Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse and Leader of the Opposition Ranil Wickremesinghe seemed to have agreed on the 6-point cooperation Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on crucial issues facing the island nation. Calling it a “historic and unprecedented” agreement, the Presidential Secretariat said the two leaders have concluded some last minute glitches that includes “crossover” of the Opposition for inclusion in the Government.

This first-of-a-kind MoU has generated a lot of excitement and hope that a political “southern consensus” is in the offing and a negotiated settlement is not far behind. Such evasive consensus has often been blamed for internal rife where a deal made by one party will be actively scuttled by another.

Besides a possible solution to the ethnic strife with the Tamil minority of the North and East, consensus will help develop the economy and bring about better governance. The deal will also bring about a rift in the ruling Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) coalition and possibly include a separation from the ultra right-wing the Janatha Vimukthi Peramunna (JVP).

Wickremesinghe’s United National Party (UNP) is facing serious dissension with some of its Members of Parliament (MP) wanting to join the Government. Observers say that Rajapakse is exploiting this dissension and point out the appointment of dissenting UNP MPs into the Government as an example.

On the flip side, Rajapakse is also fighting dissension from the coalition. Other than JVP, the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) is also apprehensive of the agreement with the UNP.