By Rohana R. Wasala

An intellectual hatred is the worst,

So let her think opinions are accursed. –B. Yeats/ ‘A Prayer for My Daughter’

In this concluding section of my article, I am making an attempt to suggest how anti-Buddhist propaganda has polluted even the academia, and how, as a potent factor, such misinformation has contributed to our country’s present predicament.

Johanson writes:

The Buddhist Protestantism of the 19th century, the monks who invoked Buddhist texts to justify the Sri Lankan civil war, and the extremist movements surging today all have one thing in common: a belief that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist nation that must be protected from foreign elements, violently if necessary. The Sri Lankan case shows that nationalism and extremism can be filtered through anything”.

This is complete nonsense. There are no ‘extremist movements surging today’ among the Sinhalese as Johansson alleges. The various nonviolent nationalist Buddhist movements led by some young lay Buddhists and Buddhist monks have come into being mainly because successive governments have failed to fulfill their constitutional obligation of protecting Buddhism. Their protests are partly against entrenched governmental inaction that is due to the misapplication of political correctness in the presence of valid complaints about the threatened state of the Buddhist cultural heritage of the country caused by tangible evidence of increasing non-Buddhist religious fundamentalist activism, destruction of archaeological sites and racist Tamil politicians advocating ethnic cleansing targeting the Sinhalese of the North.  Any government can put things right  provided they are determined to do so. They can do it with the willing participation of the leaders of Hindu, Christian and Muslim religions. The misinformation that is so liberally dished out by half baked ‘academics’ of Andreas Johansson’s type makes this task very difficult, because it undermines the already existing peace and harmony among the communities.

Johansson uses the term ‘nationalism’ in a pejorative sense and equates it with extremism. Critics of his kind condemn today’s powerful nationalist stream of politics in Sri Lanka as the direct malignant result of the national awakening movement and Buddhist renaissance (Sinhala Buddhist nationalism in short) that Dharmapala pioneered in the late 19^th century. Dharmapala was a ‘Sinhala zealot’ and a ‘Buddhist bigot’ to the Western biased local anthropologists and sociologists who had apparently no natural empathy with their own people. They were a culturally deracinated lot, although they might deny that fact. However, it is doubtful whether even the proponents of the theory of Buddhist Protestantism any longer believe in it.

What actually is Protestant Buddhism that Gananath Obeysekere et al propounded in the latter 1970s and 1980s? There is a succinct account of Protestant Buddhism and what they described as ‘Buddhist modernism’ in the Wikipedia, which I chose to quote here in full. I retrieved the following from the Wikipedia (June 7, 2018) for the purpose of this article as it gives the notion in a nutshell; it seems to have been inserted by a voluntary editor who is sympathetic to the scholars that Johansson relies on.

The term ‘Protestant Buddhism,’ coined by scholar Gananath Obeyesekere, is often applied to Dharmapala’s form of Buddhism. It is Protestant in two ways. First, it is influenced by Protestant ideals such as freedom from religious institutions, freedom of conscience, and focus on individual interior experience. Second, it is in itself a protest against claims of Christian superiority, colonialism, and Christian missionary work aimed at weakening Buddhism. “Its salient characteristic is the importance it assigns to the laity.” It arose among the new, literate, middle class centered in Colombo.

The term ‘Buddhist modernism’ is used to describe forms of Buddhism that suited the modern world, usually influenced by European enlightenment thinking, and often adapted by Asian Buddhists as a counter to claims of European or Christian superiority. Buddhist modernists emphasize certain aspects of traditional Buddhism, while de-emphasizing others. Some of the characteristics of Buddhist modernism are: importance of the laity as against the sangha; rationality and de-emphasis of supernatural and mythological aspects; consistency with (and anticipation of) modern science; emphasis on spontaneity, creativity, and intuition; democratic, anti-institutional character; emphasis on meditation over devotional and ceremonial actions.

Dharmapala is an excellent example of an Asian Buddhist modernist, and perhaps the paradigmatic example of Protestant Buddhism. He was particularly concerned with presenting Buddhism as consistent with science, especially the theory of evolution”.

Dr Susantha Goonatilake devotes  Chapter Seven (p.131-168) of his book ‘Recolonisation – Foreign Funded NGOs in Sri Lanka’ (Sage Publications India Pvt Ltd, New Delhi, 2006) to a discussion of ‘Colonising Studies on Sri Lanka’ as its title indicates. He is, among other things, Fellow of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, and president of Royal Asiatic Society Sri Lanka (2009 to date) and a prolific writer and speaker on sociology, information and knowledge systems, and science topics. In Chapter Seven Dr Goonatilake refers to an earlier work of his entitled ‘Anthropologizing Sri Lanka: a Civilizational Misadventure’ published in 2001, which examines how four most productive and often quoted anthropologists, namely, Gananath Obeysekere and (the late)S.J. Tambiah (both of Sri Lankan origin, but mostly worked in Europe and USA), and Richard Gombrich and Bruce Kapferer (both British, and worked in Britain and Australia)analyzed the recent (as viewed from 2006) changes that have taken place in the Sinhalese Buddhist society. The conclusion that Goonatilake arrives at in ‘Anthropologizing Sri Lanka’ is that the works of these anthropologists are seriously flawed in terms of not only the basic facts on the ground, but also in terms of the methodology they use and the conclusions they draw. More damagingly, their post-colonial anthropology seems worse than even the nineteenth- and early twentieth- century colonial anthropological writings on Sri Lanka  in terms of the negative attitude with which they view their subject, i.e., the Sinhalese Buddhists.” (p.132, Recolonization). The four confirmed each other’s  interpretation of the Sri Lankan reality, and ensured that their common view became the definitive version of that reality. The distortions in their writings were fed by a set of persons associated with foreign funded NGOs, which collectively provide a social framework that helps filter their own version of Sri Lankan reality to authors living outside the country. This set of institutions and individuals, working largely outside the university structure and public domain, acts as a social cognitive matrix that filters the local reality for visiting anthropologists. The re-emergence of a virulent colonial anthropology in Sri Lanka is due partly to their efforts.” (ibid)

The so-called Buddhist Protestantism is an eminently untenable academic thesis that is little known among the ordinary Sinhalese Buddhists (though it is their interests that are harmed by such threadbare theories). Protestant Buddhism is the first of the two transformations that, according to these Eurocentric anthropologists, took place in Sinhalese Buddhism (by which is meant, I assume, the brand of  Buddhism they supposed was being  practiced among the Sinhalese the late 19^th and early 20^th century) both in terms of its theory and practice. The second alleged transformation took place in the 1970s according to these theorists, who dubbed it ‘post-protestant Buddhism’.  But before giving a brief idea about this so-called ‘post-protestant Buddhism’ (as I understand it as a layman), let me say something about what the aforementioned anthropologists call ‘protestant Buddhism’ that Andreas Johansson invokes in his article.

The Sinhalese have an unbroken recorded history of two thousand five hundred years. Nearly all of it (for two thousand three hundred years according to the Mahavamsa/The Great Chronicle) is as a Buddhist civilization, which even today forms the unshakable cultural foundation of the multilingual, multi-religious, multiethnic Sri Lankan society. How many other nations in the world can boast of such a long history with a single religious tradition?  There is nothing wrong in identifying Sri Lanka as a Buddhist nation, given that 70% of its population comprises Buddhists, and that Buddhism is not confined to one race. The former prime minister of Britain David Cameron once proudly claimed in a Christmas message that the British were a Christian nation and explained what his government had done to help the church, while describing how the institution served the nation. But Britain also prides itself on its multiculturalism. Cameron implied in the same message that the accommodativeness of the British society flowed from its dominant Christian culture. Did sociologists of Johansson’s type level any criticism at his words? Lutheranism, professed by 71.5% of its population is the state religion of Norway and dominates its culture (whereas Sri Lanka does not claim Buddhism to be its state religion). America is a Christian nation. All these reputedly secular democracies have a shorter history than the Buddhist Sri Lanka. Besides, there is no other religion that is so compatible as Buddhism with the notions of secularism and multiculturalism that are basic to democracy. So, what is so objectionable about the ‘belief that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist nation that must be protected from foreign elements…’.  It is mainly due to the characteristic Buddhist tolerance that prevails in our culture that minority communities professing other faiths follow their religions in absolute freedom from interference and subversion.

Buddhist monks feel compelled to respond to what they perceive as aggressive acts by non-Buddhist religious extremists that adversely affect the rights of the exceptionally tolerant, accommodative Buddhists. Under normal circumstances they would gladly keep out of mundane affairs. But they have no other option when the Nayake monks and relevant government authorities fail to address these issues according to the existing laws. Despite this, Johansson tries to prove that Buddhist monks justify their alleged violence by invoking Buddhist texts. He quotes what are purported to be some examples from religious studies professor Tessa J. Bartholomeuz’s book ‘In the Defence of Dharma and Just War Ideology in Buddhist Sri Lanka’. (It seems that Johansson hasn’t got even the name of the book right. It is ‘In Defense of Dharma”. (The book was published posthumously in 2002 by RoutledgeCurzon, London, for the author died in 2001.) One example is a verse from a song said to have been composed by a Buddhist monk. The verse is paraphrased in English translation thus:

Linked by the love of (Buddhist) religion and protected by the Motherland, brave soldiers you should go hand in hand.”

Given its nonsensical I doubt its authenticity. Soldiers are there to protect the Motherland, not the other way around! In what sense is this a Buddhist text? The other example given is also a verse where the metaphorical nuances of the original Sinhalese are totally lost sight of:

That Buddhism is a religion of ardent aspiration for the higher good of men is not surprising. It springs out of the mind of the Buddha, a man of martial spirit and high aims……Buddhism is made by a warrior spirit for warriors.

Use of military imagery is common in religious literature. So we have Soldiers of God in Christianity. Hindu gods are always armed. Comparing Buddha to a warrior does not mean that he was a war monger. He advocated a peaceful attitude, compassion and generosity towards all beings. Cultivation of inner virtue demands qualities such as courage, endurance, selflessness, and determination, qualities expected to be found in good soldiers at the mundane level. So, the second verse cannot be interpreted as a Buddhist religious text that could invoked to justify war against any community.

But then, Johansson could be alluding to the Mahavamsa tradition, frequently cited in support of the nationalist cause, that king Dutugemunu (who ruled from 161-137 BCE), as a strategy to create awareness about, and woo public support for, his campaign on the way,  had a group of monks in the vanguard of his army when marching against the Damila (Dravida) invader Elara (205-161 BCE) in Anuradhapura. It is a historical fact that  monks have always been in the forefront of national struggles to protect the country, the nation, and the Buddhist dispensation from internal and external enemies. But the important thing to remember is that the Mahavamsa (The Great Chronicle) is not Buddhist scripture, though some biased non-Buddhist fake scholars misrepresent it as such. The Mahavamsa is a poem of great sophistication composed in the Pali language while also being the history of  Sinhaladweepa (the Island of the Sinhalese) as a Buddhist kingdom. (However, latest research has revealed that the history of the Sinhalese on the island extends to the hoary past much before the advent of Buddhism.) The answer to Johansson on his point, then, is that just as there is nothing in Buddhism that advocates fighting to settle disputes (though the Buddha himself was born to the Kshatriya or Warrior caste in a Hindu society, and was formally trained as a warrior in his youth before he set off on his spiritual quest), so is there nothing in Buddhism that prevents its adherents from fighting lawless terrorists in self defence.

Any Sinhalese Buddhist with an average knowledge of Buddhism would reject the idea of ‘Protestant Buddhism’ offhand without giving much thought to it. They would rely on their culturally determined understanding of the Buddhist teaching. However, the four scholars mentioned above in this article did not probably realize this. The mostly village dwelling Sinhalese Buddhists of that era (late 19^th and early 20^th century), though a very high percentage of them were illiterate and uneducated, knew enough of the essence of Buddhism to know that Buddhism was not a ‘religion’ unlike Christianity.  So, even in the mid-twentieth century, in the village areas, the term ‘agamkarayo’  or ‘agame minissu’ (lit. people pursuing religion or people of religion) was reserved for Christians; ‘eya agamata gihilla’ meant ‘he has embraced Christianity’. So, the unspoken assumption was that Buddhism was not a religion. Of course, this was implicit in their understanding of Buddhism and in their practice as taught by the monks; neither the monks nor the lay Buddhists would have gone so far as to explicitly say that Buddhism indeed was not a religion. Supplicating to Hindu gods for help in mundane affairs is something most Buddhists do, for which there are historical reasons. But they know that it is not a part of Buddhism.  (Here I am using the term ‘religion’ to refer to the concept of belief, without the support of empirical or experiential evidence, in and worship of a supreme being or an ultimate truth, for the purpose of escaping the unsatisfactoriness of human/worldly existence. Of course, most ordinary people who profess a religion, hardly ever worry about what exactly ‘religion’ means.) Even at that time, Buddhists ‘worshipped’ – Buddhists perform certain set devotional practices like offering flowers, incense,  and food and drinks, chanting verses in praise of the trinity of the Buddha, Dhamma and the Sangha (The Triple Gem. But their ‘worship’ does not involve any form of praying to a higher power.

The lines from W.B. Yeats’ ‘A Prayer for My Daughter’ (in the epigraph) apply very meaningfully to Johansson and the social anthropologists who proposed the theory of Buddhist  Protestantism that he embraces as gospel truth. May Johansson understand that a hate filled intellectual, when opinionated, is much more harmful to the society than an ordinary person (That’s what the poet Yeats tells his infant daughter to remember when she grows up). Look at the chaotic situation that the country has been plunged into mainly due to the West’s misconception that the majority (Sinhalese Buddhist) community want to lord it over the minorities by denying them equality out of their alleged ethno-religious chauvinism, fanaticism, xenophobia, and what have you. It is the Tamil separatist extremists and religious fundamentalists, themselves minorities within, respectively, the Tamil and Muslim minorities, who (i.e. those extremist elements) actually display these deplorable attributes that the Sinhalese Buddhists are wrongly accused of. Since internationally the Sinhalese are a small minority their protests are easily drowned in the deafening hue and cry raised by their false accusers that far outnumber them. The West’s anti-Sinhalese, anti-Buddhist misconceptions are reinforced by the sort of powerful misinformation fed to them in various forms including fake academic theories.

Let me conclude with an extract from Dr Sarath Amunugama’s book aforementioned ‘THE LION’S ROAR’:

…..the writings of these social scientists ……………….. contributed significantly to the work of propagandists portraying Sinhala Budddhists as an intolerant community which opposed the ‘legitimate rights’ of minorities, as they were captives of the Anagarika’s ideology. Some writers have referred to this alleged phenomenon as Dharmapalian nationalism”. Even the writings of many scholars examining Sinhalese folk religion, the credibility of Sinhalese and Pali narratives, particularly the Mahavamsa, and episodes in Sri Lankan history such as the career of King Dutugemunu were all neatly dovetailed into a propagandist attack on modern Sinhala Buddhism. As if to mirror this ideological approach of the social scientists, the Tamil Tigers (LTTE) targeted Buddhist places of worship and Buddhist monks in their military operations.”(p.534)

All Ceylon Railway Employees’ General Union 

ලේකම්,
ජී.එස්.විතානගේ මැතිතුමා,
ප‍්‍රවාහන හා සිවිල් ගුවන් සේවා අමාත්‍යාංශය,
සෙත්සිරිපාය, බත්තරමුල්ල.

දුම්රිය දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවේ ප‍්‍රධාන යාන්ත‍්‍රික ඉංජිනේරු අංශයේ සේවකයින්ගේ, සේවයට පැමිණිමේ හා පිටවීමේ වේලාවන් සම්බන්ධයෙන් මාස කිහිපයක සිට මතු වී ඇති ගැටළුවට නිසි විසඳුමක් ලබා නොදීම නිසා, එම අංශයේ නිශ්පාදන ඉලක්ක සපුරා ගැනීමට නොහැකි තත්වයක් උද්ගතව ඇත. මේ නිසා ධාවන තත්වයේ පවතින දුම්රිය එන්ජින් ප‍්‍රමානය 65 සිට 48 දක්වා පහල බැස ඇත.

මේ තත්වය  පිළිබඳව අවධානය යොමු නොකර තවත් කාලයක් ගත වුවහොත් ධාවනයට එක් කළ හැකි දුම්රිය එන්ජින් ප‍්‍රමානය තවත් අඩු වී යාහැකි බව පෙන්වා දෙන අතර, දුම්රිය එන්ජින් වල නඩත්තු කටයුතු දෛනිකව සිදු නොවීම මත දුම්රිය අවලංගු කිරීම, එන්ජින් අතරමග නතරවීම ආදිය සිදුවිමට ඉඩ ඇත. මේ මගින් දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවේ ඵලදායිතාවය බිඳ වැටෙන අතර, දුම්රිය මගින් අනවශ්‍ය පීඩාවකට ද ලක්විය හැකි බවද පෙනවා දෙමු.

රත්මලාන ප‍්‍රධාන යාන්ති‍්‍රක ඉංජිනේරු අංශයේ මාස ගණනාවක් තිස්සේ මතු වි ඇති මෙම ගැටළුව විසඳීම සඳහා දුම්රිය නිලධාරීන්ගෙන් පංච පුද්ගල කමිටුවක් පත්කර ඇතත්, නිශ්චිත වේලාවක් නියමකර නිසි විසඳුමක් ලබා දීමට එම කමිටුව අපොහොසත් වී ඇත.

ප‍්‍රශ්නයට නිසි විසඳුම් ලබා නොදීම හේතුවෙන් වෘත්තීය සමිති සහ සේවක කණ්ඩායම් විවිධ කි‍්‍රයාමාර්ග වල නිරත වන අතර, අවිධිමත් කි‍්‍රයාමාර්ග හේතුකොට ගෙන පරිපාලන ප‍්‍රශ්න ගණනාවක් මතුවී ඇත. මෙම ප‍්‍රශ්නයට විසඳුම් ලබාදීම ප‍්‍රමාද කිරීම නිසා සේවක අසමගිතාවයක් ගොඩ නැගී ඇති අතර, දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවේ ඵලදායිතාවය සඳහා මෙය බරපතල ලෙස බලපා ඇත. අයිතීන් දිනා ගැනීමේදීත්, රාජකාරි කිරීමේදීත් එකට බැඳී සිටිය යුතු දුම්රිය සේවකයින්ගේ සමගිය ඉතා අත්‍යාවශ්‍ය වන බැවින් දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවේ පැවැත්මට අයහපත් නොවන හා සේවකයින් හා වෘත්තීය සමිති වලට එකඟවිය හැකි නිශ්චිත විසඳුමක් කඩිනමින් ලබා දෙන ලෙස ගෞරවයෙන් යුතුව ඉල්ලා සිටිමු.

