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For the first time, we informed the country last week about the discussions taking place within the government circles and political spear about holding an emergency general election, and to face it, the government fraction is preparing to form a new political alliance.
There we said that Nimal Lansa, who was once an ardent Pohottu party member had taken over this political mission and for that the President, had taken steps to give Lansa the official residence at Malalasekara Mawatha, where former President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa used to live.
Lansa’s new political front
Gota requested for another house saying that the sound of vehicles is often heard as it is located near the highway, and in response, the government took steps to give Gota the super official house at Stanmore Crescent, which is officially owned by the Foreign Minister. Accordingly, the vacant official residence at Malalasekara Mawatha was handed over to Nimal Lansa to launch the operation of creating a new political front.
Accordingly, Nimal Lansa implemented the first phase of this and took steps to convene a meeting in the President’s Secretariat where all party representatives representing the government were involved.
Two more ministers to support
Lansa didn’t want to do this by herself. Lansa took steps to contact two other powerful cabinet ministers from Pohottuwa who represent the government for this purpose. Minister Prasanna Ranatunga and Minister Kanchana Wijesekara are the two who are currently working closely with the President. As a result, Lansa, who kept only one room in the official residence on Malalasekara Mawatha, took steps to give Prasanna the other rooms.
Accordingly, Lansa and Prasanna had taken steps to appoint coordinating secretaries to launch the political operation from there. Accordingly, Siripala Amarasinghe, a former minister who contributed greatly to the creation of Pohottuwa, launched this political operation from Lansa’s room.
Former JVP member to support
Siripala Amarasinghe first came to parliament as a representative of the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna. He later joined former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, was once the chairman of the State Timber Corporation, was the main figure who ran the political operation from Lansa’s room
The other character was Sugeeshwara, who was the private secretary of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Apart from Sugeeshwara, three other coordination secretaries were involved in this operation in a room belonging to Prasanna Ranatunga. The three are Supun Jeevananda, Isuru Herath and Srinath Gamage.
Their duty was to coordinate the ministers of Pohottuwa in the discussions with the President. Accordingly, this group took steps to organize the first discussion here two weeks ago.
Sagara aired Pohottuwa opposition
The discussion turned out to be a failure due to the fact that the President, has sent the invitations to few selected people without the knowledge of the party there for the General Secretary of Pohottua, Mr. Sagara Kariyawasam, criticised this move openly in the forum which we reported in ‘ Inside Politics’ column on the 5th.
‘Mr. President, you can call cabinet meetings at any time. You can also call group meetings of the government. But if the political parties that are with the government are called for this kind of political discussion, there is a way to do it.
But we have a big problem the way it is called, because still the government is a pohottuwa government. So, if you are talking about issues within the government, you should directly call the heads of the pothattuva and discuss about it. When Sagara protested by saying, ‘Our party decides who will participate in that discussion’, Nimal Lansa stood up to answer before anyone else.
Sagara stood firm
‘How can this be? In the present situation we cannot claim ownership to the party. We all have to get together and should take measures to strengthen the government inside the parliament. Because somehow there will be an election we all have to strongly work together for that’ Lansa said.
Sagara rose again and oppose this and said whatever the discussion is if it is about the government it should be with the leaders of pohottuwa. Susil Premjayantha , Diana Gamage, and Vajira Abeyagunawardena commented in favour of Lansa’s statement. But never stumped by this Sagara stood his grounds and maintained his stand on this.
Coached and sent by Basil
President who watched all this silently said, all have to work united and make use of further discussions to unite.
Once all left the discussion Lansa said loudly ‘he has no courage to talk like that Basil has coached him and sent we know who they are?
Monday Meeting flops again!
Despite the failure of the meeting Lansa, Prasanna , and Kanchana did not want to give this up so easily. They organised another similar meeting on last Monday with President. The cordinatiors in Lansa and Prasanna’s office called the pohottuwa district leaders but commit the same mistake of not informing the Pohottuwa party hierarchy officially.
