Sri Lanka It's Happening

April 6, 2004

Just 24 hours ago Mr Lakshman Kadirgamar was tipped to become the First Tamil Prime Minister of Sri Lanka. There was wide spread speculation that the president would make the official announcement today. Now this mornings paper says the prime minister will me Mr Mahinda Rajapakshe.

Perhaps for the first time in history (anywhere in the world) a party contested a general election without declaring their prime ministerial candidate. And because sri lankan voters don't vote on issues (for example many of them don't know or don't care about GDP growth) the UPFA won the election.

Now they have come to the bridge and need to figure out a way to cross it. for there are two many aspirant and far too many pretenders to the prime ministerial post. It remains to be seen if someone else will inch in ahead of Mr Rajapacksha during the next two hours.