Why did Mahinda Rajapaksa Win?
Reflections on the 2018 Local Government Results
Preview:
One shall ask the
fundamental question after the appalling decline of the Yahapālana Government
in the 2018 Local government election; ‘why did Mahinda Rajapaksa win?’ It is true
that the voters were angry about the negligence of this government and anxious
about their own future. They were confused about the financial transparency
that came up with the bond issue. Does
that anger justify ‘the hysterical madness’ that they display towards the very
foundation of our existence?
‘Behind all the sound and fury, beyond the endless series of set ups and punch lines, there is nothing’ (Slavoj Zizek).
The Mysterious Turn towards
Totalizing Authority:
The much delayed local government election held in
2018 February shows that SLPP (Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna) dominates in the
Southern part of Sri Lanka among Sinhala-Buddhist voters. It had acquired
nearly 45 percent of the total valid votes while UNP got only 32 percent. This
sweeping victory can easily be attributed to the Sinhala nationalistic
sentiments that it generally represents but this 'mysterious turn' shows
something more. On the one hand, it represents a common anger and
disappointment among the Sinhalese majority in the south. When President
Maithripala Sirisena and this coalition government were elected around 2005,
the voters hoped for many things; democracy, financial transparency, economic
stability, freedom of speech and devolution of power. The Ranil-Maithri union
could not actualize any of these 'progressive' expectations, (they are
'progressive' in a broader sense of universalism). The youths wanted to change
the restricted nature of the previous Rajapaksa government which, with the help
of China, was heading towards a new form of totalitarianism. It openly stood
for a Chinese model of 'democracy' i.e. achieving economic prosperity at the
cost of universal values. Hence the Rajapaksa family (and the then SLFP)
popularized its 'image' ('spectacle' is the word used by Guy Debord) to
propagate 'the lie as the truth' (non-democracy to signify democracy). That
image (even today) is used to 'mean' ( to signify) his family as the saviors of
the Sinhala nation (saving it from its imaginary enemy) and it should be
mentioned here that no political discourse in Sri Lanka could 'deconstruct' it.
Since such deconstructive capacity needed a thorough theoretical integrity
which the present political parties did not possess, general critics could
never predict what was going to happen. What Mahinda Rajapaksa shows us is an
image of an un-signifiable 'father-figure' who cannot be de-constructed through
general democratic (political) discourse. Political theory has to go through a
stage of 'surplus theory' to understand the function of a primordial father
figure in a disappointed third world nation. Hence, as Shiraal Lakthilaka
believes, the SLPP victory in 2018 was not at all a contingent one but an
easily predictable possibility (of a never-dying impossibility of a primordial
spectacle). This point is open for argument.
For They Know Not What They
Do:
When the global political trend was ignited by the European Financial
downfall, Brexit, the Donald Trump phenomenon was also heading towards some
form of fantasmatic despotism. It seems that postcolonial nations such as Sri
Lanka are also fearlessly taking the same footpath. Trump represents the
failure of western capitalism as well as the failure of modern universalism. In
Sri Lanka, after the 2015 victory, both the UNP and the SLFP were 'too
comfortable' with the prevalent symbolic space and never thought that the
fantasmatic father can contingently return to its symbolic space. They accused
each other for everything that went wrong and no party wanted to take the
responsibility of their own actions. The JVP and TNA were playing the usual
waiting game to grab power at the easiest junction. Actually, the TNA wanted a
radical power-devolution mechanism but it could never voice it properly since
they were also under the mysterious shade of liberal politics in the south (TNA
is the most damaged political party by 2018). In the meantime, the
nationalistic movement was sublimating the returning of the Rajapaksa
father-figure image (against all evils) and covered up the true failure of
liberal democracy. Here 'the Return of the Real' is derived from Freud's
'return of the repressed' to connote that the Real unexpectedly comes back to
the Symbolic space to traumatize our present (comfortable and negligent)
existence. Both UNP and SLFP 'disavowed' the factual situation that their
political space was fast deteriorating among the ordinary public and its cost
can be very high during the next few years. It is very important to understand
today that politics in the present post-global world is not only organized
around 'welfare', fertilizer, free education, free of corruption but 'jouissance',
the unknown (This is why JVP never wins). The crowd who rallies around Wimal
Weerawansa or Mahinda Rajapaksa does not know 'what they want' (che vuoi?)