They had invited Pohottuwa district leaders, along with 48 leaders, which included Cabinet ministers, state ministers and pohottuwa back benchers.
Repeated blunder
Despite the earlier blunder and highlighting the shortcoming when the same error was committed over again the pohottuwa leaders too lost their patience.
Learning this Mahind , Basil, Sagara and other leaders began to discuss how they would response to this from last Sunday. All the arguments led toward venting strong opposition to government’s highhandedness very strongly. Finally the decision boiled down to boycott the Monday meeting which is convened by Lansa, Prasanna, and Kanchana. Also they did not forget to send a representative to observe what is happening in the meeting.
Thenuka Widanagamage who is a state minister called Basil and informed that he had received an invitation for a meeting and since he is a minister in the government that he cannot avoid participation. However Basil did not comment on this and gave his consent for Thenuka to participate in the meeting and informed him Pohottuwa district leaders and other seniors have decided to boycott the meeting.
President disappointed!
On Monday after the Cabinet meeting president arrived at this meeting venue exactly six PM. He must have expected a full house but to his dismay it was only 27 pohottuwa MPs were present. Also he could not see any Pohottuwa seniors and leaders and he felt something has gone wrong somewhere. This made him discomfort presiding the meeting.
Prasanna occupied a front seat but due to lack of participation Kanchana was seated in a back row. However commencing the proceedings prasanna’s statement attacking the Pohottuwa saw President was in discomfort.
Not even 10 minutes!
‘ purpose of organising this gathering is to stenthen the government , with this problems all parties representing government should work to strengthen the government and all have to work together, it is unfortunate some working towards disrupting this effort , if that is the case we will not be able to move forward ..’ Though Presanna said this due to the failure of the meeting President did not bother to expand on that. Therefor the second meeting called on Monday did not last at least 10 minutes.
Normally after such meetings government Mps and ministers give their comments to the media waiting outside, but on Monday no one made any comments. This demonstrated for the first time that there is a disparity between the government and pohottuwa.
Due to this government’s seniors understood Prasanna, Lansa, and Kanchana are not capable of forming a new alliance with pohottuwa MPs and Ministers. What resulted is a division between the government and Pohottuwa and they decided to organise a meeting to iron out the difference between the two parties and commence a new journey.
Meeting on Wednesday
Because the Lansa, Prasanna, Kanchana combination had failed on two previous occasions, the task was delegated to the Prime Minister’s Secretariat this time. They were careful not to make the same mistakes as before, and extended official invitations to all pohottuwa leaders and party leaders, with the meeting set for Wednesday.
Pohottuwa MPs receive the invitations by Tuesday and some got alerted and many got together and had discussion about the proposed meeting. Despite the invitation was extended to former prime minister Mahinda but many expressed their views to say that meetings summoned by President should be avoided by Mahinda the leader of Pohottuwa. Mahinda said because this is an official meeting he has consented to participate however finally all agreed to keep Mahinda away from this meeting.
Further to this it was decided Pohottuwa district leaders too should be kept away from this meeting and only Sagara Kariyawasam as the party general secretary and Basil as the party national organiser should attend this meeting.
But a problem cropped around a media news item released by the media house related with the government in the evening of Wednesday the day meeting was scheduled.
False news plants again
This media unit has been very habitual in releasing false news plants in the past which we have exposed through this column. From the day President assume office 10, 20, 40, SJB members are joining the government are some of such false news plants. Due to our exposure government get exposed with their lies and also the public was well aware the media and news channels those cater to this false plant of news.
Wendesday afternoon false news planted read as president is ready to dissolve the parliament, if Pohottuwa is ready to leave the government President has decided to form a government with SJB.
The fake news read as this:
It is reported that President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s attention is focused on the dissolution of Parliament.
His attention is focused on taking these steps if there are obstacles to running the government.
It is reported that the continuous pressure from the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna side to give ministerial positions to several seniors has also affected this.
