Sunil Yatalamatta Gamage 

My family beginning to feel safe & confident in the country more than ever before, and feel the value of peace you have been creating in the country” -Tamil Civilian

People don’t want constitutional mockery & fights in Legislative Assembly

I have been trying my best to educate the public in terms of using their mandate to a cause which is predominantly to a future perfect decision by no mistake. In this cause of decision making; the public needs to think a few areas of interest of nationally, locally, economically, culturally, socially, making our country in the center of their decision. We all more or less love in our country. As a good citizen of the country, everybody has a duty towards the country. A good citizen needs to follow rules and obey the law and order of the country. We all know the year 1948 February 4th we were given independence from the British Crown. Well over 70 years gone by now, where are we today. We say we are a proud nation with a great history. There is no doubt about it, but as a proud nation did we introduce any product of our own to the rest of the world. As far as I know, we didn’t. During the second world war, many countries shattered to their poorest economic status and then rose by themselves relying on their own strengths, and energy. They became proud nations in the world. Think about Germans, Japanese, Italians, French, All those nations were ruled by strong leaders, even Adolf Hitler he was a ruthless leader to rest of the world, but he is never being considered that way by Germans. He made Germans proud. His effort of making Germany a great country with its own products to the world has been a reality in the modern world. From that perspective, he has been a great leader to Germany. But Hitler himself should be tried in an international court of justice for the crimes he did to humanity, again and again.

But in Sri Lanka, we never had foreseeable leaders who could bring the country on the development strategy 10 years from the time, or 20 years from the time, etc, kind of a vision and a strategy. We didn’t have such leaders either the present day. In Asia Lee Kuan Yew is the only leader who had that vision and strategy and he could build a Singapore; the people of Singapore want to have. Lee Kuan Yew’s vision and strategy had become a reality. All the Singapore leaders follow Lee’s vision and move forward the country through that vision with changing economic strategies of the world. So our leaders did not introduce anything made in Sri Lanka to the rest of the world. When the British Crown ended they gave us a problem that we never ever able to solve; which is called the ethnic problem”. We have been engulfed in this problem all those years and still, we are in that problem. The British rule initiated ethnic unrest all the countries they had been ruled, and they were well aware the local leaders will suffer out of that, and will never find solutions to the ethnic problem which they had created. And they found that is the best way to continue colonial hand in these countries because they knew it will bring them enough time and resources finding solutions. So ultimately we as Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims living in a country with problems

There aren’t many countries in the world where politicians can dress or make their constituents to cows or bulls, (Janathawa gonata andaweema) but it is happening in Sri Lanka. It is because politicians have developed a culture in this country to go behind them and secure employment. This tendency had been occurring ever since up to now. A segment of people secure their jobs through political intervention, in return, the politicians expect from these people to work for them on elections and campaigns. This means getting more counts of voting for them by influencing people. This culture has created an enormous problem in society. This intervention has been criminalized independence of people to think themselves. Nobody can influence of people voting rights. Politicians have been using, people for various political objectives; this relationship would be the prolongation of the massive structural splitting of peace and harmony in our society. We have heard many names of such people involved of drug dealings and underworld connections, and murders. Some of those candidates still active in the election campaign to the present day.

None of the non-governmental organizations come forward and introduced criteria to select candidates for the legislative assembly. I am aware of Rohana Hettiarchchi and his organization working to educate people of selecting candidates, but their work is not sufficient. People need to select candidates who did not involve corruptions, The candidate not involved criminal activities, The candidate’s wealth need to be aware and how he earned the wealth, Candidates behavior and conduct over the past years, Does the candidate holds good education, Does the candidate involve to vandalism of ancient historical sites, is he involved in the drug business? etc. So those are the basic entry-level qualifications as a candidate. We want to have peoples Trustees in the Legislative Assembly in Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte. So it is important to select Trustworthy, competent, Committed, resilient, respectful, collaborative candidates as people’s representatives to the National Legislative Assembly.

