Enemies of the President’s Promse: Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Seven Dwarfs – Sleepy (Part 3)
Posted on October 13th, 2014
Enemies of the President’s Promse: Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Seven Dwarfs – Sleepy (Part 1)
Enemies of the President’s Promse: Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Seven Dwarfs – Sleepy (Part 2)
Mahinda Samarasinghe was asked to chair an Inter-Ministerial Committee to implement the Human Rights Action Plan, and as usual I had to do much of the work through convening a Task Force to expedite implementation.
I resigned however in 2013 when I found that, though there was much goodwill from many Ministries, and we got a few things done, no formal coordination of activities and initiatives was possible. I realized that it was impossible without proper authority to expedite decisions and action. I told Samarasinghe in my resignation letter that he should request that a Ministry be set up. While he was the obvious person to be Minister, I told him he should suggest the President take over the portfolio and be his Deputy. This upset him, even though I pointed out that he would still be in the Cabinet with his existing portfolio of Plantation Industries.
He ignored the letter, and simply declared that he would not let me resign, but did nothing further about the matter. So, after my resignation, hardly anything happened, with Mahinda Samarasinghe uncertain too about his own position, being often asked to go to Geneva at the last minute for Council sessions. By 2014 he was talking about resigning himself, but characteristically he held on to the position, though in effect doing nothing to promote the Human Rights Action Plan.
Human Rights were grossly neglected by the Foreign Ministry, with no invitations to any Special Rapporteurs, until they were forced to interact more positively from late in 2013. Contrariwise, we had tried to engage with them constantly, and had indeed had invaluable support from the Special Representative on the Rights of the Displaced, Walter Kalin, who came to Sri Lanka three times during the conclusion of the War. But there were no visits after that until the High Commissioner herself came in 2013, followed by Kalin’s successor.
All this was of a piece with Peiris’s failure to recognize, or unwillingness to convey, that the Human Rights situation was worrying for Sri Lanka. Unlike in the days when the dedicated Ministry under Mahinda Samarasinghe coordinated responses to critiques, writing and disseminating the most effective ones, there was now no concerted response to attacks on us. As a result, the impression gradually developed that we could not answer the many allegations against us.
***
Most pernicious for Sri Lanka was the failure to deal consistently and coherently with the UN on what were termed accountability issues. Well before GL became Foreign Minister, the President had agreed, in a joint communication with the UN Secretary General, to address such issues. Nothing was done about this, and there was no response too later in 2009 to an American query about possible violations of law. This was very politely worded, and included material that would have helped us rebut any serious charges, but the President simply appointed a committee chaired by an octogenarian lawyer, which never met. My constant reminders to members of the Committee, and to Mohan Pieris who was Attorney General, and seen as the front man on such legal issues, achieved nothing, though Pieris kept assuring me that he understood the seriousness of the problem.
With nothing done for nearly a year, the Secretary General appointed his own panel of experts, headed by ‘Kiki’ Darusman of Indonesia, and including an American who had previously suggested that Sri Lanka was a genocidal state. Though members of government demonstrated against this, there was no formal response from the Foreign Ministry, which GL by then headed. The impression created was that this was not a serious issue for the country, but simply an opportunity for politicians to score brownie points by establishing their patriotism.
However government did belatedly appoint its own Commission, entitled the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission, headed by former Attorney General C R de Silva, and including two capable former Foreign Ministry officials, former Secretary H M G S Palihakkara and former Legal Adviser Rohan Perera. Though more critical countries seemed to think this would be a whitewash, in fact the Commissioners were such as to inspire confidence in their work. One unfortunate consequence of this, though, was that since Government did not make clear the need to also respond direct to the Americans, the other Committee was disbanded, and what could have been a good opportunity, to use the American Report to indicate how unreliable was some of the information incorporated in Darusman, was lost.
Towards the end of 2010 the LLRC came out with some interim recommendations, but these were not taken seriously. The President appointed an Inter-Ministerial Committee to implement them, headed by Mohan Pieris, but failed to follow up on this, and did not realize that the Committee never met.
