Former Sri Lankan top general Sarath Fonseka received a shot in the arm as the country's main opposition group United National Party today backed his candidature for the upcoming Presidential polls. UNP' s chief and former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe announced his party's support to Fonseka in Colombo. It is the second major party in Sri Lanka to back the former army chief.Earlier, the radical JVP had announced shifting of its support from President Mahinda Rajapaksa to Fonseka. In his bid to unseat Rajapaksa, the former top general is also expected to get the backing of regional and minority parties, who have formed an umbrella grouping along with the UNP to contest the elections.The UNP wants abolition of executive presidency in Sri Lanka and devolution of powers. Both the UNP and JVP want representation in Fonseka's cabinet if he is elected.AIR correspondent Kanchan reports from Colombo that after the ultra-nationalist JVP, today it was the turn of the principal opposition party, United National Party (UNP) to name the former Army Chief who led the war against the LTTE. However, the retired General himself has not yet gone public on his intentions to take on the Supreme Commander of the island nation’s armed forces and President Mahinda Rajapaksa.The delay is attributed to the ongoing consultations with the leaders of Tamil and Muslim parties and indications are the retired General would make a formal announcement on Sunday. The Tamil and Muslim parties are divided on an approach to the crucial poll and are still in the process of fine-tuning their strategy on how best they could leverage the votes of their communities to their advantage.As the opposition groups continue their parleys, a very confident Mr. Rajapaksa who provided the political leadership during the war hit out at the opposition in his inimitable style saying that he saw no challenge in the so-called common candidate , be it the retired military man or the former UNP Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe.With the man who was instrumental in the military defeat of the LTTE in the fray as a possible opposition candidate, the rhetoric would be on who deserves the laurels for the demise of the Tiger supremo, Velupillai Prabakaran and the appeal for the majority community Sinhala vote. The irony is Prabakaran would have turned 55 today.