Ruling party leads poster war

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 December 1999, 23:59 GMT]
As polling day, December 21, for Sri Lanka's presidential election approaches, all the candidates, are stepping up their campaigns, with a vigorous poster war being the most visible aspect.

Although there are 13 candidates, the two main parties in the race are the ruling People's Alliance (PA) and main opposition United National Party (UNP) with the leftist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) also expected to make a strong showing.

A ruling that prohibits poster campaigns (including billboards) during the election periods, has seemingly not deterred these three parties.

Though it is not clear who will win the election itself, the PA is visibly leading in the poster war. The UNP poster campaign is not as prevalent, with a lack of funds being blamed for this.

The PA's posters focus mainly on the UNP's alleged failure to achieve during its 17 year rule (though some political analysts say this strategy stems from fact the PA itself has little to show for its 5 year rule either).

The first poster shown, being placed by the PA, depicts UNP leader and presidential candidate Ranil Wickremesinghe in a witness box in court. (The photo was actually taken during the 'Batalanda Housing Scheme Torture camp' case and its caption reads "Batalanda leadership, our 21st Century hell on earth").

The second shows Premadasa Udugampola, a senior Police officer during the UNP crushing of the JVP upraising in the 1980s. Udugampola has been accused of being responsible for the deaths of many Sinhala youth.

The poster caption reads "Do you remember those black cats who took justice into their own hands?" in reference to the right wing death squads which 'disappeared' many of the victims, allegedly with the backing of the UNP regime of the period.

The third poster, which could prove the most controversial, shows several dead bodies, and is said to have been designed to remind the Sri Lankan populace of the indiscriminate violence of the former UNP regime. "Do you remember the killers of 60,000 youngsters?" asks the caption.

But there is a glaring mistake: The bodies depicted are not those of youngsters killed during the UNP regime, but those of LTTE fighters killed during an attack on the Manal Aaru Army camp in 1995 - which occurred during Chandrika's regime.

The PA staffers who prepared the posters say they not realize this.

However Tamil political commentators say that with the PA placing its aggressive prosecution of the war against the LTTE as a key plank of its election campaign, the poster may not be detrimental to the party's results.

But the posters were hurriedly taken down later. A TamilNet cameraman photographed one that escaped the removal frenzy.

Incidentally, there is in fact a Sri Lankan law that prohibits the exploitation of 'man-made' tragedies during such a poster campaign.

The fourth poster shown is one that is most probably intended to be displayed in the hill country by PA supporters.

It contains pictures of PA candidate and incumbent Chandrika Kumaratunge with the former Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) leader Thondaman, who passed away recently. Thondman was expected to bring a substantial section of the estate Tamil vote to the PA.

One caption reads quotes Thondaman as saying "Chandrika is the only leader to have understood the concerns of the plantation worker" and another caption requesting the voters to fulfill the wishes of their late leader.

The fifth, a large blue coloured poster, was pasted in the Tamil areas in the north and east of the island. Sources confirm that this was the poster put up in Jaffna by Tamil paramilitaries supportive of the PA.

Cadres of the Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP) -the PA's polling agents in the northern town - and Eelam Peoples Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF) cadres of a faction loyal to former party leader Varatharajah Perumal are putting up the posters say residents.

The sixth poster is that of Nandana Gunathilaka, the JVP's candidate. The caption says, "the elephant and the chair are destroying the land. Let's aid the bell to victory" in reference to the two main parties and the JVP.

With the seventh poster, the wit of the pasters is manifest. After UNP supporters put up posters of Ranil Wickremesinghe, JVP supporters follow in their wake and stick their own captions across the poster, making it seem as if the UNP leader is campaigning for the JVP.

Most of the Tamil posters are direct translations of the Sinhalese posters, resulting in unnatural and clumsy Tamil captions. This could be as a result of a shortage of Tamils among the Sinhala parties' supporters, say political commentators.

The other 10 candidates, including Vasudeva Nanayakara, have been lagging severely in this poster campaign, also handicapped by a lack of funds, and perhaps sufficient volunteers.