So the country was completely unprepared when the Darusman Committee issued its report in April 2011. The report was promptly leaked to the press. Though it is possible that the more aggressive members of the international community had access to it and handed it out to Non-Governmental Organizations opposed to the government, it is also likely that government itself leaked the report, since it appeared in a newspaper with the byline of a journalist with close links to the Ministry of Defence. Again it seemed that the purpose was to whip up feeling against the Report, rather than deal with the issues it raised.
Certainly anger about the Report was understandable since it was manifestly unfair, and seemed to ignore material that was available with officials of the UN who had worked in Colombo during the conflict. But the Foreign Ministry did not seem to understand the implications of this. I told them that they should make common cause with those officials, who were also under attack in the Report, and suggested several queries that should be sent to the UN, but government chose to pretend the Report did not exist.
This was typical of the ostrich like approach which is understandable in the less sophisticated members of government, but which the Foreign Minister should have advised against. It is possible though that his sense of insecurity had been compounded by government inconsistency. After nearly a year of pretending that the Darusman Committee was a body set up in violation of UN norms, government had sent Mohan Pieris to New York to meet its members shortly before the report was issued. This led to vociferous condemnation from the party (minor but disproportionate influential, at least with the President and the Secretary of Defence) led by Minister Wimal Weerawansa, who had embarked on a fast unto death outside the UN Compound in Colombo when the Darusman Committee was appointed. He was saved from succumbing to his principles by the personal intervention of the President persuading him to take some sustenance.
Such farcical behavior recurred in 2011, with GL claiming that Mohan Pieris, whose visit to New York proved fruitless while taking away from the formal government position that Darusman was an execresence it could ignore, had taken up more than he could handle. I told him that the same could be said about him, given that he was also on the team that was negotiating with the main Tamil political party, the Tamil National Alliance. He was not pleased, and I suppose this added to his neuroses when he saw me.
This became obvious when government, in a move it should have initiated earlier, but which was scarcely helpful in the immediate context, decided to set up study groups for Parliamentarians to understand more about international relations. At an inaugural meeting Basil Rajapaksa suggested that I should prepare position papers, but this did not seem to please GL. In fact the study groups never met. The Government Chief Whip told me that GL had insisted they could not meet without his presence and, since he was never available, this proved to be yet another fatuous proposal. Typically neither the President, nor Basil, who seemed to have been instrumental in promoting the idea, bothered to follow up to find out what was happening.
Typical of the incapacity of Government to deal straightforwardly with the Report were the responses it made. These took the form of two books which it was claimed had nothing to do with the report. The Secretary of Defence issued an account of the war, which made clear the tremendous achievement of the forces, often with great sacrifices. But while this should have been done soon after the war, when it came out after the Darusman Report, but without addressing the specific charges in that Report, it proved a damp squib.
I was asked by the Secretary to help with finalizing his Report, and I pointed out that it did not respond to the allegations against us that were now in widespread circulation. His answer was that that was not the purpose of the Report. When I told him that responses were essential, his answer was that that would be done by someone else. It seemed he had asked the Chief of Defence Staff, the former Air Force Commander, to do this, but the task was soon forgotten.
With regard to other charges in the Report, Basil Rajapaksa produced another Report about the humanitarian assistance Government had provided during the conflict. This was entrusted to the Secretary to the Presidential Task Force for the North, who had been Commissioner General of Essential Services during the war, and done a fantastic job in ensuring that the war affected populations received adequate supplies.
I was asked to help with this from the start, and we produced a fairly decent draft, but then it was decided to expand this so that everyone could tell their individual stories. The result was a massive volume that was unreadable, and certainly did not serve clearly to rebut specific charges.
The failure of the government to understand the need for evidence to deal with allegations was appalling. At the initial meeting held in the Presidential Secretariat when the Darusman Report came out, it transpired that no one had thought of looking at records. It was only after I recalled letters from the UN and the ICRC praising our efforts that these were dug out, but even then, they were to be kept in reserve, until the long descriptive books were ready. I felt they should be sent to the UN Secretary General, but I was told to do this myself, since Government did not deem it necessary to respond direct. Needless to say, my letter was not acknowledged, whereas a direct communication from the Foreign Minister would have necessitated a response.