The relevant seniors did not attend a meeting of the Podujana Peramuna called by the President.
Meanwhile, the Samagi Jana Balawega party has also informed the President that a government formed by dissolving the Parliament and holding an election is ready to deal with the current President.
The United People’s Force has also informed that it is ready to lead the country in the future with President Ranil Wickremesinghe under a new government.’
Accordingly, it did not take long for the seniors of Pohottuwa to understand that this news has been published to scare the representatives of Pohottuwa who came to discuss this news on Wednesday morning. Also, SJB seniors who saw the news also realized that the President’s side has taken steps to show the country that there is a deal between SJB and the President by publishing false news.
Sajith in Monaragala
The best thing is that SJB leader Mr. Sajith Premadasa and General Secretary Mr. Ranjith Maddumabandara were together in a program to inform Moneragala Constituency activists when this news was published. Accordingly, the party general secretary Ranjith Maddumabandara was the first to receive the message from Colombo about this news. Accordingly, Ranjith Maddumabandara informed Sajith that such false news had been published, and Sajith in turn told him to take steps to correct this immediately. From Monaragala, Ranjith took steps to issue an announcement stating that this news is completely false and that SJB will not work with the President to form a government.
Pohottuwa not shaken
Before a moment, the leaders of Pohottuwa, who were already engaged in various discussions, got to see this lie, which was ‘planted’ by the government. As soon as the leaders of Pohottuwa saw the news, they could not help but laugh as they realized that the government has done a second class job to influence Pohottuwa.
Accordingly, the Pohottu seniors, who completely rejected the news, then discussed what challenges Pohottu could face from the President’s side during the President’s meeting in the evening. Accordingly, this time we are ready to reveal to the country a very decisive decision taken by Pohottuwa in this discussion for the first time from the ‘inside politics’ column. The Pohottu strongmen took a step to take a strong decision that if the President threatened the Pohottu to dissolve the Parliament in the meeting to be held in the evening, they should respond accordingly.
Pohottuwa reply
The Pohottu leaders also decided to inform the President to call a general election if he tries to threaten the dissolution of the Parliament. There was a reason for that too. In this discussion, the district leaders had pointed out to the Pohottu leaders that the Pohottu parties who had retreated in the past are now getting stronger again, and this was seen in the Pohottu power meetings held around the country in the past few days. As a result, the Pohottu strongmen made a final decision to respond appropriately if the President prepares to intimidate Pohottu by pointing to the general election.
Lansa on fire
Meanwhile, several other interesting events were unfolding in politics simultaneously. Nimal Lansa, who works closely with the President, was involved in one of those incidents. Nimal Lansa was abroad at that time, and given a statement to a certain website in Sri Lanka while in overseas. This created some fire in politics. The website had asked Lansa if the parliament is dissolve will Pohottuwa leave the government. Lansa, who had given a strong answer in response to that, had taken steps to give Namal Rajapaksa a shot through his statement. The news published by the website is as follows.
Let Rajapakse’s leave
Parliament member Nimal Lansa says that even if Namal Rajapaksa and Rajapaksa leave the government demanding the posts of Ministers, the government will not collapse and therefore there is no need to dissolve the government.
Lansa MP, who is abroad, said that while commenting on the news report published on the 14th with the headline ‘Preparation to Dissolve Parliament’.
When Ranil Wickramasinghe met the ruling party MPs for the first time as president, the MP from Pohottu asked the president if he would dissolve the parliament. But he said that he will dissolve the parliament according to the constitution when you say so.
No need to dissolve
Therefore, the MP said that there is no need to dissolve the government at this time on the issue of cabinet ministers, and emphasized that Namal Rajapaksa’s group does not have the support of more than 25 MPs in Pohottuwa at this time.
“There is no problem even if the Rajpakse members leave the government. Because if they go, more MPs from the opposition have agreed to support the President. The only barrier for the MPs who are waiting to come to the government from SJB, Freedom Party , Northern Group is that Basil group…’ continued the MP Lansa.