When presidents visit people they request to arrest the drug dealers in their villages. Then the president asks them to send the information to the president’s office. So the question is the village police officers don’t do their duties to keep the community safe. Then the defense secretary announced if the police stations surrounding areas’ crimes are increasing; the police O.I.C held responsible and accountable for keeping the peace, law, and order for the community. Which is absolutely a great mitigation of responsibility? It is a huge battle against heroin, in the country. This battle needs to continue until the forces find the last gram of heroin in this country.

The Code of conduct for members of the assembly is a must as we are heading to a new era of politics in Sri Lanka. We have seen the behavior and conduct of members in the former parliament, the whole nation frustrated what we have seen in parliament. Then the public decided that they don’t need the whole 225 people and no use of them; parliament day was a waste of public money and the president very rightly never interested in having meetings with those members. It is the members of the parliament and Prime Minister need code conduct. The objective of such code of conduct is to bring awareness of good judgment and behavior needed by the public trustees of representatives. Awareness of public trustee responsibility towards their duties as the representative. such a code of conduct needs is important because when it comes to national interest matters the members need to align with every member for the sake of the country. The country and its people are the first, not the party they representing.

Corruption, defamation, conspiring, stealing, bribing by projects had been integral in Sri Lankan political system. Politicians have been openly discussing these violations publicly.( E.G Range Bandara and S.B Dissanayake) Sometimes we used to think that is how politicians live and do the public service. Many of those corruptions occurred through projects over the past 15 years. Most of the Chinese investments made politicians to earn massive commissions? There are no proven auditor general reports but reports reveal such irregularities happen all levels of administration of the government. Some of those state administrative officers caught in red-handed, but many of those people not caught by the government. The bribery commission does not function as it was as in the 1970’s administration. I believe the Government of China will not allow their state officers to do corruption, but when dealing with financial aided projects for foreign investments, they will encourage their officers to bribe local politicians to make the Chinese interests. The question is, Do we have a mechanism of transparency?

Sri Lankan political stage is quite tense due to the upcoming election. One of the media people ask Your name is Ravi Karunanayake but people say Hora” Then the politician said I am not a thief. So this person is one of the candidates for the election. Question is do you need this person in parliament? Sujeewa Semasinghe wrote a book about the bond scam and tried justifying there isn’t anything happen in the bond issue. Do you need this person in the parliament? When the Hambantota port deal was signed with the Chinese government Sajith Premadasa never utter a single word against the deal. Heartbreaking news for me is not that; this is an asset of our country and it is the asset of our future generation. Ranil Wickramasinghe and the gang were selling our national assets to foreign countries. I remember Rajitha Senaratne was saying that they will sell Mattala International Air Port to India. Question is Do you want Rajith Senaratna in the parliament? Over the past 4 and a half years, drug trafficking and smuggling took place in a big way. People started selling drugs-related items in the close vicinity of schools. One time Ranjith Maddumabandara became the minister for police and police operations in the country. Did Ranjith Maddumabandara do anything to find the drug traffickers and people who did those crimes? Do you Ranjith Maddumabandara in parliament? I am requesting the public to think about 5 years from now, or 10 years from now, think about your family, think about the future of your children, think about our resources and assets of the country. Most importantly think of our environment and forest reserves, think about the safety, security of the country. Then decide. This election will be the turning point of our future, our heritage, our economy, our safety, security, and many more. It will happen the way as people expected and will continue that rule many years in the country. People need to make the Good Trouble” with their consciousness of selecting the properly educated member for the legislative assembly.

