Newsmaker: Newly appointed PM Mahinda Rajapaksa tightens grip on Sri Lanka

Newly appointed Sri Lankan PM Mahinda Rajapaksa had earlier argured that being in debt was bad only when one didn't have the capacity to repay it

Former Sri Lankan strongman Mahinda Rajapaksa, who recently replaced Ranil Wickremesinghe as prime minister, has nine brothers. As previous president, he ensured much of his clan was in government employment: His eldest brother, Chamal, was Speaker of Parliament; two brothers —  Basil and Gotabhaya — were given important responsibilities in the defence and security sectors; and his son Namal was (and continues to be) a member of Parliament.

Whether the clan tightens its grip on the government should be decided when Parliament convenes. If Mahinda wins a majority in the 225-member Parliament, where he had already reached the 101-mark till the time of writing this report, he will likely stay in power even longer by amending the Constitution and lifting the bar on presidency beyond two terms. He can contest the presidency himself, or if he can’t, leave it to brother, Gotabhaya. Either way, he has pulled himself up by the bootstraps to prove he is very much a factor in the Sri Lankan politics — and will continue to be.

In his previous terms as president, Mahinda reported two significant victories. One was winning the war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), one of the most feared guerrilla groups in the world, in 2009; and the other, the subsequent turnaround in the Sri Lankan economy.

Although Sri Lanka has a majority Sinhalese population (74 per cent), it has historically viewed as a threat the Tamils (12.6 per cent), who are largely settled in the Northern and Eastern provinces of the island. Politicians in both India and Sri Lanka have exploited ethnic fears to their electoral advantage. Indian patronage to Tamil separatists from the 1970s to the late 1980s led to the rise of the LTTE, that armed intervention by India was unable to vanquish. 

Finally, in a massive military assault, the Sri Lankan Army killed the top leaders of the militant outfit in 2009 during the presidentship of Mahinda. Gotabhaya supervised the ground assault, which made him the natural successor to Mahinda.

The military assault was celebrated via spending with a free hand. The 2014-15 budget, the last one presented by Mahinda as president, was loaded with handouts, including deep subsidies for gas and diesel, a sharp reduction in electricity tariffs, free seeds to farmers growing rice, increased farm subsidies, and salary hikes for government employees. The Sri Lanka stock market grew 25 per cent year-on-year in October 2014. GDP growth ranged between 6.2 and 8 per cent after the end of the insurgency.

The country’s backbone is tourism. Although Indian tourists continue to be the largest group, tourists from China have doubled on a monthly basis. As many as 163,000 Chinese tourists arrived in Sri Lanka in the January-July period of 2018, making China the second largest market for the Sri Lankan tourism sector. Until 2004, Germany, India and the UK were the ‘top 3’ countries among Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals, and China’s contribution to local tourism was insignificant. In 2014, however, China rose to the rank of Sri Lanka’s 3rd major tourist partner, accounting for 8.4 per cent of total tourist arrivals. It climbed another notch in 2015, nudging out the UK to claim 2nd position. 

We now know that much of the money that flowed from contracts given to China was on terms that pushed Sri Lanka deeper and deeper into Chinese debt. But Mahinda argued that being in debt was bad only when one did not have the capacity to repay it.

If he stays as prime minister after the House test, what should we expect? Will some of the painful decisions imposed on Sri Lanka by deposed PM  Wickremesinghe like a hike in bus and train fares, increase in power tariffs be reversed (he has already slashed fuel prices)? Will ethnic tensions come back to the fore (one Tamil minister has been sacked for voicing the need for an LTTE-like organisation to make the government keep their promises to the Tamils). And will India’s interests be compromised forever? We should have some of the answers soon.