Was Dayasiri’s Crossover Planned 3-4 Years Ago?
Malinda Seneviratne
A conversation took place between a singer, a lyricist and a journalist, in Kaduwela. This was 3-4 years ago. The topic was the charisma and charm of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The singer, Kithsiri Jayasekera, brother of the in-the-news Dayasiri Jayasekera told a story. He had no reason to lie. Chaaminda Ratnasuriya was witness. This writer remembers. Kithsiri spoke in Sinhala. Here’s a translation.
‘Lokka (that’s the President), called Malli (younger brother). He told Malli that he knows that Malli wanted to work. He pointed out that he could not do anything for the people while in the UNP. He asked Malli to join him and do some real work. He told Malli to think about it.
‘A few weeks later he had called again. This time he had told him that he (the President) had thought about it again and decided it was not a good idea. This is what he said: “I thought about it. You should remain in the party. You have a future in the UNP. The opposition needs people like you. And anyway, despite all the insults I’ve had to suffer, I didn’t leave my party. I think you should remain in the UNP”.Read More
If You Do, Just Join The Party And We Will Get You Off The Hook!
Ranil Senanayake
The malaise of ‘profits before people’ seems to be getting well established within our political class. The concerns of local scientists and concerned citizens are now treated as a criticism of government. There are incredibly stupid statements from uneducated politicians demonizing Non Government Organizations (NGO’s) without realizing that any organization not of the government, be it funeral societies, Religious groups or flower arrangers groups are all NGO’s. In the spirit of today’s politics it could be argued that politicians do not get profits, only bribes and commissions. But to us, the public, all the underhand moneymaking of these corrupt individuals is only to profit themselves. The vision (Chinthanaya) of the founding fathers of this nation, that ‘the performance of any government must be measured by the larder of the poorest of its homes’ has been transformed into subservience to the GDP and similar abstract economic measures. The advice of the Buddha that desire, fear and hate brings suffering is ignored by monks who should know better than to support a desire filled, intolerant, gambling addicted society, where amassing individual wealth is the only goal. Fear has become a staple of society, the flames fanned and maintained so that a huge security apparatus is seen to be essential to our safety. We have become the antithesis of the dhamma as propounded by the Buddha while assiduously claiming to be ‘good Buddhists’.
What has this twisted vision of ‘economic development brought us?
