Basil’s Strategic Operations Unveiled
Ranil Approaches Final Days in Office
Continuation of Ranil and co’s valiant Legal Maneuvers to cling to office
Government’s Confusion Over Their Strategy
Strong Coalition with SJB on the Rise
The government too is confused
Three weeks ago, we disclosed in the ‘Inside Politics’ column that Mr. Ranil Wickramasinghe’s party is using the ‘Confusion Theory’ to govern. We reported that the government intends to keep the public confused by releasing various topics weekly to divert attention from real issues. UNP General Secretary Range Bandara announced a recent special government discussion where this proposal was presented, numerous topics were debated, and a referendum was suggested for extending the President’s term by two years. We shared this information in a special report through our column. However, strong opposition from various societal sectors, including the opposition, led to the suppression of this plan.
Why is the government creating confusion with these topics? The answer lies in the revelation that opposition leader Sajith Premadasa is leading in the upcoming presidential election according to a reputable polling institution. This institution, trusted for over 20 years by the international community, embassies, major political parties, and large international businesses for accurate surveys, reported that Mr. Premadasa had 39% support in the presidential election. The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna was second with 22%, Pohottuwa third with 9%, and the President fourth, excluding the North East. Another poll by the intelligence services confirmed these results. We have shared these findings with the public through our ‘Inside Politics’ column
Who is this Lenewa?
As a result, the government once again brought the Confusion Theory to the forefront to create societal confusion. D.C. Lenawa requested an interpretation of the presidential term length, whether it should be five or six years. Lenawa, representing himself without a lawyer, presented the petition before a five-member Supreme Court panel. The court dismissed the petition on the first day, reaffirming that the President’s term is five years and ordered Lenawa to pay court fees. When the opposition investigated, they revealed that Lenawa was acting as a government pawn, exposing his true affiliations.
Lenawa’s actions did not happen in isolation. Analyzing the sequence of events, it appears to be part of a larger scheme. This plan started with posters plastered nationwide saying ‘Aranchiya Subai’ during the final stages of foreign debt restructuring negotiations. After the posters appeared, the President announced the completion of debt restructuring, celebrated with fireworks and traditional food, and called an emergency parliamentary session for a two-day debate. This plan seems designed to provoke the public and culminate in a massive rally in Matara, where the President would be declared the government’s candidate for the upcoming presidential election. This would be followed by Lenawa submitting a petition to postpone the election by a year, raising suspicions among many.
We have been detailing this grand plan in the ‘Inside Politics’ column, noting the President’s preparation for a special national address on the 26th, followed by an emergency parliamentary session. We will continue to report on these developments through our column..
The poster is ominous
However, the political maneuver of posting ‘Aranchiya Subai’ posters nationwide backfired from the start. The opposition fiercely criticized these posters, claiming they falsely portrayed positive news. In response, Pohottuwa put up their own posters stating ‘Aranchiya is good – a candidate is coming from Pohottuwa,’ leading the public to see this as Pohottuwa’s doing.
On the 26th, the President addressed the nation and announced the supposed completion of foreign debt restructuring. However, the opposition pointed out that no agreement had been reached with bondholders and accused the government of using the issue for political gain. The government’s plan for a two-day parliamentary debate and poll fell apart when they failed to present the debt restructuring agreement. Instead, Parliament met for only a few hours, with speeches from the President and opposition leader, but no debates or polls.
Additionally, four SJB MPs, who were expected to support the government, did not attend the parliamentary session, weakening the government’s position. The plan to leverage foreign debt restructuring for political and financial gain collapsed, resulting in widespread protests. While the planned rally in Matara occurred, it did not include the expected announcement of the President’s candidacy. Instead, the event was marred by controversies, which we reported through the ‘State Secrets’ channel.
Lenawa’s court petition also failed when the Supreme Court dismissed the case on the same day, reaffirming the President’s five-year term. Consequently, the government’s grand plan unraveled, and the Presidential Media Unit had to officially distance itself from Lenawa, confirming there was no close relationship between him and the government.
Is the Attorney General a part?
In addition to these incidents, the opposition has raised further doubts. They question whether the President’s attempt to extend the tenure of former Attorney General Sanjay Rajaratnam by another six months is part of this grand plan. Historically, no president has ever extended the Attorney General’s term in the past 49 years. However, the current President broke precedent by extending Rajaratnam’s term and submitting the proposal to the Legislative Assembly.
Initially, the Assembly rejected the proposal. Undeterred, the President resubmitted it, only for the Assembly to reject it again. At the time, this seemed like an isolated incident. However, the opposition now suspects it might have been a crucial part of the larger scheme. If so, it’s notable that this aspect of the plan also fell apart at the last moment.
Is it wrong?
