Former strongman Mahinda Rajapaksa’s resurgence shows the limitations of U. S. economic diplomacy.
On Friday, Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena withdrew his United People’s Freedom Alliance from the government’s ruling coalition without warning, fired Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, and appointed former President Mahinda Rajapaksa to the post. On Saturday, he temporarily suspended Parliament, plunging the country into a constitutional crisis.
Sri Lanka’s sudden political reorganization will empower former strongman Rajapaksa, whose new party enjoyed unexpected success in the country’s February local elections and rattled the sitting political establishment. His resurgence means a second chance for China’s attempts to play a dominant role in the island’s politics and development, and it serves as a significant impediment to U. S. efforts for greater engagement in the Indo-Pacific.
As president from 2005 to 2015, Rajapaksa used heavy-handed tactics to end the country’s decades-long civil war, drawing accusations of war crimes, while encouraging large-scale Chinese investment to spur economic growth. His return to office undermines efforts to hold former military officials accountable for war crimes committed during the final years of Sri Lanka’s war against the Tamil Tigers and jeopardizes ongoing reconciliation efforts with the country’s large Tamil minority, to say the least. Sirisena, Rajapaksa’s successor, was first elected on promises to dilute the power of the executive and to address the abuses of the Rajapaksa regime. Now, the two men find themselves as partners in power.
Under Rajapaksa, Sri Lanka engaged in an expensive and poorly conceived spree of infrastructural spending to stimulate growth. During his tenure, the country undertook numerous loss-making projects financed and built by China, including the Magampura Mahinda Rajapaksa Port in Hambantota and the Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport— known as the “world’s emptiest airport”—both in the country’s south.
Rather than spurring sustained economic growth, these projects have driven Sri Lanka into unsustainable debt and jeopardized the country’s sovereignty from Chinese influence. Foreign debt exploded from 36 percent of GDP in 2010 to 94 percent in 2015, prompting the country to pursue debt relief from the IMF in 2016.
