Mr Speaker

I rise with great sadness in my heart to inform Members of Parliament of the circumstances leading to the dissolution of the historic Memorandum of Understanding between the Sri Lanka Freedom Party and the United National Party to cooperate on key issues vital for the nation's well being.

This MOU was truly historic because this was perhaps the first and only occasion in our nations past, since Independence – 59 years ago, that the two largest and oldest political parties in the country had agreed to cooperate on several critical issues of vital importance to our people. Chief among them the Ethnic Question which has pitted brother against brother, and divided our land causing immense human suffering, the loss of the lives of thousands of young men and women, displaced hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians from their homes and destroyed national assets worth countless millions of rupees.

The immense importance of our Agreement - between the President of the country and myself as Leader of the Opposition – was recognized not only by the ordinary people of our land in their millions but by every section of our society; the religious leaders of all faiths grieving at the wounds we had inflicted on ourselves, the Business community valiantly striving to keep Sri Lanka ‘first' in an increasingly competitive world, our highly competent Professional and Academic communities, Trade Unions and our vibrant civil society. The value of the MOU, as I was forcibly reminded by the Leaders of our neighbouring countries - India and Nepal - whom I recently visited, was appreciated by the entire international community with which Sri Lanka has had the most cordial links for so long.

We felt that it was time that we replaced the politics of confrontation which has been the bane of our nation, with inclusiveness. The MOU was to be the first step in Parliament   having an inclusive approach to resolving the North East conflict. Both Parties had alliances with other Parties in Parliament, other than the TNA. The UNP was having discussions with the TNA with the possibility of obtaining their views on a political solution on the North East conflict. This step by step approach to narrow the differences between us on all issues as a first step, and thereafter to build a national consensus for the political solution.

  But all of this was not to be – and a golden opportunity to change the course of history and indeed our country's destiny has been lost.

When the President and I agreed on the terms of the MOU, we recognised that the fundamental challenge that stands in the way of the realisation of the goals of peace, good governance and development was that of a just and honourable resolution of the ethnic problem.

There were other issues affecting the people of our country - humanitarian issues, corruption, cost of living. While we decided as the Opposition to raise these issues in Parliament and the media, we agreed among ourselves not to engage in any other form of agitation for the time being since we felt that resolving the North East conflict was the key to resolving all other issues.

The UNP also supported the Budget because a vote against the Budget is a vote of no confidence on the government with which we have entered into a MOU.

Our cooperation with the Government went so far as to discuss with it the establishment of a new Committee system in Parliament. The President had in fact asked Mr Anders Johnsson, Secretary General of the Inter Parliamentary Union, to put forward a report on this matter. This would have been a basis for further discussion between the two of us.

When the Experts Report was tabled at the All Party Representative Committee, the UNP submitted its views. I myself had a series of discussions with the Chairman of the Committee – Minister Professor Tissa Witharana, Minister of Science & Technology. Furthermore, we also gave our support to the Report submitted by the Minister.

Therefore, I was surprised when the President decided contrary to the MOU to swear-in Members of Parliament of the UNP as Ministers of the Government, without the consent of the UNP. This was contrary to the MOU which stated, that the “modalities of collaboration will be implemented at an early date after further direct discussion between the two leaders and acceptance by the appropriate bodies of each of the two Parties”.

We informed the President that such a step would amount to a breach of the MOU. Furthermore, the agreement contains a mechanism for resolving disputes which states at Article 10 “Both Parties agree to the establishment of a High-Level Committee headed by His Excellency the President and the Leader of the Opposition (including an equal number of representatives of each of the two Parties) to oversee the implementation of the above agreement arrived at between the two Parties and to cooperate with each other in regard to the resolution of any disagreement which may arise in the course of implementation of this Agreement and the policies and programmes set out therein”.

The President did not resort to such mechanism but went ahead and swore-in the Ministers thereby breaking the MOU. This has destroyed all possibilities of having an inclusive approach to the critical national issues and has affected not only the UNP but many other Parties in Parliament. This single act has divided our society sharply. It has also divided the Parliament. Instead of an inclusive democratic society which could have been enjoyed equally we are now moving towards a divided society.

The Cabinet of Ministers have become an international joke; democracy is weakened; the decision making in the government has been limited to few. The role of the Parliament has been de-valued.

The UNP thus finds it impossible to work with the government in finding a solution to the issues referred to in the MOU when the Government has broken this MOU.

But we have not wavered in our commitment to the peaceful resolution of the North East conflict. Since the government proclaims that they can carry on the negotiations by itself, we will allow the government to do so. The UNP will give its support in Parliament to any final negotiated settlement which is within the framework of the paper submitted by the Party representative Mr K N Choksy to the APRC.

It is clear that the government has disregarded the wishes of the people to achieve its narrow partisan political objectives. We will witness in the coming weeks an increase in the violation of human rights, deterioration of good governance, spread of corruption, undermining of democracy, and the rising cost of living.

Therefore, we in the UNP will continue without any restriction our campaign to protect human rights, uphold good governance, eliminate corruption and safeguard democracy and bring relief to the people. More so, we will keep in our minds the twin objectives – peace in Sri Lanka and an inclusive society.