CLASSIFIED | POLITICS | TERRORISM | OPINION | VIEWS

UNP Leader and His "Kahala Nadaya" Campaign

By Darmitha-Kotte

Leader of the UNP and the Opposition has suddenly got himself into "action" mode after the Eastern Elections and is beginning to show himself out as the champion of the media, human rights, as well as patriotism in Sri Lanka. This is very heartening indeed because it is quite obvious that who ever his PR advisor happens to be, the advise seems to be contrary to party policies. These are sure signs of desperation and impatience that until now, all their efforts to destabilize the GOSL have proved to be failures. Therefore, strategies need to be changed and tested to check which method will work?

Media Freedom:
At the recent memorial meeting in memory of Mr. Esmond Wickramasinghe his late father, the Leader of the Opposition and UNP made scathing attacks on the GOSL and the lack of Press Freedom and stated that the UNP always championed the cause of media freedom in this country. For whatever reason best known to him, he seems to be having a very short memory and thinks that others also have the same malady. What happened to the late Richard de Zoysa and how he was murdered during the UNP regime of 1978-1994 period is and open secret. Together with the late Richard de Zoysa, there were many writers at the time, who also faced life threats and physical abuse at the hands of organized thugs of various UNP politicians at the time.

It was in the last quarter of 1988 that the then Mayor of Colombo used his gangs to print and paste posters exactly in the model of JVP(giving the impression that they were JVP posters) warning the public and terrorizing them into silence. A group of such youth were arrested, taken to the Cinnamon Gardens Police Station and assaulted assuming they were JVP youth when unable to bear the punishment any longer, the boys had said they were not JVPers but supporters of the Mayor who happened to be Mr. Sirisena Cooray and requested the Police Officers to kindly check with him. When the Police checked with Mr. Cooray the information given by the boys proved to be correct and the boys were released at the Mayor's request. This was reported in an Asia Week Magazine but that particular issue of the magazine was banned from entering Sri Lanka! Anyone could go through the archives of Asia Week during the last quarter of 1988 and check this out if it is still available.

Numerous were the cases of journalists who went missing or went floating down rivers in black polythene bags during this period for expressing anti-Government views! So much for the media freedom that UNP offered journalists at the time and about which the Leader of the Opposition and UNP is talking very proudly about.

Human Rights:
Another cause that he is now championing is human rights and states vehemently that the current GOSL is violating all norms on human rights and freedom. Again it was not so long ago when the country was under the governance of his late uncle J.R.Jayawardane and late R. Premadasa(1978-1994), that lawyers, highly respected academics like Prof.Ediriweera Sarathchandra were hooted down and physically abused to silence them. It was also during this same period that lawyer Kanchana Abhayapala, Rohana Wijeweera, Vijaya Kumaranatunga, Ranjan Wijeratne were all murdered in the most brutal manner and the then UNP government never did anything to investigate and punish those who committed the crimes even though culprits were well known. Again it was during this same period that en-mass government officials were sent home without compensation in the early 1980s for protesting against UNP mismanagement-to this date those persons have not been compensated fully.and are out of jobs.

In the Katunayake Free Trade Zone there was not a singhe individual who gained employment during this time unless he/she happened to be a UNP supporter because every person who sought employment in the FTZ had to be recommended by the Jathake Sevake Sangamaya(JSS) which is the UNP Labour Union, if employed even by an accident such persons were deprived of identity cards which was a requirement for all employees who were working within the FTZ. The late Mr. Terence Perera, the Police Officer in charge of FTZ security affairs was instructed not to issue such identity cards.

Just as much as the JVP cannot talk about human rights in this country, so does the UNP have no right to talk let alone champion the cause of human rights in Sri Lanka given their track record during the last 30 years. Government servants working during the UNP regime of 1978-1994 dared not talk contrary to the government stand even in the compounds of departments or ministries for fear that they were not sure of who was listening. Those who dared to do so, suddenly disappeared and were found dead or floating down rivers, yet some others were found burning on tyres under organised thuggery of the JSS and underworld mafia which was created by the UNP politicians of the time. Whether or not the famous Batalanda Torture House was directly under the supervision of the UNP leader or not is immaterial given the fact that there was a lot of brutality wreaked out inside this compound on anyone who dared to cross-paths with the UNP at the time!

One wonders whether it was " in the name of human rights" that personalities like Gonawala Sunil and Sothi Upali were created during the UNP regime, to lead the under world mafia to bump off or brutally assault opponents during 17 years of their rule in this country.

One also wonders whether it was "in the name of human rights" that the very vote of SLFP Presidential Candidate the late Mr. Hector Kobbekaduwa was rigged and cast when he arrived at the polling booth to vote? It is also a great question as to how many UNP politicians carried their guns into polling booths to terrorize the Election Officers to bring in ballot boxes full of rigged votes and replace them with the official boxes which were at polling stations to declare UNP victories? It is highly ironic now to hear the UNP leader talking about vote rigging at local elections because it is the UNP that taught everyone else, how to do such things in the past-now, that very same UNP cries "foul" when they lose an election!

Patriotism:
It was rather hilarious to listen to the UNP leader Mr. Ranil Wickramasinghe recently ranting about Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse being a traitor purely because he had left the Army and the country during the last UNP regime of 1978-1994 and migrated to the USA. The fact that he opted to live abroad during a reign of terror, is considered un-patriotic by the current UNP leader! The very fact that Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapakse decided to return to Sri Lanka and help his brother eliminate terrorism in this country alone is a very good example of patriotism even though the UNP terms it as "unpatriotic" according to his understanding!

There are many Sri Lankan expatriates who are extremely patriotic and working for the welfare of Sri Lanka even though they have left the country unlike the UNP leader and many others who remain in this country but have chosen to champion the cause of terrorists like the LTTE in this country.. The so called "Ceasefire Agreement(CFA)" that he signed in 2002 with the LTTE terrorists even without the approval of the then Executive President of Sri Lanka is one of the most unpatriotic acts that a politicians could have done in Sri Lanka whereby he gave the LTTE a free hand to do anything in the North and East and gain control so that a piece of this country could be demarcated and handed over to a group of minority terrorists..

The very fact that the UNP leader is still attempting to support LTTE terrorists when the GOSL is making every attempt to eliminate terrorism in this country and bring about peace-one wonders whether this is considered " patriotic" or not?

If Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapakse's leaving the country and settling down in USA is considered traitorous by the UNP leader, then why was it that when he became Prime Minister of Sri Lanka after the 2001 Elections, he invited Mr. Paskaralingam and Mr. Sirisena Cooray (to name two only) who both fled the country after many accusations of misappropriation and terror during the 1978-1994 UNP regime, to return and work for the country to support the UNP leader? This too then, must be a very "unpatriotic" act on the part of the UNP leader and the above mentioned individuals?

What normal people consider unpatriotic is to work for and with the enemy, to go abroad and connive with foreign governments not to support our country in our efforts to eliminate terrorism, not to offer financial support to the GOSL at the time when we were devastatingly struck by the Tsunami of 2004, lobbying against the democratically elected GOSL at all international conferences that the UNP leader participates and also to work against the majority of this country. It is best that "people in glass houses do not throw stones" because too many citizens of this country still remember what happened during the 1978-1994 and 2001-2004 UNP regimes whether they were under the late J.R.Jayawardane, the late R.Premadasa or whether it was under the Premiership of the current UNP leader Mr. Ranil Wickramasinghe.

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