Crucial talks on UNP alliance formation today

• Party leaders to meet to discuss proposed amendments to draft constitution 
• Tuesday’s talks end with no conclusion 
• Parliamentary group meeting set for Monday, question of candidacy likely to be taken up

By Chathuri Dissanayake

United National Front (UNF) Party leaders are set to meet today to discuss amendments to the proposed constitution of the new alliance, after failing to reach a settlement during Tuesday’s meeting. Conflicting reports surfaced following Tuesday’s party leaders meeting regarding the possible presidential candidate, but the United National Party senior members maintained that no final decision has been reached on the candidate nor the criteria for selection. 

“The meeting on Saturday will be to discuss the amendments on the alliance, nothing more. There will be no discussion on candidate during the meeting,” a senior UNP member who is set to attend the meeting told Daily FT.



“We hope to reach agreement on the proposed constitution for the new alliance,” he said. 

Party leaders who met on Tuesday were not able to reach an agreement on the amendments proposed by some of the UNP members when the draft constitution was presented during the working committee meeting last week. Following the deliberations of the meeting, the UNP postponed the signing of the agreement to form the new alliance ‘Democratic National Front’ to end of August. During the meeting, objections were raised on several points in the proposed constitution, including the appointment of the general secretary, the decision-making process, and the office address of the proposed new alliance. Some members insisted that the general secretary of the new alliance should be from the UNP and wanted the party office address to be the same as Sirikotha - the Head Office of UNP. 

The UNP is set to hold the parliamentary group meeting on Monday, where the question of presidential candidacy is likely to surface again. During the last parliamentary group meeting, several members insisted that the presidential candidacy should be agreed upon within the party before the alliance is formed, to which another faction objected. 

However, UNP General secretary Akila Viraj Kariyawasam told Daily FT that such a decision is premature when the election almost four months away. 

“The decision will be taken by the parliamentary group and the working committee of the party when the time comes, but there is still time for such a decision to be made,” he said.

However, on Monday, UNP Deputy Leader Sajith Premadasa held a large rally in Badulla with several other members of the party in attendance, where he announced his readiness to contest in the upcoming elections.