By Adolf
Sri Lankan politics has long been shaped by personalities, rivalries, and the inability of leaders to rise above factional divides. Today, President Ranil Wickremesinghe finds himself paying the price for a choice he made years ago: refusing to reconcile and unite with Sajith Premadasa. That decision not only fractured the United National Party (UNP) but also paved the way for Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s unexpected rise to national prominence. Ironically, Anura is someone whom Ranil trusted, accommodated, and in many ways helped to build his political profile — and now, that decision has come back to haunt him.
When Sajith broke away from the UNP to lead the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), Ranil viewed it as an act of betrayal and allowed pride and control to override reconciliation. Instead of bridging the divide and uniting the old UNP base, Ranil chose to consolidate power for himself. That meant the traditional UNP vote base was split, leaving space for a third force to grow. Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who had long been a peripheral figure in mainstream politics, seized the moment. With the collapse of the two-party dominance, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and its National People’s Power (NPP) platform gained credibility as a genuine alternative.
This political vacuum did not appear overnight. It was cultivated over time. Ranil underestimated Sajith’s ability to command grassroots loyalty and alienated party loyalists who might have otherwise remained under a united front. Sajith, despite his differences with Ranil, has never been known to play politics in a way that would directly harm the UNP’s survival. Whatever his shortcomings, he would not have facilitated the rise of an external force to replace the party’s decades-long dominance. Ranil, however, opened the door.
Adding to the irony is Ranil’s past dealings with Anura. During difficult times in Parliament, Ranil often counted on Anura and the JVP to push through reforms or maintain a veneer of democratic accountability. He treated the JVP as a convenient ally when it suited his agenda, believing their role in the larger political field would remain limited. In doing so, he gave Anura a platform, visibility, and legitimacy that the JVP had long struggled to achieve.
Now, the same Anura — armed with a rejuvenated NPP movement and mass disillusionment with traditional politics — has emerged as the strongest challenger to both Ranil and Sajith. For Ranil, this is an especially bitter twist of fate: the man he once dismissed as politically marginal has become a direct beneficiary of the UNP-SJB split that he refused to heal.
Had Ranil and Sajith found common ground earlier, the political space for Anura’s rise would have been far narrower. A unified centrist bloc could have protected Sri Lanka’s liberal democratic tradition while containing populist extremes. Instead, Ranil’s decision to prioritize personal control over party unity created the perfect conditions for Anura’s ascent.
In the end, Ranil’s legacy may well be defined not by his long career in politics or his eventual rise to the presidency, but by his inability to reconcile with Sajith when it mattered most. That failure has come back to bite him — and to empower a rival he once considered as a friend. Ironically something he will have to ponder in Remand .
