Some “Wonders Of Asia”
By Emil van der Poorten –January 9, 2016
Emil van der Poorten
I have, from time to time, referred to the camp followers of the Rajapaksa Regime (MR1) who fattened their wallets and visited destruction and death upon those who were seen as enemies of their patrons. Those references have, generally, been “in passing.”
Also, given a grossly over-burdened judicial system in this country, it is understandable if the primary effort was to net the big sharks first and deal (or not deal) with the acolyte remoras that survived (very well!) on that body politic. However, what has clearly emerged in the past year has been that it has been an infinitesimally small number of even those sucker-fish who have been prosecuted while their host monsters continue to swim free.
One that fits into the category I describe was taken into custody for signing cheques worth hundreds of millions for the building of houses in Tsunami-ravaged parts of the country, houses that, up to now – more than ten years after that calamity – have not seen the light of day. After a period in custody- spent mostly in rather comfortable “digs,” at state expense, in one of those places referred to as a “private ward” in Sri Lanka’s premier public hospital, he was not only set free as the proverbial bird but employed, presumably at a salary “befitting his status,” by the very government that had taken him into custody in the first place! As to what happened to the very serious charges that would, in similar instances, have been laid for the alleged crime, suffice it to say that your guess is as good as mine. The indications, though, are that they have disappeared much as humans dragged into white vans did, not so long ago. The exhortation to “Put up or shut up” is surely deserving of modification to “Prosecute or exonerate,” in this context.
Incidentally, this individual’s defence at the time of his initial apprehension was something to the effect of, “I only signed the cheques. I didn’t know anything else about the whole business.” If this came from the office peon it might have been credible. However, emanating from a top-rung functionary with the kind of financial authority he obviously possessed, it seemed, at the least, a bit bizarre.
But “the powers-that-be” obviously bought his response because he has been re-employed by the very government – Maithripala-Ranil (MR2) – that took him into custody in the first place! “Only in Sri Lanka you say?” Well, we are “the wonder of Asia” after all, aren’t we? And this government might well have felt obliged to indulge in practices even more weird and wonderful than their predecessors in order to maintain that status!
