H. L. D. Mahindapala

In response to my article “Jehan (Pacha) Perera has done it again” the Governing Council of the National Peace Council (NPC) has rushed to defend their Executive Director  with the following paragraph:

“We also take issue with Mr H L D Mahindapala whose article “Jehan (Pacha) Perera has done it again”   was published on the page opposite the editorial of the Daily News on the same day.   One of the points made in this article is that, to quote him, “When I met Jehan in Geneva I asked him why he keeps on boosting Balasingham’s image with a doctorate which he has not received from any university. He admitted that Balasingham is not qualified to be titled with a “Dr” but he did so because others did it.”  This was a truthful answer and belies the claim of “Pacha”.  There was certainly no reason for him to give any assurance to Mr Mahindapala regarding how he would address the late LTTE ideologue upon his return to Sri Lanka, as Mr Mahindapala had no moral authority or legal standing to make any such demand.  The National Peace Council also wishes to assert that its media releases are the responsibility of its Governing Council and not of any single individual and Mr Mahindapala is making a false allegation (Pacha) when he attributes our media release to Jehan Perera.”

This press release raises three issues: 1. “the moral and legal authority” of  a journalist to ask questions from a self-confessed prevaricator who knowingly misleads the public with lies; 2. Jehan Perera is a “truthful” person even when he admits his lies and 3. Jehan Perera and the Governing Council are two separate entities though he is the Executive Director who sits right in the center as the key role-player in the Governing Council.

First things first. I admit I was wrong in selectively accusing only Jehan (Pacha) Perera as a liar for saying, in the press release, that Abraham Lincoln was “neutral” and did not hold a victory parade at the end of the American Civil War. The Governing Council has contradicted me saying that the press release was a collective product of the entire Council and not that of Jehan Perera alone. My mistake was in naming only Pacha Perera as the sole liar. According to the admission of the Council I should have named the entire pack on the Council as liars as I proved with pictures that Abraham Lincoln did celebrate triumphantly the ending of the Civil War with a massive victory parade. My apologies to all the members in the Council for leaving them out of the list of liars. They have all the right to be offended by my selective approach. It is absolutely  wrong of me to pick only one liar when the entire Council – including the Buddhist monk – admits that they have been lying together in Council..

My article dealt in the main with National Peace Council’s / Jehan (Pacha) Perera’s lie that Abraham Lincoln did not celebrate the defeat of the South with a victory parade. In its reply the Governing Council skips this main issue and picks on the conversation I had with Jehan in Geneva in which he told me that he knew Anton Balasingham did not have a doctorate, even though he addressed him as “Dr.” I cited this incident in my article to substantiate the fact that Pacha Perera is a liar who would twist the truth to suit his political agenda. In other words, he was trying to make the world believe that Balasingham, who was only a Tamil translator in the British High Commission in Colombo, was a scholar holding a post-graduate degree. At best Balasingham must have passed his O-level or, perhaps, may be A-Level. Knowing this Pacha Perera was deliberately lying to boost the image of Anton Balasingham by “conferring” on him a doctorate. This fictitious doctorate was designed to give respectability to “Dr” Balasingham’s propaganda aimed at serving the cause of Tamil Tiger terrorism – an act outlawed in UN Security Council resolution 1373.

Perhaps, an elaboration of the conversation I had with him on the bus transporting us would present a clearer picture.

When Jehan (Pacha) Perera told me that he “conferred” a doctorate on Anton Balasingham because others did it, I asked him whether he would jump into a well because others had jumped into it. He grinned sheepishly. He knew he was lying when he “conferred” a doctorate to Balasingham and not knowing how to justify it he came up with the inane excuse that he was following others. Such a stupid answer is not  worthy of a man who claims to have a Ph.D. from Harvard University. Then I asked him whether it is fair for him to lie when he  knows it is not true and how long  he would continue to address Balasingham as “Dr.” now that he knows it is a lie. In reply he admitted, on his own, that it was untruthful and that he would desist doing so in the future. That is the assurance he gave me.

As a journalist I was pressing him for answers – like the way all other journalists would do – on his conduct as a responsible head of the NPC who owes it to the public to be truthful in every minute detail and I trusted him when he assured me that he  would be truthful in future. But when he returned to his NGO he continued his practice of referring to Balasingham as “Dr” knowing it was a lie.

