Media has nothing but conflict in UNP to talk about, says Dayasiri
June 6, 2010 03:33 pm
When a political party suffers defeat after defeat, it is natural that conflicts of interest arise within the party. This is nothing new and is being faced by the United National Party (UNP) as well, said Parliamentarian Dayasiri Jayasekera.
Addressing a meeting at Panduwasnuwara in Hettipola, Mr. Jayasekera said that even the media keeps on harping on the conflicts within the party and nothing else.
Recently, when he participated in the 360 programme with Derana TV, the host also kept on asking about the conflict within the UNP and nothing else, he said.
Adding further, Dayasiri Jayasekera said that since the UNP has been suffering successive defeats, conflicts have arisen. But still members have not fought among themselves or gone to courts against another group in the party. If any UNPer goes to courts against the party, that person has to be taken to task first as he or she would be the person trying to weaken the party.
It is natural for any party in government to weaken the
opposition. J.R. Jayewardene did the same to the Sri Lanka Freedom Party
(SLFP). The conflicts within the SLFP became so bad that several factions
battled it out in courts as well. That led to two factions dividing the party
headquarters at
The Kurunegala District parliamentarian reminded the audience that there was a process in the UNP to select the leaders through a poll. That was in existence till 1994 and during the Kataragama UNP convention the members agreed for the party hierarchy to appoint the leaders without going for a poll. So the UNP had a process where leaders were elected. This should be reminded as today most think that the UNP has no democracy within the party, Mr. Jayasekera added.