So government contented itself with diatribes against the Darusman Report and made no effort to deal with specific charges. On my own I produced two short booklets that addressed them, the first prepared immediately on the basis of the knowledge I had from my work as head of the Peace Secretariat. I had in those days monitored the news releases of those who supported the Tigers, and had queried the forces with regard to any abuses that were alleged. This enabled me to show that the general charges made in the Darusman Report could not be substantiated on the basis of even the worst case charges during the conflict period.
Government however took no notice of these. The Governor of the Central Bank, who understood the need to communicate, ordered some copies but the Foreign Ministry was not interested. Clearly GL did not think it was his responsibility to respond to the United Nations, and was happy instead to leave matters to Gotabhaya and Basil Rajapaksa, since he saw his main role as keeping on the good side of anyone in authority.
When I realized how ineffective were our responses, I thought a second more detailed rebuttal was essential. To get this ready, I toured the North with the full support of the army, to check on the various sites mentioned in the Darusman Report. I was able then, from evidence on the ground, to establish that four of the five charges in the Report were unsustainable. In particular, I could show that hospitals they claimed had been attacked were still standing, a fact that had been clear enough from my records too. These showed that, over several months, fewer than a dozen shells had fallen – according to Tamilnet, which would obviously have recorded the worst possible scenario – into hospital premises, let alone hospitals.
Again, the booklet I produced then was ignored by Government, except for the Central Bank, which bought some copies, so that I was at least not entirely out of pocket. But I should note that this was par for the course because when, soon after the war concluded, I produced at the Peace Secretariat a booklet called We Help Ourselves, about the humanitarian assistance extended by government, and especially the forces, to the populace held as hostage for so long by the Tiger, this too was ignored.
I had sent copies to the Foreign Ministry and to all our Missions abroad, asking if they wanted copies, but only three responded, including the Air Force chief who was serving in Pakistan, and one of our branches in India. In the immediate aftermath of the War, there seemed no understanding that we needed to tell our story straight away, and establish what we had done, before the forces waiting to denigrate us took over the setting of an agenda.
Ceylon Today 9 Oct 2014
October 13th, 2014 at 3:21 pm
“Again, the booklet I produced then was ignored by Government, except for the Central Bank, which bought some copies, so that I was at least not entirely out of pocket. But I should note that this was par for the course because when, soon after the war concluded, I produced at the Peace Secretariat a booklet called We Help Ourselves, about the humanitarian assistance extended by government, and especially the forces, to the populace held as hostage for so long by the Tiger, this too was ignored.”
– This is an obvious mistake of branding good people as evil and not listening. No matter what the political idealogy differences , shouldn’t the patriots get together in a crisis , not in an election ?
Are we to discard all these allegations calling the reader as a LTTer, UNPeer or a JVPeeer or even a BBS extremist
just because of Maha Raja getting ready for an election ?
October 13th, 2014 at 3:56 pm
“Well before GL became Foreign Minister, the President had agreed, in a joint communication with the UN Secretary General, to address such issues. Nothing was done about this, and there was no response too later in 2009 to an American query about possible violations of law.”
This is NOT TRUE! A complete lie.
1. Ministry fo Defence (they KNOW what happened on ground) did a MASSIVE FACTUAL DOCUMENT rebutting all these allegations. Foreign Ministry sent it everywhere.
2. Reconstruction, Rehabiliatation, Resettlement & Reconciliation had ALREADY begun and HUGE achievements were made by then.
UN, UNICEF, US, UK, etc. diplomats SAW this themselves!!
Foreign ministry funded their visits to COME AND SEE and they saw. FM also educated them MANY MANY TIMES.
3. Even LLRC report didn’t stop these HYPOCRITES!
It is utterly naive to think “human rights” is the REAL ISSUE for UNHRC, UN and USA. They have NO CONCERN for human rights.