The Governing Council also admits, in the quote above, that their Executive Director is a liar. Of course, in their queer way the Councilors insist that he is truth-teller because he admitted to telling lies. Funny logic, eh? The Council ignores the fact  that Jehan’s lie is just not a white lie that can be dismissed as having no consequences. It is a deliberate lie propagated by him to deceive the public and to legitimize the crimes committed by Balasingham’s ruthless mass murderer, Prabhakaran.

Consequently, there is a heavy responsibility and a duty on the highly moralistic Governing Council to deal with its Executive Officer who had lied to the public. This leads to several issues: Has the Governing Council asked for an explanation to this day as to why their Executive Officer lied so blatantly to deceive the public? Will the Governing Council even now  ask for an explanation from their Executive Director and apologize to the public for the of the grievous misconduct of its principal operator at a time when the nation was faced with mass murders of non-combatant civilians legitimized by Jehan (Pacha) Perera glorifying LTTE’s one and only theoretician? Why did the Governing Council turn a blind eye to the complicit role of  its Executive Director who was propagating lies for a terrorist organization which is against the UN Security Council Resolution 1373?

Instead of dealing fairly and squarely with the complicit role of its lying Executive Director the Governing Council has challenged my “moral and legal authority” to question the lying Pacha Perera. To my knowledge only a pack of morons who do not know the journalistic and democratic practices  would question my authority to question a self-confessed liar like Jehan (Pacha) Perera. It is the unwritten law in journalism to raise questions on any given issue, particularly to challenge and expose public figure like Pacha Perera who is deliberately lying to mislead the public. Besides, the Governing Council should  know – unless they are con artists – that their watchwords of “transparency” and “accountability” gives me the right to question and get answers from the likes of their Pacha Perera, particularly when they are lying knowingly.

The Councilors should also know that the entire free world runs on the moral and unwritten legal right of journalists to question lying humbugs like Jehan Perera. Questioning is a moral and legitimate right handed down the ages to journalists. It is the like the British Constitution where the convention is stronger than the written law. Any challenge to this sacred right is an attack on the entire free media. Which media in the world can survive without asking questions? Questioning is the primary function of all journalists in whatever field they operate. The journalist profession is based solely on asking questions and the morons in the governing Council of NPC are asking what moral and legal rights I have to ask questions from Pacha Perera. Can these nitwits get one single reputed journalist, or any other authority they know, to back them up by saying that I had no moral or legal authority to question Pacha Perera when he deliberately lied to the public by “conferring” a doctorate on Anton Balasingham which he had not earned? If this is the level of intelligence on which the Governing Council operates can anyone trust these dunderheads to either utter the truth or work out a lasting process based on the truth for peace?

The pin-heads in the Governing Council who do not know the basics principles of journalism should be taught that the moral and legal right to ask questions – particularly from those lying  to the public – has been established by the ethics and conventional standards binding the journalistic profession over the centuries. With this kind of inane questioning the Governing Councilors have proved to be a veritable pack of jokers who have nothing better to show for whatever pay/perks they get from  NPC. When the Governing Council comes up with this kind of idiotic responses it can mean only one of two things: 1. they do not know what they are talking  about or 2. the Councilors consists of nit-wits who have ganged up to defend their Executive Director because they owe their existence to their paymaster who keeps them on his pay list.

The Governing Council is saying, in other words, that media has no right to question their Executive Director even when he is lying through his teeth. Incidentally, at any point in drafting their press release did the Governing Councilors ask their Executive Director why he lied? Have they told him that he is a stupid idiot for repeating what the others had said without checking? Have they told him that he has brought disrepute to the NPC by lying with the deliberate intention of glorifying the image of Tamil Goebbels whose primary mission was to the justify, glorify and white-wash the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the LTTE? Wasn’t Pacha Perera consciously trying to give a shine to the leading ideologue of the LTTE which in turn would cover-up the crimes committed by the LTTE? By trying to butter up Balasingham wasn’t Pacha Perera trying to curry favour with the Tamil Goebbels? Above all, isn’t this lying clear proof of Pacha Perera’s bias to boost the LTTE at the expense of human rights? On the self-confessed evidence of Pacha Perera lying to the public has the Governing Council called for the resignation of its Executive Director? Or are they also complicit  in the crime of covering-up the crimes of the LTTE along with their mendacious Executive Director?