However, for such an intricately planned scheme to unravel, a significant mistake must have occurred. The opposition suspects that UNP General Secretary Range Bandara may have been the one to make this critical error, either knowingly or unknowingly. According to the opposition, the plan likely involved passing Cabinet proposals and submitting them to Parliament to determine whether the President’s term was five or six years before any court proceedings.
Before this could be done, Range Bandara prematurely announced at a UNP meeting in Medawachchi that the President had already presented and passed this proposal in the last Cabinet meeting and that it would be brought to Parliament and passed the following week. However, this announcement was incorrect. When the media asked Cabinet Press Spokesman Bandula Gunawardena about it, he angrily denied it, calling the story absurd. The next day, Range Bandara held another press conference, correcting himself by saying the proposal would be presented at the next Cabinet meeting.
This mistake appears to have been a significant part of the grand plan. Range Bandara, not being a Cabinet minister, likely misunderstood the details discussed in the Cabinet. He may have assumed the proposal had already been discussed and passed, given the sequence of events and poor communication. The government likely withheld the proposal from the Cabinet, believing the petition would be tied up in court for at least six months based on their information.
Range Bandara’s premature announcement and subsequent correction exposed a gap in the plan, contributing to its eventual failure.
Heavy artilleries from the opposition
The government’s plan was already known to certain opposition members. These members were informed that the masterminds behind the court case expected it to drag on for about six months, delaying the presidential election accordingly. Due to this insider information received by a few key opposition figures, an unexpected and crucial discussion took place among them last week. While we have all the details of this conversation, we are not reporting it this time due to a special request from the involved parties.
During this discussion, the opposition decided to use their full strength to defeat the government’s plan. The SJB selected a top-tier legal team led by Mr. Romesh de Silva, a renowned legal expert. Other opposition parties also chose well-known lawyers for their respective teams. This concerted effort resulted in the opposition successfully defeating the government’s plan in court.
Since the government could not achieve the anticipated six-month delay, they were forced to act on the plan prematurely announced by Range Bandara. Last Monday, the President submitted a proposal to the Cabinet to standardize the presidential term to five years, resolving the discrepancy of terms being cited as both five and six years in different places. Although the Supreme Court had already ruled the term to be five years, many in the opposition viewed the President’s proposal as a desperate move by a defeated administration.
Additionally, on Friday, another lawyer filed a petition before the Supreme Court requesting that the 19th Amendment be subjected to a referendum and that the presidential election be postponed until then. Many suspect this might be another aspect of the government’s hidden grand plan.
The opposition is coming together
However, the opposition and the government were not ready to give up on this last effort. Accordingly, a special discussion took place between the main parties of the UNP on the response to be given in the Parliament. Everyone had pointed out that the opposition should jointly protest it in the parliament. Accordingly, it was decided that SJB and NPP should jointly present and pass a proposal to the Parliament that the presidential election should be held at the right time. This proposal was planned to be presented by Anura and Sajith.
Accordingly, in the meeting chaired by the speaker last Monday, the proposal was presented by the opposition. The government did not oppose it because if it did, the country would get an opinion that the government was against holding the presidential election. However, although Anura agreed to present the proposal here, Sajith did not agree with Anura regarding its adoption. Anura said that since he and Sajith have already been announced as the presidential candidates of the opposition, by presenting and passing this proposal together, it will send a message to the country that there is a relationship between the two. Anura argued that it would be disadvantageous for both. Although there was some debate there, in the end Sajith said that he also wanted to submit this proposal to the Parliament, so he did not have a problem with whoever submitted it and confirmed it. Accordingly, in the end, it was decided to present Anura’s proposal and the chief organizer of the opposition Mr. Lakshman Kiriella to confirm it.
The opposition had taken another special decision last week while making plans to hold the presidential election on the scheduled date. That is to give the necessary strength to the Election Commission to conduct the presidential election. Accordingly, it has been decided that the members of the opposition will go before the Election Commission in groups from this week to give strength to the members of the Election Commission to face the pressure from the government. Accordingly, it is possible to see that the Confucius Theory that the government is putting into the country week after week is now turning into one mold after another.
Why is Ranil like this?
However, despite the Supreme Court ruling once again that the President’s term is five years, why does the President push forward with Cabinet proposals and bring bills to Parliament? There’s a significant backstory to this. The core issue is that the President has not yet secured official approval from Pohottuwa for his presidential candidacy. His main strategy to gain this approval was the claim that 25 MPs from SJB would join the government. However, this effort failed, as not even four or five SJB members joined the government. Only Rajitha Senaratne and Sarath Fonseka expressed their willingness to join, but Pohottuwa warned that bringing in figures like Rajitha and Fonseka would harm the government’s popularity rather than boost it.
