{"id":100910,"date":"2020-04-08T17:08:50","date_gmt":"2020-04-09T00:08:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=100910"},"modified":"2020-04-08T17:08:50","modified_gmt":"2020-04-09T00:08:50","slug":"sri-lanka-needs-a-partial-dictatorship-for-efficient-and-clean-administration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/04\/08\/sri-lanka-needs-a-partial-dictatorship-for-efficient-and-clean-administration\/","title":{"rendered":"SRI LANKA NEEDS A PARTIAL DICTATORSHIP FOR EFFICIENT AND CLEAN ADMINISTRATION"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

When\nI was talking to people in Sri Lanka as well as those who were overseas, they\nexpressed that Sri Lanka needs a partial dictatorship for efficient and clean\nadministration. Major news items in print and web media at present are mainly\nfocusing on corruption, misappropriation, cheating, and information related to\nthe dishonesty of politicians and government employees. If the public sector is\nso corrupt it would not difficult to assume that private sector and\nNon-government institutions popularly called NGOs, may also in a similar\ncorrupt situation despite the general belief of people that they are clean\norganizations.  Sri Lankans are\nfrustrated with so corrupt information are being reported in the existing\ndemocratic operation and people expect corruption-free efficient and effective environments\nin the country. Coronavirus pandemic may give a signal to temporarily forget\npast corrupt practices but it doesn\u2019t mean that it should forget forever and\never.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 It seems that democratic political operation\nsupports the corrupt administration despite political rhetoric that democracy\nis the best administration representing peoples\u2019 participation. When it looks\nback on the government administration mechanism since independence in 1948\ncorruption and maladministration have been gradually increased and they have an\nupward trend without political party differences. Administrators under all\npolitical parties have recorded relations to corruption and malpractices. The\ninvestigation process relating to various cases appears delaying justice and\npeople are discomfort about this situation and they assume that politicians\nwilfully delay the bringing justice or support for delaying tactics.  The perception of the public in this arena is\nnegative and many people are of opinion that Sri Lanka needs a partial\ndictatorship to achieve expectations of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After\nthe presidential election in 2019 people are full of hope that elected\npresident, Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa will do the needful to eliminate corruption\nand change the malpractices in the government sector.  Now, people are observing the operations with\nprecarious minds what are going on and news media report that corrupt practices\nare active and when people hear such information, they disturb about new\nadministration too.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\nnews spread on the election of Mr. Rajapaksa many Western commentators\nattempted to spread negative opinions especially referring to ethnic problems,\nwhich is a possible issue of less than 5% of the population or a tiny group of\npeople in the country.  Recently, I read\na BBC report, it was a completely negative opinion and I have a question of why\nthis reporter sent negative opinion when many people of Sri Lanka reject such a\nnegative way of reporting.  I had a\nsuspicion that the report aimed at the Geneva Human Rights Conference and ideas\nwere not authentic views of BBC.  Reports\non BBC have ignored the issues of more than 95% of people and during the LTTE\nwar and just after the war these negative commentators had an organized attempt\nto undermine the Rajapaksa administration giving the wrong impression that Sri\nLanka might be a failed state.  There is\nno doubt that reporters need to show what they have done for the payments, but\nproviding unreliable information may be a clear undermining of the credibility\nof the news agency. They were the only opinion, but not true information and\nreaders of the report might misunderstand the government of Sri Lanka. The\nyahapalana regime recorded more dishonest work but not a single point about the\nregime has mentioned in the reporting process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nhistory, people of the country without any ethnic difference adapted to a\ndictatorship in political administration and people preferred to dictatorship\nas it was less corrupt and attempted to fulfill the aspirations of common\npeople. The public of Sri Lanka hadn\u2019t the idea of any other style of political\nphilosophy when they gained democratic administration to compare the\ndifferences.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

[D1]<\/a> The\nexercise of democratic administration had been effective since the State\nCouncil in 1931 and the administration was strictly scrutinized by the British\nrule. When Sri Lanka gained independence in 1948 people had democratic\nexperience only for 20 years and the knowledge and experience gained from a\nshort period have not been sufficient to exercise clean administration and the\nfreedom has been misunderstood by elected representatives as well as supporters\nof political parties. The active participation of people in administration at\nthe regional level had been lower and people did not want to be engaged in or\nparticipate except voting in elections. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nimpartial opinion about this matter is that people of the country had a short\nperiod to learn democratic administration, its operational pattern and its\nconsequences.  If it looks at the British\ndemocratic operations, the UK has no written constitution but conventions had\nbeen developed throughout centuries and people learned well about democratic\ntraditions so they respect them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nclear evidence under the dictatorship in history was nobody wanted to divide\nthe country neither wanted to implement different styles of administration\nexcept cultural or religious practices, democratic administration promoted to\ngo beyond the cultural and religious practices and mark borders withing the\nsmall island.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many\nEnglish Dictionaries define democracy as a system of government by the whole\npopulation or all the eligible members of the country typically through elected\nrepresentatives. The question is when there are no differences in ethnic,\nreligious, caste or any other differences exist, could the rule of majority be\naccepted as Democracy when there is a violation of human values? This is a\nvital point that people need to understand when applying a democratic rule in a\ncountry.  It was not educated in Sri\nLanka before introduce the democratic system. Broadly democracy involved in\ndifferent concepts such as representative democracy, social democracy, and many\nothers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nshort period of administration of the president Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa showed\nthat a partial Dictatorship is the most suitable and appropriate administration\nto Sri Lanka and many academics confirmed it. The struggle to control the COVID\n19 proved that how a partial Dictatorship is suitable for efficient and clean\nadministration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nacademics of Sri Lanka expressed the following points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n