By Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror Sovereignty is about authority. In usage, it is about a people or a nation or a state being able to control affairs independent of outside influence. In this globalized world, there are no sovereign states, if you really think about it. What we have is the appearance of sovereignty […]

Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror The Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, addressing top diplomats posted in neighbouring countries (July 3, 2018), opined that India should not focus on competing with China on resources. That’s sensible considering resource-mismatch. She also said that India must closely watch all Chinese activities. That’s sensible too, considering India’s economic […]

By Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror Take a deep breath. Let it go. Suppress all urges to laugh your guts out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Have a cup of chamomile tea. Think of the best joke you’ve heard so far. Think of Charlie Chaplin and other great comedians. Now read. The US Ambassador to the […]

By Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror Anyone who has read Noam Chomsky’s ‘What Uncle Sam really wants’ would not get too excited when a US President, Secretary of State or Ambassador talks about democracy. Neither would they lose any sleep over such worthies speaking in somber tones about individuals, parties or governments they dislike. Chomsky’s […]

By Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror The burning political question of the day appears to be who and how many Parliamentarians received money from Perpetual Treasuries Ltd (PTL) for their respective election campaigns. In a political season marked by scandalous memory-loss some have claimed that they didn’t always know who was depositing money in their […]

By Malinda Seneviratne Courtesy The Daily Mirror Minister Mangala Samaraweera, speaking to the media at the Finance Ministry on Tuesday (May 22), stated that knowing well the crimes committed by Gotabaya Rajapaksa, he is in fact frightened of the former defence secretary. That’s political-speak, obviously. Mangala, after all, was never scared of the LTTE, was never […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Exactly one year ago, just after the Joint Opposition picked up the gauntlet thrown by the Yahapalana Government (that of filling Galle Face Green on May Day) and put up an unprecedented show of force, I posted the following comment on Facebook: චැලේන්ජ් එකක් අවශ්‍ය නම් මෙන්න: එජාපයේ හෝ ජවිපෙ හෝ ශ්‍රීලංනිපයේ […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE The word on the street thanks to President Maithripala Sirisena is ‘science’. The cabinet reshuffle, Sirisena said, would be done scientifically this time. He went on to say that he had discussed (presumably scientifically) about it and made changes. He implies that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe submitted to the power of his […]

Malinda Seneviratne First they offer help and then they enslave ‘First they had the book and we had the land. Then they said close your eyes, let us pray”. When we opened our eyes, we had the book and they had the land.’ — Bishop Desmond Tutu on the relationship between invader and missionary in […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE The term is attributed to Lynton Crosby, a political strategist who has managed campaigns of right-of-center parties in several countries.  Boris Johnson, who employed Crosby during London mayoral elections explains the term thus: There is one thing that is absolutely certain about throwing a dead cat on the dining room table – and […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in recent statements have alluded to people fishing in troubled waters for political gain. It’s an ‘it’s not us’ kind of position to take. Safe.  Dangerous too. We all know how the United National Party of J.R. Jayewardene used that line to proscribe the […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Law and Order. This seems to be the one thing that the yahapalana government has cottoned onto in the aftermath of the election rout. And I don’t mean that in a good way.  The United National Party in particular has climbed down and fast from grand pronouncements of victory (no less!). Party […]