ස්තූතියි.,

මෙයට, 

සේවක අයිතීන් වෙනුවෙන්

එස්.පී.විතානගේ

ප‍්‍රධාන ලේකම්

 අරවින්ද අතුකෝරල

පිවිතුරු හෙල උරුමයේ නායක පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත‍්‍රී උදය ගම්මන්පිල මහතා එම පක්‍ෂ මූලස්ථානයේදී පැවති මාධ්‍ය හමුවකදී මෙසේ අදහස් පල කලේය.

19 වන සංශෝධනයෙන් පස්සේ ද්විත්ව පුරවැසියෙකුට ජනපතිවරණයට තරග කරන්න බෑ.  ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්ෂ මැතිතුමාගේ ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසි භාවය ඉවත් කිරීමේ අයදුම්පත ප්‍රතික්ෂේප වුණු බවට බරපතල බොරු ප්‍රචාරයක් සමාජ ජාලා වල පැතිරෙනවා.  ඒ වගේම පුරවැසිභාවයෙන් ඉවත් වීම ඇමෙරිකාව විසින් අනුමත කරන්නේ ජනපතිවරණයෙන් පසුව බවට කටකතා පැතිරෙනවා.  එතකොට අල්ලපු අත්තයි පය ගහපු අත්තයි දෙකම නැති වෙනවා වගේ ගෝඨාභය මැතිතුමාට ජනපතිකමයි ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකමයි දෙකම නැති වෙනවා කියලායි පුවත්පත් වලට ලිපි ලියන ඩොලර් පවුම් විද්වතුන් කියන්නේ.  මේ තත්වය නිසා ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම පිළිබඳව නීතිමය තත්වය රටට පැහැදිලි කරන්න කියලා ගෝඨාභය මැතිතුමා මගෙන් ඉල්ලීමක් කළා.

මුලින්ම කියන්න ඕනෑ ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත් හැරීම ඇමෙරිකාවට නුහුරු දෙයක් නොවේ.  විවිධ හේතු මත සෑම වසරකම 5,000ක් වැනි විශාල පිරිසක් ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත් හරිනවා.

ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකමට අදාළ නීතිය තමයි Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 නොහොත් 1952 සංක්‍රමණ සහ ජාතිකත්ව පනත.  මේ පනතේ 349(ඒ)(5) වගන්තිය යටතේ ඕනෑම පුරවැසියෙකුට ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හරින්න පුළුවන්.  දෙපැත්තම කැමැති වෙන්න ඕනෑ නෑ.  පුරවැසියා කැමති නම් අත් හරින්න පුළුවන්.  පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීම ප්‍රතික්ෂේප කළ යුතු හෝ කළ හැකි අවස්ථා නීතියේ සඳහන් වෙන්නේ නෑ.  නමුත් නඩු තීන්දු වලින් තීරණය වී තිබෙනවා.

ඇමෙරිකාවේ සිටිමින් පුරවැසිකම අත් හැරීමට අයදුම් කළොත් ප්‍රතික්ෂේප කළ යුතුයි.  ඒ වගේම අයදුම් කරන පුද්ගලයා සතු එකම පුරවැසිකම ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම නම් ඔහුගේ ඉල්ලීමත් ප්‍රතික්ෂේප කරන්න පුළුවන්.

පළමු පියවර තමයි වෙනත් රටක පුරවැසිභාවය ලබා ගැනීම.  රටක් නැති පුද්ගලයෙකුට බරපතල නීතිමය ගැටළු වලට මුහුණ දෙන්න වන නිසා බොහෝ විට ඇමෙරිකාව ප්‍රතික්ෂේප කරනවා.  ඒ නිසා ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ සම්මුඛ සාකච්ඡාවට යන විට පුරවැසිකම තිබෙන අනිත් රටේ ගමන් බලපත්‍රය රැගෙන යෑම අතිශයින්ම වැදගත්.  ගෝඨාභය මහතා දැනටමත් ලංකාවේ පුරවැසියෙකු නිසා පළමු පියවර සම්පූර්ණයි.

දෙවන පියවර වන්නේ ඩීඑස් 4079 සිට ඩීඑස් 4083 දක්වා වන පත්‍ර පිරවීමයි.  ඩීඑස් 4079 යනු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමට අදාළ ප්‍රශ්න මාලාවක්.  ඩීඑස් 4080 කියන්නේ පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ දිවුරුම් ප්‍රකාශයයි.  ඩීඑස් 4081 යනු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ ප්‍රතිවිපාක තමන් දන්නා බවට කරන ප්‍රකාශයයි.  ඩීඑස් 4082 යනු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීම පිළිබඳ සාක්ෂිකරුවන් පුරවන පත්‍රිකාවයි.  ඩීඑස් 4083 යනුවෙන් හඳුන්වන්නේ පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ සහතිකයයි.

මේ පත්‍රිකා අධ්‍යනය කරලා අවශ්‍ය තොරතුරු සූදානම් කර ගත් පසු තෙවන පියවර වන්නේ ඇමෙරිකානු තානාපති කාර්යාලයට අවශ්‍යතාවය දන්වලා වෙලාවක් වෙන් කර ගැනීමයි.  හතර වන පියවර වෙන්නේ අදාළ පත්‍රිකා පුරවලා සාක්ෂිකරුවන් දෙදෙනෙකු සමග තමන්ගේ දෙවන පුරවැසිකම තහවුරු කරන ලේඛණ ද සමග අදාළ වේලාවට ඇමෙරිකානු තානාපති කාර්යාලයට යෑමයි.

තානාපති කාර්යාලයේ දී පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ ලේඛණයට තානාපති කාර්යාලයේ නිලධාරියා සහ සාක්ෂිකරුවන් ඉදිරිපිට අත්සන් තැබුවාම ඒ මොහොතේ සිට පුරවැසිකම අවසන් වෙනවා.  ඒ බව සහතික කරලා ඩීඑස් 4083 කියන මෙන්න මේ ලේඛණය ලබා දෙනවා.  ඒකට තමයි පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ සහතිකය කියන්නේ.  රියදුරු බලපත්‍රය ලැබෙන තුරු දෙන තාවකාලික රියදුරු බලපත්‍රය වගේ, රක්ෂණ සහතිකය ලැබෙන තුරු දෙන තාවකාලික රක්ෂණ ආවරණය වගේ මේ සහතිකය තාවකාලිකයි.  ඇමෙරිකාවේ රාජ්‍ය දෙපාර්තමේන්තුව විසින් පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ ස්ථිර සහතිකයක් නිකුත් කරන තෙක් මෙම ලේඛණය වලංගුයි.

අවසාන පියවර වන්නේ  අවසාන බදු වාර්තාව ගොනු කළ දිනයේ සිට පුරවැසිකම අත් හරින දිනය තෙක් වූ කාලයට අදාළ බදු වාර්තාව ගොනු කිරීමයි.  ඊට පස්සේ මාස දෙකක් සහ හයක් ඇතුලත පුරවැසිකම අත් හැරීමේ ස්ථිර සහතිකය නිකුත් කරනවා.

මේ ක්‍රියාවලිය දෙස බැලුවාම කාරණා දෙකක් පැහැදිලියි.  පළමු කාරණය තමයි වෙනත් රටක පුරවැසියෙකු වන ඇමෙරිකානුවෙකු විසින් ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීම නැවැත්වීමට ඇමෙරිකානු ආණ්ඩුවට හැකියාවක් නැති බවයි.  දෙවන කාරණය වන්නේ ඇමෙරිකානු තානාපති කාර්යාල නිලධාරියෙකු ඉදිරියේ පුරවැසිකම අත් හැරීමේ ප්‍රකාශය නිසි ලෙස සම්පූර්ණ කළ වහාම ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත් හැරෙන බවයි.  මේ නිසා ගෝඨා භය කියන භීතිකාව වැළඳුනු පිරිස් පතුරුන ආකාරයෙන් ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්ෂ මහතාට ජනපතිවරණයට තරග කරන්න ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම බාධාවක් නොවන වග ඉතාම වගකීමෙන් ප්‍රකාශ කරනවා.

https://youtu.be/iUcWxisTXwU

ඩබ්ලිව්.කේ. ප්‍රසාද් මංජු උපුටාගැණීම  මව්බිම

ලෝකයේ දරුණුතම ත්‍රස්තවාදය පරාජය කරමින් රට වේගවත් සංවර්ධනයකට ගෙනගිය තමන්ට 20% කින් බදු බර අඩුකර ජනතාවට සහන ලබාදෙමින් රට ඉදිරියට ගෙනයෑම කිසිදු ගැටලුවක් නොවන බව හිටපු ජනාධිපති මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මහතා අප කළ විමසීමකදී ප්‍රකාශ කළේය.

සියයට 20කින් බදු බර අඩුකරන්නේ කෙසේදැයි කියා පෙන්වාදෙන ලෙසට අග්‍රාමාත්‍ය රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ මහතා හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරයාට කරන ලද අභියෝගය ගැන මව්බිමකළ විමසුමකට පිළිතුරු දෙමින් හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරයා මේ බව පැවැසීය.

ලෝකයේ දරුණුතම ත්‍රස්තවාදය පරාජය කිරීමට නොහැකි බව එදා ඇතැම් දේශපාලනඥයන් ප්‍රකාශ කරද්දී ත්‍රස්තවාදය පරාජය කිරීමට තමා නායකත්වය ලබා දෙමින් අභියෝග රැසක් මධ්‍යයේ ත්‍රස්තවාදය පරාජය කර රට සංවර්ධනය කළ තමාට රටේ ආර්ථිකය ශක්තිමත් කරමින් බදු බරෙන් ජනතාව නිදහස් කරමින් ඔවුන්ට යම් සහනයක් ලබාදීම අභියෝගයක් නොවන බවත් ඒ සඳහා තමා තුළ සැලසුම් තිබෙන බවත් මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මහතා පෙන්වා දෙයි.

වත්මන් ආණ්ඩුව විසින් ජනතාව මත දිගින් දිගටම පටවන බදු බරට එරෙහිව ඒකාබද්ධ විපක්ෂය ප්‍රමුඛ ආණ්ඩු විරෝධී බලවේග දිගින් දිගටම හඬ නඟපු නිසා බදු බර ගැන අග්‍රාමාත්‍යවරයා ප්‍රමුඛ ආණ්ඩුවේ අවධානය යම් ආකාරයකට යොමු වී තිබෙන බවත් හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරයා ප්‍රකාශ කරයි.

අවධානයට පමණක් සීමා නොවී බදු බරෙන් මිරිකී සිටින ජනතාවට යම් සහනයක් ලබාදීමට ආණ්ඩුව දැන්වත් ක්‍රියාකළ යුතු බවද හිටපු ජනාධිපතිවරයා වැඩිදුරටත් ප්‍රකාශ කළේය.

ආචාර්ය නාලක ගොඩහේවා උපුටාගැණීම  මව්බිම

ලංකාවේ ආර්ථික වර්ධන වේගය පළමු වරට සෘණ අගයක් ගත්තේ 2001 වසරේ චන්ද්‍රිකා බණ්ඩාරනායක ජනාධිපතිනිය යටතේය. 1996 වසරේදී වසර 19ක එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ පාලනය අවසන් කරමින් 62.28%ක අති විශාල ඡන්ද ප්‍රතිශයකින් ජයග්‍රහණය කළ චන්ද්‍රිකා බණ්ඩාරනායක ජනාධිපතිනිය ගැන රටේ විශාල බලාපොරොත්තුවක් තිබුණද අවාසනාවකට මෙන් ඇය ඉතිහාසයට එක්වූයේ ආකාර්යක්ෂම නායිකාවක් ලෙසය.

විශේෂයෙන්ම වෙලාවට වැඩ කළ අතිශයින්ම කාර්යක්ෂම ජනාධිපතිවරයකු වූ ආර්. ප්‍රේමදාස වසර 3ක කෙටි කාලයක් තුළ සිදුකළ වැඩකටයුතු සමඟ සසඳන විට ඇගේ වසර 11ක පාලන කාලය රටට මෙලෝ වැඩක් සිදු නොවූ යුගයක් ලෙස නම් කළ හැකිය. එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂය බලයට ආවොත් නම් රටේ සංවර්ධනය වේගවත් වනු ඇත යන මිථ්‍යාව රටේ මුල්බැස ගත්තේ චන්ද්‍රිකාගේ මේ දුර්වල පාලනය නිසාය.

වත්මන් එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ නායකත්වය ලංකාවේ ආර්ථික කළමනාකරණයට චන්ද්‍රිකා බණ්ඩාරනායකටත් වඩා දුර්වල බව අද ලංකාවේ ආර්ථිකය ගැන සුළු හෝ අවබෝධයක් ඇති අයකුට නම් වැටහී යා යුතුය. චන්ද්‍රිකා බණඩාරනායක 2004 බලයට එනවිට මේ රටේ යුද්ධයක් තිබිණි. රටේ ආර්ථික ගැටලු රැසක්ද තිබිණි. ඇගේ නොහැකියාව නිසා ඒවාට විසඳුම් සෙවීමට නොහැකි වූ බව සැබෑවකි.

එහෙත් වත්මන් ආණ්ඩුව බලයට එනවිට යුද්ධය අවසන් වී තිබිණි. සෑම ආර්ථික දර්ශකයකින්ම වාගේ ලංකාව ආසියාවේ ඉදිරියෙන්ම සිටි රටවල් කිහිපය අතර සිටියේය. සංවර්ධන වේගය ආසියාව තුළ දෙවැනි වූයේ චීනයට පමණි. විදේශ ආයෝජන විශාල වශයෙන් රටට ගලා එමින් තිබිණි. කොළඹ නගරය පුරා විවිධ ඉදිකිරීම් සිදුවෙමින් එය දිස්වූයේ කාර්යබහුල වැඩපොළක් මෙනි. රටපුරා යටිතල පහසුකම් ඉදිවී තවත් සංවර්ධන ව්‍යාපෘතීන් ක්‍රියාත්මක වෙමින් තිබිණි. අලුත් ආණ්ඩුවට තිබුණේ එතැනින් පටන්ගෙන සංවර්ධන වැඩපිළිවෙළ තවත් වේගවත් හා කාර්යක්ෂම කිරීම පමණි.

පසුගිය වසර 3 1/2 තුළ අගමැති රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ ප්‍රමුඛ වත්මන් රජය සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම අවුල් කරගත්තේ එවැනි ස්වර්ණමය අවස්ථාවකි.

2017 වසර වනවිට ලංකාවේ සංවර්ධන වේගය 3.1%ට පහත වැටී තිබිණි. මේ ආසියාවේ දළ සංවර්ධන වේගය 6%ක් පමණ වන අවස්ථාවකය. ලංකාවේ මුදල් ඇමෙරිකානු ඩොලරයට සාපේක්ෂව වත්මන් රජය යටතේ 20%කින් බාල්දු වී ඇත. නොපියවූ විදේශ ණය වසර 3ක් වැනි කෙටි කාලයක් තුළ 40%කින් ඉහළ ගොස් තිබුණු අතර මේ වන විට තත්ත්වය තවත් බරපතළය. ජනතාවගේ ජීවන වියදම අතිශයින් ඉහළ ගොස් තිබියදී රජයද ජනතාව මත විශාල බදු බරක් පටවා ඇත. 2014ට සාපේක්ෂව රජයේ බදු අයකිරීම් 100%කින් ඉහළ යෑමට නියමිත අතර අවසානයේ එහි බර දරන්නට වන්නේ සෘජු හා වක්‍ර මාර්වලින් රටේ පුරවැසියන්ටය.

මේ අර්බුදයට හේතුව මෛත්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන ජනාධිපතිවරයා රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ අගමැතිවරයාට වැඩ කිරීමට බාධා කිරීමය යන අලුත් මිථ්‍යාවක් ජනගත කිරීමට එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂයේ දේශපාලනඥයන් උත්සාහ කරන්නේ මීළඟ ඡන්දය ඉලක්ක කරගෙනය. තනි එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ ආණ්ඩුවක් යටතේ නම් ආර්ථික දියුණු කළ හැකිය යන මතයක් ජනතාවට ඒත්තු ගැන්වීම ඔවුන්ගේ අරමුණයි.

රටේ ආර්ථික අර්බුදයට හේතුව මෛත්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන ජනාධිපතිවරයාගේ ඇඟිලි ගැසීම නොවන බව තේරුම් ගත යුතුමය. වත්මන් රජය බලයට ආ පසු රටේ මුදල් ඇමැති තනතුර දිගටම දැරුවේ එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ ඇමැතිවරුය.

ආර්ථික ප්‍රතිපත්ති සකස් වන්නේ අගමැතිවරයා යටතේය. ආර්ථිකයට වැඩිම බලපෑමක් එල්ල කරන අමාත්‍යාංශ සියල්ලම වාගේ තිබෙන්නේ එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ ඇමැතිවරු යටතේය. හවුල් ආණ්ඩුව තුළ සිටින දෙපිරිසටම වැඩ බැරි බව මේ වන විට පැහැදිලි වුවත් ආර්ථික කළමනාකරණය අනාගැනීමේ මූලික වගකීම හවුල් ආණ්ඩුව මත පටවා නිදහස් වීමට රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ අගමැතිවරයා ප්‍රමුඛ එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ ඇමැතිවරුන්ට කිසිසේත්ම නොහැක.

උදාහරණයක් වශයෙන් පසුගිය ජනාධිපතිවරණය අවසන් වී දින 50ක් ගතවන්නටත් පෙර මහ බැංකු මංකොල්ලය කරන්නය කියා දින 100 වැඩපිළිවෙළේ ලියා තිබුණේ නැති බව පසුගියදා මෛත්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන ජනාධිපතිවරයාම සෝභිත හිමි අනුස්මරණ උත්සවයේදී පැවැසීය. බැඳුම්කර කොල්ලයෙන් රටට වූ පාඩුව රුපියල් කෝටි ලක්ෂය පනින බව මුලින්ම පෙන්වා දුන්නේ ශ්‍රී ලංකා නිදහස් පක්ෂයේ ඇමැතිවරයකු වන ලක්‍ෂ්මන් යාපා අබේවර්ධන මහතාය.

