Senapala Samarasekera, a Gentleman Politician-by Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha
Source:Dailynews
No angels today, though again I shall write about transitions, and the passing of an angelic personality, my father’s favourite cousin. I went down to condole with my cousins last Friday, and then got back after a night in Getamanna for the funeral on Saturday afternoon. But I left before the final rites, for the speeches took a long time, and I needed to get back to Colombo by nightfall. I had a few minutes alone though by the coffin, and reflected on how time passed and the older generation had now slipped away almost entirely, and we were now the aged.
But it is not personal reflections that I will engage in here, but political ones, roused in that the speech during which I slipped away was by Ramesh Pathirana whose father Richard won the Akmeemana seat in the bye-election of May 1983. The previous SLFP member for Akmeemana had been Senapala Samarasekera, husband of my aunt Rupa. He had indeed been the first member for that seat, which had been created before the March 1960 election, and he won again in July 1960 and in 1970 though he went down in 1965 and in the UNP landslide of 1977.
He was not given nomination for the 1983 by-elections because he fell victim to the infighting in the party, having been on Anura Bandaranaike’s side against Chandrika Kumaratunga when they fought for the soul of the party and the indulgence of their mother. Now it is largely forgotten how, after he had stripped Mrs. Bandaranaike of her Civic Rights in 1980, J R Jayewardene manipulated rivalry between her and her Deputy, Maithripala Senanayake, through leaking some unfortunate remarks of Maithri’s wife, the former Lake House journalist Ranji Handy.
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| Former MP Senapala Samarasekera |
Bitterness grew, and Maithri was passed over for the 1982 Presidential Election when Hector Kobbekaduwa, the choice of Vijaya and Chandrika Kumaranatunga, got the nod. That was followed by the referendum when Maithri behaved appallingly, supporting JR to avoid the General Election due in July 1983. Anura it should be noted was better, and joined his mother to campaign against it. But the principal draw of the SLFP, Vijaya, had been jailed on trumped up charges, and with thuggery to the fore the UNP succeeded.
Before that J.R.J had ensured undated letters of resignation, designed to make MPs work by hook or by crook to get the referendum through. Afterwards, to fulfil his commitment to cleanse Parliament of those who were unpopular, JR got rid of those who had failed the party in elections, and evolved a formula that got rid of his most honourable Minister, Ranjith Atapattu. But there the UNP flooded in force for the campaign, so Mahinda Rajapaksa was put in jail and Maithripala Sirisena claimed that he was in danger of his life from UNP’s goons. Both naturally forgot all this when it served their turn.
Only four Opposition candidates were returned, including Dinesh Gunawardena who benefited from the gentlemanly nature of his opponent, Gamini Wijeyesekera. The others who got in were Anil Moonesinghe, who had left the LSSP for the SLFP to support Kobbekaduwa, and two individuals who were new like Dinesh to Parliament, Richard Pathirana from Akmeemana and Amarasiri Dodangoda from Baddegama.
Senapala was disappointed to have been passed over, and I have often wondered whether this contributed to his death, in October the following year. But though the death was premature, and sad, that he had to leave politics was just as well, for he was a great gentleman, and far too decent for the rough and tumble of the politics of subsequent years.
He and his family also lost out then on what became unashamedly dynastic politics over the elections that followed. This was inevitable because of the PR system JR introduced, changing what he had originally envisaged, and instituting a free for all in fighting for votes, with intra-party violence trumping inter-party rivalries.
And by promoting vast numbers of candidates for each electorate, now a full district, he made it inevitable that those in power should promote their offspring. That might have been attempted anyway, but now it became inevitable that those offspring would come in again and again into Parliament since, with voters having three preferences, they would cast two if not all three for well known names. And while celebrities benefited, so did the simpler name recognition of those who had been involved in politics in the area over the years.
Hence, the vast number of dynasties that have sprung up. I did notice, when I was in Parliament, that fathers who had a basic approach to politics had by and large provided good education for their offspring, and I was impressed by the sophistication of several youngsters. Ramesh Pathirana was amongst the most thoughtful of these, and I was happy Gotabaya made him a Minister straight away. Ramesh spoke well about Senapala but I wondered too if he understood the reasons why he now stood there as an MP and a Minister. One of Senapala’s sons had also I should note been in Parliament when I entered, but as Sergeant-at- Arms, an admirable public servant, well out of the mess which politics has become. But had more people like Senapala been around, perhaps things would have been better.
Richard Pathirana was a decent man on the whole, and I recall Tara de Mel speaking positively about him, for he did not stand in the way of the reforms she spearheaded in Chandrika’s first term as President. But he had to play politics like the rest, given the electoral system, and I recall how I found the new University at Oluvil full of security guards from Galle (they told me in mitigation that the Galle Port was full of Ashraff’s proteges from Oluvil).
More seriously, when I found that the English medium materials I produced caused a fraction of what Sinhala and Tamil medium materials Government had produced cost, I found too that for years the contracts for printing had been given to firms in Galle. It was no wonder that Tara tried to clean up the mess at the Educational Publications Ministry, by introducing a Multiple Book Option, but vested interests perverted and destroyed that, and still the Ministry continues to satisfy rent seekers more than the needs of students.
I like to think Senapala would have behaved differently. But perhaps the tide was too strong then for anyone to resist.
