own bet- ter judgment in order to please the JVP, there is no possibility for the government to ignore that program and shift to a more realistic framework either. The JVP too is not ready to make any allowance for such a change.
The government’s program of ‘Country First (Rata Perata) is not a realistic one and as such the government cannot proceed with it. On the other hand, the government cannot give up that program of the JVP and go on either. Finally the President will be compelled to play a role similar to that played by her father. There is no possibility at all for her to escape from it.