රුපියල් කෝටි ලක්ෂයක් යනු එසේ මෙසේ මුදලක් නොවේ. 2014 වසරේ ලංකා රජයේ සමස්ත ආදායම රුපියල් කෝටි ලක්ෂයක් විය. 2015 බැඳුම්කර මංකොල්ලයෙන් රටට වූ පාඩුව ඒ හා සමානය. මෙය ලංකාව වැනි රටකට දැරිය හැකි පාඩුවක්ද?

එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ රජයක් යටතේ ව්‍යාපාරිකයන්ට හොඳ කලක් උදාවනු ඇති බවට තිබුණු බලාපොරොත්තුව බිඳ වැටීමට වත්මන් රජය පත්වී මාස 3ක් ගත නොවිණි. 2015 මාර්තු මාසයේ නව රජය විසින් ඉදිරිපත් කරන ලද අතුරු අය-වැයෙන් ඉතිහාසයේ කිසිවිටක අසා නැති අසාධාරණ බදු රැසක් ව්‍යාපාරිකයන් මත පැටවිණි. උදාහරණයක් ලෙස අතීතයට බලපාන ලෙස පැනවූ සුපිරි ආදායම් බද්ද නම් කළ හැකිය. ඊට පෙර වසරේ ඕනෑම සමාගමක් රුපියල් බිලියන 2කට වඩා ලාභයක් ලබා ඇත්නම් එය අයුතු ලෙස ඉපයූ ආදායමක් ලෙස නම් කළ මුදල් ඇමැති රවි කරුණානායක ඒ සෑම සමාගමකින්ම අතීතයට බලපාන ලෙස 25%ක බද්දක් ඔවුන් එතෙක් නීත්‍යනුකූලව ගෙවා තිබූ බදුවලට අමතරව පැනවීය.

සියලුම ජංගම දුරකථන සමාගම් මත කිසිදු සාධාරණ හේතුවක් නොදක්වා එකවරක් පමණක් ගෙවිය යුතු රුපියල් මිලියන 250ක බද්ඳක් පැනවිණි. ක්‍රීඩා ප්‍රචාරක නාළිකා මත එකවරක් පමණක් ගෙවන රුපියල් මිලියන 1000ක බද්දක් පැනවිණි. පිටරටක පදිංචියට යන ශ්‍රී ලාංකිකයන්ගෙන් 20%ක බද්දක් ඔවුන් රැගෙන යන මුදල් මත පැනවිණි. මෙවැනි අත්තනෝමතික බදු පැනවීමේ ප්‍රතිඵලය වූයේ සමස්ත ව්‍යාපාර ක්‍ෂේත්‍රයම මවිතයට හා තැතිගැන්මට ලක්වීමයි. පිස්සන් රැළක් බලයට පැමිණ ඇත්දැයි සැක පහළ කිරීමට පළමු සංඥාව ඒ වූ බැවිනි. දේශීය හා විදේශීය ආයෝජකයන්ගේ නව රජය පිළිබඳ විශ්වාසය බිඳ වැටීම ආරම්භ වූයේ එතැනිනි.

පසුගිය ආණ්ඩුව යටතේ බොහෝ කෘෂි නිෂ්පාදනවලින් රට ස්වයංපෝෂිතව තිබිණි. රටේ හාල් අතිරික්තයක් පවා තිබිණි. නමුත් වත්මන් රජය බලයට ආ සිටම කළේ කෘෂිකර්මාන්තයට කෙනෙහිලි කිරීමය. පළමු අය-වැයෙන්ම පොහොර සහනාධාරය කපා දමන ලදී. විකල්ප විසඳුමක් සෙවීමට කල් නොදී යම් රසායනික පොහොර වර්ග තහනම් කරන ලදී. වී වගා කරන ඉඩම් ප්‍රමාණය වැඩියි. කියා කෘෂිකර්මාන්ත ඇමැතිවරයාම කර්මාන්තයට අපහාස කළේය. 2016 දී කෘෂිකර්මාන්ත 3.8%කිනුත් 2017 දී තවත් 0.8% කිනුත් කඩා වැටිණි. පසුගිය දශකය තුළ අඩුම වී නිෂ්පාදනය වාර්තා කරමින් වසරක් තුළ වී නිෂ්පාදනය මෙටි්‍රක් ටොන් 2.4ක් දක්වා සියයට 46.1කින් පහත වැටිණි. 2016/17 මහ සහ යල කන්න දෙකෙහි වාර්ෂික වී නිෂ්පාදනය සහල් මෙටි්‍රක් ටොන් මිලියන 1.7කට සමාන වූ අතර එය ප්‍රමාණවත් වුණේ මාස අටකට ආසන්න කාලයක දේශීය පරිභෝජනය සඳහා පමණි. කෘෂිකර්මාන්තයට කුඩම්මාගේ සැලකිලි දැක්වීමේ අවසන් ප්‍රතිඵලය වූයේ සහල් ආනයනයට රටට විශාල වියදමක් දරන්නට සිදුවීම හා වෙළෙඳපොළේ සහල් මිල ඉහළ යෑමයි.

රජයේ සමහරක් මෝඩ තීරණ නිසා රටට වූ පාඩුවද අපමණය. උදාහරණයක් ලෙස දේශපාලන ප්‍රචාරක වාසිය බලාපොරොත්තුවෙන් බලයට ආ විගස පෝට් සිටි ව්‍යාපෘතිය නතර කිරීම නිසා අවසානයේ චීනයට ගෙවන්නට වූ වන්දිය රුපියල් කෝටි 2,600ක් පමණ වේ. දුරදිග නොසිතා ශ්‍රී ලන්කන් ගුවන් සේවය විසින් ඇණවුම් කොට තිබූ නව ගුවන් යානා ඇණවුම අවලංගු කොට ගෙවන්නට වූ වන්දිය රුපියල් කෝටි 1,700ක් පමණ වේ. හයට් හෝටලයේ ගෘහ නිර්මාණ කොන්ත්‍රාත් අවලංගු කිරීමට ගත් එවැනිම තීරණයක් නිසා සැපයුම්කරුවන්ට ගෙවන්නට වූ වන්දිය රුපියල් කෝටි 160ක් පමණ වේ. මේ නව රජයේ වැරැදි තීරණ නිසා කරගත් පාඩුවලින් කිහිපයක් පමණි. අවසානයේ මේ සියලු වන්දි ගෙවන්නට සිදුවූයේ මහජන බදු මුදලිනි.

සෑම වසරකම රජයක් විසින් අය-වැයක් ඉදිරිපත් කොට අමාත්‍යාංශවලට මුදල් වෙන් කරන්නේ ඒ ඒ අමාත්‍යාංශවල අරමුණු යටතේ රටට වැඩ කරන්නටය. එහෙත් පසුගිය වසර කිහිපය පුරාම වසර අවසානයේ විශාල මුදලක් භාවිත නොකොට ඉතුරු වන බව රජයේ වාර්තාවලින් පෙනී යයි. මින් පෙනී යන්නේ සමස්ත රාජ්‍ය තන්ත්‍රයම අකර්මණ්‍ය වී වාර්ෂික අනුමත වැඩසටහන්වත් නිම කර ගත නොහැකි තත්ත්ත්වයට පත්වී ඇති බවය.
2014 වන විට ලංකාවට තවත් වසර ගණනාවක් සඳහා අවශ්‍ය යටිතල පහසුකම් බොහෝමයක් අවසන්ව තිබිණි. කඩිනමින් නිම කිරීමට අනුමතව තිබූ තවත් වැදගත් ව්‍යාපෘති කිහිපයක් වූයේ සාම්පූර් ගල් අඟුරු බලාගාර ව්‍යාපෘතිය, නුවර අධිවේගී මාර්ගය, අගනුවර එකතුවන කසළ සනීපාරක්ෂක ක්‍රමවේදයක් යටතේ ඉවත් කිරීමේ සැලැස්ම හා කොළඹ නගරයේ වැසි ජලය ප්‍රවාහන පද්ධතිය නවීකරණය කිරීමේ ව්‍යාපෘතියයි. මීට අමතරව බස්නාහිර ප්‍රවාහන තදබදය විසඳීමට නියමිත ගුවන් දුම්රිය සැලසුමද සාකච්ඡා මට්ටමේ තිබිණි. අද මේ සියල්ල එක්කෝ නැවතී ඇත නැත්නම් ඉබි ගමනින් ගාටමින් තිබෙනු දැකිය හැකිය.

මේ සියල්ලෙන් පෙනී යන්නේ කුමක්ද? හවුලේ කළත් තනිවම කළත් මේ උදවියට නම් රට කරන්නට බැරි බවය.

තිළිණි කෞශල්‍යා විජේසිංහ උපුටාගැණීම  මව්බිම

ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් කළේ
රාජපක්ෂවරුන්ය කියා ප්‍රකාශ කරන මෙන් අත්අඩංගුවට ගත් හමුදා නිලධාරීන්ට විවිධ බලපෑම් එල්ල වෙන අතරේ ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් කිරීමේ වගකීම පා.ච. රණවක ඇමැතිතුමා භාර ගැනීම සතුටට කාරණයක් බව පිවිතුරු හෙළ උරුමයේ නායක පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රි උදය ගම්මන්පිල පැවැසීය.

මන්ත්‍රිවරයා මෙසේ පැවැසුවේ ඊයේ (11දා) පිවිතුරු හෙළ උරුම ප්‍රධාන කාර්යාලයේදී පැවැති මාධ්‍ය සාකච්ඡාවේදීය.

මන්ත්‍රිවරයා මෙසේද කීවේය.

‘මව්බිම’ පුවත්පත තමන්ට නිශ්චිතව සාක්ෂි තිබෙන නිසා ඉතාම වගකීමෙන් ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් කළේ පා.ච. රණවක ඇමැතිතුමන්ය කියන කාරණය තමන්ගේ පුවත්පතේ ප්‍රසිද්ධ කළා. ඇමැතිතුමා කෝටි සියයක් වන්දි ඉල්ලලා ‘මව්බිම’ පුවත්පතට නඩු දැම්මා. නඩුව දැක්කම බයවෙලා සමථයකට පත් කරගමු කියා කියයි යැයි එතුමා හිතන්න ඇති. ‘මව්බිම’ පුවත්පත සතුව සාධාරණ සාක්ෂි තිබුණු නිසා ‘මව්බිම’ එහෙම කරන්න ගියේ නැහැ.

පා.ච. රණවක ඇමැතිතුමාගේ නීතිඥයෝ මව්බිම පුවත්පතේ නීතිඥයන්ට කතා කරලා අහනවා නඩුව ගොඩින් බේරගමුද කියලා. නඩුව කරගෙන යමු කියලා ‘මව්බිම’ පුවත්පත කියනවා. තමන්ට අපහාසයක් වුණාය කියලා නඩු දාපු රණවක ඇමැතිතුමාම නඩුව ඉල්ලා අස් කර ගන්නවා. කෝටි සියයටත් පයින් ගහලා.

ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් කළේ පා.ච. රණවක ඇමැතිතුමන්ය කියලා පුවත්පතේ පළවීම තමන්ට අපහාසයක් වී නැතැයි කියා එතුමා පිළිගන්න නිසා තමයි අපහාසයට සිදුවූ වන්දිය ඉල්ලලා ගොනු කළ නඩුව ඉවත් කරගත්තේ.

එතුමාගේ පෞද්ගලික ජීවිතය පිළිබඳ ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ, ලංකා ඊ නිවුස් එකට බරපතළ අශිෂ්ට ගණයේ ලිපියක් ලිව්වා. ඒ ලිපියෙන් පස්සේ එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් වෙන්නේ. ඒ ලිපියයි අතුරුදන් වීමයි අතර කාල පරාසයේ සිදු වුණු දේවල් පිළිබඳ අපටත් යම් අවබෝධයක් තිබෙනවා. ඒ නඩුවේ සාක්ෂිකරුවන් වෙන්න අපිත් බලාපොරොත්තුවෙන් හිටියා. නමුත් අපිට ඒ අවස්ථාව අහිමි වුණා නඩුව ඉවත් කර ගැනීම නිසා.

අපි දෑස් දල්වා බලාගෙන ඉන්නවා අපරාධ පරීක්ෂණ

දෙපාර්තමේන්තුව මෙවරවත් ප්‍රශ්න කරාවි කියලා. මීට පෙරත් මේ නම තමයි කියැවුණේ. නමුත් ආණ්ඩු පෙරළියෙන් පස්සේ මේ පැත්තෙන් ඒ පැත්තට පැන්න නිසා චම්පික ජම්පික වූ නිසා ඔහුට එරෙහිව නීතිය ක්‍රියාත්මක වුණේ නැහැ.

තමන්ම පිළිගත්තට පස්සේ සාක්ෂි හොයන්න දෙයක් නෑ. දඬුවම් කිරීම පමණයි තියෙන්නේ. සාක්ෂි ආඥා පනතේ ඉතාම පැහැදිලිව කියලා තියෙනවා ‘පිළිගත් දේ ඔප්පු කිරීම අනවශ්‍යයි’ කියලා. ඒ වගේම ජනතා විමුක්ති පෙරමුණේ හිටපු පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රි වසන්ත සමරසිංහ මැතිතුමා දූෂණ විරෝධී හ‍ෙ¾ඩ් නායකයෙක් ලෙස මාධ්‍ය හමුවක් කැඳවලා ගල්අඟුරු වංචාවේ මහා මොළකරු පා.ච. රණවක ඇමැතිතුමන්ය කියලා ප්‍රකාශයක් කරලා, එය ‘මව්බිම’ පුවත්පතේ පළ වුණා. මේ ප්‍රකාශය නිසා තමන්ගේ කීර්ති නාමයට සිදුවූ හානියට වන්දි වශයෙන් රුපියල් මිලියන පන්සියයක් ඉල්ලලා නඩු දැම්මා. දැන් ඒ නඩුවත් අයින් කරගෙන.

එතුමා කියන්නේ ගල්අඟුරු වංචාවේ මහ මොළකරු පා.ච. රණවකය යන ප්‍රකාශයෙන් තමන්ට අපහාසයක් වෙන්නේ නෑ. අපහාසයක් නොවන්නේ ඇත්තටම කළ කෙනකුට පමණමයි. එතුමා ප්‍රගීත් එක්නැලිගොඩ අතුරුදන් කිරීමේ වගකීම විතරක් නෙමෙයි ගල්අඟුරු වංචාවේ මහා වගකීමද භාරගෙන තිබෙනවා. එතුමා වසර ගණනාවක් ගිහින් හෝ ඇත්ත ඇති සැටියෙන් පිළිගැනීම නිසා අපි සතුටු වෙනවා.

19 වැනි සංශෝධනයෙන් පස්සේ ද්විත්ව පුරවැසියකුට ජනපතිවරණයට තරග කරන්න බෑ. ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්ෂ මැතිතුමාගේ ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිභාවය ඉවත් කිරීමේ අයැදුම්පත ප්‍රතික්ෂේප වුණු බවට බරපතළ බොරු ප්‍රචාරයක් සමාජ ජාලවල පැතිරෙනවා. ඒ වගේම පුරවැසිභාවයෙන් ඉවත් වීම ඇමෙරිකාව විසින් අනුමත කරන්නේ ජනපතිවරණයෙන් පසුව බවට කටකතා පැතිරෙනවා. එතකොට අල්ලපු අත්තයි පය ගහපු අත්තයි දෙකම නැති වෙනවා වගේ ගෝඨාභය මැතිතුමාට ජනපතිකමයි ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකමයි දෙකම නැති වෙනවා කියලයි පුවත්පත්වලට ලිපි ලියන ඩොලර් පවුම් විද්වතුන් කියන්නේ. මේ තත්ත්වය නිසා ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම පිළිබඳව නීතිමය තත්ත්වය රටට පැහැදිලි කරන්න කියලා ගෝඨාභය මැතිතුමා මගෙන් ඉල්ලීමක් කළා.

ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකමට අදාළ නීතිය තමයි ධ්ථථඪඨපචබඪධද චදඤ ව්චබඪධදචතඪබර ඒජබ ධට 1952 නොහොත් 1952 සංක්‍රමණ සහ ජාතිකත්ව පනතේ 349 (ඒ)(5) වගන්තිය යටතේ ඕනෑම පුරවැසියකුට ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හරින්න පුළුවන්. දෙපැත්තම කැමැති වෙන්න ඕනෑ නෑ. පුරවැසියා කැමැති නම් අත්හරින්න පුළුවන්. පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීම ප්‍රතික්ෂේප කළ යුතු හෝ කළ හැකි අවස්ථා නීතියේ සඳහන් වෙන්නේ නෑ.

පළමු කාරණය තමයි වෙනත් රටක පුරවැසියකු වන ඇමෙරිකානුවකු විසින් ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීම නැවැත්වීමට ඇමෙරිකානු ආණ්ඩුවට හැකියාවක් නැති බවයි. දෙවැනි කාරණය වන්නේ ඇමෙරිකානු තානාපති කාර්යාල නිලධාරියකු ඉදිරියේ පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරීමේ ප්‍රකාශය නිසි ලෙස සම්පූර්ණ කළ වහාම ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම අත්හැරෙනවා. මේ නිසා ගෝඨාභය කියන භීතිකාව වැලඳුණු පිරිස් පතුරන ආකාරයෙන් ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්ෂ මහතාට ජනපතිවරණයට තරග කරන්න ඇමෙරිකානු පුරවැසිකම බාධාවක් නොවන වග ඉතාම වගකීමෙන් ප්‍රකාශ කරනවා.

Lahiru Pothmulla Courtesy The Daily Mirror

Higher Education and Cultural Affairs Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe today said the presenting of the 20th Amendment to the Constitution on abolishing the executive presidency at a time such as this could pose a major problem.

After a visit to the Colombo Arts Gallery, he told the media that if the executive presidency was abolished at a time when even the local government bodies were unstable, the country would end up in anarchy.

There is a major issue with the 20A. This is not a personal or a party political issue, but an issue which effects the country. The executive presidency the Proportional Representation (PR) system were introduced together. There would not be major repercussions if the executive presidency was abolished while the PR system remained unchanged. However, the electoral system has been changed today resulting in ‘hung’ local government bodies. The provincial council electoral system had also been amended,” he said.

The minister said when all three levels of governance in the country including the Parliamentary system was changed resulting in ‘hung’ governing bodies, the country would become a ‘Somalia’ in the absence of an executive presidency.

