SRI LANKA: JVP PUMMELS GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATING

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 COLOMBO 000426 SIPDIS STATE FOR SA/INS USPACOM FOR FPA E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/24/2015 TAGS: PGOV CE LTTE SUBJECT: SRI LANKA: JVP PUMMELS GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATING OVERTURE; CWC SHEDS PORTFOLIOS REF: A. COLOMBO 404 ¶B. COLOMBO 359 Classified By: AMB JEFFREY J. LUNSTEAD. REASON: 1.4 (B,D). -------------- SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (SBU) Summary: President Chandrika Kumaratunga's tenuous majority in Parliament looks shakier than ever after renewed threats from the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) to quit the coalition and the decision by two Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) ministers to resign from their posts. Although both parties stopped short of withdrawing support from the government, these very public displays of partisan pouting are putting increased pressure on the troubled coalition. End summary. -------------- JVP: THIS TIME WE MEAN IT -------------- ¶2. (U) Government coalition partner Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) is once again threatening to pull out of the United People's Front Alliance (UPFA) coalition government--this time to protest Peace Secretariat chief Jayantha Dhanapala's February 22 announcement of Government willingness to begin talks on an interim arrangement with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) (Ref A). Speaking in Parliament on February 24, JVP MP and Propaganda Secretary Wimal Weerawansa asserted that his party would quit the coalition if the Government began discussions with the Tigers on their controversial proposal for an Interim Self-Governing Authority (ISGA). (Note: Dhanapala's statement, which appeared on a government website February 23, did not refer to ISGA specifically. End note.) He emphasized that the JVP had not been consulted before Dhanapala made the announcement, a lapse Weerawansa described as a violation of the coalition agreement between the leftist JVP and President Kumaratunga's Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). Weerawansa's warning was followed by a JVP press conference later in the day, in which he, flanked by hard-line MP Nanda Gunatilleke and party Secretary Tilvin Silva, lashed out at the government for making unilateral decisions without consulting its coalition partner. The JVP does not oppose negotiations with the LTTE, Silva said--just negotiations focusing on an interim arrangement, which the party has long maintained would open the door to a de facto separate state in the north and east. Any talks on an interim arrangement must occur in tandem with discussion of a final settlement, the trio stressed. ¶3. (C) JVP MP and Culture Minister Vijitha Herath confirmed to us on February 25 his party's displeasure at Dhanapala's statement. Agreeing to talk about ISGA is tantamount to agreeing to a blueprint for a separate state, he said, to which the JVP would never agree. Dhanapala's announcement was a "national decision" on which the JVP, as the largest partner in the UPFA, should have been consulted. When reminded that the JVP has threatened to leave the coalition a number of times before (Ref B),Herath conceded the point but stressed that this time his party was "very firm" in its commitment to follow through if the Government ignores its concerns. Information Minister and presidential confidant Mangala Samaraweera had been in discussions with JVP leaders until midnight that day trying to sort out the differences, Herath said, to no avail. The JVP was incensed by the President's "my-way-or-the-highway" ultimatum (Ref B) in a public address earlier in the month--and had tried unsuccessfully to extract a retraction--and now saw the coalition in deep crisis, he indicated. "We are headed for a political tsunami," Herath concluded. -------------- CWC, IN PLAYGROUND DISPUTE, OPTS TO STOP PLAYING -------------- ¶4. (U) The JVP's very public display of impatience with the Government coincided with a decision the same day by Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) MPs Muthu Sivalingam and M.S. Sellasamy to resign from their positions as Minister and Deputy Minister, respectively, of Estate Housing, Infrastructure and Community Development. The two MPs have an appointment to meet the President on February 28. Despite the resignations, the CWC stopped short of formally withdrawing the support of its eight MPs from the government. ¶5. (C) Sivalingam told us on February 25 that he had tendered his resignation because of a playground dispute. According to Sivalingam, he had sponsored the construction of a playground in Nuwara Eliya District, CWC's traditional stronghold, only to have the Government give the credit for the project--and the honor of presiding over its opening--to a rival Tamil politician. There is no point in holding a Cabinet post, Sivalingam lamented, if the Government ignores him. -------------- COMMENT -------------- ¶6. (C) Since the tsunami, concerns about maintaining her fragile coalition and appeasing her contentious partner appear to have faded into the background for President Kumaratunga. If the JVP was looking for the President to back-pedal on some of her recent tough replies to its chronic complaints, it must be disappointed. Dhanapala's February 22 statement, with its reference to an "interim arrangement" was a reiteration of what the President has been saying for months. The JVP, however, has taken it as a direct challenge. The coalition partner has threatened to walk out numerous times before, but this latest falling-out cuts to the core of JVP efforts to pose as last-ditch defender of Sinhalese nationalism. It remains to be seen whether these former Marxist insurgents remain "firm" in their most recent ultimatum to the President, since the common analysis is that the JVP benefits in the long term by staying in the coalition. LUNSTEAD