The fact that game-changing nation-saving legislation such as 19A struggled in the womb so much before it could be born is a good thing. At least in the opinion of those who have gotten over the disillusionment of the somewhat dubious ethic that was bipartisan politics and its passing.
For one, it reassured us that democratic dissent and due process (consultation, compromises, consensus) – whether good, bad, or ugly – was alive in the legislature. For another, it demonstrated that – ironically enough – democratic republicans seeking paradigm-shifting reform can have their heart’s desire stymied by the very independence of the judiciary that they so strongly espoused, then endorsed, and engendered. Yet for all the hassle and heart-ache and horse-trading, there appears to be something enduring – if not endearing – about the third and perhaps most influential arm of government. For the executive presidency, especially its egregious abuse – like some undesirable bit of detritus bobbing about in the cistern of civic society – has for some time refused to be flushed down the tube of history. Until now, that is.
There can be many reasons why this most powerful of offices has refused to go up to now, and why it has gone only now. And no doubt over the next fortnight or so, many will essay educated guesses as to why the executive has proven to be so resilient in the face of antipathy on one hand (“for God’s sake, go!”) and apathy (“come or go, Chicago?”) on the other. Here is one way of looking at how and why 19A came to the pass that it came to earlier this week before it was passed. It entails seeing the groundbreaking bit of legislation being ratified through four dimensions in which politics is done. It involves at least two executives and their profiles/legacies, and their contribution – for bad, or better – leading up to the pass we as a nation have come to today, and passed the day before yesterday. It is brief, personal, opinionated.
MR, the man
Maybe there is no better embodiment in our time of the Aristotelian cum Twainish dictum that man is a political, social, and religious animal. A seasoned politician with a shrewd understanding of people, perhaps it was inevitable that his over four-decades-long vocation should create a personality cult to go with the political career. And add muscle to an already mesomorphic presidency. If JR had Gamini in mind, perhaps he would have thought twice if he could have foreseen the MR-driven and -designed 18A that would make 19A oh-so-necessary.
MR, the movement
The poet Eliot observed that in our beginning is our end. That may not be true of this politician. After a relatively mediocre start, he catapulted to fame – and infamy – in mid path. Having hailed from Hambantota District, his meteoric rise to power over every nook of the nation in later years eclipsed the middling responsibilities of former times. His juggernaut swept everything before it from the battlegrounds of Kotte Sri Jayawardanapura to the killing fields of Kilinochchi.
MR, the machine
With position and its attendant perks came privileges and the potential for proving Acton’s extended reasoning that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely; that great men are almost always bad men; and that there is no greater heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it. With absolute power also came parasites – family, friends, fan clubs, sycophants – who were to spell the beginning of the end; for there is no stronger reason for even the staunchest of former allies and compatriots to rebel – and desert, as they did (and better late than never) – other than that humankind cannot bear too much reality. With this development, dull roots were beginning to be stirred with the spring rain of the counter-movement to abolish and eradicate this ogre: a power- and money-making machine that brought the nation to the brink of banana republicanism.
MR, the monument
But despite the now-historical association with corruption, drug barons and ethanol kings, war-crime allegations and accusations that make his name legion, he will be remembered as – if not a demigod that his propagandists once claimed him to be – a war hero of sorts. Arguably, he was the key player whose agency and instrumentality ended the scourge of a brutal military conflict that had crippled Sri Lanka for decades. Today, there are certainly still a large number of islanders – some 47 per cent of them (now less, maybe) – who would give the devil his due, and want him to continue to hold the highest office. Their chance has been well and truly scuppered now, with the gravitas given to the term limit.
In this context, the most frenetic parts of the song and dance to have 19A passed by Parliament prior to being ratified by the Supreme Court could be said to be ad hominem. For all their espousal of republican virtues, the baser elements of the national unity government and its stalwarts are veterans at campaigning for or against personalities, as opposed to principles. Thus a keenness to usher in a new golden era of democracy, good governance, and the ethic put out by their partners in the UNP was more than overshadowed by the fear that an old beast was slouching towards the hot seat to be born again. As much as 19A was also clearly pro bono publico, the spectre of MR’s possible and much-rumoured return to power compared and contrasted poorly with the demeanour of the new poster boy of the advocates of accountability, transparency, and the rest of that ethos.