Before making amendments, the repercussions should be properly evaluated,” he said.

By Shamindra Ferdinando Courtesy The Island

June 12, 2018, 12:01 pm

The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna/Joint Opposition yesterday ruled out the possibility of reunification of SLFP factions under any circumstances.

SLPP Chairman Prof. G.L. Peiris emphasized that the SLFP proposal to field President Maithripala Sirisena as its candidate was not acceptable to the dissident group and therefore that party shouldn’t expect their backing. The SLPP announced its position on the presidential poll, at Nelum Mawatha Office, Battaramulla.

Former External Affairs Minister Prof. Peiris quoted former President Mahinda Rajapaksa as having declared recently that their candidate would be announced at the appropriate time.

Prof. Peiris said so when The Island asked him whether the SLPP/JO would field its own Presidential candidate. Referring to statements made by SLFP General Secretary Prof. Rohana Lakshman Piyadasa and SLFP National Organizer Duminda Dissanayake as regards the formation of a broad coalition to back Sirisena at the next presidential poll, Prof. Peiris said that the outcome of the Feb. 10, 2018 Local Government polls indicated the public opinion. A political party in power had never suffered such a humiliating electoral defeat, Prof. Peiris said, urging the SLFP to review its strategies or face the consequences.

Of 95 lawmakers elected and appointed to parliament at Aug. 17, 2015 parliamentary polls, 41 (39 SLFP and two Ceylon Workers Congress) comprised the group loyal to President Sirisena. Although 16 of the SLFPers in Sirisena’s camp had formed a separate group, it remained with the ruling SLFP.

The SLFP and the UNP seemed still unable to grasp the ground situation, Prof. Peiris said, pointing out that in spite of much publicized appointment of office bearers of the party, key SLFPers were pulling in different directions.

Prof. Peiris said that Ministers Duminda Dissanayake and Mahinda Amaraweera continued to call the shots and Prof. Piyadasa lacked the required authority though being appointed General Secretary of the party.

The former minister asked how the SLFP even contemplated bringing all factions together in the wake of both National Organizer Dissanayake and UPFA General Secretary Amaraweera reiterating their commitment to yahapalana partnership with the UNP. Prof. Peiris insisted that there couldn’t be any dialogue between SLPP/JO with the SLFP as long as the SLFP protected the UNP. Prof. Peiris pointed out that Messrs Dissanayake and Amaraweera had very clearly contradicted Prof. Piyadasa as regards future co-operation with the UNP.

In response to The Island queries raised after the conclusion of the media briefing, Prof. Peiris said that especially after President Sirisena’s onslaught directed at the UNP on May 30, the SLFP couldn’t continue with the UNP. There couldn’t be two leaders, all elected and appointed members would have to decide soon whether they accepted former President Rajapaksa’s leadership.

Prof. Peiris said that those who had exercised their franchise in support of the SLPP at the Local Government polls wouldn’t like the party to throw its weight behind Sirisena’s candidature. Now that the SLFP had decided to remain in partnership with the UNP in spite of that party declaring its intention to field Ranil Wickremesinghe at the next presidential poll, there couldn’t be any justification in prolonging their ‘marriage.’

Prof. Peiris said that the SLFP had been in difficult times over the years though the party always managed to bounce back. The current situation could be described as the worst ever crisis experienced by the party due to poor management skills and shortsighted policies and strategies.

Prof. Peiris said that the Group of 16 comprising of SLFP lawmakers who voted for JO-led No Confidence Motion (NCM) against PM Wickremesinghe on April 4, 2018 couldn’t delay taking a decision now. The former minister said that as long as members of the Group of 16 functioned as SLFP office bearers, they, too, were responsible for deteriorating national economy.

In fact, they owed an explanation to the public why a final decision couldn’t be taken after President Sirisena not only accused the UNP leadership of perpetrating treasury bond scams but making a deplorable bid to undermine the entire state banking sector, Prof. Peiris said.

By Norman Palihawadana Courtesy The Island

June 12, 2018, 12:08 pm

The same people who challenged him to end the war a decade ago were now daring him to reveal how he could reduce the taxes by 20%, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa told The Island yesterday.

“I took up their challenge and enabled our military, police and the civil defence force to neutralise terrorism. Some of my detractors belittled the war effort and the sacrifices made by the troops. I think everyone remembers how some people derisively asked us at the height of the war whether our troops had mistaken Pamankada for Alimankada (Elephant Pas) and Medawachchi for Kilinochchi. Most of these people didn’t even think of going to the north and the east when the LTTE was active and now they have all become tough guys.

“Some of them would wet their pants when Prabhakaran roared in the Wanni. They were hiding under beds fearing the Tigers. We defeated terrorism and, today, they are moving about freely like heroes while conspiring with foreign powers and LTTE fronts against the national military.

“They even demeaned the capture of Toppigala by calling it a barren rocky terrain”, Rajapaksa said.

Speaking to The Island a few weeks ago, Rajapaksa said that he would reduce the taxes by 20% under a future administration. In response, speaking at a function in Ranwala, Dompe, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe asked Rajapaksa how he would repay the country’s debt after reducing taxes.

Upali Ranaweera Courtesy The Daily Mirror

Responding to a claim by former President Mahinda Rajapaksa that he would reduce taxes by 20 percent after regaining power, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe challenged him on Saturday to reveal the country how the latter is going to repay the huge amount of loans the country owes to the other countries after reducing taxes.

Speaking at a function that was organised to declare open the iron bridge that has been constructed over the Kelani River connecting Siyane Korale and Hapitigama Korale at Ranwala, Dompe, the Prime Minister stated that he wanted to know how Mr. Rajapaksa is going to reduce taxes while at the same time repaying the foreign debt with interest.

The Prime Minister was referring to a statement made by the former President during an interview with a Sinhala newspaper days ago.

Claiming that his government had to pay the loans including one amounting around Rs. 21,000 million obtained by the previous regime for acquiring lands from all over the country, Mr. Wickremesinghe said that his government was paying for the sins of Mr. Rajapaksa.

The Prime Minister referred to the proverb “people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones” when he recalled how the government of former President who accuses the incumbent government now that it sells national assets to foreigners, sold 50 acres from the Port City outright to China and the land where the Army Headquarters was situated to a Chinese hotel.

He said that the country had to face several natural disasters such as floods, drought and the collapse of Meetotamulla garbage dump, yet the government has embarked on development projects such as the construction of Ranwala and Milleniya bridges.

Editorial Tuesday 12th June, 2018 Courtesy The Island

June 11, 2018, 10:39 pm
A complaint has been lodged with the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) against MP Dayasiri Jayasekera, who has owned up to receiving funds from Perpetual Treasuries Ltd. (PTL), as we reported yesterday. The CIABOC will decide whether it could conduct a probe thereinto. Such action is welcome, but much more remains to be done. Several complaints have been made to the anti-graft commission against government top guns and the public has a right to know who they are, whether investigations have got underway and, if not, why. The Presidential Commission of Inquiry which probed the bond scams recommended action against certain individuals. Have these recommendations been carried out?

Some government panjandrums claim that the bond probe commission report does not contain a list of the names of MPs who took money from PTL. It is also doubtful whether PTL owner Arjun Aloysius will go out of his way to expose those he has helped financially. Only a thorough probe will help identify the beneficiaries of his largess. However, now that the image of the entire Parliament has been tarnished, the onus is on all MPs to submit affidavits, suo motu, protesting their innocence, if they can, with a promise to resign in case they are found to have lied.

UPFA MP and Joint Opposition firebrand Udaya Gammanpila has made the aforesaid suggestion in Parliament, but it has not found favour with his parliamentary colleagues, we are told. Let him be urged to prevail on his JO comrades to submit affidavits declaring that they received no funds from PTL or its subsidiaries and, thereby, set an example to their rivals. The JO has to put its own house in order before asking others to clear their names. We bet our bottom dollar that some of the holier-than-thou JO members will not dare do so, for obvious reasons.

One wonders whether the ongoing media hype, surrounding the individual MPs who are believed to have taken PTL money, is consequent to an exercise in smoke and mirrors, on the part of the masterminds of the bond scams, to obfuscate the main issue. Politicians who have sold their souls to unscrupulous businessmen with deep pockets and hidden agendas need to be exposed, but the public should not fail to see the wood for the trees.

Many critics have been baying for the blood of Jayasekera and State Minister Sujeewa Senasinghe, who has also got money from a PTL subsidiary. Among them are notorious crooks who helped themselves to public funds and abused their positions to put various crooked deals through under the previous government and successfully covered their tracks. It is a case of sinners stoning sinners. However, even if the efforts being made to get rid of the MPs who sullied their hands with PTL money, reach fruition by any chance, the problem of moneybags greasing the palms of lawmakers will not go away. The present-day rulers came to power, condemning their predecessors for malpractices and promising a radical departure from the culture of corruption, but, today, they have got exposed for mega scams. The practice of politicians benefiting from anti-social elements with huge slush funds at their disposal will continue unless action is taken to remedy the systemic flaws they exploit to get away with their offences. What is called for is to put in place robust legal and regulatory mechanisms, as a national priority, to prevent black money being lavished on politicians et al.

The need for new laws to impose a cap on campaign funds has been felt for a long time. At present, no politician is legally bound to declare how much he receives by way of campaign funds or the amount he actually spends on electioneering. The sky is the limit, and needless to say this sorry state of affairs nurtures corruption. Moneybags bankroll prominent politicians’ election campaigns, on both sides of the political divide, and bend governments to their will, later on. This may explain why the interests of big businesses always take precedence over those of the ordinary people under all governments.

Parliament is not short of self-righteous members who pontificate on good governance. Will, at least, one of them move a private member’s motion calling for new laws to regulate campaign funds?

It was a farewell that has shocked & left plenty of critics speechless. It has put to rest & completely nullified the lies that have been spread against Sri Lanka’s Army. The culprits include foreign governments/envoys, INGOs/NGOs, UN & even the present government in particular the Tamil leadership & the LTTE diaspora who must be startled at the pictures emerging of an entire village weeping as they bid farewell to a military officer who had played the role of their mentor, their father, their brother, their advisor & virtually their leader. Col. Rathnapriya Bandu has done what Prabakaran, Wigneswaran, Sivajilingam, Sumbanthiran, Sambanthan or even Tamil Nadu politicians could not do & do not want to do. In a world that plays divisive politics of divide & rule he has shown that it takes a hero to unite & Col. Bandu is one hero that we must all salute. No former LTTE village would ever carry a Sri Lankan Military officer on their shoulders & weep as he bid goodbye if he was no hero in their eyes.

Lesson 1: No Caste difference

Vishwamadu was an one time tiger den. Many LTTE cadres were enlisted from Vishwamadu. It was also a village of only low caste & impoverished Tamils. They were virtually outcastes of their own Tamil people. No Tamil politician desired to look into their needs. They were good enough only to be fighters & have their dead bodies exhibited in photos across the world for political gain. To Col. Ratnapriya these villagers were not low caste or poor. They were people & he opened up to them & they in turn opened up to him. These images can fill the rest of the story. These pictures have shattered the myths & lies that have been floated.

Lesson 2: Sinhalese & Tamil do not need to live separately

No TNA politician has been honored by LTTErs in this manner. No TNA politician has been carried by the people of any Tamil village in the North but these Tamil villagers not only carried Col. Rathnapriya they were all seen crying. It is a sight that has stupefied all of us because it has completely negated the lies that the Tamils & Sinhalese cannot live together, it has completely dislodged the argument that a new constitution is needed with an asymmetrical federated state separately for Tamils. When an entire LTTE village showers love & affection for a military officer the incident must surely shake the entire world in particular the foreign governments & the UN.

Lesson 3: Artificial barriers

We are drilled day in and day out that the Sinhalese cannot live with Tamils & Tamils do not want to live with Sinhalese. We are brainwashed to think the soldiers are cruel & mean to Tamils & the military should be removed from the North. But then, we have an entire LTTE village carrying a soldier on their shoulders, crying as each line up to bid farewell. What the hell is going on, we all are now asking. Well, the pictures tell the story & we really just need to look at the tearing eyes of these Tamil villagers & in digesting the love & affection that has taken place to realize that we have been fed lies & fake news & distortions & these are all artificial barriers created for political agendas. When one soldier has won an entire village, no wonder the TNA & the present government together with the lying machines want him transferred & away from the people.

Lesson 4: Third Parties & Foreign Templates useless

The third parties sitting either across the world, in some hotel or AC room in Colombo, or UN rapporteurs arriving on business class with files & folders of templates on reconciliation & peaceful coexistence should not waste their time, money or our time because one soldier & an entire LTTE village have shown the rest of the country that we don’t need external parties, we don’t need foreign paid NGOs, we don’t need damn rocket science to live in peace with mutual respect & sharing ups & downs together. Let everyone remember that this one officer changed an entire village of hardcore LTTErs. No foregin document can have the answers to that! Without these international community & other meddling parties the LTTE families & the Sri Lankan Military have shown that they have mended & bonded & the trust & harmony that has been cemented must be a shocker to all the critics. The incident has shown that reconciliation doesn’t need foreign interference, doesn’t need foreign templates, doesn’t need NGOs, INGOs, foreign envoys & it has shown that reconciliation is easy & is very much possible without the external interferences & interventions.

Lesson 5: TNA / Tamil high castes / LTTE Diaspora don’t fool your own people

Vishwamadu is just one village with virtually a 100% low caste & poor Tamil populace. They were used and good enough only to be enlisted to take a gun & die for a cause that would benefit the Tamil higher castes. They had no voice, they had no one to care for them. TNA, the Tamil high castes & the LTTE diaspora must feel ashamed just as they must be reeling with envy & jealousy seeing how these low caste & poor Tamils are treating with honor a Sri Lankan military officer. They have given a strong message to the TNA/the Tamil high castes & the LTTE diaspora – they no longer wish to kill. They only wish to live. So be it & we must reach out & make many more Vishmadu villages where the hearts & minds have opened to reconcile & usher peaceful coexistence that we were made to believe was never possible. What lies we have all been fed by the same parties that wish to keep us divided promoting bogus reconciliation templates.

Col. Rathnapriya Bandu has completely shattered the lies & myths that have been floating.

The Tamils of Vishwamadu a village that produced hard core LTTE cadres are crying as they bid farewell to a Sri Lankan Military Officer. The message is very clear – remove all interfering parties, remove racist TNA politicos, remove the Sinhalese/Muslim racist politicos, remove Tamil caste system & do not allow LTTE diaspora to divide any further & the Tamils & Sinhalese will be at peace, will be living in peace & harmony as they have done for centuries.

If Vishwamadu had to elect a chief minister it would not be Wigneswaran or the TNA, Col. Rathnapriya would win hands down!

We salute this gallant officer who has silenced all, shattered the lies & myths & shown what true reconciliation, peace & harmony are all about.

Shenali D Waduge

http://www.colombotoday.com/carnal-rannapriya-bandu-2018-6-10/

http://sinhala.adaderana.lk/news/90670/රණවිරුවෙක්-ස්ථාන-මාරු-වෙලා-යද්දි-%C2%A0කවුරුත්-නොහිතපු-විදියට-හිටපු-LTTE-සාමාජිකයෝ-කරපු-වැඩේ-මෙන්න

Nothing happens in isolation. Everything has a connection & it is left to us to join the dots & make the distinctions. Where is the world going, what is the future for the global community can be seen in understanding the geopolitics & global dynamics at play. It is in understanding how industrialization, the capitalist system of free markets, liberalization, private ownership & who controls these entities that we can better understand who controls the world & where the world is going.

Retracing backwards by 500 years to the Colonial Project of Colonial imperialism

The present international systems & concepts emerged as an off shoot of Western European Christian colonization of the world.

Therefore, it is imperative that we put into context how the world changed as a result of colonial imperialism & the changes that took place thereafter. It saw a complete shift in the not-so-developed Europe becoming industrialized after draining the once rich-fertile & resource-rich invader nations & turning them into what they are today classified as developing nations suffering consequences of European divide & rule policies which conquerors used as a means of portraying their power & their rule over people & territory which they partitioned & drew according to their advantage. This was how new countries were created including all of the countries of Africa.

What British East India Company, a private profit seeking corporation representing the British Government did during colonial reign is no different to what the Transnational Corporations/Multi-National Corporations are presently doing. We see a subtle movement to remove the Westphalian sovereign nation system & have corporates govern the world. Corporates/INGOs are using political clout to acquire land often for 200 year lease and the buy-in for the scheme is seen in the manner politicians are now turning into corporate heads are heading these supposed to be non-for-profit entities.

Is the world Anglo-European centric?

International laws, education systems, international organizations & the common goals & concepts being rolled out have little place to absorb any of the civilizational cultures, traditions, laws, social systems that existed far before Europeans set out to discover the world. In fact ever since European invaders landed in the Americas, Africa & Asia Pacific their indigenous laws, social systems, traditions, cultures,, education etc all came under the European gavel & everything indigenous became diluted, changed or were completely annihilated. All the laws, conventions, treaties, agreements were all designed by the West, to suit the West & adjudicated according to what the West deemed as right, wrong, ethical, moral etc.

Societies were turned into consumers – divided as rich-poor, have-have-nots, black-white, slaves, elite-working class, rural-urban etc.

There were no constitutions before the Europeans compelled all colonized countries to adapt a new constitution at the time of independence. No one has yet questioned in what capacity invaders can decide a country’s independence & force countries to create constitutions that would bind them to the monitoring of these invader nations who were giving a bogus ‘independence’.

The world is Western-centric

International trade law is based on theories of economic liberalism developed in Europe and later the United States from the 18th century onwards (GATT/WTO)

The next step was to create the modern monetary system tying all nations of the world substituting gold for US dollar as the global currency. The modern monetary theory was created to allow governments the power to issue their own flat currency & force people to use it through taxation. According to the Bretton Woods Agreement signed by 43 countries in 1944 after World War 2 countries promised their central banks would maintain fixed change rates between their currencies & the dollar. Countries could regulate currencies only under conditions. US became the only country with the ability to print dollars.

What is noteworthy is that the UN was established AFTER all these international systems of control were set up thus leaving no room for the developing nations or former colonies to include their demands. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 completely ignores the social differences of 191 UN member states and the 58 nations that existed when it was drafted. All Conventions & Treaties are drafted from looking at issues from the angle of the West – their morals, their ethics, their stands giving no podium to the laws that existed under indigenous rule with older civilizations that the West can boast of.

