The Myth Of The Rajapaksa-Supermen
By Tisaranee Gunasekara -September 8, 2012
(UPFA Propaganda Song)
Last week Sri Lanka won her first Paralympic Medal. Sooner, or later, the credit for that triumph would be laid at some Rajapaksa-door, though Lankan Paralympic-entrants were left to fend for themselves even more than Lankan Olympic-entrants. As the winner of that lonely Bronze told the BBC, “I have to buy all the equipment, shoes and clothes, everything from my own salary. I did not get sponsorship for my training…” (Colombo Telegraph – 4.9.2012).
That unpalatable truth would be lost in a country where official propaganda labours with Herculean effort to credit the Ruling Siblings with every triumph; and to advance the counterfactual claim that the Rajapaksas(and the Rajapaksas alone) hold the wellbeing of the land and the happiness of the people in their mightily competent grip. True, there are a few problems in this near paradisiacal land: inflation, a crumbling education system, child rape, disappearances… But we must not harp much on these issues, according to Gotabaya Rajapaksa, because “improper reporting of crime related reports would have a negative impact on tourism and investments to the country…” (Colombo Page – 23.8.2012). Our patriotic task is to believe that life is good and getting better, all thanks to the Rajapaksas.
Those who fail to embrace this ‘correct perspective’ are pawns of national and international conspirators who lurk under every stone and behind every bush, eternally plotting to destroy Lankan security and happiness. Like the Emperor’s New Clothes, only patriots can see this Perennial Threat; and only the Rajapaksas, as the Sole Patriotic Leaders, can deal with it, Adolf Hitler observed, “If popularity and force are combined, and if…they are able to survive for a certain time, an authority on an even firmer basis can arise, the authority of tradition. If finally, popularity, force and tradition combine, an authority may be regarded as unshakable” (Mein Kampf). A tradition of Rajapaksa Rule cannot be created without implanting the mythical image of the Ruling Siblings as a Trinity of Supermen capable of any feat and essential for our wellbeing.
It is a belief which is counter to provable facts. And it vitiates our sense of self as citizens and as human beings. A Übermensch cannot be, without countless Untermenschen; a Superman to be a superman needs his fellow men to be less than men. Super-leaders do not need intelligent and responsible citizens with critical faculties. Super-leaders need an infantile-populace which can be taught to embrace its inequality and love its subjugation. The Rajapaksas cannot become Supermen unless they can make us believe that we are a nation of political-minors in need of their wise counsel and vigilant protection. The Rajapaksas cannot dominate the SLFP without downgrading fellow SLFP leaders (their peers or superiors of not so long ago) into servile acolytes.
The Rajapaksas can ennoble themselves only by diminishing the rest of us.
The Rajapaksas can ennoble themselves only by diminishing the rest of us.