Despite the President’s repeated assertions about the SJB MPs joining the government, Basil Rajapaksa eventually informed the government that the SJB group must be included by June 15th, after which Pohottuwa would announce its stance. When this deadline was missed, the President requested more time, and Pohottuwa extended the deadline to July 15th. With just a few days left before this new deadline, the government still hasn’t succeeded in securing the promised 25 SJB MPs.
As the deadline approaches, the President launched another special operation last week: attempting to extend the timeframe by meeting with former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. This meeting marked a significant departure from the usual dynamics, showcasing a notable shift in the President’s approach.
Meeting Mahinda
In the past, when Mahinda wanted to meet the President, he informed the President about it. It was the President’s custom to give Mahinda the date after being reminded about it two or three times. Accordingly, these meetings mostly took place in a special room of the Shangri-La Hotel or at Mr. Sagala Ratnayake’s home in the Shangri-La Hotel. On several occasions, we took steps to report how Yoshita Rajapaksa or Rohitha Rajapaksa participated in it along with Mahinda.
However, according to the information we have says, this meeting has taken place after the President made a request. It has been further learned from the news that the President has tried to postpone the date of July 15 by another two weeks due to the fact that the group of 25 SJB MPs could not be included in the government in that meeting. It is also known that Mahinda has given a green light for that.
Accordingly, it is now clear that the President’s plan is to somehow get around Mahinda to take more time from the pot. For that, the President has used a group around Mahinda like Yoshita Rajapaksa and Rohita Rajapaksa. It is also suspected that the President is using a strong security officer who has been close to Mahinda for some time. It is also said that it is the President’s plan to exert pressure on Mahinda from various parties and get Mahinda to influence Pohottuwa.
Basil’s Chamber of Secrets
The progress that made so far in this candidacy conflict
According to the information we have, a special proposal has been submitted to the President by Pohottuwa to resolve this crisis. It is said that in order to give the candidature of Pohottu to the President, the President should make a public statement that Namal Rajapaksa, who was the national organizer of Pohottuva, will be nominated as the Prime Minister. It is reported that the President’s side, which was planning to go on a raid against the Rajapaksa’s with this nomination presented by Pohottuwa, has been deeply disturbed by this.
On the other hand, Basil, who is considered to be the mastermind of Pohottuwa, had secretly completed another special operation by last week. That is to create a special presidential election operation office at the party headquarters very secretly with the aim of preparing the party for the upcoming presidential election. The ‘inside politics’ column has heard that Basil allocated one floor of the building where the party headquarters is located to this operational office without anyone knowing, and provided it with modern computers, tables and chairs to network the organizational activities of the entire country. Last week, the inside politics column was able to enter this secret presidential operations office in Pohottuwa office, which is still forbidden to outsiders.
Here are the extraordinary photos of the amazing office we saw there.
Next operation
So what is Basil going to do next? The information we have says that if Ranil fails to take a team of 25 from SJB even if he is given another fortnight after the end of the date given to Ranil on the 15th, Pohottuwa has already planned what to do next. Accordingly, Basil has already planned to convene an emergency meeting to pass a resolution to propose a presidential candidate for the presidential election and to appoint a committee of seniors headed by Mahinda to decide who the candidate will be. After that, it is said that it is planned to call a general conference on July 25th or 26th.
There is a reason for that too. According to the election law, the Election Commission has the power to announce the presidential election on the 17th. Accordingly, the date for calling nominations for the presidential election is scheduled to be announced on the 27th or 29th. Accordingly, Pohottuwa has planned to call the general meeting of the party before that. However, it is not yet clear whether the name of the presidential candidate in Pohottuwa will be announced, or whether the decision made by the central committee will be adopted. Most of the people are of the opinion that on that day Pohottuwa will announce who will be their presidential candidate.
Rohita’s celebration
Last week, Rohitha Abeygunawardena celebrated 27 years of his political career in Pohottuwa. Although Ranil went to Galle to participate in the Galle district conference organized by Vajira that day, Ranil’s mind was occupied with Rohitha’s ceremony that afternoon rather than the Galle conference. The reason for this was because Ranil had received information in advance that all the chiefs of Pohottuwa would participate in this event. Accordingly, Ranil planned to participate in this event and play some political game.
The chiefs of Pohottuva had also learned in advance that Ranil was planning to attend the event. So they also gave a front seat to Dhammika along with Ranil to give some hints to Ranil. Speaking at the ceremony was entrusted only to a few seniors including Mahinda, Ranil, Basil. It was also a special that Dhammika also gave a speech at the event to give another hint to Ranil.
Basil’s story
However, much of the attention was focused on Basil’s speech. Basil stated that they are not afraid of Ranil and owe him nothing. He also mentioned that Pohottuwa would support the President no matter what.