මලින්ද සෙනවිරත්න ‘පළාත් පාලන මැතිවරණ ප්‍රතිඵල වලින් පෙනෙන්නේ අපගේ වැඩපිළිවලට ජනතාව අකමැති බවයි. අපි එයාලගේ බලාපොරොත්තු බිඳදමලයි තියෙන්නේ. ඒ නිසා අපි තීරණය කෙරුව අපේ වැරදි නිවැරදි කරගෙන ඉදිරියට යන්න.’ මෙහෙම කියන්නේ අගමැතිතුමා. ඒ කියන්නේ එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ නායක රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ.  නිහතමානී මනුස්සයා.  වටිනා කියන මනුස්සයා.  ආඩම්බර විය යුතුයි එහෙම කෙනෙක් අපේ රටේ අගමැති වීම ගැන, […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE A bud is a metaphor and it is one that has naturally led to over-use because it is the party symbol of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), the nelum pohottuwa. ‘The bud will bloom,’ they said with as much conviction as the rhetoricians of other parties predicted its withering. The results are […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Constitutions are not always made with good intention. Even when the intention is good the unexpected trumps the word. They are supposed to be documents of the ‘forever’ kind, but if one thing is certain it is the fact that the sum total of human knowledge is but a speck of dust compared […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Mahinda Rajapaksa, after losing the Presidential Election, making his now infamous from-the-window speech, blamed it ‘on the Tamils’.  It was a crass, knee-jerk conclusion which was racist and a complete disavowal of his own and significant flaws.  He has since sobered up.   Maybe the United National Party (UNP) will also sober up soon.  It’s to […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Shyamon Jayasinghe, in an article published in the Colombo Telegraph (‘The political tug-o-war in Sri Lanka is cockeyed and absurd: only Ranil talks of economic goals’) dwells on the ‘dooshanaya-discourse’ or the ‘discussion on corruption.’  Shyamon makes an interesting observation: One never observes any printed or online media that tries to balance the imbalance […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE There’s a pithy Sinhala saying that probably predates Sigmund Freud’s notion of the slip that reveals the deliberately concealed truth: කට බොරු කිව්වත් දිව බොරු කියන්නේ නෑ (even if the mouth lies, the tongue does not). So we are talking about mouths and tongues.  And we are talking about the United National Party […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Let’s get to the name and the man later.  Let’s begin with what this is all about.  Local Government.  Local government elections, that is.  In other words, municipal councils, urban councils and pradesheeya sabhas; all reduced, in the parlance of the political, to the gama or village.   Whether it is a candidate or a party, a man or a […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE The Foreign Affairs Ministry and the British High Commission declared in a joint statement released on Friday (February 2, 2018) that a document offering ‘Royal Etiquette Guidelines’ circulated by an entity calling itself ‘Welcome Committee of British Royals’ is false.  Both parties stated that neither had set up any such committee.  It was headlined […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Another January 25th is upon us.  No big deal.  Not the first, not the last.  Follows a January 24th and will be followed by a January 26th.  In a sense dates are meaningless things, relevant only in part and irrelevant in the larger order of things.  We are, however, frail creatures who do not […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE We are a resilient nation and I’ve insisted on the point before.  Sri Lanka is not a failed state but has signs of failing.  That is not new either.  The signs have been there at least as long as the moment J.R. Jayewardena brought in the Second Republican Constitution in 1978.  Nineteen amendments later, all things […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE  Words are easy for politicians and in politics.  Take ‘the people’ for example.  It’s hard to think of a term that has been as abused.  It’s all ‘in the name of the people’ isn’t it?  There are of course other useful (and cheap) words in the lexicon of politics.  ‘The nation’ has a lot of utility value, […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE තමන්ගේ ධූරකාලය අවසන් වන්නේ කවදාද කියල මෛත්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන ජනාධිපති තුමා ශ්‍රේෂ්ඨාධිකරණයෙන් විමසලා තියෙනවා. ජනාධිපති මාධ්‍ය ඒකකයට අනුව එහෙම විමසලා තියෙන්නේ “ධූරකාලය පිලිබඳ මත දෙකක කතිකාවක් සිවිල් සහ දේශපාලන ක්ෂේත්‍ර වල පවතින නිසා” ලු.  එහෙම කතිකාවක් ගැන ඇහුවමයි! ‘මගේ ධූරකාලය ස්වකැමැත්තෙන් අවුරුදු හයේ සිට පහකට අඩුකරා…..එහෙම අඩු කරපු වෙන නායකයෙක් මේ ලෝකේ කොහෙවත් […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Last week I wrote that Wilpattu should be the core issue of the forthcoming local government elections because the said election has taken on a national character and because ‘Wilpattu’ is a national issue. I defined Wilpattu thus:    ‘Wilpattu’ in the sense the term is used here is not a forest reserve […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE It’s not just another punchi chandaya or ‘minor election.’ If the local government election has by default taken on a national character then it is due to the undue importance attached to it by a government that has clearly been fighting shy of facing the voter.    It is ‘national’ for other reasons. For example, […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE ‘Democracy!’ was the clarion call of Maithripala Sirisena’s campaign against Mahinda Rajapaksa.  Much was promised.  So far, the only victory in this regard is the 19th Amendment and even this is but a shadow of what was pledged.  If there is a greater sense of freedom and more reasons to hope that things […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE  “දෙපැත්තෙන්ම කෑව ඇති.  ජවිපෙට ගම දීල බලමු.”  ජනතා විමුක්ති පෙරමුණේ මැතිවරණ පෝස්ටරය මෙයයි.  මීට අවුරුදු විස්සකට විතර පෙර ඒ වගේම පෝස්ටරයක් ගැහුවා. ‘උනුත් එකයි, මුනුත් එකයි, මෙදා පාර අපි ජවිපෙට.’ ඊට පස්සේ ජවිපෙ විරෝධීන් මෙහම කිව්වා: ‘උනුත් එකයි, මුනුත් එකයි, තොපිත් එකයි.’  මැතිවරණ කාලේ ඔහොම තමයි.  මැතිවරණයක් කියන්නේ ‘මමයි පොර’ කියල කියාගන්න […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE “සකල දේශවාසී ගෝතයිනි මතකය අවදි කරව්; තොපිලට නැතිවීමට ඇත්තේ තොපිලගේ දීනකම් පමණයි”  — කාලකන්ණි මාර්ක්ස් (කාල් මාක්ස් ගේ මුනුපුරු) 1988 වර්ෂයේ අග භාගයේ මුළු රටම එක්තරා පොස්ටරයකින් වැහුන.  ‘මේ කව්ද? මොනවාද කරන්නේ?’ යන ප්‍රශ්න දෙකෙන් හදපු පෝස්ටරයක්. පාට තැඹිලි.  කිතුහලය ප්‍රචාරණය වෙනුවෙන් දේශපාලනයේ යොදාගත් පළමු අවස්ථා ව මෙයයි.  ලංකාවේ.  අදහස වික්ටර් හෙට්ටිගොඩ සහ […]

BY MALINDA SENEVIRATNE Way back in the year 1988 an island-wide poster stamped in the public conscious the notion of political teaser advertisements.  It was a simple question: මේ කව්ද? මොනවාද කරන්නේ (Who is this [and] what is he doing? It did not come in colors associated with any of the major parties.  It was in orange.  It […]