Beyond “Bizarre!”
Emil van der Poorten
With a presidential election very obviously in the cards in the near future, there has been a flurry of activity – at least in the media – connected with the expected event.
What should fascinate anyone observing the Sri Lankan scene are the various scenarios being predicted, all based, seemingly, on the fiction that elementary standards of democratic practice will prevail during this event.
To describe such an expectation as “bizarre” would be to understate the case when every bit of evidence points to the fact that the government and its acolytes cannot, in any shape, form or fashion, even consider the prospect of losing political power and, with it, protection for the criminal enterprises that they have conducted with absolute impunity and success during the tenure of the current regime.
What are the real implications of the bandits who are involved at every level of political power simply losing that power to a similar group of a different political hue? While it might cause tremors of seismic proportions for some, that scenario, at its simplest level, will not mean a change for the better for the vast majority of Sri Lankans forced to live in the steadily-worsening slough of despond which its rulers try to pass off as some kind of democratic paradise.
Consider what being subjected to “governance” by people adhering to the same pattern of absolute lawlessness that prevails today really means: a new bunch of thieves and thugs usurping the authority of those currently practicing the same dark arts. What that will amount to is a transfer of impunity from one lot to another with Joe Public in the crossfire of a conflict which has the prospect of setting new standards in the matter of violence and brutality. Add to that mess the prospect that those removed from the hog-feeder of privilege that passes for a national treasury will not go gently into the good night while they still have access to one of the largest armed forces in the world! As a side-bar, I’d suggest to those readers still living in a fool’s paradise where putting flowers in the barrels of guns pointed at them, seeking to turn swords into ploughshares etc.,etc., will only work in a situation where some element of civil discourse still prevails. That is not the reality in the Debacle of Asia!