President re – built the country
‘The people who were hiding in the past, when President Ranil came to rebuild the country, have now started working against the President. These are clearly hypocritical works. It is unacceptable to pull the President’s leg whenever we want to build the economy together. As soon as I come to Sri Lanka, I will make a special statement about this .’ Nimal Lansa MP added.’
Namal responds
Namal was abroad when Lanza made this kind of statement. Accordingly, a certain friend who called Namal from Colombo informed about the attack on Namal by Lansa. Accordingly, before a moment had passed, Namal had taken steps to issue a strong statement in response to Lansa. Below is the statement.
We said that if the president calls the MPs of the Podujana Peramuna on political affairs, the party leaders should be informed according to the correct method and informed through the party. Because coalition politics is not about bringing MPs as each one wants. Now some people say that they do not come to meetings called by the President because they were not given ministries. I would like to say again that I am the first to say that I will not take a minister ship. Also, the seniors did not go to the meetings only because they were not informed according to the proper procedure.
SJB and President
SJB likes to work with the president, but they say that they will not join the government from the opposition because of the people of Pohottuwa. How many times have we said to strengthen the government by taking members from SJB? How many times have we said that we don’t want ministries, take our ministers and give them to those coming from the opposition to strengthen the government? It’s been a year and no one has come. We have our full blessing if the people of SJB come.
Recent false rumours
Recently, it was said that 40 people are coming from the opposition and 20 people are coming. No one came. If possible, don’t brag about strengthening the government by giving us any position and taking the people from the opposition. We said that if you want to come to the meetings, only to properly inform the party. Make us aware of the proper system through the party instead of talking about ministers like rat snakes who poured kerosene on them. It seems to me that no one is coming from SJB. I would like to say to nip incompetence in the bud. Because our deal is with the party and not with the president. Namal said that the people who made the deal personally were hurt a lot by this.
Sagara commenced the attacked
In the evening, the meeting between the President and the representatives of the ruling party began under this background. Sagara Kariyawasam, General Secretary of Pohottuwa, started the discussion, making it a heated one. As decided in the previous discussions, Sagara launched the first attack and took steps to explain the party’s position to the President.
We made you president
We made you president. Pohottuwa is a party that has its own identity. When the crisis came, we brought you to this position by taking a decision of the party. But if you are now trying to break our party, create crises within our party, and destroy the identity of our party, that is a problem. If they are going to create crises within the party by using different methods, that is also a problem. We request you not to do that.
Face election as one party
Last time, we protested the meeting which was called in different ways because different parties were ready to interfere with our party. Therefore, if you still want us, allow the identity of our party. Don’t encourage splitting the party. Otherwise, we cannot go on one trip. If not, we will have to make a decision. Because in the upcoming elections, we will have to compete from the bottom. As a party, we have to face the election. Therefore, we request you not to embarrass us…’ as Sagara continued, it was seen that the President was also facing a bit of embarrassment. Realizing that, Basil immediately intervened in the conversation and took steps to comment in a rather subdued tone.
Middlemen causing problems
‘From the time you were appointed to the presidency until now, we have come without any problems. Mr. Sagala Ratnayake and Mr. Saman Ekanayake dealt with us very well. When any of us discussed a problem with them, they intervened and solved it. When a call is given, it is answered. Both of them are easy to work with. But when the middlemen come in the middle of this, the problems arise. Therefore, we have no problem with you. We are ready to extend our support to you. It can be done through Sagala and Samanu as it has been done so far. When Basil said that there is no need for intermediary help, the President took steps to intervene in the discussion for the first time. There, the President said that he has no need to divide the Potuttu or create crises within the Potuttu.
‘No. I do not want to break your party or create crises within the party. We have to go on this journey together. I will tell Saman and Sagala to continue the program they have been carrying out. Also, let’s meet like this once a month and discuss at the level of party leaders and solve these problems…’ the President took steps to end the discussion peacefully.
