Lanka faces uphill task at Commonwealth polls

by Keith Noyahr published on December 05, 2003 in Daily Mirror

A little over a fortnight ago, Sri Lanka announced the candidature of former Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar to contest the election for the coveted post of Commonwealth Secretary General at the three-day summit at Abuja, Nigeria that opens today.

Set to sail through , the incumbent Donald Charles McKinnon, himself a former Foreign Minister of New Zealand, was at the eleventh hour being challenged by a formidable candidate making his re-election bid no easy task.

If Kadirgamar gets elected he will be the fifth Secretary General and the first from Asia. It will also be the first time a holder of the post is unseated without being re-elected a second four-year term.

McKinnon, I recollect, held the scales well during the 50th Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Australia when the crisis over Zimbabwe saw African and Asian countries (including Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka) grouping together against Britain's and Australia's passion to impose sanctions on the former Rhodesia.

But, since February last year much water has flowed under the Zimbabwe bridge with President Robert Mugabe allegedly rigging the March elections and closing down the country's only independent newspaper the Daily News and introducing anti-media legislation earning the wrath of the international community. His country was excluded and sanctions imposed.

McKinnon as the Secretary General was asked to re-evaluate the decision of the committee to have Zimbabwe further excluded. His report reaffirmed that a majority of the member countries had wanted Zimbabwe suspended for a further year.

In this backdrop Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe gave the impression to New Zealand Foreign Minister Phil Goff in the last week of September that Sri Lanka was not in favour of Mugabe attending CHOGM at Abuja.

In fact, Mugabe is furious that he's being excluded from Abuja and blames it on McKinnon, due to his perceived bias towards the present regime in Harare.

With Mugabe out, and President Chandrika Kumaratunga, the promoter of Kadirgamar's candidature, skipping CHOGM, McKinnon has a greater chance over his rival who is unable to attend, as he has no protocol status.

With New Zealand's Prime Minister Helen Clark attending the summit where she is personally campaigning for her candidate unlike the telephone and letter campaign by Kumaratunga, one would be inclined to give the incumbent an edge over his challenger.

She made out that Kadirgamar had all the qualifications to lead the Commonwealth at a time of great challenge. He was elected President of the Oxford Union in 1959 and has lectured extensively on commercial, legal, international and political affairs in many countries.

In his capacity as Asian Director in the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) Geneva, where he worked from 1976 to 1988, he has advised developing countries in the region on upgrading their intellectual property legislation and infrastructure.

Kadiragamar has the added backing of the country's two main political parties – the government and the opposition – and is only opposed by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and groups sympathetic towards the Tigers.

McKinnon's candidature, however, is divided.

A New Zealand Government MP Matt Robson reportedly said the Sri Lankan challenger Kadirgamar was a worthy contender who would appeal to the poorer Commonwealth countries.

"He is actually a better candidate than Don McKinnon," said Progressive coalition MP Robson, a former associate foreign minister who is backing the Sri Lankan candidate saying the Labour party had not consulted its coalition partner for its views.

"We're supposed to have a coalition government where we have a say in it, but Labour run it pretty close to their chest," said Robson whose comments will only indirectly help Kadiragamar's candidature.

Clark's Foreign Minister Goff was firmly behind McKinnon lobbying his case among member nations even as MPs like Robson took a different position back at home.

"He would have all 14 members of the Pacific (Islands) Forum," declared Goff even as British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Australia's Prime Minister John Howard are set to vote for McKinnon after the humiliation they received at last year's CHOGM again over Zimbabwe. Canada was also expected to vote for the incumbent.

The incumbent is also depending on the Carribean support while little canvassing has been done by Kadfirgamar in this region.

The New Zealand Foreign Minister who is going flat out to support McKinnon is also trying to make out that his contender Kadirgamar was too old and in fact in some comments he was made out to be 75 already and on completion of his term 79. Far from it, Kadirgamar is clear-headed, well-informed and fields questions from the media even better than McKinnon.

Despite Sri Lanka's serious cohabitation crises and bitter acrimony between Kumaratunga and the ruling United National Front, the government headed by Wickremesinghe endorsed the candidature of Kadirgamar, a presidential adviser on international affairs and a personal friend of the Prime Minister.

