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By Baladeva Senanayaka

Items appearing in the Daily Mirror of Colombo, which is now popularly known as the Uncle's Daily, tend to indicate that Ranjith W, the uncle, seems to be determined that his nephew also should become the President of the country like his cousin, the creator of the draconian constitution, the notorious Junius Richard Jayewardene .who created conditions and sold the earlier independent newspapers like the Lankadeepa, the Daily Mirror and the Times, all state property later, for a song to him to compensate the family for the loss of Lake House.

The latest tactic both Ranjith W and the UNP have adopted to woo Ranil Wickremesinghe these days is to give fullest and undue publicity and financial support to the Buddhist Monks party, the Jathika Hela Urumaya. The new policy is based on the old Jayewardene policy of releasing Rohana Wijeweera from jail to attack the Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Though Roahana's release was universally appreciated while the story how it misfired and nearly destroyed Jayewardene's political career is part of Sri Lanka's history now.

The uncle and nephew duo, Ranjith and Ranil, who call themselves Walawkarayas( the blue blooded aristocrats), thanks to the British imperialists and the Anglican Church, but whose ancestral job was to float timber down the Kelani river, are doing the same mistake. Although the political bhikkus are not at all appreciated and popular like the late Rohana Wijeweera the calamities created by the political gamble might compel the uncle and nephew duo very soon to switch jobs and start floating timber down the Kelani river, like their ancestors did.

Then Rev. Oswald Gomis, the glorified one time parish priest of Kelaniya who is issuing statements published in the Uncle's Daily condemning the exaggerated attack on the political bhikkus in the parliament will be scratching his head thinking what to do next.

The extraordinary unity exhibited by the virulently anti Sinhala Buddhist elements like Sandeshaya (that attacks Anagarika Dharmapala through paying an ex-Buddhist monk who wants to earn a quick buck), the Oswald Gomis led Catholic Church and the all-Christian panel of lawyers appearing for Jathika Hela Urumaya leaders (including Champika Ranawaka, who has stopped trotting the globe collecting money from Sri Lankan expatriates after he has found more fertile grounds close to intelligence services), in supporting the Jathika Hela Urumaya came as no surprise to Sinhala patriots since they knew from the very beginning that at least part of the bhikku parliamentarians were nothing less than agents of the imperialists. The fact that US embassy and the queer Cinnamon Gardens hermitage were so close was unfortunately known only to few intellectuals like Nalin de Silva and Gunadasa Amerasekera. But Ameresekera sadly failed to understand S.L. Gunasekera.

Gomis, very strangely got interested in the rights of the Maha Sangha and issued a statement on behalf of all the bishops of the island including those of the LTTE led Rayappu Joseph and others that said, "We also condemn unequivocally the alleged indignities inflicted upon the members of the Maha Sangha in the chamber of parliament."

This is the very Gomis, who is very angry at the anti-conversion bill prepared by the government against unethical conversions taking place in Sri Lanka by Christian churches funded by US money with the patronage of the Bush administration.

When un-Buddhist monk like robed individuals of the JHU kidnapped a Buddhist monk and took his signature to a letter of resignation under duress the panel of lawyers who appeared for them for a case arousing out of it were amazingly non Buddhist. S. L. Gunasekera , not the least but the last is the most controversial figure, the main reason why the Sihala Urumaya broke. Champika Ranawaka deprived him of his post of the Member of Parliament saying that he was born Christian and a person daily consuming alcohol. They also alleged that he refused to offer a basket of flowers to the tooth relic of the Buddha. S. L. Gunasekera is an agnostic actually, and that's why he refused to offer a basket of flowers at the temple of the tooth, a traditional custom than religious, even performed by visiting non-Buddhist foreign dignitaries. Even a Catholic priest like Father Marceline Jayakody was on record offering a basket of flowers at the temple of the tooth, simply because it was a national tradition and he considered Buddha's tooth relic a national treasure. .

One cannot forget how the Jathika Hela Urumaya was originally created. Actually it was created using the sudden demise of Venerable Soma who was campaigning against unethical Christian conversions on fair grounds. But unfortunately Venerable Gangodawila Soma had political ambitions of contesting for the post of President of Sri Lanka going against his own guru the Most Venerable Madihe Pannaseeha, who detested Buddhist monks entering active politics.

Decades ago the Late Pannaseeha, flatly refused to accept a post of a Senator during the bicameral days of Sri Lanka's parliament, when the then government wanted to appoint him to the Senate. Venerable Soma for a long time was suffering from a heart ailment and had scars of previous heart attacks on his heart, as indicated in the post mortem. He was a secretive person. He kept his heart ailment a secret mostly for political reasons and wanted to obtain an honorary degree in a secret manner- in this case a false one, to boost up his ego, from a Russian Institution run by a Sri Lankan con-master who established himself in Russia unethically earning money from Sri Lankan students who wanted to enter Russian universities, after the Soviet Union collapsed, through fraud.

Evidence show when Soma Thera suffered a heart attack in his plane on his way to Russia and the con master was unable to arrange him medical assistance immediately. But the leader of the Jathika Hela Urumaya, Ven. Ellawela Medhananda said at his funeral, with blatant political ambitions thus: "Christian fundamentalist connection to Soma Thero's untimely death in St. Petersburg Russia was not an accident." There is no evidence that the con master is connected to Christian fundamentalists, who were converting in Sri Lanka or otherwise. He had obtained his false PhD from a Pasadena, California institution, that sells degrees for a price for anybody, to conduct themselves as pastors or priests of Christian, Buddhist or Muslim places of worship.

They call themselves an open denominations institution. To be precise, it is a fraudulent money earning institution that taught the Sri Lankan con man how to earn easy money by selling degrees to foreigners who want to earn worthless paper qualifications through the easy way out from St. Petersburg The con man's institution and the Pasadena institution are affiliated to each other now. The con man also kept close relations with Sri Lanka's then UNP Minister of Education.

It is regretful to note that there was nothing holy about Soma Thero's trip to Russia. There was nobody capable in the con man's institution that could assess the Late Soma Thero's book written in Sinhalese- for that matter even any book written in English for a degree. There is no evidence that Soma Thero paid the con man or whether the con man wanted to attract publicity by the act to lure more students to his institution

The people voted Venerable Ellawela Medhananda to the parliament to cherish Soma Thero's ideals against unethical conversions and see an end to the horrible practice of buying people to embrace Christianity for money using their poverty. But how come the greatest enemies of the anti-conversion bill like Rev. Gomis, his beloved Christian lawyers and the Uncle's Daily are united like one to protect the Jathika Hela Urumaya today?

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