‘Plant media’ report
However, the most special event to be seen here was that some media units of the government, which had ‘planted’ news to scare the public before the meeting, had also published strange news about this meeting. Without mentioning a word about Sagara Kariyawasam’s attack, in a statement released by the media units, it was reported as that Basil had given an assurance that he would support the President and the government.
Government was scared
What is clear here is that the government parties were scared of what would happen in this meeting. Because the government knew very well that if there was a problem, it would definitely affect the majority of the government adversely. By now, they have confirmed that the government will no longer exist if 11 people move around in Pohatuwa.
Force against government
When various upheavals are taking place within the government, it is seen that the opposition is launching a big work to create a huge force against the government. In the past, the government thought that the opposition had fallen on all fours with the postponement of the local government election which was favourable to the opposition. But the opposition has filed court case after court case against the postponement of the polls, and it is understood that the final decision is likely to be received next July. In particular, JVP has already taken steps to file two new cases with new statistics.
JVP protest
In addition to this, two weeks ago we made a special disclosure on the front page and revealed that the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna has decided to start a massive fight for the local government elections. There we said that the JVP has planned to come to Colombo and hold a massive meeting at the end of this campaign which is to be held at the district and village levels. However, the latest proposal that has been received by the opposition parties says that all the opposition parties should come together in Colombo on one day and hold a massive campaign against the government, demanding local government elections, as has never been done before in history.
Opposition as one force
Sajith, Anura, and the Dallas team have received this proposal from several parties, and it is said that the green light has already been given by all those parties. Recently, Professor G.L. also attended the executive committee meeting of the common opposition. Mr. Peiris presented this proposal and a long discussion was held there. Many people pointed out that while all the opposition parties are campaigning separately, the government can have a huge impact by coming to Colombo on the same day.
It was said that this rally is not to be held together, but can be held separately while protecting the identity of their respective parties. Especially for the first time in history, the Tamil parties representing the North and East have received a good response. The ‘state secret’ belt has heard that they have already expressed their agreement to the proposal. JVP revived this protest movement and arranged to hold the first rally in front of the Election Commission in Rajagiri and the second rally in Tangalle accordingly.
However, with the disclosure we made in this regard in the last few weeks, it has been learned that in addition to political parties, trade unions, civil organizations and associations of professionals have also inquired from political parties about how they can join this protest movement. It has been learned that they have already spoken to SJB, JVP and the Dallas team to inquire about how they can join. Accordingly, if this campaign is successful, it will undoubtedly be recorded as a day when all the opposition parties took to the streets together for the same purpose for the first time in history.
Cancel LG nominations?
In the midst of all this, it was seen last week that the government is preparing to play another game targeting the local government elections. That is the plan to cancel the nominations of the local government elections. Accordingly, this proposal was presented by the government in the Sectoral Committee of the Ministry of Local Government, and it was seen that several MPs representing the government had expressed their opinions in favour of it.
But according to the current provisions, the government cannot cancel the nominations in the local government elections before the sectorial committees or in any other way, and to do that, the government will have to pass a bill in the parliament. Mr. Saman Sri Ratnayake, who was the director of the Election Commission, also explained that while attending a press conference the other day.
President’s Indian tour
Meanwhile, President Ranil Wickramasinghe is scheduled to visit India next July after taking office. Dates have been set for that, but it appears that the President’s trip to India will not be easy because the President has to sign several agreements before the trip. Apart from this, it is known that the President should give a certificate before the visit to India, not only regarding the local government elections, but also regarding the provincial council elections.
However, by last week, Basil’s side also received the information that India is expecting a confirmation from the President regarding the provincial council elections. Accordingly, Basil very secretly called the party’s former provincial council ministers to the Battaramulla head office and took steps to hold a discussion about this. Accordingly, Basil told them that although the court should give a decision regarding the holding of the local government election, India has imposed a strict condition on the president regarding the provincial council election.