Following Basil’s declaration of support for the government, an order from a high-ranking official mandated that Basil’s speech be widely publicized. Consequently, Basil’s statement of continued support for the government became the headline news on that night’s broadcasts.
Why did Basil suddenly make such a speech?
During an investigation in this regard, it surfaced that at that time, asked for an interpretation regarding the tenure of the President. Mr. Lenawa had gone before the Supreme Court, so Basil made this speech. Earlier we mentioned that the government was hoping to drag out the presidential election for about 6 months through this litigation. According to the information we have, it is said that Basil was of a position that if the government was able to get another 6 months through the Supreme Court, he should support the government within that period as well, and accordingly, Basil made a speech in this manner in Rohitha’s meeting. Because this story that came out from Basil was very favorable to the President, steps were also taken to give it high publicity.
Welgama is back
Meanwhile, after some time, another Kalutara character came to light last week. It was none other than Kalutara Kumara Welgama, who had been ill for some time. Welgama came to Parliament with enthusiasm, but later left it and formed the New Sri Lanka Freedom Party, Welgama then formed another alliance with Champika. Later, Welgama left it and is now independent.
However, in the last few weeks, Welgama took steps to hold several rounds of discussions with the groups that make political decisions. That is to know about the political decision to be taken in the future and the political situation of the country. The opinion of the majority of the people who were in the discussion is that Ranil cannot win the presidential election at all, and that Ranil has no support in the villages. Also, this group, which has pointed out that Sajith is at the forefront in the villages, has also informed Welgama not to make a mistake in making decisions this time.
Welgama therefore came to Parliament last week with this advice in mind. Since Ranil had also attended Rohitha’s meeting, Welgama launched a serious attack on Ranil and all the leaders of the Pohottuwa during the parliamentary speech. Welgama said there that no one involved in thefts should be brought to Parliament, and all those who were in the front line of Rohitha’s meeting have been accused of various things. It was also a special event when Velgama introduced Sajith as Prince ‘Diyasen’ in his speech.
Dullas to Sajith
Meanwhile, another significant event last week was the decision of all remaining members of the Nidahas Janata Sabha, led by Dullas, to join Sajith. This announcement was made by Professor Charitha Herath, who stated to the media that all 13 members of the Freedom Janata Sabha, including Dullas, had decided to support Sajith. Even before Charitha’s announcement, six councilors, including GL, Dilan, and Wasantha Yapa, had already expressed their support for Sajith and joined SJB.
Sajith has also planned a major initiative for the first of next month: the formation of the broadest opposition alliance aimed at the presidential election. All opposition political parties have agreed to sign this alliance, and it is known that many unexpected prominent figures will be part of it.
Sajith is ahead and Anura is behind
About two months ago, in an extraordinary disclosure through the ‘inside Politics’ column, we said that an opinion poll on the presidential election had been conducted by an internationally recognized polling agency, and according to the results, Sajith got 39% of the votes in other regions except the North-Eastern regions. Being at the forefront. We revealed there that JVP is in second place with 22%, Pohottuwa is in third place with 9% and UNP is in fourth place with 7%. We mentioned that not only embassies, political parties, but even business companies have conducted opinion polls through this institution on various occasions due to the fact that the opinion polls conducted by this institution have been very accurate for about two decades.
This time we are going to talk about the latest opinion poll conducted by this institution. Last Tuesday evening, the result of this second opinion poll, which was conducted for the period from June 4th to June 24th, was handed over to the relevant institutions. According to the information we have come to know, Sajith has taken a few more steps forward in this poll too. Accordingly, this time Sajith has increased his popularity from 39% to 42%. But the most special event that can be seen here is that the JVP, which was in second place with 22% of the votes, has retreated to 15%, showing a big decline. It is said that Pohottuwa is in the third place with 11%, and the President is in the fourth place with a growth of 2% from 7% to 9%. Also, it has been revealed that 17% have not decided which party they will vote for, and 5% have decided not to vote.
Rishad’s position
Meanwhile, last week, a special meeting took place between Rishad Bathiudeen and Indian High Commissioner Santosh Jha. This meeting followed the publication of photos showing the President and Rishad together during the President’s visit to Mannar, amid reports that Rishad would support the President. Despite this, Rishad was seen actively participating in various programs with Sajith during Sajith’s visit to Mannar.
During the meeting with the Indian High Commissioner, Rishad was asked about the current political situation and the leading candidate in the presidential election. Rishad confirmed that Sajith is leading in the presidential race and expressed that Sajith has a strong chance of winning. When asked which candidate he would support, Rishad responded decisively that his party had already decided to support Sajith in the presidential election. He reportedly provided several reasons for this decision to the Indian High Commissioner.
A week earlier, Rauf Hakeem had also been questioned by the Indian High Commissioner on the same topic, and he gave the same response as Rishad, confirming support for Sajith.