I was not making demands banging my foot on the floor of the bus and saying give me an answer, as the Governing Council makes  it out to be. No. It was a decent conversation in  which I was cross-examining him and caught him lying. It is clear that the Governing Council also consists of ”pachorises” when it says that I was making a demand without moral and legal authority. The rush to defend their lying Executive Director, without apologizing to the public for misleading them, certainly questions whether it is an independent Governing Council or a Council governed by Jehan (Pacha) Perera.

Furthermore, the press release which states that I “had no moral authority or legal standing to make any such demand” has convinced me that Jehan (Pacha) Perera is not the only stupid in the Governing Council of the NPC. In any case, if I was making any such unwarranted demand why didn’t Jehan raise the issue then and there. I presume that he answered my questions because it is the right of any citizen – let alone journalists – to ask from those who pose as moralists as to why they are lying in public? Can  anyone respect Pacha Perera as a credible, reliable witness to the tragic events of the immediate past when he chooses to deliberately distort facts to serve the interests of the Tamil Tiger terrorists?  

Then there is this bizarre statement which admits that Pacha Perera lied to the public and states: “This was a truthful answer and belies the claim of “Pacha”.” How can an admission of lying to the public prove that he is a truth-telling person? He is admitting it now because he was caught red handed. He  has no escape. But the fact remains that he told lies and continued to tell lies even after he admitted that he was telling lies about Anton Balasingham. A liar doesn’t cease to be a liar by admitting one lie any more than a murder ceases to be a murder because he has admitted guilty to one murder committed before and after his admission. Pacha Perera is not even a reformed liar because he continued to address Balasingham as “Dr” long after he admitted he does not hold a doctorate.

Finally, there is the issue of my attributing the statements of the Governing Council to Jehan (Pacha) Perera. Here the Governing Council is trying to prove that the  Executive Director (Pacha Perera) and the Governing Council are two separate and independent entities. In their typical devious ways of lying they are trying to make that one has nothing to with the other. But what is the reality? Pacha Perera holds the key position in the Council as the Executive Director. Any statement issued by the Council comes with the approval of all its members including Pacha Perera. For all intents and purpose, Pacha Perera  is the NPC and NPC is Pacha Perera. His role as Executive Director makes him not only the public face of the NPC but also the key operator with wide powers vested in him to hire and fire, to make an unmake those  in the NPC. The Governing Council is only a puppet-show for Pacha Perera to legitimize it as a multi-cultural, multi-religious formation to market it as a broad front of the nation for him to rake in funds from abroad. In reality he is the body, the face and soul of the NPC. Furthermore, whenever the Council issues a statement Pacha Perera ineluctably is also a part – a key part – of it. So where’s the difference?  Technically, the Governing Council may be right in saying that it was issued under its name which, mark you, consisted also of Pacha Perera. So what’s the big deal? What’s in a name? The Governing Council which consists of Pacha Perera is as rotten as Pacha Perera – and smells equally bad.

It is not  unfair to consider the NPC and its associated parts as an inseperable part of Jehan (Pacha) Perera political apparatus. The distinction they try to draw between itself and Pacha Perera is a deceptive lie to draw wool over the eyes of the public. Structurally and operationally the Governing Council is a part and parcel of Jehan’s outfit. Their conduct of going along with the lies of their Executive Director, without questioning  him, or  holding him responsible, indicates that they must be a bunch of blind “yes-men” who are only too happy to say “Yes, Sir,” “No Sir,” “All my bags are full Sir” to Jehan (Pacha) Perera. No wonder they don’t want to rock the boat steered by their Executive Director / Paymaster!

If the Councilors disagree they can show their independence by answering  the following questions in their next reply: 

1.      How did the Councilors get into the Governing Council of the NPC?

2.      Since there are no election and since they do not represent any local electorate who handpicked them?

3.      What kind of remuneration do they get for serving in the Council?

4.      Who has the overall authority in handling the finances of the NPC?

5.      How much are the Councilors paid and how much is the Executive Director paid?

6.      What are the names of those in pay list of NPC, including  the journalists?

7.      Who are main funders of this budget?

8.      Why has the Governing Council failed to question their Executive Director for dragging the NPC into the sewer?

There are many other questions to be raised. This is only the beginning. And like everything else, let’s start at the beginning.