Can Sri Lanka Survive A Wickremesinghe Government After A Mahinda Chinthanaya?
Emil van der Poorten
Particularly since the Weliveriya atrocity, there has been a surge of “Ranil Wickremesinghe is the only hope” thinking! Many moons ago, in an article in the now-defunct Montage magazine I explored the same theme – of Ranil being “Hobson’s Choice” insofar as the Sri Lankan electorate was concerned – and, despite the total ineffectuality of the Wickremesinghe-led official opposition United National Party, that thought (concern?) has not deserted me as my friends who had given up on RW a long time ago will vouch for!
As that fabled voice of wisdom in American baseball had it, “It’s déjà vu all over again!”
I do not apologise for returning to this theme one more time because what is left of the “dissident media” is becoming more insistent about this possibility; not so much writers of bits and pieces of journalism, but, perhaps more significantly, commentators on those pieces.
How can or does one read those particular tea leaves with regard to what could succeed the current brutal and corrupt regime under whose whip (and I use that term advisedly) this country exists and which regime is showing decidedly suicidal tendencies insofar as its future is concerned?
To me the rotten root of the current regime is the combination of monumental corruption and violence, one consistently complementing the other. The window-dressing that the indescribable Dayan Jayatillekas, Rajiva Wijesinhas and, now, Tamara Kunanayakams provide is just that, window dressing meant to dilute a brutality that is approaching, if it has not already surpassed, that of the unlamented Bokassas, Saddam Husseins and Idi Amins of this world. This poison has infected every element of life in this country and I do not exaggerate in that regard and invite any reader to look closely and objectively at every “issue” that effects his or her daily life for confirmation of the fact that the greed of a coterie of individuals in this country is affecting the most basic levels of life in Sri Lanka. I am constantly being told by apologists – there is no other word to describe them – for the current Monarchy – that all sins cannot be laid at the feet of the Rajapaksa family and their hangers-on. I beg to differ, they can and they must because simple examination will reveal that every one of the major maladies affecting our lives today issue from the corruption that “our” government assiduously promotes in its own personal, financial interest.Read More