The Bretton Woods Agreement also created the World Bank & the IMF. IMF could print money & countries could borrow from IMF, adjust their currency value, The World Bank was initially set up to lend to the European countries devastated by World War 2.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank are run by their member governments on the basis of shares they hold. The US government has the largest share of votes in both the IMF and World Bank. United States, Germany, Japan, the U.K. and France control about 40% of the shares in both institutions. the president of the World Bank has always been a U.S. citizen, and the head of the IMF has always been a European. IMF and the World Bank lends money to government on conditions.

Of the 185 members that make up the IMF, six colonial masters and their allies – comprised of the United States, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, France and Italy – control 42 per cent of the votes.

The IBRD & IDA make up the World Bank

The World Bank Group consists of 5 international organizations

1. International Bank for Reconstruction & Development (IBRD)
2. The International Development Association (IDA)
3. The International Finance Corporation (IFC)
4. The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA)
5. The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID)

But who controls the money supply of the world? The Bank for International Settlements which is the Central Bank of Central Banks & located in Basel, Switzerland, founded by the global elite & operates for their benefit. It is immune from taxation & international laws. 58 global central banks belong to the BIS. Only North Korea & the islands of Micronesia do not have a central bank.

How many are aware that the US Federal Reserve (FED) is also a privately owned company. The following banks all of whom are connected to the London Banking Houses have shares in the FED.

• Rothschild Bank of London
• Warburg Bank of Hamburg
• Rothschild Bank of Berlin
• Lehman Brothers of New York
• Lazard Brothers of Paris
• Kuhn Loeb Bank of New York
• Israel Moses Seif Banks of Italy
• Goldman, Sachs of New York
• Warburg Bank of Amsterdam
• Chase Manhattan Bank of New York

FED prints the money for the US Government but the US Govt has no stocks in the FED yet it has the right to print money through the Treasury. The FED creates money from nothing, and loans it back to us through banks, and charges interest on our currency. The FED also buys Government debt with money printed on a printing press and charges U.S. taxpayers interest.  https://www.globalresearch.ca/who-owns-the-federal-reserve/10489

According to a study by Swiss Federal Institute of Technology on 37 million companies and investors worldwide & concluded that 147 mega-corporations controls 40% of the entire global economy.

According to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) the United States remains the world’s top arms exporter since 1990. https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2017-03/news/us-leads-rising-global-arms-trade Sales of arms and military services across the world totaled $374.8 billion in 2016 of which $217.2 billion were American companies. Lockheed Martin sold $41 billion of military equipment.

6 giant media corporations control more than 90% of what people watch & read in the US.

According to UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) report Transnational corporations TNCs – 40,000 parent firms and 250,000 foreign affiliates – account for two-thirds of the world trade in goods and services,

According to OXFAM – 10 companies control the world’s food

1. Associated British Foods PLC
2. The Coca-Cola Co
3. Groupe Danone S.A.
4. General Mills, Inc.
5. Kellogg Co.
6. Mars, Inc.
7. Mondelez International, Inc.
8. Nestlé S.A.
9. PepsiCo Inc.
10. Unilever Group

Oxfam also declares 8 men own wealth equivalent to the combined wealth owned by 3.6billon of the world’s populace. In other words, what half the world own equals what 8 individuals own!

1. Bill Gates
2. Amancio Ortega (Spanish founder of Inditex)
3. Warren Buffett
4. Carlos Slim (Mexican businessman)
5. Jeff Bezos
6. Mark Zuckerberg
7. Larry Ellison
8. Michael Bloomberg

According to Dean Henderson The Four Horsemen of Banking (Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo) own the Four Horsemen of Oil (Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch/Shell, BP Amoco and Chevron Texaco)”

The numbers of active MNCs went from being roughly 7,000 in the 1970’s to 78,000 in 2006, being responsible for over half the global industrial output. Some of these companies are now even taking governments to court & tax payers end up paying massive compensations for agreements that have been unethically signed between governments & corporates.

The value of the top 10 corporations was $285tn (£215tn) is more than 180 countries which include Ireland, Indonesia, Israel, Colombia, Greece, South Africa, Iraq and Vietnam (Global Justice Now study)

Tax avoidance by corporations involves the use of low-tax countries and preferential tax regimes.

According to a study by the European Parliamentary Research Service corporate tax-dodging has cost the EU between $54.5 billion and $76.4 billion a year.  Companies are dodging taxes by funneling their profits made in Europe to low-tax countries. To the guilt list includes Google, Apple, Starbucks, Ikea, Amazon, Gap Microsoft, http://fortune.com/2016/03/11/apple-google-taxes-eu/  if the EU are gunning after these MNCs shouldn’t third world countries that provide these tax havens on the claims of foreign investment also increase country claims without offering further tax holidays & incentives for tax dodgers?

Global Financial Integrity says that ‘$900 billion is secreted each year from underdeveloped economies, with an estimated $11.5 trillion currently stashed in havens. More than one quarter of these hubs belong to the UK, while Switzerland washes one-third of global capital flight.’ Of this $900 billion, $150 billion comes from Africa.

According to United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research the estimated tax losses by profit shifting (tax evasions) by multinational companies, the global losses are around $500 billion a year. https://www.taxjustice.net/2017/03/22/new-estimates-tax-avoidance-multinationals/

Khadija Sharife writes:

‘This policy is especially lethal for developing countries where the poor are now caught in tax brackets, courtesy of the IMF and World Bank’s structural adjustment programmes (SAPs), instituting policies ranging from tax holidays” to the privatisation of state services [and] carving out huge slices of natural capital at corporate auctions… Africa has collectively lost more than $600-billion in capital flight, excluding other mechanisms of flight including ecological debt (globally estimated at a potential $1.8-trillion per annum), the cost of liberalised trade (just under $300-billion) … and the list goes on…’

While Jerry Brown says “Multinational corporations do control. They control the politicians. They control the media. They control the pattern of consumption, entertainment, thinking. They’re destroying the planet and laying the foundation for violent outbursts and racial division.” 

In his book, “Confessions of an Economic Hitman” (2004) [7] , John Perkins states how he was hired by such organizations to coerce leaders of developing countries to take high levels of un payable loans in favor of a quick short time gain. He states that by doing so, the country would eventually default or ask for more time, upon which these multinationals would sweep in and monopolize the markets.

Meanwhile, the UN says the cost of pollution and other damage to the natural environment caused by the world’s biggest companies would wipe out more than one-third of their profits if they were held financially accountable”

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/18/worlds-top-firms-environmental-damage

According to The Economist though multinationals account for only 2% of the worlds jobs, they own or orchestrate the supply chains that account for over 50% of world trade; they make up 40% of the value of the West’s stock markets; and they own most of the world’s intellectual property”

Who says MNCs are not corrupt – look at the extent of the crimes they engage in

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2011/12/13/The-Ten-Largest-Global-Business-Corruption-Cases

http://www.businessinsider.com/11-examples-of-recent-corruption-on-wall-street-2010-4#repo-105-6

The corporate clout has been such that even governments & leaders have been toppled – South America & even Iran’s Mossadegh is an example & reveals the extent to which corporates can manipulate even the strongest of governments through money & lobbying. Transfer of MNCs to developing countries results in unemployment in western countries as statistics clearly reveal (200,000 are jobless in US)

Orchestrated economic crisis will have IMF force governments to privatize national assets – energy, agriculture, transport etc which will fall into private hands and soon citizens will become employees of global corporates whose rules & regulations will conform to national laws. It will place people in servitude. This would entail the curtailing & reducing of both police & military & the manner military is being clipped in terms of manpower & equipment (Salawa incident) – all aimed at denying any nation state to challenge any external power. Notice the build-up of the UN as the sole one world government – the decider of all laws, the decider of what morals people follow, the decider of who gives justice & who are the enemies. Notice too how people are being electronically filed to identify & monitor them. The use of terror organizations to curtail people’s freedoms by introducing laws & legislations has worked to perfection. The manner that a handful of organizations are controlling the food flow globally which is tied to various issues of chemicals & other saturated elements have seen increase in death by artificial substances, poisons, contaminations & cancers. Do we consume anything natural today?

The next player is the media that controls society through strategy of distraction. Keeping people busy with sensationalized item is the name of the game. Watch our people’s emotions are being tapped & how education is being experimented in such a way that children grow up not thinking for themselves but to think it is fashionable to be stupid, vulgar & hippie & this failure of intelligence makes them blame themselves & draw them to suicidal & depressants that again make the handful of companies richer. Look at how the West is on prescription drugs – even children.

The other method now liberally used is to create the problem, create the desire reaction & then set out the solutions that had already been designed before the problem or the reactions were created. Put this scenario against several conflicts for which the reactions have resulted in unbelievable solutions that have only curtailed people’s freedoms & rights.

Yes, politicians & the political system may be corrupt but then it is we who elect them & it is we who can change them. The people essentially have a voice. Imagine if the nation state was abolished & in its place corporates & NGOs ruled, they own the resources, they own the assets & they even own us – we don’t elect them, we can’t even change them and they are not accountable or answerable to any of us.

Is this a good arrangement as an alternative to a corrupt government/governance?

Shenali D Waduge

Dr Sudath Gunasekara

6.10.2018

I hope you have seen today’s newspaper headlines this morning, especially the Irida Divaina banner headline where Vignesvaran Chief Minister NPC has made two very serious statements

1 That you must break up the Sri Lanka Army in to 9 parts and relocate in the other 8 Provinces as the people in the north don’t want the Sri Lanka Army to remain there, as if he is already reigning over his dream EELAM.

2 He also has said that the NPC has passed another resolution that they will not give any land  to the Sri Lankan Army within the NPC area without the approval of the Council

Has the Northern Province already ceased to be a part of the Republic of Sri Lanka. If not how can a man like Wignesvaran who is supposed to be a learnerred retired judge of the Supreme Court makes such drastic statements in public. Should the Sri Lankan Government get permission from a head of a local Authority within its territory to deploy armed forces to protect the country and its people which falls within the domain of its main functions under the Constitution.

I would like you to make a public statement as to whether your yahapalanaya Government has already granted Independence to the NP as a separate Tamil State or at least the Prime Minister has done so without your knowledge. I have a feeling that you or your Prime Minnister may have, at least given an undertaking that it will be officially confirmed before your term of office ends. Who knows whether it is a part of your election promisess. The way things happen in the North, the people of this country have every reason to think so.
Otherwise how can he make such bold statements when the 6^th Amendment to the 1987 Constitution which read as follows is, I think, is still vin force and therefore valid.

157A (1) No person shall directly or indirectly, in or outside Sri Lanka, support, espouse, promote, finance, encourage or advocate the establishment of  a separate State within the territory of Sri Lanka

2 No political party or other association or organization shall have as one of its aims or objects the establishment of a separate State within the territory of Sri Lanka

Isn’t what Wignesvaran has said and done not a violation of the law enumerated in 157A. The whole country poses this question to you as the Head of the State, the Head of the, Executive and of the Government and the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces.

Punishment for such acts are enumerated under 157A (3) a) b. c and d as be subject to civil disability, forfeit his movable and immovable, property, not been entitled to civic rights for seven years and cease to be such member in Parliament or any position referred to paragraph 1 of Article 165 This should apply to any politician holding positions in any local council as well, though it is not mentioned under 157A 3, (d).

Under these circumstances why don’t you Mr. President immediately dissolve this rabid monkey cage and communal piggery called the NPC and take legal action against these errant politicians?

I am asking the question as to why this section  has not being invoked so far by the President against the CM  and other lunatics like Sivajilingam who have been indulging in this type of lose talk for the past three years. Now that it has come to an unmanageable climax, why don’t you deal with them at least now?

Mr. President you owe an explanation as well as a duty by the people of this country as they are the people who have elected you as the President of this country and you too have taken the oath under the fourth schedule to the Constitution to faithfully perform duties and discharge the functions of the office of President in accordance with the Constitution of the Republic of Sri Lanka and the law and to be faithful to the Republic of Sri Lanka and that to the best of your ability to uphold and defend the Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.

You may forget things like the promises you made to the people in your election manifesto and things like how the 100 days programe was made and by whom etc but surely you can’t forget your Constitutional obligations by the country and the people who have elected you, particularly at a time where you have already declared your candidacy for the Presidential election 2020.

Furthermore I would earnestly request you to abolish the 13^th A and close down all these wasteful and devastative monkey cages called the Provincial Councils that have ruined the whole governing process in this country, as I have said more clearly in another letter published in the Lankaweb (5. 10, 2018) in the following words.

Abolish these monkey cages and dens of thieves that have exponentially increased waste and corruption and completely ruined the decent political culture of this country for the past 31 years and multiplied separatists tendencies and communal agitations dragging the nation to complete disintegration on ethnic lines with no chance of redemption in future.

This is the billion Dollar question I pose to the entire nation in view of the President’s above statement which he appears to have made after a deep slumber?

I know it very well that no political party, including the UNP as well as all those who were against them in 1987 will ask for their abolition as they use these Councils members to net votes at the general elections. But for the general public these Councils are an eye sore when they see the way how public funds are been wasted criminally on the upkeep of these useless lotus eater Governors, Chief Ministers, Ministers, Members, plethora of officials and the institutions that house them. Other than enjoying the luxuries of office, attending openings, weddings, funerals school functions like sport meets, temple functions, and various other social and private tamsas, roaming all over the world on pleasure trips and running all over the country to show their loyalty to their political masters,  misusing public funds, and collecting votes and funds for their political leaders in Colombo and herding people for their meetings like May day rallies and propaganda meetings of their masters in Parliament who in turn ruin the whole country and throwing their weight on the innocent and helpless masses on the other hand, I ask these parasitic creatures as to what service they to the people or the country that pay their salaries and ill-gotten fabulous perks”

I can assure you for certain that even if you have the elections to these Councils at the end of the year, going by the present political situation in the country, you want win a single Council. That will only further depreciate your chances at the next election in 2020. Why add pain to injury.

Asoka Weerasinghe Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario .Canada

10 June 2018

John Argue
Amnesty International’s Coordinator for Sri Lanka
Toronto
Ontario.

Dear John:

I stumbled onto your interview with Sulochana Ramaiah Mohan which was headlined 40,000 death claim should be researched. Reading it, I wasn’t sure whether I should laugh at it or cry. In fact I was disappointed in you, for your typical covering of the dishonest AI’s rear-end, the self-appointed Policeman of Human Rights around the world.  I understand, as you are part of this cabal.

You know, that you guys at AI were crowned as the spokesperson for the Canadian Tamil Congress (CTC), a longtime supporter of Tamil Tigers, from the moment you and Alex Neve  stretched your beggar’s palms to accept that $50,000 largess as a donation in September 2011..  Remember John, when it was about to happen, I told you that your AI should not accept that gift as it was going to  come and bite you guys at some point in time.   And it has, not once but several times.  And I suppose it was a too bigger sum to refuse when you all were hungry for funds. And since then you have supported their cause of their wanting their Eelam damning the majority Sinhalese community.  That is sick, John! I resent it, and it so happens that I am a full-blooded Sinhalese to boot.

John, you guys were lucky that Asoka Weerasinghe was not the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka.  I wouldn’t be that stupid to give you all a space in Colombo to build your nest to have your decentralized HQ to monitor Human Rights violations in South Asia, until you returned that $50,000 to the Canadian Tamil Congress and cleanse yourselves of the sin of being bias in favour of the  minority Tami  community. I would have demanded that you prove to me and my administration that AI has become a truly neutral INGO, as I just don’t trust Amnesty International one bit,  AI is suspect.  And I have told you this not once, not twice, but several times.

You know John, you guys at AI have the gall and temerity to claim your moral right to make statements about human rights violations of the Tamils in Sri Lanka when it was your Amnesty International  that abdicated that moral right long time ago, in 1975 when your outfit, Amnesty International devoted a modest half page to Kampuchea in its annual report covering 1975, the year Phnom Penh fell to the Khymer Rouge.  And I learn that your Secretary General sent a cable expressing concern for civilians detained in areas of conflict”, while noting prudently those allegations of mass executions were based on flimsy evidence and secondhand accounts.”  This was when it was a known fact that nearly one-fifth of the population of Kampuchea were exterminated by the Khymer Rouge in the early 1970s.  It was also interesting to note that Amnesty International sent a cable congratulating the new regime of Kampuchea on the large national union without distinction of class, religious belief or political tendency”, it had just proclaimed. Shish!, what a bunch of disingenuous Yahoos!

John, your interview announces that you had said that the 40,000 death claim should be researched..  Sweet Mother of Jesus!  First use your common sense AI, before you attempt to embark on your research project.”.

Don’t you guys at AI want to ask the 40,000 Tamil death believers,  alleged to have been killed by the Sri Lankan soldiers during the last five months of the Eelam War, Show us the bodies, show us the skeletons of the 40,000 deaths before we believe you.”

John, 40,000 Tamils killed in five short months mainly along a sliver of land when the Tamil Tigers were on the run, there weren’t much land to dump the average 5’8” bodies even in pyramidal  piles. This is a hard to believe number of deaths.

And you know what, John? No one, not even your Amnesty International  told us that the Government soldiers forced the retreating Tamils to claw the sun-baked Mullaithivu earth and feverishly dig big holes to dump these 40,000  dead Tamil bodies.  No one, not even your AI told us that they sighted 5 to 10 backhoes digging large craters to dump the 40,000 dead Tamil bodies.  No one, not even your AI  told us of the stench of black plumes of smoke snaking towards the heavens from the burning  mounds of the dead Tamil bodies that were burnt to get rid of them in a hurry.  No one, not even your Human Rights Police, Al, told us that they sighted fast moving fiberglass boats loaded with dead bodies, speeding through the indigo-nights to dump them in the mid-Indian Ocean to get rid of them.  No people in the villages of the east coast of South India in places like Chitambaram,  Cuddalore and  Pondicherry reported that there were several  dead bodies, presumably those of the dumped Tamil’s washed onto their shores. Nor did anyone nor Amnesty International reported some weird things going on in the Mullaitivu  theatre of war where hundreds of dead bodies of Tamils were strewn around.  And that Sri Lankan Army higher-ups were skipping through the bodies, like skipping through our Spring tulips with very effective Made in China disappearing wands and waving over the dead bodies saying A-B-R-A-C-A-D-A-B-R-A and doing the disappearing act and wooossshhhh”’; the dead bodies disappear into the thin air,  How else would they disappear that quickly John.  It has to be an act of magic.  Right!