The tuition teacher has been arrested for being sexually abusing school children. There may be many like such people in society. Hunting them down and charge them and jail them is the normal procedure according to law and order. What is prudent and wise is to introduce something different immediately. Child abuse cases increasing in an alarming pattern in the country, so hunting them down, charge and jail them not sufficient. It is the time of government to introduce a much-needed Child abuse registry, & Adult abuse registry checks immediately. For all kinds of jobs of government, abuse registry check must be a prerequisite before the job offer. Professionals who engaged in medicine, child care, etc need to check the child abuse registry. If anybody convicts of such abuse they shouldn’t continue to be doing the job of such nature. The confidential registry information could be protected by the competent authority. The commissioner of child and adult abuse registrar. These are real solutions to protect the society as well as our children, I brought up this valued idea as we are in the threshold of change for better governance.

‘TNA party has published their election manifesto, which is different to any other political party. In the manifesto, they are inviting international mediation of United Nations Intervention, etc. They want all our local problems and make international mediation. Surprisingly they enjoy all the benefits and privileges form the Government Of Sri Lanka. They are not transparent and honest about their agenda. The dangerous politician Sumanthiran has been in his ideology of separatism well over a period of time. He needs to understand that his ideology will welcome by the international countries as well as countries that have geopolitical interests and organizations interested in diaspora dollars. The money they have and the assets; have been a huge influence on this cause. Most importantly the people in north and east do not need a separate land. Mr. Sumanthiran please do something good to your people in north and east. First of all Sri Lanka is your country, please love your country, learn the Sinhalese language, travel everywhere in the country see the beauty of the land, encourage Tamil people to learn the Sinhalese language. Have a daily meeting with your people and identify their problems in farming or small industries and try to find solutions. As long as this country has liberated from terrorism, there will not be separate police powers for provinces, there will not be separate sea for north and east. There will not be separate constitutions etc. You have been singing an old song but it Is no more a song for Tamil people in this country. Please do something lasting value to your people to improve their lives, at least those people will have some gratitude if you could honestly deliver something good to those deserving people. Those people weary of the past 30-year civil war. They are craving for equality, respect, education, opportunity, inclusion to Sri Lankan workforce, dignity, and live a better life with their families. Please don’t propagate separatism in the country. The concept of separate Tamil land is a dead and gone entity. It will never ever surface again.

Today expatriates living in the western world living with enormous chaos of Covid-19 and other racially motivated issues. There are a lot of discussions actively happening in media as well as in institutions. Topics include such as microaggression, unconscious biases in corporations, diversity, equality, inclusion, on a daily basis. One thing very clear in the western world as such, when issues surface, everybody makes their platform to discuss in depth the nature of it and solutions. They contribute in many ways and participate to analyze the issue and that helps to experience many facts behind incidents. They openly discuss victims and experts contribute to finding solutions. As an example start bucks which has 8000 stores worldwide wide discuss how to train their employees on unconscious bias training. Because they need their mission statement of third place” for their communities. They want their employees to aware of unconscious bias. Star bucks taking active actions to make their policies, the culture around employees, one that is less racist and more equitable. In the western world today there are two pandemics in discussion to find solutions. In many parts of the world England, France, the United States Of America racism is there, but nobody didn’t want to discuss racism and discrimination because it is ugly by its nature. In many countries, racial residual remains as it is, and certain segments of the white population want to consider slave traders as heroes. What we saw over the months’ black people turned slave traders statues and vanished. In the United States George Washinton named as a slave trader. If you happen to read the book of Roots” of Alex Haley you may know in-depth how terrible slavery at that time.

The first pandemic is Covid-19 and the other issue has been racism, diversity, equality, and inclusion in their societies. Racism has defined in many ways in different countries. In some countries such as Brazil, it will be defined as how you look like. In the united states in multiple ways, it is defined. The incorporate world it is an unconscious bias for discrimination of racism. Microaggression, white privileged which is quite common in the world. White privilege works in such a way that black people and white people in two different ways. Today world-class athletes and many in the United States says equality still remains an elusive goal to achieve. However, they have started the conversation of black lives matters, white privilege, unconscious bias, racial disparities, etc. All the university dons are doing research to find solutions to the racism problem. There is a huge public awareness and participation happening in the entire United States Of America. It is because American history is the history of black people, without them, there is no United States Of America.