Their action is driven by ANTI-CHINA ANTI-FORMER-COLONIES policies. SL replaced CO CHAIRS COLONIALS by China as the biggest donor. SL DEFEATED COLONIAL FUNDED LTTE. These are the REAL REASON for US, EU, UNHRC (HEADED BY A TAMIL!!) and UN anger against us.
So it is foolish to blame eachother and fight among us over these hypocrites.
SL should do what is good for SL people (75% Sinhalese, 10% Muslims, 14% Tamils, 1% other) and SCRAP 13 amendment, SCRAP the NATIONAL LIST (this is how politicians rejected by the people get into parliament), MAKE it compulsory to uphold the UNITARY STTUS of SL by all and resttle Sinhalese and Muslims in Jaffna.
We cannot be running around just to PLEASE the colonails. They NEVER wished anything good for us. If we keep our promises to COLONIALS, we will have to commit suicide.
The president must keep his pormise to the people of SL. “There are no more majorities and minorities. There are only those who love SL and those who don’t.” Look after those who love SL. And stop appeasing a minority that does not exist as per his golden statement to the people on 21 May 2009. Keep that promise Mr. President and show us you are the president of the SL people, not an agent of the hypocrite colonials!
October 13th, 2014 at 3:58 pm
Appoint MPs ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE to these important places – foreign minister, reconciliation minister.
Then they become RESPONSIBLE & ACCOUNTABLE to the people. If they are appointed by the president from the national list, they are not accountable to voters.
October 13th, 2014 at 4:04 pm
“Appoint MPs ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE to these important places – foreign minister, reconciliation minister.
Then they become RESPONSIBLE & ACCOUNTABLE to the people. If they are appointed by the president from the national list, they are not accountable to voters.”
– furthermore they then think they are bigger than the rest and head become a football. But MR the executive go his own way like a bull without listening to real friends.
Lorenzo should have been the presidential adviser from may 2009. all these foolish mistakes could have been easily avoided.
October 13th, 2014 at 4:11 pm
Actually on the Ministerial positions it is the time NOW to let the voters know who will be the ministers if the presidential candidate and the party wins. That is the Buddhist way. people do not know whether Mervyn Silva becomes the foreign minister or not. Where is the transparency ?
Our dirty buggers will never do such good democratic actions. They just want the “VOTES” and appoint PAL HORU’s to ministerial posts.
October 13th, 2014 at 4:15 pm
Lorenzo,
““Well before GL became Foreign Minister, the President had agreed, in a joint communication with the UN Secretary General, to address such issues. Nothing was done about this, and there was no response too later in 2009 to an American query about possible violations of law.”
“, but the President simply appointed a committee chaired by an octogenarian lawyer, which never met. ”
– here he is talking about war crime allegations, not Reconstruction, Rehabiliatation, Resettlement & Reconciliation.
IT IS NOT A LIE.
October 13th, 2014 at 6:04 pm
Nanda,
The war crimes issue was addressed very well by MOD and MEA together CONCLUSIVELY in 2010 (and many times after that. Lalith Weeratunga did a fantastic presentation last year in USA, etc.)
Ban raised the other issues as well relating to reconstruction, etc.
The REAL issue here is NOT war crimes. We have to understand that.
NATIONAL LIST MPs should NEVER be made MINISTERS, PM or speaker. This practice of national list MPs becoming ministers is found ONLY in SL (and North Korea, China, Burma).
Our PM, Speaker, FM, reconciliation minister are all national list MPs!
No wonder they are SO disconnected from the people.
See the danger? So they don’t care about voters. They don’t have to! No accountability to voters.
Do you get national list MPs holding ministerial posts in your country? Anyone?
SCRAP the national list. Follow democracy. Let the people elect ALL MPs. If anyone wants to be a MP or president, CONTEST the election and WIN it.
October 13th, 2014 at 7:41 pm
The president must keep his promise to the people of SL. “There are no more majorities and minorities. There are only those who love SL and those who don’t.” Look after those who love SL. And stop appeasing a minority that does not exist as per his golden statement to the people on 21 May 2009. Keep that promise Mr. President and show us you are the president of the SL people, not an agent of the hypocrite colonials! – Lorenzo
That’s it, that is all and that is everything. Not an iota needs be added.
