Basil, The Sacrificial Lamb Or A Trojan Horse?
By Granville Perera –June 15, 2015
Basil Rajapaksa, the former President’s sibling and the powerful ex-minister of Economic Development has been arrested and remanded for the misuse of funds of the Divi Neguma Department during the tenure of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Basil has been charged under the ‘Public Property Act’ and now enjoys the luxury of the Merchant Ward of General Hospital, Colombo, at state expense.
As per the November 2014 Budget, it is reported that the Rajapaksa family had control of 56 cents of every rupee spent by the government during Mahinda’s rule. With this kind of access over the country’s spend, this scandal is probably just the tip of the iceberg, and we are sure to witness bigger things to come. If the good governance promised by Sirisena-Wickramasinghe administration is enforced, many more corrupt individuals of the Rajapaksa regime will be brought to the FCID and other investigating units.
There probably is no doubt that the powers his elder brother vested in Basil was made use either to fill his own pockets or the family coffers during President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s iron-fisted rule between 2005 and 2015. Today, all the dirt of the Rajapaksas is being dumped on Basil. It seems that the entire coterie of the UPFA politicians, including legislators like of the foul-mouthed Vasudava Nanayakkara who didn’t even dare to stand straight opposite Basil during his hey days are today seen hurling verbal abuse at Basil continiously. For the unprincipled leftist, a fallen man is easy prey.
Mahinda Rajapaksa has the habit of flushing down all those who have helped and stood by him, when he has no more use of them. Those who were thus discarded include Sripathi Sooriyarachchi, Mangala Samaraweera, Tiran Alles, Sarath Fonseka and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), to name a few. Has his unfaithfulness and greed for power gone beyond his loyalty to his own family, that he is willing to sacrifice his sibling Basil, without whom his first election to the Presidency would have only been a dream?
