ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The Island Editorial 19th October 2011

SLFP politicians are killing each other as the government has allowed them to rise above the law. When presidential advisor Bharatha Lakshman Premachandra was killed and UPFA MP Duminda Silva received serious injury in a recent turf war, we said the government was reaping the whirlwind, having sowed the wind. It looks as if the government were now sowing the whirlwind!

An attempt by the government to pull the wool over the eyes of the public by declaring war on the underworld in the aftermath of the Mulleriyawa incident prompted us to argue in these columns that its anti-crime ops were likely to run into stiff resistance from its own members one day. And that day has come earlier than expected!

The Special Task Force (STF) has incurred the wrath of no less a person than President Mahinda Rajapaksa for conducting a raid on Western Provincial Council minister (UPFA) Nimal Lanza’s residence in Negombo as part of the on-going operations to seize drugs and illegal weapons.

The search is said to have drawn a blank and the government has demanded to know why the police ever searched Lanza’s house. Lanza says the STF came without a search warrant. His was not the only house the STF raided. The government’s reaction is puzzling. It has had even places of worship searched. Is it that the government considers Lanza’s residence holier than a temple? Minister Mervyn Silva was armed with no legal document when he and his goons stormed a kovil in Chilaw last month to save scores of animals that were being kept there for ritualistic slaughter.

No sooner had the STF conducted its raid than President Rajapaksa rushed to Negombo to visit Lanza in a bid to pledge solidarity with him, nurse his bruised ego and control political damage. The presidential visit has left a bad taste in many a mouth, to say the least!

In a country where people have to be protected against their violent representatives surrounded by armed criminals, no sensible person will blame the STF for conducting raids with or without search warrants. If politicians can carry out extra judicial executions in broad daylight and get away with them as we saw in Mulleriyawa the other day, there is no reason why the police crime busters should be restrained from resorting to extraordinary measures to protect the hapless public. If the police and the STF are to be made to obtain search warrants prior to their raids, the government might as well abandon its much publicised anti-crime drive so that the pro-UPFA criminals will be able to operate without let or hindrance. For, obtaining court orders before conducting raids is tantamount to issuing warnings or giving advance notice to government politicians and their pet criminals, who have moles everywhere.

LTTE terrorism may be a thing of the past but people are not yet safe. There is hardly a single house/shop that has not been robbed; a woman wearing jewellery cannot walk in public without fear of chain snatchers; businessmen live in eternal fear of extortionists, kidnappers and land grabbers. The police have drawn heavy flak from the public for their contribution to the near collapse of the rule of law but when they really make an effort to hunt down criminals, they become the hunted!

If politicians have nothing to hide, let them throw the doors of their mansions open and tell the police, ‘Come and see!’

In its battle against the underworld, the police have taken out the most potent weapon at its disposal, the STF. The elite police commandos know what they are doing and on no grounds should they be demoralised. While care is taken to ensure that there will be no room for excesses on their part, they must be allowed to operate without looking over their shoulder. If the government seeks to block their operations or victimise them for targeting the UPFA politicians, nothing can prevent the country’s slide towards total lawlessness.