Do it and live to fight another day. Abstain and vanish from the scene or run the risk of being removed from the scene.
There is not to make reply
There is not to reason why
There is but to DO OR DIE
Mario Perera
Kadawata
October 13th, 2014 at 7:52 pm
I have no argument on “appointed” ministers, him included. But we can compare him to Mervyn Silva who is elected. Why is MR keeps on appointing ministers all the time even though he promised a “lean cabinet” in the previous election.
On the same argument appointed high( some very Low) commissioners is also wrong. But what training we provide for these two professions ?
Don’t the people have a right to know who are the would be ministers (important portfolios ) in a campaign ?
But what he said was since 2009 May GOSL just ignored war crime allegations until they came on pressing, which is true. It is not a lie.
As you rightly said they concentrated on “Reconstruction, Rehabilitation, Resettlement ” which is good but also wasted time on n “Reconciliation” nonsense (LLRC) which has become a problem now.
October 13th, 2014 at 8:30 pm
Abolition of the Executive Presidency.
This slogan of the opposition and of the Venerable Sobitha is a RED HERRING.
The crying need of the hour is NOT the abolition of the Executive Presidency BUT THE ABOLITION OF THE 13th AMENDMENT (Lorenzo stated it clearly).
The opposition is like a blind man using the white stick that is the abolition of the Executive Presidency. Everyone knows how blind men advance with their white sticks. In Sinhala you call this opposition tactic a DIRACHCHI LANUWA or ‘dead rope’. Whoever emerges as the opposition candidate clinging to this dead rope will fall with it. What the opposition if heading for is a bruised bum.
As for Maha Raja’s latest statement on the issue, he is clinging to the Executive Presidency on the argument that the TNA is clinging to the Ealam idea. So the Ealam idea is now turning to his benefit !! He strengthened his hold on the Executive Presidency by defeating the Ealamists. Now he is strengthening his hold on the same on the basis of the continuance of the Ealam idea. Is this not an admittance of DEFEAT?
His present stance is a public admission that he only won a battle and NOT THE WAR. He won the battle but has lost the war. What he now says is: I need to be Executive President to fight the next coming battle because the Ealam band wagon rolls on.
Both MR and the opposition are battling it over lofty ideas that are as blinding lights to the ordinary voter.
What the voters of this country understand is toilet language, so low being their capacity of understanding. The opposition should tell them that no ‘job’ is done until the ‘paper work’ is over. MR has done his ‘job’ with the stinking remnants jutting out of his rear orifice. The toilet paper that is the 13 A has not been put by MR to its natural use.
The opposition is not showing the public the stinking orifice of MR probably for fear of having to do the wiping part.
All what this means is that whoever wins, the stinking ars or the reluctant wiping hand, the toilet paper that is the 13A will never go where it belongs, that is, into the CESS PIT.
Mario Perera
kadawata
October 13th, 2014 at 11:36 pm
Lorenzo said
“It is utterly naive to think “human rights” is the REAL ISSUE for UNHRC, UN and USA. They have NO CONCERN for human rights. Their action is driven by ANTI-CHINA ANTI-FORMER-COLONIES policies. ”
ABSOLUTELY TRUE, and therefore, there is NO POINT in trying to Appease them at Sri Lanka’s expense. NONE at all!
October 14th, 2014 at 2:55 am
ABSOLUTELY TRUE, and therefore, there is NO POINT in trying to Appease them at Sri Lanka’s expense. NONE at all!
“Reconciliation” nonsense
You all accept We had 33 Years war ended in may 2009 but you do not want to accept reconciliation !
to whom you are fooling ??? apart from yourself !!!
October 14th, 2014 at 3:06 am
we can compare him to Mervyn Silva who is elected- that is elected system
but we do not Mervyn Silva would have done better job then GL as he know how to handle people very well !
October 14th, 2014 at 3:32 am
Nanda,
Mervin Silva was appointed a NATIONAL LIST MP in 2000, 2001 and 2004!!
