Ian Paisley Jr’s Sri Lankan Beach Holiday: On Mediocrity, High Costs & Public Disregard  

By Chamindra Weerawardhana –SEPTEMBER 23, 2018

Dr. Chamindra Weerawardhana

The best authority for luxury Sri Lankan sun holidays in Northern Ireland, Ian Paisley Jr. caused controversy last July, when he was suspended for 30 sitting days from the British House of Commons, for breaching parliamentary rules, by not disclosing the details of his luxury Sri Lankan escapades, all paid for by Sri Lanka’s Rajapaksa administration. For more information about the exact circumstances surrounding the two all-expenses-paid-for luxury trips offered to Paisley Jr by the Government of Sri Lanka and resulting repercussions, click here, for this writer’s article published in The Colombo Telegraph on 21st July 2018. It has since emerged, in Sri Lankan political circles, that the real cost of the two trips would be much higher than the GBP 100,000 mentioned in the British and Irish press. 

Paisley’s Sri Lankan sojourn provides insights into the mismanagement of Sri Lankan foreign policyunder the Rajapaksa administration [Dec 2005-January 2015]. As this writer has repeatedly argued, shady partnerships with controversial politicians representing socially conservative political parties should not have any place whatsoever in foreign policy praxis. In the end, the luxury trips to Sri Lanka, the sun holidays and lobbying with Paisley Jr, a few other British Conservative MPs and peers, and politicos sharing similar ideologies in other countries did not bring Sri Lanka a single foreign policy victory. Foreign affairs mismanagement, and accommodating space for highly incompetent individuals to manage foreign policy, happened to be the key factors that led to the ultimate downfall of the Rajapaksa administration in early 2015. 

The Paisley case is no coincidence, and its unfolding says a lot about Paisley Jr and his party, the Democratic Unionist Party, one of the most regressive, socially conservative, misogynist, and to put it simply ‘backward’ parties in Western Europe. The DUP is the main obstacle that prevents the extension of progressive Westminster legislation to Northern Ireland. The best example is the 2013 Marriage [Same Sex Couples] Act, which does not apply to Northern Ireland, primarily due to DUP opposition.

The DUP’s intransigence is the main political reason why Northern Ireland continues to stick to some of the most outdated abortion laws in Western Europe. The fact that these laws of yesteryear should and can be successfully repealed and replaced by modern, respectful and equity-focused legislation, was evident in the successful 2018 #Repealthe8threferendum campaign in the Irish Republic. In Northern Ireland, there is tremendous public support to the implementation of modern, bodily autonomy-focused reproductive justice legislation. But that public support cannot be transformed into political action and actual legislation, for as long as the Province’s largest political party, the DUP, clings to its dinosaur-era perspective on women’s rights.

The Paisley Jr Recall Petition: A Failure

A ‘recall petition’, to oust Paisley Jr and call for a by-election in his constituency of North Antrim, was put in place as soon as the controversy broke in London. 

It was reported earlier this week that Paisley Jr’s star was good. 

The recall petition fell short of the 10 per cent of electorate signatures required to force a by-election. In Paisley Jr’s constituency of North Antrim, this means a total of 7,543 signatures. The petition fell short of a mere 444 signatures, enabling Paisley Jr to avoid a by-election and retain his Westminster seat. The announcement came from Northern Ireland’s Chief Electoral Office Virginia McVea on 20thSeptember 2018. 

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