Dr Sarath Obeysekera 

After conquering the Kandyan  kingdom British established a regime where body tax, property tax, etc were implemented and there was no income tax. British police with Sri Lankan supporters of various Arrachchis’ has ruled the masses with a strict regime.

The country was ruled with an iron fist and people had to work for the rulers.

They siphoned our the revenue and yet built some infrastructure like road-rail lines and they also built their underground rail network in London 

They had also an establishment code. 

We got independency and partial democracy initiated by the British was made to a full democracy under DS.

Then SWRD based his rule on Nationalism and created Tamil Sinhala rift.

Sirimawo went further and tried to bring socialism coupled with quasi communism. She nationalized all most privately owned industries and plantations  and further brought Russian funded industries 

It did not work and JR opened the economy and a dictatorship with a touch of.  democracy was established

It worked to a certain extent but corruption and indiscipline prevailed

RP further strengthen one-man rule concept with a somewhat iron fist 

He quelled JVP insurrection like MR getting rid of the danger from LTTE and GR now trying to control Corona spread. 

Then MR came who  followed the same method but one – family rule was installed with an allegation of mishandling finances and haphazard borrowing and nepotism’ 

After MS and RW took over the country stayed standstill except that some changes were made  to show that one-man show is somewhat diluted

But it backfired  

Now we have GR who is supposed to be a tough ruler who had to chose which path to take.

Corona issue had given him a good chance of putting various methods of ruling and crowd control into practice similar to Communist rule.

Making people obey strict rules and socialistic methods to distribute food etc to the poor is put into practice.

At the same time provincial politicians also make money like under communism, where communist party provincial leaders were pilfering national wealth and abusing power.

Strict rules on selling liquor are implanted like in the Middle East and it is working Rule- breakers are punished with no hesitation sometimes with long bamboo sticks like India.

It looks to me that the learning curve is taking place during the last month and it. had given a good chance for GR to decide what type is administration he should have to take the country further.

It is up to the people to judge, but my opinion is that administering country using law enforcement and the military is the best for our country 

Let the name give by JR Socialist Democratic Republic of Sri Lanka remains for namesake.

Dr. Sarath Obeysekera
CEO Walkers Colombo Shipyard
Colombo
Sri Lanka