Editorial-September 18, 2013
Elections are said to be the lifeblood of democracy. That may be so, but in countries like ours, they also cause quite a lot of blood to be spilled. Politicians here apparently don’t consider an election complete unless it is marred by bloodletting. If they are without any competition and provocation from their rivals they resort to internecine clashes among themselves. Dracula looks a babe in comparison to the desperadoes in the garb of politicians thirsting for blood.
Besides violence and bloodshed, elections lead to a colossal waste of public resources. Polls monitors have been crying from the rooftops during the past few weeks that the government is misusing public assets to its heart’s content in support of the UPFA candidates in the PC election fray in the three provinces going to the polls on Sept. 21. It is rather disturbing that the TNA, too, stands accused of misusing the assets of the local government institutions under its control for electioneering.
Yesterday, our main news item said election poster clearing operations would cost the public 10 million rupees. We also reported on our provincial news page that thousands of schoolchildren were likely to be deprived of their midday meals as the food suppliers hadn’t been paid. Public funds are going down the gurgler while the voiceless people are struggling to make ends meet and hitting the sack on empty stomachs. If party leaders had cared to rein in their unruly candidates with the police enforcing the election laws without fear or favour, funds wasted on clearing posters could have been used for poor children’s midday meals or some other worthy cause.
Why should taxpayers’ money be spent to hire workers to remove propaganda materials when there are so many local government bodies burdened with tens of thousands of freeloaders? Keeping areas under their jurisdiction clean is the responsibility of these councils. Why keep a dog and bark yourself? Not even a banner announcing a school event is allowed to be hung in a public place without their permission which is granted for a fee. But, no such rules and regulations apply to election posters, banners and cut-outs. Why?
The heads of local government bodies must be asked to get their act together and do what they are paid for with public funds. They are not worth their salt if they cannot keep their areas free from illegal posters, banners etc.
The display of propaganda materials in undesignated places is a clear violation of election laws. What are the police doing? They should not wait till posters are pasted and banners hung to remove them. Pasting posters is not a clandestine operation. That is done openly, sometimes during daytime, in full view of the public with the police looking the other way. One way of tackling the problem is to arrest the poster pasting gangs and haul them up before courts. They could be charged with violating election laws and causing environmental pollution.
In the Jurassic jungle that is Sri Lankan politics infested with tyrannosauruses in kapati suit the Elections Commissioner is helpless. The need for an independent elections commission capable of withstanding political pressure and making the police and the pro-government state bureaucracy fall in line during electoral contests is felt more than ever.
The public must not be made to bear the cost of cleaning up the mess politicians make during election campaigns. It is the offenders who must be made to pay.
