{"id":41369,"date":"2015-02-09T20:33:24","date_gmt":"2015-02-10T02:33:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=41369"},"modified":"2015-02-09T07:34:32","modified_gmt":"2015-02-09T14:34:32","slug":"the-first-30-days-of-yahapalanaya-good-governance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/02\/09\/the-first-30-days-of-yahapalanaya-good-governance\/","title":{"rendered":"The First 30 days of Yahapalanaya (Good Governance)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Janaki Chandraratna, Perth Western Australia<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

My recent visit to Sri Lanka on 13 January 2015, 5 days after the Presidential election, has left me appalled to the core. It was the annihilation of the vanquished that left me flabbergasted. \u00a0I had to pinch myself to ensure I am in the right country as the post election conduct of the victors were certainly not that of a nation that boasts of over 2500 years of civility based on compassionate Buddhist principles.<\/p>\n

The disparaging of the defeated pursued throughout the election campaign continued with much vigor, after the elections. Many unsubstantiated claims and counter claims were made by senior Ministers to shock the nation. Some of the claims that grabbed headlines in the first week after the election included the discovery of fake ballot papers; Rajapaksas leaving the country to a Island in Seychelles acquired by Rajapaksas from ill gotten money; Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the Defense Secretary, had used an Air Force Plane to flee to Maldives as he was denied entry to Singapore. On investigation it was evident that there were no fake ballot papers and Rajapaksas except Basil were safe and well with their relatives in Sri Lanka.\u00a0 I understand that Mr. Basil Rajapaksa had returned to his host country, America. The particular comment on Seychelles was categorically denied by an angry Seychelles Finance Minister who considered it as an attack on the integrity of his country.<\/p>\n

The print media was later ablaze with a claim by the new Foreign Minister of an attempted coup by the defeated President at Temple Trees in the wee hours of 9 February 2015. This claim supposedly is under investigation although all present denied the allegation. The coup claim, I understand was splashed across the world news media.\u00a0 Another shocking allegation was a bank account with billions of Govt. money was found deposited to the credit of Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the Defense Secretary.\u00a0 On investigation it was evident that the account was set up in the name of the Ministry of Defense after a due process of Cabinet approval in order to expedite the payments for Army Head quarters construction! There were many more unsubstantiated claims, which were later commented on some commentators as a well designed despicable \u2018Witch Hunt\u2019 to defame and destroy the vanquished from future elections. To me, the new Government activities at the time were more like that of vultures descending on and tormenting a half dead prey.<\/p>\n

Then there was the surreptitious appointment of the Prime Minister and the takeover of the Cabinet by a minority party, the UNP. Ranil defended his appointment as it was mentioned in Mr. Sirisena\u2019s Manifesto.\u00a0 The questions regarding the legality of replacing the constitution with a manifesto are yet to be answered. The take over of the Cabinet was akin to a Tsunami where not only the Cabinet Ministers but also the Secretaries and Department Heads were replaced with loyal supporters without any regard to Mr. Sirisena\u2019s manifesto Yahapalana promises where Govt. appointments were to be made on seniority and merit. Nepotism, a charge against the previous regime, was also seen to be alive and well with Mr. Sirisena appointing his brother to the Dept. of Telecommunications.\u00a0 What were of most concern were the intimidation, harassment and dismissal of the Chief Justice with least regard to the constitutional provisions and procedures. The re-instatement of an impeached former Chief Justice for a period of one day, and the subsequent appointment of the new chief justice without the due constitutional process caused great deal of anxiety and distrust with the new Government, which appeared to have deceived the people with promises of \u2018Yahapalanaya\u2019. The attack on the judiciary, according to Ranil, was to appease Bar Association of Sri Lanka (BASL). This explanation, raised the question as to who was in control of the country? Was it the BASL, Trade Unions and West sponsored American NGOs. The interference in the judiciary generated a fear psychosis within the country, in particular, with the journalists. The eerie silence of western media and the so-called international community including UNHRC clearly demonstrated their successful involvement in the regime change in Sri Lanka.\u00a0 The dictatorial activities undertaken in the last 30 days by the new government are too numerous to be elaborated in this short article. In short the government has left the electorate high and dry without any apparent recourse to justice with its ultra despotic activities, under the guise of Yahapalanaya.<\/p>\n

The interim budget was also another burden to the electorate. Although it provided much needed relief to the community with price reductions and increased salaries its sustainability beyond 100 days is a question for most economists. One off taxes to fund the salary increases indeed is not a great long-term solution for the country. The funding of the budget was expected to be from the savings of the alleged extravagancies and misappropriations of the previous government.\u00a0 So far the government does not appear to have had a windfall from these sources and has sought the assistance of the World Bank and India to trace the treasures hidden overseas by the previous regime. In desperation the Govt., has inflicted an unprecedented humiliation on the Ex-President by organizing a search of his premises for stolen goods under a search warrant! This despicable action, which had never taken place in Sri Lankan history, has not provided any joy to an anxious Govt.<\/p>\n

Rule of law, relief to battlers, good governance, deliverance of the Government from alleged corruption and containment\/ditching of Presidential powers, electoral reforms are desired and valued by most if not by all Sri Lankans. Many people claim to have voted for a regime change for these reasons. In practice however the first 30 days of Yahapalanaya do not appear to have delivered on any of these expectations. So far the Government has engaged in grabbing headlines for unsubstantiated here say and innuendos and is tinkering at the edges with the security of the nation in alliance with India and the West. The electorate waits in hope that the manifesto promises would be honored within the next 70 days of the 100-day parliament.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Janaki Chandraratna, Perth Western Australia My recent visit to Sri Lanka on 13 January 2015, 5 days after the Presidential election, has left me appalled to the core. It was the annihilation of the vanquished that left me flabbergasted. \u00a0I had to pinch myself to ensure I am in the right country as the post […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dr-donald-chandraratna"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41369\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}