Foreign Minister Tyronne Fernando who enjoys a good rapport with President Kumaratunga will certainly push the case of Kadirgamar with the hope that this will set the trend for his own election to the prestigious post of United Nations Secretary General several years later.

But sans Kumaratunga, it will be an uphill task for Fernando to try and sway Heads of State/Heads of Government to vote for Kadirgamar.

Of course Fernando made it to the last CHOGM in Australia and did cultivate a number of his counterparts but that may not do when you have to deal with the heads of government among whom there is an unwritten understanding when lobbying is done.

Kadirgamar's case is further weakened by Kumaratunga's negative international image largely created by the western media following the recent Constitutional crisis when she took over three portfolios of government.

Attempts to disassociate himself from Kumaratunga's recent volte face and pro-Tiger stance are rather late in the day and was not likely to serve much of a purpose.

At least if Kumaratunga made it last year, her letters of recommendation to the 50-odd Commonwealth leaders would have added weight.

Instead of the Foreign Minister, had Wickremesinghe, whose international stature has grown in recent times, made it to CHOGM and canvassed for a candidate from a rival political party in Sri Lanka, Kadirgamar's chances would have been enhanced.

Knowing full well that the election of a Sri Lankan to the UN top post was an uphill task, Fernando announced his candidature well in advance unlike Kadirgamar who has a 50-50 chance of pulling through making up his mind "surprisingly" late in the race.

Kadirgamar who has an international reputation to live up to agreed to enter the fray rather late knowing full well that it won't be a disaster.

His decision came after a visit to London where the Commonwealth is headquartered and where he met diplomats from countries in the grouping including the crucial Asian component.

In fact Kadirgamar was directly approached after several countries had earlier contacted the Sri Lankan High Commissioner in London Faiz Musthapha suggesting that the country puts forward a candidate. Colombo was not interested as it had already named its candidate for the UN’s top post.

According to the Sunday Leader, the principal promoters for his candidature are Lindsay Ross Executive Director Commonwealth Press Union in the UK, and Tom Humphreys from the coordinating division of the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office.In fact both Ross and McKinnon were in Sri Lanka this February for the CPU biennial sessions where Kadirgamar himself presented a paper.

Requiring 27 votes to scrape through, Kadirgamar already has the backing of the African countries (19) and all he needs are eight votes, which is exactly Asia's complement in the 54-nation grouping, according to some analysts.

Pakistan and Zimbabwe are suspended bringing the total votes to 52 in an election where the African continent was apparently fully behind the unseating of McKinnon, as it is widely believed that he was largely responsible in extending the suspension of former Rhodesia.

The fact that even after 50 odd years, Asia has not had a chance to hold the post, the eight Asian countries had all the justification in the world to support one of its members to the influential post partly in their own interest.

With the SAARC meeting around the corner, countries represented in both groupings might even have an obligation to vote for a candidate from a country represented in both.

Kadirgamar and Kumaratunga enjoy very close ties with India and are frequent guests of the state.

Lanka-Bangladeshi relations have been steadily growing and Kumaratunga has close ties with the leaders there, too.

Was it a case of taking the South Asian countries for granted?

The two neighbouring countries are playing their cards close to their chests, as there are political and other considerations, before they decide. Once a leader has given his/her assurance to one candidate it may be awkward to change that position as one needs to honour one's words.

In this instance however they pledged their support while there was only one candidate.

But what about those who pledged support to McKinnon after New Zealand learnt of moves to field Kadirgamar way back in the first week of October?

What was Kadirgamar and his advisors doing all this while? Either he was caught up with domestic politics or just biding his time until he had greater assurance.

The timing and politics are in favour of McKinnon while the personality and the Asian factor are plusses for Kadirgamar, according to analysts.

Even Western diplomats concede that Kadirgamar whose foreign policy is acceptable to the West is head and shoulders above McKinnon but the timing of announcing his candidature and other factors went against him.

