ජය – පරාජය
The presidential contest can only end with one man winning and the other losing, and the system is built so that struggle runs on hatred rather than argument. Rajapaksa and Fonseka fought Prabhakaran on the same side and praised each other publicly; now each sees a traitor across the field, and the public that cheered both has split into camps that regard the other candidate with the loathing once reserved for Prabhakaran. Given that venom, the losing leader and his senior followers will face reprisal whoever wins. The press profits by fanning it. Beneath this lies a system that keeps one party in power for decades — seventeen years to the first change of government, sixteen so far for this one — long enough for the bureaucracy and police to make common cause with whoever rules.
ජනාධිපතිවරණය ජනතාව භේද කරන තරගයක් නොවිය යුතුය
Government figures have attacked the Tamil National Alliance’s decision to back Sarath Fonseka, one claiming it could revive terrorism. The alliance did serve the LTTE’s programme, but out of fear rather than conviction; with the LTTE defeated its representatives can act freely, and its local councillors have sung the national anthem. Backing one of the two main candidates is better than a boycott or a separate candidate. Fonseka, once a hardline Sinhala nationalist, has drawn wide minority support. The Vaddukoddai declaration ruined the Tamil people as much as the country, and the LTTE’s defeat opens space for a united society of equal citizens. Both candidates have a duty to make this an election that moves the country forward rather than one that sows division.
යන්නේ කොයිබටද?
The first presidential election after the defeat of Prabhakaran’s de facto state ought to be about what kind of Sri Lanka replaces it, but the campaign has been consumed by trivia and mutual spite. Both main candidates are products of the war they won — Rajapaksa as commander-in-chief, Fonseka as army commander — and neither has said what he would build. Rajapaksa promises a good future without describing it; Fonseka would abolish the executive presidency without saying what succeeds it. Both are asked to address the grievance minorities believe survives Prabhakaran’s defeat, and to explain how corruption can be beaten within a system built to protect it. The press is told to stop staging cockfights.
අවලස්සණ ජනාධිපතිවරණයක්
Three weeks before the January 2010 presidential election, Ivan argues the contest between Mahinda Rajapaksa and Sarath Fonseka has taken the shape of a fight between two bazaar thugs rather than between democratic forces. Both camps breach the law on cutouts and posters, and neither the police nor the Elections Commissioner will enforce it. He traces the collapse to Chandrika Kumaratunga’s appointment of Sarath Nanda Silva as Chief Justice over the senior Mark Fernando, while corruption complaints against Silva were still before the court. Silva, once the target of a joint UNP–JVP impeachment motion, is now the opposition campaign’s constitutional spokesman. Ivan concludes that defeating a man will not change a system, and no party has said what should replace the executive presidency.
දූෂණය සනාථ කළයුත්තේ කටකථාවලින් නොව නිශ්චිත සාක්ෂිවලිනි
Corruption is the loudest subject of the campaign and the worst argued. Ivan says any administration’s corruption deserves scrutiny at an election, then insists the opposition move from rumour to specific proof — and gives his own examples, among them a broadcasting licence written into a regulator’s own name and sold on. Assets declarations filed with nominations, he notes, are documents anyone may examine.
ජනාධිපතිවරණය නිදහස් හා සාධාරණ විය යුතුය
The presidential election decides state power, and it is being held without an elections commission, with all its powers resting in one commissioner. Ivan lists what a fair contest requires — the opposition left to campaign unobstructed, its supporters not intimidated — and reminds both sides that winner and loser have to live in the same country afterwards.
ඡන්ද බලය හා පරමාධිපත්ය බලය
Sovereignty is exercised at elections, Ivan writes, and Sri Lanka’s record of holding them on time is better than its record of holding them freely. He sets out why no elections commission was ever appointed under the 17th Amendment, names who advised against it, and tells voters to make the commissioner keep his back straight.
මඩ ගහගන්නවා වෙනුවට අවශ්ය වී ඇත්තේ අර්ථවත් සංවාදයකි
Where should Sri Lanka stand after winning the war? Ivan says that is the question the election ought to be about, and instead both sides are throwing accusations. Abolishing the executive presidency in 180 days means nothing until someone says what replaces it; and if corruption is the great challenge, both camps owe the country an account of how they would beat it.
ජනරාල් මුහුණදී තිබෙන දේශපාලන උභතෝකෝටිකය
The General’s arrival lifted the anti-government forces but has not yet built him a position to win from. Ivan reads the signs — the JVP still absent from his poster campaign, the UNP machine uneasy beneath its enthusiasm, no answer on the minorities or on abolishing the executive presidency — and says a man flying on two borrowed wings that beat in opposite directions may not fly straight.
සේනාපති හා සේනාධිනායකයා අතර තරගය
The UNP and the JVP brought the General forward partly to force a parliamentary election first, Ivan argues, and the president wrong-footed them by calling the presidential one early. He compares the two men as political animals — one seasoned and cured, the other still an apprentice — and says that is the factor that will decide it, for and against the General alike.