Provincial council elections
Upon receiving this information, we also took steps to investigate it. There we were also able to uncover the details of a game played by the President to establish provincial councils in a different way without holding the provincial council election.
Previously, through the ‘inside politics’ column, we once took steps to reveal the details of an operation planned by the President to hold the Provincial Council elections only for the North Eastern Provinces and show the results to India. But as soon as that information was reported, India protested and India had informed that there is a possibility of racial conflicts in the country if steps are taken to hold provincial council elections only in the North-East. Accordingly, we pointed out that the President withdrew that effort. We further pointed out that after calling the provincial council election, the election commission decides how it will be conducted, and the president cannot have any influence in that regard.
Sumanthiran oppose
However, the President played a new game regarding the provincial council election in the last discussion with the Tamil National Alliance. There, the President has proposed to the Tamil Alliance that he is ready to establish an interim government for the North and East Provincial Councils according to the 13th constitutional amendment. The President has indicated to the Tamil National Alliance that it is a constitutional clause and can be dealt with accordingly. But the most special thing that was seen here was that Mr. Sumanthiran of the Tamil National Alliance was totally opposed to this proposal of the President. Bringing a legal argument, Sumanthiran had pointed out that there is absolutely no possibility to do such a thing at this time. Sumanthiran had taken steps to indicate to the President in which cases such interim control can be given.
In this way, while proposing an interim administration for the North East, the President should also be reminded of a matter that he had forgotten. Former president Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunga also attacked LTTE in this way. That the organization proposed an interim administration for the North East. But it should be mentioned here that the proposal ended up sending Chandrika’s government home.
Prakash Nair
Earlier we had reported that the President is going to India next July. This is what we are going to say about the invitation the President has received to visit India in August. This invitation was received not from such and such a person, but from one of the most famous businessmen in India. Not only in the business world, this person is related to India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, and the ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party. His name is Prakash Nair.
Although Prakash Nair is known as a low profile figure in the political arena, behind the scenes he is known as a huge figure in India.ප්රකාශ් නායර් The President has been invited to India for his daughter’s wedding. Although it is mentioned as a marriage, it is correct to say that it is actually a ‘royal wedding’ rather than a marriage. The reason for this is that Prakash has taken steps to fully book the Sheraton Hotel in Cochin, India for two days for this wedding.
Involvement in SL politics
Prakash Nair first involved in Sri Lankan politics during the time of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Prakash Nair, who established a relationship with Gota, succeeded in establishing Gota’s relationship with the Indian BJP. There, Prakash Nair took steps to develop his relationship not only with Gota, but also with Mahinda, Basil, Namal. Also, with Ranil becoming the president after Gota, Nair was able to build relations with Ranil in a very subtle way. Once we reported on this column as a very special news that when Ranil went to Nuwara Eliya, Nair also came to Nuwara Eliya and met Ranil and took steps to gift him a reclining Buddha statue. In addition to this, the we heard that Nair has met the President and held discussions after coming to Colombo and stayed at the Taj Hotel.
Royal wedding
In this way, Nair, who has built a close relationship with Sri Lankan politicians, took steps to invite President to attend his daughter’s wedding ceremony. Nair arranged to invite not only the President, but also the Prime Minister, Mahinda, Basil and Gota. Nair also took steps to give invitations to many leading businessmen.
Another very special event that was seen here was that along with this invitation, Nair also arranged to give a first class air ticket to all these people to come to India. In addition, Nair has planned to bring all of them from the airport to the Sheraton Hotel in luxury vehicles after their arrival in India, and to provide accommodation at the Sheraton Hotel. That includes all meals and facilities.
Also the news is that Nair has arranged to invite all the BJP leaders from Indian Prime Minister Modi to this feast. Accordingly, on the days of the Mangalotsavam, the Indian security authorities have planned to deploy a very tight security around the Sheraton Hotel and clear the area from the remaining people.