You smart Alec’s at Amnesty International should be able to tell us how that 40,000

dead bodies disappeared.  If you don’t know, ask Ban-Ki Moon’s Cut-and-Paste Brigade’s, Ban-Ki Moon, ask Navi Pillay, ask Marzuki Darusman, ask Steven Ratner, ask Yasmin Sooka.  If they cannot provide you with an honest answer, then slap on their backs stickers saying, in red I am a right Royal HUMBUG, trying to hang Sri Lanka from the UN’s rafters”  Do it, John. This is a vicious game of Bullying the small guy

Tell me, John, did you all at Amnesty International comment on the 100,000 Tamils being killed by the Sri Lankan soldiers during the last five months of the Eelam War as claimed by the British Labour Party’s,  Siobhain McDonagh, MP for Mitcham and Morden, in Surrey,   If you all didn’t then why not?  It is a hellava gory numbers game that you all keep playing as if, in a gambler’s den called, HUMAN RIGHTS HUMBUGS  ON KILLERS OF SRI LANKAN-TAMILS BINGO”.  A game to target Sri Lanka, to crucify that little island nation, Sri Lanka, where I come from.  What a bunch of Dodo’s, John.  I know McDonagh’s constituency is peppered with Tamil refugees and immigrants. That  doesn’t give her the  legitimacy to lie about Sri Lanka’s last 5 months of the Eelam War  She as a British politician  has NO moral right to come up with these  unproven atrocious  Fairy Tale numbers.

I did ask her in a letter, what  she smoked when she woke up that morning on the day she made that statement.  There was no response.  So she sells her soul for a Tamil vote as what most of our Canadian Liberals, Conservatives and NDPers do.

You know what, John, Siobhain McDonagh’s claim of 100,000 killed is a whole population of a town like Ontario’s Waterloo of 104,986; like British Columbia’s town of Delta  of 102,238 people;  like Ontario’s town of Chatham-Kent of 101,647 people, and that of Alberta’s Red Deer of a population of 100,418.   Can you imagine trying to bury those populations within a few days, within a few weeks before their skin and flesh starts to deteriorate under a hot tropical sun!  This woman is nuts, and AI didn’t speak on it to be fair on Sri Lanka who eradicated Tamil terrorism after the Tamil Tigers haemorrhaged that island for 27 blooding years killing over 100,000 soldiers and innocent people.  Too bad.

John, here’s what I am resentful of.  Not a single Human Rights outfit, in the world and that includes your Amnesty International, and of course, every Sri Lanka watching-Canadian parliamentarian haven’t had the honesty, the gumption and the dignity of their conscience, to stand up and be counted,  telling the world, that – Sri Lanka is the only country in the world that eradicated terrorism, by annihilating the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE aka Tamil Tigers), the ruthless of them all, on May 19, 2009, by their armed forces.  And by doing so gave back to their 20.5 million peoples, the most paramount Human Right, their RIGHT-TO-LIFE, which was hijacked by the Tamil Tiger terrorists,  for 27 long  bombing-years.  All these International Human Rights Organizations who call themselves activists are a bunch of pathetic jokers!

John, when you were asked about the charges of ”genocide” attributed to the Sri Lankan armed forces, your answer was, I feel sympathy for those  who feel it was Genocide, but AI has not come up with the conclusion that it was Genocide.”

Come on John you can do better. Let’s not waffle about this charge of Genocide”. Let’s be honest,  let’s be conclusive, and let’s not be iffy about your answer. You are dodging it consciously, aren’t you!  Bad John!

If there was Genocide, the Sri Lankan Soldiers would not have rescued 295,873 Tamils  by the end of the Eelam War, on 19 May, 2009.  They were rescued  from the clutches of the Tamil Tiger terrorists who herded them for 30 scorching months  from the west coast to the east coast under the hot Jaffna sky, like unwashed cattle as a ‘human-shield’.  It would have been easy for the soldiers to tie their hands behind their backs, blindfold them, ask them to kneel and shoot them through their skulls as what the Tamil Tigers did to the 700 Sinhalese policemen who had surrendered to them in the Eastern Province on 11 June, 1990.  Well, the Sri Lankan soldiers didn’t do a copycat cold blooded massacre.  There was affection and love for these Tamil refugees whom they considered as brothers and sisters.  I am not kidding!

Not only that John, they were the very same soldiers, all Sinhalese, who joined the other Sinhalese civilians to prepare  one million hearty meals of breakfasts, lunches, and dinners to feed them every day when they were temporarily housed in  refugee camps.  So what is your difficulty to come to a conclusion that there was no Genocide, John?  Open your mouth and spit out the truth  Spit out the good humanitarian words.  For Pete’s sake, Amnesty International,  be honest for once and say so what is a Fact.   You know what John, not a single International Human Rights Organization has uttered a word and acknowledged this amazing humanitarian deed by the Sri Lankan soldiers who won the war against terrorism. And who also won the hearts of feeble Tamil grandmothers and grandfathers who were carried to safety in their arms like babies, and who  kissed the soldiers cheeks and said, Puthata Buddhu Saranai” (Son, I wish you Blessings from the Buddha)..

That itself is good enough reason for me to point my finger at everyone of those organizations and yell at them calling them, ”You Bloody Humbugs!”. By now you know me enough John, I don’t hold my punches back to anyone who is ever ready to hurt my Motherland, Sri Lanka, unfairly. That is my Mission and I will sing my Anthem heartily –

O Mother-Lanka,  my home and native land

True patriot love in me you command

After being haemorrhaged by Tamil Tigers

I see you proudly rise

As a true democracy and free

From far away I will love you

And not let you being cut in to two.

From far away Canada, O Mother-Lanka

You bet, I will stand on guard for thee”

Tell the Canadian Liberal Party’s  TERRIBLE FIVE – Robert Oliphant, Jim Karygiannis, Judy Sgro, Derek Lee and Albina Guarnieri (some are not MPs anymore) who stood on Canada’s Parliament Chamber floor during the Emergency Debate on Sri Lanka, at sundown on 4th February 2009, and, charged the Sri Lankan Government of Genocide of the Tamils, looking up at the Gallery. Do  you know why they were looking up at the Gallery, John?  It was sardine packed with Tamils, almost saying to them,.You witnessed us lying for you all, now give us your votes.”   What a bunch of lying Yahoos.  This is why i wouldn’t hold my nose and drop my ballot into the ballot box with a X against the Liberal candidate at the Federal and Provincial elections. No more…Never!

Come on Amnesty International don’t pussyfoot around the Genocide” charge.  There was no GENOCIDE, period. Surely, not when Sri Lankan soldiers carried frail Tamil grandmothers and grandfathers in their arms like babies and ran dodging Tamil Tiger bullets to safety  And that is the rub John.  You waffle, and I tighten the screws on you  lot as DISINGENUOUS  HOG-WASHED  HUMAN RIGHTS  HUMBUGS.

John, you said, 40,000 death claim should be researched.” Don’t be silly and waste your time.and AI funds unless you are hoping to seek  more donations from the Canadian Tamil Congress who might fork out Canadian dollars in the 50,000s.

The research has already been done by  British  Lord Naseby  by accessing confidential reports compiled by none other than London’s own Defence Attache present in Sri Lanka during the infamous last phase of the Eelam War in 2009.

Lord Naseby came up with some startling discoveries during his research which has kept nailing deep into the coffin of lying International  Human Rights Organizations including the UN as despicable Humbugs’ that claimed  there had been 40,000 Tamil deaths  during the last five months of the war. Or, may be, 100,000 deaths as claimed by that silly woman British MP Siobhain McDonagh.  I am still curious to find out what she smoked when she woke up that eventful day when she plucked that number of 100,000 Tamils killed by the Sri Lankan soldiers from the air, when the Sri Lankan soldiers were on the war path to decimate the Tamil Tiger terrorists who were on a daily killing spree with bullets and claymore-mines of innocent people for 27 years  And they did it Big time, when they shot the  last Tamil Tiger on the sandy beach of the Nandikadal lagoon on the east coast.

Lord Naseby said, I’ve tracked the war carefully because I just couldn’t’ believe these official figures – they didn’t stack up to the information I was getting.  So I then invoked our freedom of information inquiry.

I asked for the dispatches sent by our Defence Attache to our foreign office during the last days of the war.  The application was refused twice by our foreign office.  I then applied directly to the Information Commissioner -which is my right – and got 26 pages of redacted dispatches.  Missing were the last six weeks of them.  So I applied again. And lo and behold, another 12 arrived.  I went through them very carefully.

And in there, there was more than enough evidence that no one in the Sri Lankan government had said anything about killing civilians at all.  That was not the objective of the exercise.  And from our Defence attache’s dispatches.  I thus gleaned that about 7000 were probably killed.  And even the Attache  says, that about a quarter of those killed were possibly Tamil Tigers (LTTE) because they’d thrown away their uniforms.”

Well, there you are John.  You Guys at Amnesty International couldn’t do any better than Lord Naseby’s research and I can bet my last dollar on that.  But here is  the final conclusion as I could comprehend.  This saga of 40,000 Tamil killed during the last five months of the war, is a bunch of baloney, buckets of hogwash,  piffle, poppycock, crotches of codswallop,,  buckets of crap, and loads of  elephant dung patties.

But here’s what it is John, the 6th Salome veil has come off the 40,000 Tamil, killing promoters and believers and they are in deep tanks in boiling water, doing  the Last Credibility Waltz.  And when the 7th veil of lies comes off, which will be pretty soon according to my Crystal Ball reading. there will tattoos on all the naked bodies saying

Yes, I  lied”, I am a disingenuous bastard”, Sorry Sri Lanka, I know I acted like a no good pariah,” I am mad with you separatist-Tamils for making me believe you, and I look a dunce-capped stupid fool!.” Sri Lankan soldiers, you are the best  there was, there is, and the best that will ever be”. Teach us how to eliminate terrorism”,  and many more slogans..  Some tattoos will be with neon ink so that they could be read in the dark.

John, you have heard me, loud and clearly, as clearly as the ding-dong of a Sunday Church bell calling you for confession to absolve you of your sin wanting to crucify my Motherland, Sri Lanka,..unfairly.

You looked good  and well in that photo accompanying the article.  Keep well, and my advice to you as an older brother is, get off that Amnesty International choo-choo train at the next stop, as it is going nowhere on Sri Lanka.

Take care,

Warmly

Asoka

(Weerasinghe)

Kanthar Balanathan DipEE(UK), GradCertRelEng(Monash), DipBus&Adm(Finance-Massey), CEng.MIEE

SriLankan government since snatching power in 2015, have been in corrupt practice which has led the country to tiptoe towards bankruptcy. The term accountability” does not mean anything today, to the people of SriLanka or the members of parliament anyway. Parliamentarians think that they are the god which has freed them from conviction and that they can do anything they wish.

It is beyond the scope of this document to discuss government accountability”. However, it is good to discuss a few of those in government accountability”. The framework that forms government accountability mechanism: (i) Political accountability mechanisms, (ii) Legal accountability mechanisms, (iii) Administrative accountability mechanisms

The question is: does the GOSL has a framework for government accountability, and if so, do they practice?

Of course, we know that the current GOSL has no political accountability mechanisms”, which we have seen from their actions in political blunders and slip-ups in the past and in continuation. With the power GOSL has embraced, they seem to shovel through the docks with no hesitation.

The question of Administrative accountability mechanisms” and Legal accountability mechanisms”, can also be questioned.

Why do we need a parliament? Quote: we need a parliament to ensure that you have freedom of speech, movements, and association, and to ensure that there is no misuse of authority by elected leaders as constitution describe their powers and limitations to select the national government to control guide and inform the government for making laws

Why do we need MPs: Quote: MPs have three major responsibilities: legislating in Parliament, representing their riding and political party, and serving their constituents’ needs. MPs are elected to represent the interests of the people in their constituencies where they maintain an office.

Of course, SriLankan Parliament is like a DOSA KADE”, cos, how many of them have the educational background and/or knowledge. Do they have 1.25 to 1.5 kg of the brain with perception/intelligence? How many of them want to be a role model for people (young ones) to follow them? Could CB be considered a Kasappu Kade?

My previous article Ref: http://nrnmind.blogspot.com/2018/06/srilankademocracy-barter-system.html explains how MP candidates are selected.

Each MP receive a sum to develop his/her electorate. Where is the money channeled to? Do they invest in any small-scale development?

Treasury Bills, Treasury Bonds, & Development Bonds:

Th public Debt Department accepted Rs 10,000 million treasury bills in an auction where bids received was Rs 55,688 million to be settled by the 8^th June 2018. (Ref: https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/) This may be good planning of the value accepted according to the muscle of SriLankan debt trap crisis.

However, we must note one action: GOSL owns the land and the infrastructure. Well, in other words, the people, citizens of SriLanka own the assets and they have elected some people to manage and govern the assets.

It looks like GOSL to manage their immediate debt crisis, raise Treasury bills, Treasury Bonds and collect their funds, and do not invest to collect the funds for repayment. For example, how many of these people will be in parliament for the next 10-20 years. Even if they are they manage to go scot-free without any imprisonment for any crimes committed. A reference article on US debt crisis; The US economy is caught in a debt trap. Avoiding a major economic downturn requires alleviating the burden of servicing public and private debt. The key is restructuring federal debt, which will diminish the country’s net interest burden. Ref: Escaping the US debt trap Now is the time to strike deal with creditors Ref: by Joergen Oerstroem Moeller in Singapore, Fri 11 May 2018

Q1.

Does the Governor of the CB advise GOSL on the risk of issuing large bonds for a longer period? Does he advise on the necessity and the risk of Treasury Bills sale? Does CB do an analysis before deciding on a sale of Bond?

It looks GOSL Treasury has more activity in the sale of Bills and Bonds rather the governance carries out any development other than foreign countries involved in a couple or two.

Q2.

Why would GOSL sell valuable lands to foreign companies? Have the lands been sold to settle the bond repayment? It is a must that land sales shall be approved by the people, citizens of the country. Maybe the representative for the electorate or by other approved means.

Q3.

Why cannot GOSL sell lands in the Northern sector? Ie. Jaffna, Vavuniya, Kilinochchi etc.

Q4.

What is the reason for handover of the Port and the Airport in the South to foreigners?

Finally, Sri Lankans would be left with no lands and assets, except their toilets.

The main reason for selling assets to overseas companies is to receive kickbacks in foreign currency to an overseas bank.

Sri Lanka Development Bonds Outstanding, as at 30 January 2018, is US$ 4,239.45 Billion. Can GOSL show proof whether they have completed any development to the value of such amount. Or do the Opposition Leader R. Sambanthar has the guts to ask questions on this development bonds. (Ref: CB)

Financial System Financial System Stability Review 2015, the report was prepared and signed by Arjuna Mahendran in 2015. How often is this report prepared and released?

It is recommended that readers view the page as given here.

Ref: https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/sites/default/files/cbslweb_documents/Treasury%20Bond%20Series%20Available%20for%20Investments%20as%20at%2001.06.2018.pdf.

As of 2^nd May 2017, the Treasury Bond for Foreign Investors amounts to Rs.4,089,965,085,500.00. This is over four Trillion Rs. Of which Rs 504,250,120,000.00 is supposed to have been settled between 15th May 2017 and 1^st June 2018.

Q5.

Was the land sale a collateral for this amount to the parties?

Hope the LOP has the guts to raise this in parliament rather talking about missing persons & self-determination”. How many of Sri Lankans assets are planned to be sold?

If the current GOSL cannot manage then they should leave office and hand over to credible people to run. Maybe Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa? The only choice in SL with the blessings of Mahinda Rajapaksa.

It is recommended that citizens and professionals become quite acquainted with the CB operations. It’s their right and duty.

(වික්ටර් අයිවන් -රාවය පුවත්පත )

මෙම අශීලාචාර කාලයේදී සියලු මිනිසුන් ජීවත් වූයේ අඩු වැඩි වශයෙන් සැකයෙන් හා මරණ බියෙනි. ඔවුන්ට නිතර නිතර දකින්නට හෝ අසන්නට ලැබුණේ මනුෂ්‍ය ඝාතනයන් ගැනය. අතුරුදන්වූ පුද්ගලයන් හා වදහිංසාවන්ට ලක්වූ පුද්ගලයන් ගැනය. හිංසාව හිංසාවට ලක්වන්නන් කෙරෙහි පමණක් නොව හිංසා කරන්නන් කෙරෙහිද බලපායි. ඒ දෙපිරිසම මානසික රෝගීන් බවට පත් කරයි.

යුද හමුදාවේ සේවය කළ සමහර සොල්දාදුවන් මානසික රෝගීන් බවට පත්ව තිබෙන ආකාරය හා ඒ තත්ත්වය පෙරළා ඔවුන්ගේ පවුල් ජීවිත කෙරෙහි බලපා තිබෙන ආකාරය පිළිබඳව කදිම විග්‍රහයක් යුද හමුදා රෝහලේ මානසික වෛද්‍යවරයෙකු ලෙස සේවය කළ රුවන් එම්. ජයතුංග විසින් ලියා පළ කර තිබෙන ‘සංග්‍රාමයෙන් පසු – ඊලාම් යුද්ධයට මුහුණ දුන් සොල්දාදුවන්ගේ කතා’ යන කෘතියට ඇතුළත්ය.

යාපනේ විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයේ වෛද්‍ය පීඨයේ සේවය කළ මහාචාර්යවරයෙකු වන දයා සෝමසුන්දරම් විසින් ලියා පළකර තිබෙන Scared Minds – The Psychological impact of war on Sri Lankan Tamils” නමැති පොත දෙමළ කොටි සංවිධානය, ආරක්ෂක හමුදා හා ඉන්දියානු සාම හමුදාව විසින් කරන ලද යුද්ධය විසින් උතුරේ දෙමළ සමාජය කෙරෙහි ඇතිකර තිබෙන සාමූහික ව්‍යසනය ගැන තමන්ගෙන් ප්‍රතිකාර ලද රෝගීන් ආශ්‍රයෙන් කරන ලද විශිෂ්ට අධ්‍යයනයක් ලෙස සැලකිය හැකිය.

එය සාමූහික ප්‍රචණ්ඩත්වය ඊට ගොදුරු වන පුද්ගලයන් කෙරෙහි පමණක් නොව ඒ පවුලේ සාමාජිකයන් කෙරෙහිද අවසාන විග්‍රහයේදී මුළු මහත් දෙමළ සමාජය කෙරෙහිද බලපා තිබෙන ආකාරය ගැන කර තිබෙන කදිම විග්‍රහයක් ලෙස සැලකිය හැකිය. එම මහාචාර්යවරයාද උතුරේ දෙමළ සමාජය පිළිබඳව එහි දක්වා තිබෙන චිත්‍රය සමස්ත සමාජයටද අදාළ කරගත හැකිය.