Only in 2010 he managed to win the election after making a name for himself as a NATIONAL LIST MP.
IF there was NO national list, Mervin would NOT be in politics by now.
October 14th, 2014 at 5:06 am
We have to think of HOW to counter EBOLA which is an EPIDEMIC.
It WILL reach SL too. It is WHEN not IF.
The way we handled the TSUNAMI should teach us it will be a DISASTER the way GOSL will handle it. Someone even stole tsunami funds!! Same thing will happen to ebola funds.
A disaster facing method has to be in place NOW. We have to STOP people from WESTERN, SOUTHERN AND NORTH WESTERN AFRICA to visit SL.
NGOs, red cross should be prevented from sending foreign workers to SL.
WHEN ebola reached Endia, it will be one of the WORST human catastrophes ever! It is expected to reach Endia by November. We have to close our borders and STOP all kallathonis.
With PC crooks and presidential elections, ebola will take a back stage until it hits the fan.
October 14th, 2014 at 1:06 pm
Interestingly, i was led to believe that Mahinda Samarasinghe was a reluctant participant at Geneva 2014 with caveats.
It remains to be seen if MS will succumb to another round of ill prepared presentations and willing to further compromise his credibility knowing the shenanigans at EAM.
October 14th, 2014 at 2:19 pm
Lorenzo,
“Mervin Silva was appointed a NATIONAL LIST MP in 2000, 2001 and 2004!!
Only in 2010 he managed to win the election after making a name for himself as a NATIONAL LIST MP. ”
-This is an extremely good example of how meritocracy and DemoCazy work.
Remove all your metal barriers and “think” for the country as you always do.
Ill use of (exploitation of) meritocracy created a monster called Mervyn Silva “the minister”. They the DemoCarzy was crazy enough to legalise his appointment. Sri Lanka’s democracy is good for crazy people.
We need strong leaders from outside the factory of impotent idiots.
This is why you suggested military takeover recently. Are you scared to declare its (even more) validity now ?
Our buggers are kings of exploitation of any good system to destroy it. It is our buggers who destroy everything. This “BUGGERY” should be defeated by any means.
Main issue is now ALL politician is talking about Executive Presidential system and con-institution, including the BigCon.
They have conveniently forgotten 13A.
It is at the peak of the argument on 13A that this “Thief Justice” issue came up and distracted the main issue for years. One woman destroyed the whole progress made on 13A discussion. Now one man went to a drinking party and another distracting discussion has been initiated. True, these discussions are important, but still a distraction from the main cause.
October 14th, 2014 at 2:35 pm
Ebola could well be the next weapon that will be used by Christian West to subjugate the rest of the world.
Regime Change farce is now an open trick. World has seen it for what it is. There is no trick anymore and there is no more magic and the It is not about democracy nor human rights. This aspect is clear to the world at large. It is only the Western media and their lackeys who keep the farce going. Western world and the American Empire will not go away like the Soviet Empire. It is determined to destroy the rest of the world before it implodes from within. Implosion of the Western hegemony is waiting to happen. However they are determined to make it slow and painful for all.
Ebola could be the next tactic they will use to make countries helpless and failed states. They are already talking about a few West African states as ‘failed states’!
Lorenzo is right. Sri Lanka should be proactive and have realistic and practical measures in place to prevent this plague reaching Sri Lanka. At the same time the medical authorities in Sri Lanka should not be found wanting if the disaster were to strike Sri Lanka. Just as in the army – “Be Prepared” should be the motto!
October 14th, 2014 at 3:39 pm
Thank you Lorenzo ! yes Ratnapala it is very important. In fact “Regime Change” is no more and Ebola is the one!
Remember Romesh Seneviratne says how USA with others worked to create AIDs to be implanted in Africa in his book
“Eugenics and Genocide in the Modern World”.
Fortunately Cuba is more advanced in medicine than USA and the West.
Cuban team working in affected countries as we speak.
We should get CUBA’s help to establish a way of fighting without the help of dreaded USA and the west. USA is bringing us destruction and distractions.
Our leaders should act now ( if we have any left).