{"id":86555,"date":"2019-03-20T03:25:03","date_gmt":"2019-03-20T10:25:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=86555"},"modified":"2019-03-20T03:32:11","modified_gmt":"2019-03-20T10:32:11","slug":"%ef%bb%bfleadership-and-motivation-for-policy-corrections-in-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/03\/20\/%ef%bb%bfleadership-and-motivation-for-policy-corrections-in-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"\ufeffLEADERSHIP AND MOTIVATION FOR POLICY CORRECTIONS IN SRI LANKA"},"content":{"rendered":"\n


BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

To\nachieve a rapid economic development and sustainable economic growth, the most\nessential desideratum in Sri Lanka is policy correction in relation to\npolitical, economic, social and cultural areas. It is a gigantic task with a\nstrong political and social motivation.  Since\nthe political independence in 1948, Sri Lanka continuously involved in policy\ndevelopment tasks, which were misguided by a lack of clear vision, mission,\nobjectives and activities. The other issue that related to the policy\ndevelopment is that the task doesn\u2019t involve in a policy monitoring, variance\nanalysis and remedial management process for redevelopment of policies\nconsistent to international initiatives, directions, innovations and changes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nis possible to make many mistakes or incurring weakness at the stage of policy\ndevelopment and the correction of policies, developed in the past.  In fact. it is a quite difficult task. For\nexample, Sri Lanka introduced new language policy after 1956 election, later\nthe country wanted to correct policy and it had many hurdles as UNP opposed\nwith a public protest and in 1965 elected government attempted to develop a\npolicy for political administration (Rata Saba), it was unsuccessful due to\npublic protest but same policy introduced with the 13th<\/sup> amendment to\nthe constitution, which has now a strong opposition in the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Policy\nmonitoring and remedial management roles were purely the responsibility of\nbureaucrats and they never informed the outcomes of the role to public. It may\nhave the ignorance of them or politicians did not direct them to do so.  The elected government in 1972 introduced a\npolitical authority for the purposes, later it became a tactic of taking\nrevenge from opponents and making special treatments to political supporters.  Obviously, politicians and bureaucrats have\npoor knowledge, skills and experience for policy development and correction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therefore,\nthe policy development and monitoring process had a clear division between the\ngovernment, bureaucrats and public. The way bureaucrats were playing the role\nsupported to the development of Machiavellian politics in the country to cheat\neach other. These are major reasons for the requirement of policy corrections\nand the current government has no opportunity to engage in policy correction,\nmost probably it will cease to exist in 2020. The reason to achieve this type\nof situation by the current government was misguided so-called yahapana policy\nwithout a clear and strong political leadership.  Therefore, the next head of state will be\nelected by the presidential election should essentially need to engage in\npolicy correction.  As people of Sri\nLanka strongly believe that Mr Gotabaya Rajapaksa can give a political\nleadership and motivation for this giant task, SLPP needs educating voters on\nthis issue.  My feeling is that IBRD, IMF\nand other international financial organizations would have informed to the\ngovernment the requirement of honest policy process, but the government was\nreluctant to openly talk with public and show the nakedness of yahapalanaya to\npublic as the government had to take responsibility to what they have done and\nOctober 26, in 2018 president Sirisena attempted to change the yahapalanaya but\nit was too late.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Party\npolitics in Sri Lanka have been dominated since the era of the State Council\nand people must have realized that party politics have been Machiavellian than\na real loyalty to the country. According to Machiavellian advices political\nleaders as well as public are bamboozlers in the society. The best example was\nthat last stage of Sir John Kotelawala\u2019s administration presented a Four-Year\nDevelopment Program, which focused on a middle path between private sector and\npublic sector economic strategies, but the program was cancelled after 1956\nelection. If there was a policy monitoring and remedial management at that time\nthe shape of Sri Lanka would have different. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All\npolitical parties are still standing on Machiavellian politics than an honest\nintention to achieve a balance and rapid development and sustainable growth.\nPeople of the country also are behaving within a self-centred framework and\npolitics in Sri Lanka seems that political parties attempt to mislead people in\none time and people endeavours to mislead political patrician in another time.\nThat is why I state politics in Sri Lanka obviously Machiavellian. Attitudes of\npeople badly turned to selfishness and the of tele drama in Sri Lanka educates\nthis dirty behaviour to kids and young generation.    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nfact, it seems that current politicians of the government are like crabs in a\ncooking sauce pan until get it heat at the next general election.  I read this interesting poem in a book\nwritten during the Kotte era, while I was studying in primary schools. The most\nregrettable experience is that people of Sri Lanka has not learnt lessons from\nthis bad politics and next elections must lead to educate and go beyond the\nself-centred Machiavellian attitudes.  Today\npeople need to positively response and create the stability eliminating\nMachiavellian politics in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nthis situation, people of Sri Lanka have realized that the best leader to\nchange the current environment and to launch the country with a right\nleadership and motivation is Mr Gotabaya Rajapaksa and either, UNP, or SLFP or\nany other political party cannot stop him. \nSLPP must announce his candidacy and commence election work. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS To achieve a rapid economic development and sustainable economic growth, the most essential desideratum in Sri Lanka is policy correction in relation to political, economic, social and cultural areas. It is a gigantic task with a strong political and social motivation.  Since the political independence in 1948, Sri Lanka continuously involved in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-edward-theophilus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86555","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=86555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86555\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}