Link : http://ravaya.lk/?p=168814

Courtesy wionews.com

Editorial Courtesy The Island

Monday 11th June, 2018

The UNP, during the last government, condemned the Hambantota Port as a white elephant and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe keeps calling it the world’s biggest swimming pool. Some UNP notables said the Rajapaksas were waiting on the Hambantota beach and waving at passing ships in a bid to get them to call at the deserted inland port.

Today, it looks as if the yahapalana leaders were waiting, near the Chinese embassy in Colombo, for the release of the next tranche of more than half a billion US dollars for the lease of the Hambantota Port. The desperation of the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government knows no bounds. It has to shore up the dwindling foreign reserves.

The rupee has hit a record low against the US dollar. The government has pinned its hopes on the Chinese funds to stabilise the falling rupee. But the signs are that it will not get the money soon due to its failure to fulfil some obligations in the port lease agreement.

The yahapalana leaders may have thought they had succeeded in taking the Chinese for a ride by leasing out the Hambantota ‘swimming pool’. But, it has turned out to be the other way around. The China Merchants Port Holdings Company Ltd. is reported to have called for sorting out some issues pertaining to an artificial entertainment zone, agreed upon in the port deal, expeditiously for the next tranche to be released. Entertainment is a broad term, which can mean virtually anything, and casinos are expected to be set up in the case of the port agreement being fully implemented. Nobody knows what else will be there in that zone. The Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) has reportedly said the existing laws do not provide for the use of port land for entertainment related activities.

The government finds itself between a rock and a hard place. It is willing to do anything to get the Chinese funds, but it cannot allow an entertainment zone to be set up without amending the SLPA law. The yahapalana leaders have overcome some legal barriers previously by steamrollering bills through Parliament. They are likely to make a similar effort once again to please the Chinese. However, it will be interesting to see the reaction of the self-proclaimed moralists within the yahapalana ranks to the setting up of casinos.

Most of the allies of the current administration resisted, tooth and nail, a move by the Rajapaksa government to bring in gaming mogul, James Packer, who undertook to build a USD 350 million luxury resort, which was to include a casino. They let out howls of protest and the Rajapaksa government got cold feet. When Packer announced his decision to abandon the project after the 2015 regime change, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe demanded to know who had asked him to come. The PM said that Sri Lanka, under the new dispensation, wanted only good investors and did not want an economy which relied on casinos. Among other vociferous critics of casinos were the JHU.

The Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government has earned notoriety for policy U-turns. In the run-up to the 2015 presidential election, its leaders vowed to scrap the Colombo Port City project, first thing, after forming a government. They considered it an environmental disaster. But, today, it has become the jewel of their Megapolis crown. China has tamed the yahapalana leaders over the years and the latter are now ready to do anything to humour the Chinese; they are even promoting the Belt and Road initiative much to the chagrin of their western well-wishers.

At this rate the yahapalana leaders might have to swallow their pride and perform some political pole dancing in Parliament to entertain the Chinese in a bid to get the much-needed USD 585 million.

By Rathindra Kuruwita

June 11, 2018, 12:51 pm

The Secretary to the President and other officials who could release the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) report on the bond scams had sent the anti corruption activists on a wild goose chase in the hope that they would get tired and drop the issue, Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE) Executive Director Keerthi Tennakoon said.

In a letter to Speaker Karu Jayasuriya Tennakoon said, on Friday, that he had been attempting to obtain the full PCoI report from January 18, 2018. “I have written to you on several occasions and I know that you are trying to obtain these documents to safeguard the dignity of the MPs. The Secretary to the President has promised to provide these documents several times and asked a number of persons to obtain the documents from the National Archives. But the National Archives states that they can’t release these documents for another 30 years,” he said.

“They are trying to demoralise us by making us run in circles. I have spent 3,360 hours trying to get these reports and there are many others who have done likewise.

By Shyam Nuwan Ganewatte

June 11, 2018, 12:47 pm

It has been revealed that State Minister of International Trade, Sujeewa Senasinghe accepted three cheques to the tune of Rs. 3 million from W. M. Mendis & Company, belonging to Arjun Aloysius, after the 2015 general election.

The last parliamentary election was held on August 17, 2015.

The first cheque for one million rupees, issued from W. M. Mendis Company’a Bank of Ceylon account, to Senasinghe was dated August 24, 2015. The cheque was cashed by Ministerial Security Division (MSD) Sub Inspector E. G. Priyantha Vipula Sampath at the BOC Lake View branch and the money handed over to one of Senasinghe’s aides. Sampath was questioned by the CID on May 28, 2018. The second cheque also for one million rupees, issued on Nov. 12, 2015 from the same account was cashed by Ministerial Security Division (MSD) PC BR Gunasena. The cheque was given to him by Amal Ravindranath Dias, one of the persons who handled Senasinghe’s election campaign. Gunasena was questioned by the CID on May 30, 2018.

The third one-million-rupee cheque was issued on March 31, 2016 from the same account and cashed by Ministerial Security Division (MSD) Sergeant Ranjith Lal Jayasena. The cheque was given to him by Amal Ravindranath Dias. Jayasena was questioned by the CID on May 30, 2018.

Dias was also questioned by the CID on June 05, 2018 for accepting Rs. 2 million by way of encashed cheques, on Nov. 13, 2015 and April 05, 2016. Dias has insisted, like Senasinghe, that the money was spent on the election campaign and that he is not aware who gave the cheques. However, there was no election at that time, and the CID has instructed him to return for a statement on June 06, 2018. He has said that he can’t come on June 06 as he has a prior engagement on June 06. When CID officials went to his residence on June 06 to ask him to come the following day, there was no one at home, and he did not answer his phone on June 07 morning.

By Dr. DAYAN JAYATILLEKA Courtesy The Island

I was delighted to read Lalith Weeratunga’s revelatory article ‘The Troika’ (Counterpoint, Daily FT). I regard him as a friend and I respect him as one of the finest public servants we have had. President Mahinda Rajapaksa could not have had a better Secretary to the President at a crucially testing time in our contemporary history. I have long encouraged Lalith to write his memoirs and I hope what I see in the newspaper is but a ‘teaser’, which will eventuate in a full volume.

Lalith Weeratunga’s account of the Troika is the truth. However, while it is the truth, it is not the whole truth and nothing but the truth. There are important pieces that requires inclusion to establish a clearer account of the times and issues. These are of crucial importance because unless we insert them back in and complete the diplomatic history of that time, we shall be unable to understand what happened in President Rajapaksa’s second term, how we got mired in the war crimes quagmire in Geneva, and the problems we shall have in extricating them even if the Troika returns, even with some in significantly and qualitatively elevated roles.

Lalith’s account is of a golden moment in Sri Lanka’s foreign relations, where we avoided the fate that the Jayewardene administration suffered when it rightly attempted to defeat the LTTE in 1987. That attempt triggered intervention. Under President Rajapaksa, the Troika helped avoid it and secure the space necessary to win the war.

However, Lalith’s account omits the two crucial and inextricably interrelated factors that enabled this success.

Let me back up a bit. The Indians had been negotiating a political settlement with President Jayewardene since 1984. In late 1985, HW Jayewardene signed off on an agreement on Provincial level devolution. Further talks took place in December 1986 and early 1987. LTTE provocations and national Security Minister Lalith Athulathmudali’s faith in his Israeli military connection delayed the agreement. The Vadamaarachchi offensive therefore took place without the cover of a political agreement with Delhi, which only be devolution-centered. When the electorally powerful MGR lobbied Rajiv Gandhi, he caved in to pressure for intervention because he had nothing with which to neutralize Tamil Nadu. Later, after the Indo-Lanka Accord was signed, the Indian stance pivoted so drastically that the IPKF was in combat with the Tigers by October that very year, 1987.

What this goes to show is that if we had this political solution in place (which had been in the pipeline for years) before launching the Vadamaarachchi operation, the Indians would not have intervened to stop us, because Delhi would have had something to balance off Tamil Nadu.

Which brings me to my main point. What Weeratunga’s account omits is the heart of the matter; the meat in the sandwich. The policy and politics of it.

The Troika was brilliantly managing the relationship with Delhi, but they were representing and operating on the pragmatic policy decided on by President Rajapaksa, namely the promise to his Indian counterpart, to proceed with the implementation of the 13th amendment. The Troika’s managerial excellence was building on the policy equation and axis with Delhi decided upon by President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Any account of its success without specific mention of that understanding is like Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark.

It is this promise that kept India on side and gave us the space to finish the war even in the face of US-UK pressure. President Rajapaksa was able to play the Delhi card to ward off the Hillary-Miliband-Norway driven ‘evacuation attempt’ by the US, the goalposts of which kept shifting.

That this policy was at the very heart of the Indo-Lanka equation during the war years, was amply and irrefutably proven by the content of the Joint Statement between the Government of Sri Lanka and the visiting Indian Troika (the Delhi counterparts of the Sri Lankan Troika that Lalith, a member, writes of).

The text of the Press Statement issued on May 21, 2009 after the top-level meeting with the Indian team and posted on the GoSL website read:

“Mr. M.K. Narayanan, National Security Advisor and Mr. S. Menon, Foreign Secretary of India visited Sri Lanka on May 20 and 21. They called on His Excellency Mahinda Rajapaksa, President of Sri Lanka and met with senior officials, including Hon. Basil Rajapaksa, MP, Mr. Lalith Weeratunga, Secretary to the President and Defence Secretary, Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa.

They also interacted with a number of political parties in Sri Lanka…Both sides also emphasized the urgent necessity of arriving at a lasting political settlement in Sri Lanka. To this, the Government of Sri Lanka indicated that it will proceed with implementation of the 13th Amendment. Further, the Government of Sri Lanka also intends to begin a broader dialogue with all parties, including the Tamil parties, in the new circumstances, for further enhancement of political arrangements to bring about lasting peace and reconciliation in Sri Lanka.” (May 21, 2009)

Note that Colombo’s commitment to ‘proceed with implementation of the 13th Amendment’ was not contingent upon the statement that GoSL ‘…also intends to begin a broader dialogue with all parties, including Tamil parties…’ and was therefore not contingent on the obstreperous behavior of the TNA in 2011 (when the GoSL-TNA dialogue began) but was seen as preceding that ‘broader dialogue’.

I wrote earlier that Lalith’s testimony about the Troika omits two, not just one, crucial and interrelated points. The second point is what went wrong, postwar, despite this wonderful arrangement.

Three years after the war ended, in 2012 India voted against us in Geneva. It did not return to our side in 2013 and 2014, though it did abstain. Now, what is of greatest salience is the fact of continuity in leading personalities and managerial personnel! The Troika was still in place in Colombo. The President was the same as during years of successful management of Indo-Lanka relations. The government in New Delhi was that of the Congress, with the same Prime Minister in place. If so, what had gone so wrong? What could have?

If one sticks simply to Lalith’s account, one would not find the answer to the question. One would not even know there is a question. Let me reiterate: same Troika, same leaders in both capitals, no change in government in either capital, but a complete turnaround in Indian behavior. Why so? Because our policy had changed or was not being implemented. We were perceived to have reneged on our promises– public, official promises which Lalith’s article makes no mention of! The Troika worked not only because they were good chums with their Indian counterparts but because they represented a policy pledge which was not being honored, perhaps being blocked, and therefore made the Indians increasingly vulnerable to pressure from Jeyalalitha, Hillary Clinton and civil society opinion. We did nothing to help them help us, though even our best friends the Chinese kept signaling us to do so.

By the time we held the Provincial Council election in the North (with Japan’s nudging) it was 2013. India had already voted against us in Geneva. The warning signals from Delhi were coming in by 2011, but were ignored by Colombo. However, the Indians were still not on board with the West and were still running interference for us in 2011, which is why the US pulled back and did not back the Canadian attempt against us, which folded. But months later, when the West knew we no longer had India with us, it moved against us in 2012. When the Non Aligned knew that India was no longer with us, our traditional support from the BRICS and the global South began to flake off. Rising Islamophobic discourse and unprosecuted violent activism in Sri Lanka even neutralized Malaysia’s vote.

We could have kept India with us but we didn’t. What happened to the Troika? The Troika had nothing to sell. It was either internally divided or had shifted collectively from its wartime stand.

None of this is merely history. It is serial defeats in Geneva in 2012, 2013 and 2014 (with the Troika still intact in Colombo) that paved the way for the surrender in Geneva under the new government in 2015. I have been and remain a harsh critic of the 2015 and 2017 resolutions and fervently hope to see us roll them back. But that cannot and will not happen by returning to the failed post war policy of the second Rajapaksa term, which resulted in the serial defeats of 2012, 2013 and 2014. That failure was due to a deviation from or at the least the non-implementation of or the imprudently delayed implementation of President Rajapaksa’s correct wartime policy agreement with India.

I have no doubt that there could be a 1977 or rather a “reverse 1977″ (the UNP at the receiving end) result at the next election. That is not my main concern. We all lived through the aftermath of that spectacular electoral victory and the rapid growth (a phenomenal 8% at one moment) of the economy. All that came to naught with the mishandling of the Tamil question and the concomitant mishandling of the equation with India, notwithstanding excellent relations with the US Republican administration (President Reagan) and strong security cooperation with Israel.

So, winning an election by a landslide, experiencing a rapid spike in economic growth, and an embrace of or by Washington and Tel Aviv, is only half of the story. Not plunging over the precipice is the more important half of that story. I do not think Sri Lanka can withstand a repeat performance after the experience of the 1980s. And that experience cannot be avoided by having a supposedly tougher, more patriotic leader than President Jayewardene. In fact, a leader without President Jayewardene’s pragmatic flexibility could result in a permanently divided island. After all, Serbia’s Slobodan Milosevic was regarded as a more nationalist Serbian leader (who also spoke of ‘socialism”) than the enlightened multiethnic socialist President Tito! Milosevic abolished the autonomous status of Kosovo. The result was the end of Yugoslavia.

There can be no sustainable Sri Lankan foreign policy which does not deal with the “intermestic” issue (to use Kissinger’s category) of the State and the Tamil people as a community. Good relations with India cannot be restored except by acknowledging the Indo-Lanka accord and its concomitant political commitment the 13th amendment. Without the Indian umbrella or shield supplementing the Chinese, we shall be vulnerable to Western pressure. The Indo-Lanka Accord cannot be ignored or bypassed without consequence.

We shall be unable to rebuild the broad coalition, beginning with India that would enable Sri Lanka to neutralize the Geneva 2015 Resolution, and exit what outgoing US Ambassador Athul Keshap calls “the Geneva framework”.

Any delusion about an Israeli option of exit from the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva will only trigger a shift back to New York where the Darusman Report originated, and the activation of prosecutions under universal jurisdiction by a variety of countries, ending in unilateral sanctions by some.

Today in Sri Lanka there is a growing social sentiment that all it takes is a return to the competent management– as represented in this case by the Troika. While it is crucial, it is not enough.

What is necessary is the correct political policy and it is only then that a managerial and technocratic stratum can implement it because it will have something to implement.

The basic distinction posited by rightwing neoconservative American scholar Thomas Sowell, with its implicit appreciation of the “doers” over the “talkers”, if taken to a logical conclusion, would place Hitler over Heraclitus, Attila the Hun over the Buddha, Genghis Khan over Socrates, Pol Pot over Pope Francis, and Donald Trump over Dr. Martin Luther King.

This ‘doers/talkers’ hierarchy of practices and values is dangerous, because you can “do” right and you can “do” wrong. “Doing” and “doing the right thing” aren’t the same. Destruction, which is doing, is not the same as creation/construction. Thanos, in ‘The Avengers: Infinity War’, is the ultimate “doer”.

Wrong discourse cannot yield right deeds, only wrongdoing. That is why the Buddha preached (“talked”) right thinking, right mindfulness. That is why the Bible says “In the beginning was the Word”– rendered as Logos, a complex Greek term, principally meaning “Reason”.

By Sugeeswara Senadhira Courtesy Ceylon Today

By Narada

Courtesy NewsIn.Asia

New Delhi, June 10 (newsin.asia): Niroshika Sanjeewani Liyana Muhandiram, the only Sri Lankan national to have graduated from the New Delhi-based South Asian University (SAU) this year, has topped the Master of Laws programme in the university bagging a Gold Medal, a press release from SAU  says..

Niroshika, who works for the Faculty of Law at the Open Univesity of Sri Lanka, received the  Gold Medal for her outstanding academic performance in Legal Studies” at the third convocation of the SAU  held at the Pravasi Bhartiya Kendra, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi on June 7.

Bangladeshis have been bagging gold medals in computer science at the New Delhi-based South Asian University (SAU). At the Third Convocation, Main Uddin of Bangladesh received a Gold Medal for his outstanding academic performance’ in the MSc Computer Sciences program. With that, Main Uddin became the second Bangladeshi to have got the top award in computer sciences.

SAU also awarded its first set of PhD Degrees, along with 10 MPhil and 160 Masters Degrees this year.

A total of 176 students were conferred Masters, MPhil and PhD Degrees in various programmes that include Applied Mathematics, Biotechnology, Computer Science, Development Economics, International Relations, Legal Studies and Sociology. 7 programme toppers were honoured with the SAU Gold Medal – one each from Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, and 5 from India.

Out of the total number of graduates, 21 were from Afghanistan, 17 from Bangladesh, 5 from Bhutan, 11 from Nepal, 5 from Pakistan and one from Sri Lanka and France while the rest 99 are from India.

Ten students will get their MPhil Degrees – two from Nepal, one from Bangladesh and 7 from India. For the first time since its inception, South Asian University handed out its PhD Degrees to 6 of its scholars – one each from Afghanistan and Bangladesh and 4 from India, representing various Departments and Faculties.

The convocation was presided over by Giriraj Mani Pokhrel, Minister for Education, Science and Technology, Government of Nepal. Among others who              graced the occasion were Dr.. Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, President, ICCR and Member of Rajya Sabha (Chief Guest) and Amjad Hussain B Sial, the Secretary General of SAARC.

Speaking on the occasion, Pokhrel said: South Asia has a common enemy called poverty and the young minds of the region should find ways and means to unleash the true potential of collective strength to transform the region through rapid economic growth and defeat this common enemy.”

