An Action Plan That Is Basically Dishonest
Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena
One cannot fail to be amazed at the considerable ingenuity if not wild imagination with which the government’s National Plan of Action to implement the recommendations of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission has been drafted. Some responses invoke chuckles of glee whilst other promises invoke far more heated reactions given the sheer chutzpah with which they have been made.
Lack of requisite political will
For example, the unfortunate inhabitants of this blessed land would be vastly relieved to learn that this administration has committed itself to disarming persons in possession of unauthorized weapons and to prosecute them in the impressively speedy period of six months (point 9.204).
Yet if this process is as uncomplicated as is made out to be, why was such a disarming exercise not carried out for so long? Several deaths would have been spared, among them an innocent British tourist in Tangalle who ironically enough had been engaged in humanitarian work in the Gaza as well as a UPFA politician who lost his life in a deadly skirmish with a UPFA parliamentarian cum drug lord. It is most relevant that the latter is rumored to be back in the country but is well beyond the reach of the Criminal Investigation Department, protected as he is, by the ruling hierarchy. Did we need a Lessons Learnt Commission and an imaginative Action Plan if the requisite political will to disarm political thugs was evidenced? The answer to that question is all too self evident.