but they do so 'for they know not what they want'. The meaning of their
speeches never becomes a serious issue for them. The real success of SLPP is
that it 'promises' (one should note the interesting fact that no election
promises are given by Mahinda Rajapaksa) 'the impossible', what the mass cannot
demand (does not know what to demand). It seems the Mahinda Rajapaksa
phenomenon is the perhaps the most profound psychoanalytical development that
sprung up in post-independent Sri Lanka.
The Rise of Jouissance:
People
also seem to believe that a father-figure such as Mahinda could break of
deadlock (of impossibility or the failure) of Liberal politics and elevate the
country to a higher state. The Capitalist paradise of consumerism has become
the ulterior utopia of our time. He seems to carry the strength of 'protecting
the insecure subject' of capitalism, the ultimate consumer who wants to consume
more and more without any objective interference (especially women), steals the
unconscious of the consuming subject. In this case, one can also argue why did
not the same consumer vote for Ranil who stands for limitless liberalism. The
answer is that he cannot promise 'the short-circuit for jouissance', the
pervert nationalistic bar that prevents the very same jouissance from the subject.
Ranil is not a master of generating the illusion of consumerism - the
promise of paradise and the very prohibition of desire (the apple). When Ranil
is easily subject to deconstruction Mahinda is not. This is where one can find
'the pervert symptomatic link' between totalitarianism and ideology.
Mahinda never questions the self-certainty and the hysteria of his
subjective voters (crowd) but uses the same hysteria to establish himself as a
master who asks 'why am I what you are saying that I am?' (බලන්න හැමෝම ඇවිල්ල ඉල්ලන්නේ මාව. ඉතින් මට බැහැනේ
නිකම් ඉන්න. Why does everyone want me even when I do not want myself?).
In this case, rational liberal politics fail to answer this mysterious question
and this is the highest form of Stalinist de-politicization of the modern
political space. When the modern space fails to 'understand' the rise of
totalitarianism, it brings in the very destruction to the modern politics
itself. Such a father can never resolve the true antagonisms (division of
power, poverty, social inequality, etc.) of a society but can postpone them
endlessly so that the subject may never feel the need to resolve them. People
die without knowing what their true problems are. Their choices are forever
barred by the totalitarian ruler and what is offered to them is always a
'forced choice'.
The Working Class (petit bourgeoisie) Gone Awry:
In this context,
the Left (especially the old camp) cannot mobilize a revolutionary agent who
can competitively hegemonize his position against the totalizing power of a
family. Even the so called working class unite under the family umbrella of
Mahinda Rajapaksa abandoning its universal signifier. Since Mahinda
'represents' (like Donald Trump) the agony of the working class and its
grievances, political signs become extremely complicated and indistinguishable.
This is why the rise of totalitarianism is always a postmodern development
where universal subjectivity (that inspires revolutions) is replaced by a
historically transformed empty-signifier (Sinhala-Buddhist-Southern-Dutugamunu-Maharaja-a
blood relative to Lord Buddha etc.) which can never bring about true
emancipation. He is popular among the majority and excessively demanding
nothing but absolute authority which he needs to ‘cure’ the hurt ego of
the postcolonial subject. At the same time, he promises to heal the traumatic
wounds of capitalism while promoting the domination of capitalism itself. The
final horizon of the Sri Lankans is determined by a paradoxical marriage
between nationalism and capitalism. This is the space that Mahinda successfully
exploits. Yes, he has come back. He has come back to show us how fragile the postcolonial liberalist framework is.
This time result has for the first
time shattered the very foundation of the Yahapālana Government. It hardly has
any legitimacy to continue its rule for another two years. However, there is
another contingent point that we must never forget. Despite the above
theoretical paradoxes, will Mahinda and his party try to ‘change’ the fate of
Sri Lanka? Will he embrace universalism and change the derogatory image that he
already possesses? We'll wait and see
whether he learns from his historical mistakes and deliver better for the
future of this country.
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