{"id":60214,"date":"2016-10-28T16:11:34","date_gmt":"2016-10-28T23:11:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=60214"},"modified":"2016-10-28T16:11:34","modified_gmt":"2016-10-28T23:11:34","slug":"cope-cope-and-cope-all-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/10\/28\/cope-cope-and-cope-all-the-way\/","title":{"rendered":"COPE, COPE and COPE all the way"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Lucien Rajakarunanayake\u00a0Courtesy The Island<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

October 29, 2016, 12:20 pm<\/span>
\nCOPE is almost everywhere; it sounds like the new theme song of Good Governance, or did someone call it Yahapaalanaya.<\/p>\n

One does feel sorry for the COPE Chairman, Mr. Handunetti, had to do a rapid scoop out of COPE, with the pressure brought on him by the Green Elephants in the Committee, who had a special love for the former Governor of the Central Bank \u2013 Arjuna Mahendran. It looks like the COPE Report, which has somehow been presented in Parliament, without any sub-reports from the Greens, will have to face a Perpetual Problem in the days ahead, with the details of the hoary profits made by Mahendran\u2019s son-in-law, Arjuna Aloysius, who was involved in perpetual and hugely profitable dealings with the Central Bank, which were not profitable to the country.<\/p>\n

Twisting and turning the law with regard to Treasury Bond auctions seem to have been a family business of the Mahendrans \u2013 the father-in-law and son-in-law, giving a whole new twist to \u2018in-law profiteering\u2019 that appears to have gone beyond the crooked profiting activities of the Family Tree of the corrupt, which held sway in the politics and finances of the country not so long ago. Those who make huge noises about Good Governance or “Yahapaalanaya” as it was dubbed in Sinhala, to suit Polonnaruwa thinking in politics, will soon have to come to understand how they are to COPE with the reality of \u2018in-law corruption\u2019 at the Central Bank.<\/p>\n

\"article_image\"<\/p>\n

This is the new issue that Parliament will have to COPE with in the coming weeks, offering opportunities for great excitement, as the Greens and Blues in government, try to find escape routes for those perpetually rich Mahendrans, to escape the Rule of Law, that is said to be a policy priority of Good Governance, until the President with Polonnaruwa ideology, recently came up with new thinking of the independence of probing into the corruption of those who display medals of honour in the armed forces, and we are now seeing a race to release \u2018War Heroes\u2019 from the cells of the Remand Prison.<\/p>\n

\"\"Parliament is a privileged place, and its members will have all the privileges they need to probe into the COPE Report, and the various sub-issues on its content that will come from the Greens and Blues, depending on whether the voices of discord are in favour of the father-in-law or son-in-law.<\/p>\n

But this is only one issue in the much wider COPE crisis facing the country. What the COPE members of Parliament have to worry themselves about, is nothing compared to what the public have to COPE with today, in the much wider area of politics, corruption, and corruption of a huge scale in almost every aspect of government.<\/p>\n

Just think about it. Can you COPE with the situation where Members of Parliament, whether elected or appointed or crept in, are given permits to import luxury vehicles duty free, and no sooner the permit is obtained sell it for millions of rupees to those outside the House at Diyawanna. There are senior MPs who say this profiteering on duty free vehicle permits is part of the privileges of an MP, as it has been going on for quite a long time, on the principle that practice makes it perfect or gives it privilege.<\/p>\n

How can you COPE with any Minister who obtained a huge building on rent worth several millions of rupees of taxpayer money, and does not occupy the premises for months on end, as the repairs and fittings have not been completed in the building? All this while there is government premises nearby, that is wholly capable of accommodating that minister, his ministry and his political work, too. That is certainly a huge COPE issue before the public, which is never discussed in parliament.<\/p>\n

How does the public COPE with a situation when VVIP Security Guards accompany a Dahamson, member of the power that be or the \u2018palana balaya\u2019 tries to enter a night club, after closing hours (night clubs do close very late) and has violent confrontations with the Night Club Bouncer, who is injured and treated in hospital; and somehow, when the power-of-powers calls for a full inquiry there are no CCTV records available of the entire incident, the Bouncer cannot recognize those who assaulted him, and the proprietor of the Night Club, gladly agrees to bear the cost of all damages, as if he was doing a great service to the country, and not the paternal forces that produced that Dahamson, of canny and powerful escapability.<\/p>\n

There is much, much more the people will have to COPE with from next week, with the new VAT coming into force, and there will be even more pains to COPE with when the new Budget is presented next month, trying to cover up all the failings of the last Budget, as well as sort out the huge economic, budgetary and fiscal crisis we are in, thanks to the corruption in the past, and in the present.<\/p>\n

It is time you and I decided to find a way of COPING with the reality of the pledges of Good Governance or Yahapaalanaya being the stuff of political forgetful convenience. Get used to COPING with the new corruption that is holding sway, in a coalition of the consensual corrupt. There will be no stunning statements coming soon or even later on how the people have to learn to COPE with the broken promises, of those who sought the vote of the people to defeat corruption, but now expect the people to COPE with both the old and new corruption.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s try to get used to COPING with a Cabinet of the Crooked. It will take a long time to develop the COPE-surgery, needed to remove corruption, fraud and crime from our body politic. Have patience and just learn to COPE with in all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Lucien Rajakarunanayake\u00a0Courtesy The Island October 29, 2016, 12:20 pm COPE is almost everywhere; it sounds like the new theme song of Good Governance, or did someone call it Yahapaalanaya. One does feel sorry for the COPE Chairman, Mr. Handunetti, had to do a rapid scoop out of COPE, with the pressure brought on him […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-106"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60214","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=60214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}