He further said as the current chair of the SAARC, Nepal would give full support and cooperation to the SAARC process and particularly to SAU,  which he said, was a dream of the visionaries of the region.

Dr Vinay Sahasrabuddhe reiterated the importance of the day i.e. 7 June as it was on this day Mahatama Gandhi resolved to fight injustice when he was thrown off of the first class compartment of a train in South Africa.

Empowered youth of the region should fight for unity and harmony in the region and SAU could be converted into a universal fraternity university, Sahasrabuddhe said.

Dr. Kavita Sharma, President SAU, congratulated the graduates and shared her hope for the region as more and more young minds of the region are equipped with cutting-edge knowledge in the fields of Science and Social Sciences, in an inimitable environment of camaraderie.

Co-operation among the students in South Asian University drawn from different parts of South Asia is nothing but inspiring,” Dr.Sharma said.

Mandated to inculcate a sense of regional consciousness among the young minds of the South Asia region while imparting cutting-edge knowledge, South Asian University was established by the governments of the eight SAARC nations. The university took off in 2010 with two Masters Degree Programmes. Today, SAU offers seven Masters and an equal number of Doctoral Programmes.

SAARC Secretary General, Mr. Amjad Hussain Sial said that with the knowledge and education that the graduates have acquired from the University will play an important role in the development of the South Asian countries and the region.

He also thanked the Government of India for allocating a 100 acre land in New Delhi and its magnanimous contribution for constructing the permanent campus of the university.

The construction of the permanent campus of the South Asian University is going on in Maidan Garhi in New Delhi.

Composition of the Student Population Skewed 

As per SAU rules, 50 percent of the students should come SAARC countries other than India, and the remaining from India, the host country.

We have been maintaining this ratio but there has been a shortfall of students from Bhutan, Maldives and Sri Lanka,” Dr Sasanka Perera, Vice President of SAU and Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, told BDNews.com.

Himself a former Professor of Sociology from Colombo University in Sri Lanka, Dr Perera said that there has been a lack of initiative from the governments of the countries like Sri Lanka which send fewer students.

We have been pushing the case for more applicants from these countries have made significant progress vis-à-vis Bhutan. From 5 or 6 applicants from Bhutan, a few years ago, it has now gone up to 120 and the number of Bhutanese admitted has gone up to 25, which is significant,” Dr Perera said.

Students have to sit for an entrance examination.

On Sri Lanka, Prof Perera said, he plans to visit the island soon to talk to university authorities and show them a promotional video he had made for a State broadcaster on the opportunities and prospects offered by SAU.

(The featured image at the top shows Niroshika Sanjeewani Liyana Muhandiram (at the extreme right) after she received the Gold Medal)

Courtesy NewsIn.Asia

Qingdao, June 10 (The Hindu): India was the only country in the eight-nation Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) on June 10 which refused to endorse China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)  for which Beijing has signed pacts with nearly 80 countries and international organisations.

A declaration issued at the end of the two-day summit of the SCO said Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have reaffirmed their support for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). But India does not find mention.

The Member States express appreciation for the joint efforts taken towards its implementation, including efforts to coordinate the development of the Eurasian Economic Union and the BRI and call for using the potential of the regional countries, international organisations and multilateral associations to create a broad, open, mutually beneficial and equal partnership in the SCO space,” it said.

In his address at the Summit, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in an oblique reference to the BRI, said any mega connectivity project must respect sovereignty and territorial integrity and assured India’s support to projects  which ensure inclusivity.

India has been severely critical of the BRI, the pet project of President Xi Jinping, as the $50 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is part of the BRI, passes through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). India says it cannot accept a project that ignores its core concern on sovereignty and territorial integrity.

China had unveiled the BRI in 2013 with an aim to link Southeast Asia, Central Asia, the Gulf region, Africa and Europe with a network of land and sea routes.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has already announced that China would invest around $126 billion for the project.

However, there has been suspicion among several countries that the main aim of the project is to expand China’s influence globally.

In his address, in presence of Mr. Xi, Prime Minister Modi said India’s commitment to connectivity projects is reflected in its involvement in International North South Corridor project, development of the Chabahar port and the Ashgabat agreement.

Connectivity with the neighboring countries is India’s priority. We welcome the connectivity projects which are sustainable and efficient and which respect territorial integrity and sovereignty of the countries,” he said.

(The featured image at the top shows Indian Prime Minister Modi in Qingdao) 

lanka C news

අර්ජුන් ඇලෝසියස් විසින් දුන් මුදල් ඇතැම්විට ජනාධිපතිවරණයදට විදයම් වන්නට ඇතැයි ඇමති සරත් ෆොන්සේකා මහතා පවසයි.

මැතිවරණ කාලවලදී විවිධ පුද්ගලයන් පැමිණ මුදල් දෙන බවත් එම පුද්ලගලයන් එලවා දැමීමට හැකියාවක් නැති බවත් ඇමතිවරයා කියයි.

ඒ ආකාරයේ මුදල් ලබා ගත් අය අස් කරන්නේ නම් මුළු රටේම සිටින දේශපාලයන්ට ගෙදර යාමට සිදුවනු ඇතැයිද ඇමතිවරයා කියා සිටී.

උත්සව අවස්ථාවක් අවසානයේ මාධ්‍යවේදීන් විසින් කරන ලද ප‍්‍රශ්ණ කිරීම් හමුවේ ඔහු මෙම අදහස් පල කලේය.

By Meera Sreenivasan/Courtesy The Hindu

The arch above the school gate sits like a crown over the pillars that support it on either side. It bears the name ‘Sri Shanmuga Hindu Ladies’ College’, painted in a turquoise blue that must have been vibrant once but looks faded now. Beyond the arch, a couple of two-storied pink buildings face each other. Their proximity amplifies the commotion that erupts when the bell rings. It is break time.

This school, many in Sri Lanka’s eastern port-city of Trincomalee will tell you, is for girls who study well. It was founded in 1923 by Thangamma Shanmugampillai, a local advocate of women’s education. Shanmuga ‘College’, as many secondary schools in Sri Lanka are called, steadily built its reputation and has preserved it for nearly a century.

However, when the school made headlines in late April, it was not for an academic feat. It drew national attention when controversy erupted over a few of its teachers wearing the abaya, a full-length, gown-like dress of Arab origin that many Sri Lankan Muslim women have begun to wear in recent decades. Seeing this as an aberration from earlier practice, where Muslim teachers wore the saree in Tamil style accompanied by a headscarf, a group of parents and teachers from the Hindu community protested, demanding that the teachers abide by an unwritten but apparently entrenched school ‘dress code’.

At first, this seemed like a case of Tamils objecting to the Muslim teachers’ change of attire in a ‘Hindu school’. But beneath the surface are cracks that manifest in small and big ways, at times exploding into visceral hate speech. With its almost equally proportioned ethnic mix of Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims, Sri Lanka’s Eastern province could be an ideal site to demonstrate reconciliation and coexistence among the different communities. For the same reason, it is the most challenging too.

In two of the Eastern province’s three districts, Ampara and Trincomalee, Muslims are the majority, whereas in Batticaloa district there are more Hindus, and the Muslim minority, comprising around 26% of the population, is concentrated in pockets along the coast and inland. The districts skirting Sri Lanka’s east coast are among the most scenic parts of the country, where lagoons, lakes and lush fields paint the landscape in shades of blue and green.

Deriding Difference

The protesters who gathered outside the school in the last week of April held placards in English and Tamil with messages such as, Hindu schools are for Hindus, let us not entertain racism here”, and Even if you don’t speak in pure Tamil, do not speak in crass Tamil”, indicating that the issues at stake were larger than what teachers should wear to school.

The Tamils unleashed a commentary on the Muslims’ culture and language in unmistakably derogatory terms, provoking hard-line Muslim groups to return the favour in a counter-protest. Social media was rife with charges reeking of prejudice and suspicion – of spreading Wahhabism” by one side and of continuing the separatist Eelam struggle” by the other.

Though mostly Tamil-speaking, Sri Lankan Muslims, who comprise about 10% of the island’s population, have historically identified themselves as a separate ethnicity. A majority of the Tamils in the island’s north and east are Hindus, accounting for most of Sri Lanka’s nearly 13% Hindu population. The island’s Tamils see themselves as an ethnicity distinct from the Muslims, despite a common language. They often speak of Muslims, many of whom are engaged in agriculture, fisheries and trade, as a prosperous” community, well networked and upwardly mobile.

As recent incidents stirred up latent tensions between the Tamils and Muslims, some within both communities are visibly troubled. We thought the situation was going to escalate. Everyone was forwarding hate messages and rumours via social media. It was getting dangerous,” recalls a Tamil youth, who manages a small business minutes away from the school. But the fact is Shanmuga has traditionally been a Hindu school. That must be respected, don’t you think?” he says, requesting anonymity.

He was echoing what veteran Trincomalee parliamentarian and leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA, a political alliance of Tamil nationalist parties) R. Sampanthan highlighted in response to Rishad Bathiudeen, the Minister of Industry and Commerce, who had taken up the cause of the Muslim teachers. Appreciating the changes in the culture of attire among all communities, and noting it was each community’s right to make its choices, Sampanthan urged education authorities to resolve the matter in a way that respects the traditional dress code followed in the [said] school” and ensure no community introduces new ways of dressing.”

His seemingly conciliatory tone, however, hardly concealed an uncompromising message: Muslim teachers teaching in a traditionally ‘Hindu school’ must abide by the ‘traditional Tamil attire’ for female teachers — the saree. However, Shanmuga College, though denominated as Hindu, is a state-funded school under the education department. Students from all communities are admitted — 120 Muslims are enrolled among the 2,000-odd students — and teachers from any community may be appointed.

Among Sri Lanka’s 353 such ‘national schools’, there appears to be an implicit recognition of the role played by religious movements in establishing them, as seen in their official self-identification as ‘Hindu’ or ‘Muslim’ schools. Despite some diversity within, most national schools are ethnically marked, including in the mixed Eastern province. Since the controversy, all the four Muslim teachers at Shanmuga College, according to an authoritative source, have sought a transfer to a Muslim school in the same district, so they can wear the abaya to work.

Symbolic Clothing

For the men from both communities, who voice strong views on the abaya, the attire worn by Muslim women is symbolic, signifying either adherence to religious convention or defiance of ‘Tamil culture’, depending on their religion. On the other hand, women, including those who use it, offer a more complex reading in which history is not incidental.

Mainstream narratives around Sri Lanka’s almost three-decade-long internal war focus on the north, where Tamil militant organisations were based, but the east has seen its share of action and suffering. Several thousand people lost their lives in indiscriminate shelling by government forces and bloody massacres by all sides. From the violence unleashed by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on Muslims in the 1990s, to the 2004 split within the LTTE when its eastern commander Karuna Amman broke away, the Indian Ocean tsunami the same year, and the armed forces’ capture of LTTE-controlled territory in 2007, the Eastern province has endured profound losses and devastation. The impact of that is still seen in the large number of women-headed-households, the wide prevalence of poverty in the province — Batticaloa is among the island’s poorest districts — and the high rates of out-migration, in the form of low-skilled labour, to West Asia. Resilient locals are labouring hard to rebuild their lives, but recent bouts of communal tension foreshadow a difficult future.

I grew up in Kattankudy and have always lived here,” says Fahmiya Shareef, an activist in this Muslim-dominated locality of Batticaloa district. A narrow alleyway leads from the main road to her house right at the end. She can recall the August 1990 mosque massacre, when over 100 Muslims, kneeling in prayer, were mowed down in gunfire by the LTTE.

Now 41, Shareef remembers a time when Tamils and Muslims lived in amity in the 1980s. Many of our boys joined the Tamil militant movement. Muslims were very sympathetic to their struggle, and at the same time tried being a bridge to the state.” Once, when the state security forces were hunting Tamil youth suspected to be linked to the LTTE, her father, who was a school vice-principal, disguised some of his Tamil students as Muslims and smuggled them to distant border villages.

In the years of heightening conflict, the relationship soured. Mutual distrust replaced respect, and hostility overwhelmed cordiality. Tamils increasingly viewed Muslims as accomplices of the state, and Muslims in turn saw Tamils as an oppressive local majority trying to carve out a separate state in which Muslims were either discriminated against or displaced. Ties spiralled downward from the early 1990s, when the LTTE attacked eastern Muslims and forcefully evicted northern Muslims overnight.

Unveiling Prejudice

That trust deficit remains intact today and dominates all debates, ranging from a proposed re-merger of the north and east (from 1988 to 2006, the Northern and Eastern provinces were temporarily merged to form the North Eastern province) to allocation of local, provincial and national resources. Unlike the Northern Tamil parties, Muslim political parties are coalition partners of the government, holding key portfolios. This leads Tamils to accuse them of favouring their ethnoreligious electoral base while distributing government jobs or public funds.

There is certainly truth in that allegation, but the Tamil community cannot get too far by resorting to hatred and divisive politics in return, can it?” asks K. Thurairajasingam, general secretary of the TNA’s main constituent, the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi, and a former minister in the Eastern Provincial Council. As far as the east is concerned, it is home to Tamils and Muslims. We have to work together in a way that is fair to all the people here.”

Protesters outside the Trincomalee school derided the Tamil spoken by Muslims as impure” and crass”, forgetting that some of their northern Tamil brethren do not consider their eastern dialect pure” enough. Objections to Muslims span other spheres of culture too, including dietary habits. In May, a hardline Tamil Hindu organisation protested against the sale of beef, mainly by Muslims, in parts of Jaffna, claiming Sri Lanka to be a land of Hindus and Buddhists where the cow is revered and therefore cannot be slaughtered. Muslim women’s changing attire also appears to be contentious to Tamils. Why must they suddenly wear these new outfits imported from Saudi Arabia?” asks a senior academic in Batticaloa.

His barb brought to mind what Shareef had said earlier: The abaya issue was not really a problem of our udai (clothing). It was about our urimai (right).” Young Batticaloa lawyer Jawshana Musammil, herself dressed in an abaya, concurs with Shareef. In her view, to tell someone that their attire is inappropriate is a violation of their fundamental right.

To many Muslim women, the abaya is about following a convention. For some, it is about convenience too. Working women find it quicker to wear the abaya during their morning rush, as compared to the pleated saree. Some of them have received abayas as presents from a relative returning from West Asia, others buy the dresses in the local market. Some of them wear it in black, others like experimenting with brighter colours. Even many Tamil women today prefer wearing the salwar kameez to the saree. Can we say that it is wrong? Culture keeps changing with time for all of us,” Shareef notes.

In the 20 years that she has spent working with women of all communities in the East, Tamil activist Lakshmi (name changed on request) has seen many changes to women’s clothing and attitudes about them. So many Tamil women tell me that their husbands force them to wear the sari or the thali. Similarly, there are Muslim women who are not particularly fond of the abaya. If you ask these women, they will tell you it is an issue of patriarchy more than religion,” she says, adding that the battle against male dominance is common to all religions.

However, in Sri Lanka’s east, everything is seen through a communal lens first. Further, in recent times, sections within all communities are showing signs of becoming more conservative and insular, many living here observe.

You must remember that religion has its own power base,” says Jesuit priest Fr. Veeresan Yogeswaran, at the sea-facing office of the Centre for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights in Trincomalee, which he heads. In a setting as complex as in the Eastern province, where religion is not merely a matter of personal belief but also a means to accessing resources from public and private actors, people of all faiths appear to be asserting their identities and cultures.

Pointing to the growing number of evangelical groups among Christians and Muslims as a cause of concern for Hindus, Fr. Yogeswaran says, Putting up churches in predominantly Tamil villages will be seen as an attempt to disrupt coherence.”

Local Tamils speak of new mosques that have sprung up in the last few years, and of the massive Batticaloa Campus of Sri Lanka, a private higher educational institute. It is chaired by an influential regional Muslim politician.

Further, there is concern over possible a north Indian influence”, says Fr. Yogeswaran, referring to more aggressive Hindu organising in the east. The Tamil Hindus of Sri Lanka, especially in the north and east, are essentially Saivites. Their kovils are all Siva temples. But increasingly, you notice many Vishnu temples coming up here.”

Murmurs of a likely Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh influence, coupled with the efforts of organisations such as the Siva Senai, which led the anti-beef campaign in Jaffna and has claimed links to Hindutva groups such as the Shiv Sena, RSS and Vishwa Hindu Parishad in India, have fuelled these fears.

In the Sinhala-majority south, where many Sri Lankans worry about the growing incidence of anti-Muslim attacks over the last five years, hardline Buddhist organisations have been talking about combating a growing threat of radical Islam”.

Targeted Both Ways

That is perhaps why Shareef worries about Muslims getting beaten on both sides.” The Muslims of the Eastern province, sandwiched by the Tamils at its northern end and Sinhalese in the south, are feeling squeezed. More so after Sinhalese mobs carried out a spate of attacks targeting Muslim eateries and shops in Ampara in February, alleging that a Muslim-run restaurant had mixed sterilisation pills in food served to Sinhalese customers.

Weeks after the anti-Muslim violence and destruction, which also spilled over to Kandy in the Central province, where it claimed at least two lives, lab tests of the food sample found the complaint to be false. We live in constant fear of being attacked again,” says Mohamed Mustafa Junaideen, leader of a cooperative society in Ampara. Both the Tamil and Sinhalese instigators of the two protests have political reasons, some suspect.

There are forces who know that if you disrupt peace in a [multi-ethnic] city like Trincomalee, it will affect the whole country. They use that for their political gain,” says social worker M. Noorul Ismiya. Whatever the conflict might be, you will find women at the receiving end of it. As a feminist I am uncomfortable with the idea of an abaya, but at the same time I believe that no one in the world has the right to tell a person what she must or must not wear.” The abaya has become a prop for a more virulent prejudice, she adds.

Lawyer Musammil, who has many Tamil clients, says that she keeps hearing about a host of issues in Tamil society ranging from domestic violence and alcoholism to indebtedness caused by microfinance. There are so many big problems around us and silence about them, but some people harp on a matter like women’s attire which has no consequence to their lives,” she says.

Those like Shareef fear that in the long term, if the two minorities can’t stand in solidarity with each other, then the future for the individuals in either community would remain bleak. She cannot see why identities must complicate coexistence. Like in a fruit salad, we could be in a common dish but still retain our distinct colour and flavour. But when you try to blend us all into a juice, then the one fruit you add more will dominate the taste. That will be at the cost of others.”

(Photo Credit: Getty Images)