"It's not the way things are usually done in the Commonwealth," said New Zealand's Prime Minister Clark through a spokeswoman referring to the last-minute candidature of the Lankan contender.

Kadirgamar is no novice to elections for this top post as he himself led the Sri Lankan delegation at the 1999 CHOGM at Durban, South Africa where McKinnon was elected unanimously.

He stood in for President Kumaratunga who herself was making a re-election bid at that time.

Kadirgamar's chances could only be considered on the presumption that the African countries fully support his candidature.

The North-South split over Zimbabwe in Australia last year seems to be repeating itself in the form of a quasi-racial divide between the former British colonies in Africa, and the "white Commonwealth" of Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

According to reports some African leaders, including South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki and Olusegun Obasanjo President of the host nation Nigeria, have lobbied for Mugabe to be included but Australia's Prime Minister John Howard was adamant that Zimbabwe be permanently expelled. The three leaders sit on a Commonwealth troika for Zimbabwe. Australia hosted CHOGM last year and Nigeria has the honours this time while McKinnon was elected when South Africa played host in 1999.

Such a block support from African countries for Kadirgamar would give him a chance to tip the scales.

However, there were unconfirmed reports that Obasanjo had telephoned President Chandrika Kumaratunga and acknowledged her forwarding of Kadirgamar's candidature while regretting that he had already committed himself to voting for the incumbent. (It is already learnt that Mozambique a new entrant to the Commonwealth was likely to vote for the incumbent).

If these reports are true, then Kadirgamar had little chance despite being the better candidate of the two. The host and an African country at that lending support to McKinnon means Kadirgamar’s chances are bleak. In this instance, it must be said, it is unfortunate that Kadirgamar failed to fight a good fight after joining at the end of the race hoping to win. As an all-round sportsman he would take defeat in his stride.

As a Sri Lankan we still wish him all the best for if he does win he will bring pride to himself, the country and the region.

Above we present a table of those Commonwealth countries and their status vis-a-vis their media laws.

Archaic laws still used to harass journalists

This year’s CHOGM theme at Nigeria is development and democracy .

"Entrenching people's right to access information is the most practical way of achieving this," says the report, entitled "Open Sesame" prepared by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI), a non-governmental organisation based in India.

The report asks leaders to implement immediately "liberal access to information laws developed by people and governments working in close cooperation."

"Without this, the quest for robust democracy and rapid development willnever be realised."

"Open government is notoriously absent in the majority of Commonwealth member states," the report notes.

"Only 11 out of 54 Commonwealth countries have access to information laws."

In the case of Sri Lanka the former People’s Alliance Government pledged to introduce a Freedom of Information Act, to no avail.

The United National Front gave media freedom a prominent place in its manifesto.

Subsequently, despite legislation for a Freedom of Information Act drafted with the help of the Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka the legislation is yet to be tabled in Parliament.

At the last biennial session of the Commonwealth Press Union in Colombo in February this year the government pledged to bring in these new salutary media laws, but they never saw the light of day.

Media Minister Bakeer Markar has been removed and President Kumaratunga has taken over the portfolio under her wing.

The President should, before dissolving Parliament, ensure that such a piece of legislation was passed.

"Today, except in a handful of countries, governments enthusiastically retain and indeed embrace these symbols of supremacy as if there has been no intervening change from colonial to constitutional governance. Official secrets acts, preventive detention and anti-terrorist legislation, criminal defamation laws, overly indulgent contempt and privilege laws, media and privacy regulations and restrictive civil service rules all remain very much intact."

Even as the report has urged CHOGM 2003 to declare that the right to information is central to democracy and development., a former media minister has used these very archaic privilege laws to harass journalists.

A former UNP media minister W.J.M. Lokubandara now the Minister of Justice and Law Reform has raised a matter of privilege against the writer for a factual news item under the heading, “Speaker’s House ruling contrary to AG’s advice.”

The matter has been referred to the Committee on Privileges under Standing Order 127.

It would not be out of place if Mr. Lokubandara, a former media minister and the incumbent Law Reforms Minister introduces fresh legislation to scrap these archaic laws and allow journalists to perform their duties, unfettered.