Monday, July 15, 2013

Special Bench To Take Up Cases Challenging Substituting Legal CJ With De Facto CJ Mohan Pieris Tomorrow

July 15, 2013

A “Special Bench” to take up the cases challenging the steps taken by the Rajapaksa regime to oust Chief Justice Dr. Shirani Bandaranayake from functioning in her office by adopting the findings of a kangaroo style Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC), disregarding and flouting court rulings of the Supreme Court and Appeal Court, the Colombo Telegraph can reveal today.

The following bench has been set up for tomorrow (16.07.2013) ;

Mohan Pieris

COURT ROOM 403 (AT.10.00 AM)

HON. SALEEM MAROOF (P.C.) J

HON. CHANDRA EKANAYAKE J

HON. SATHYA HETTIGE (P.C.) J

HON. S. EVA WANASUNDERA (P.C.) J

HON. ROHINI MARASINGHE J

SPECIAL BENCH

TO BE MENTIONED

1 SC APPLICATION (FR) 665/2012

SC APPLICATION (FR) 666/2012

SC APPLICATION (FR) 667/2012

SC APPLICATION (FR) 672/2012 WITH

SC APPLICATION (FR) 23/2013

2 SC APPEAL 67/2013 - WITH

SC SPECIAL LA 24/2013 – CA 411/2012

FOR LEAVE TO PROCEED

1 SC APPLICATION (FR) 23/2013

Several parties asking to intervene in several of these cases are trying to get the disregarded court rulings reversed, in what is seen by many as an effort to try and give some appearance of legitimacy to the locally and internationally widely condemned act of disregard of judicial rulings, with de facto Chief Justice Mohan Pieris now in charge of the judiciary. Read More

Indian Intelligence agent journeys into a war torn island: Madras Cafe

[ Monday, 15 July 2013, 02:24.55 PM GMT +05:30 ]

Madras Cafe is a upcoming Indian Political film which includes several scenes on SriLanka war and historical incidents.

Shoojit Sircar's Madras Cafe is a racy political thriller, set against the backdrop of the strife going on between India and neighbouring country, Sri Lanka.
It's about an intelligence officer played by John Abraham who, in a war-like situation, gets into a covert operation and the chaos to finally save his country.
An Indian Intelligence agent journeys into a war torn coastal island, to break a resolute rebel group. He deftly maneuvers his resources to make significant breakthroughs, amidst a scenario where the enemy has no face and the only counsel is 'don't get caught.'
At various junctions, he meets a charismatic and passionate journalist] who is following her will to reflect the truth behind the civil war. The story unfolds as their quest for the truth reveals a deeper conspiracy, by a faceless enemy, united to seize a common nemesis – India.
Previously this film was named as Jaffna and later changed to Madras Café.

Who Did Lasantha?

By Lal Wickrematunge -July 15, 2013

Lal Wickrematunge

“The clock of life is wound but once,

and no man has the power to tell when the hands will stop,

at late or an early hour.

Now is the only time you own.

Live, love, toil with a will.

Place no faith in time.

For the clock may soon be still.”

That may well be true, if the cycle of life is allowed to take it’s full course . But, it was the vile man ( men) who went against the natural order to stop the hands from turning, to snuff out the full cycle of Lasantha running it’s course.

Time and again, it has proven that no man can alter the course of nature and continue to do so, with impunity. Pay back will come at a time when it is least expected to those who take it upon themselves to mock at the natural order of life. Man’s biggest aphrodisiac AND failure, is man’s continued power over other man. One will always be followed by the other. Men become no more than wild animals when power is bestowed in disproportionate doses. It requires education and a large dose of breeding to stay away from falling prey. None of which is evident amongst our present crop of rulers. If there was a semblance of it, all those journalists who have been killed, assaulted, abducted and forced to flee would have had the full force of justice with them.

The timing, of the wheels of justice moving at this late stage into the killing of the students in Trincomalee, reeks of opportunism. Was CHOGM the catalyst? Would these fail in court? Would the government want the forces to be demoralised , however warped that kind of thinking may be? A rational thought process given the track record thus far.

Details: Created On Monday, 15 July 2013 13:01; Category: Peace Journalism

Media Statement of condemning the attempt of ITN (a state media in Sri Lanka) to vilify and disgrace Gamini Viyangoda, a social activist and banning the movie "Flying Fish" directed by Sanjeewa Pushpakumara.

15 July, 2013

Colombo

We the undersigned, who stand for justice and democracy, note with regret and concern the use of State media, especially the Independent Television Network (ITN) that uses its air time to stick labels on and intimidate social and cultural activists who stand for plurality and fair play and for their dissenting views.

It is almost habitual for ITN to vilify and attack dissenting voices and the most recent victim of such irrational, racist and intimidating attacks over ITN in its 07.00 pm Sinhala news bulletin on Sunday 14 July, 2013 was reputed writer, columnist and media activist Gamini Viyangoda. His name had been dragged into the controversy of the suspension of the French Film Festival on 12 Friday 2013 for screening the Sinhala film directed by Sanjeewa Pushpakuamara, "Flying Fish", held at the BMICH. It should be clearly said, the certification for screening provided for this film by the Public Performance Board had been exclusively for this festival and Viyangoda, certainly has no role in it.

Gamini Viyangoda as we know quite well, is a well known public figure, who had always stood for freedom of expression, the rights of the oppressed and for minority rights including power devolution. It is his right to express his convictions and conscience without restrictions.

We believe Gamini Viyangoda's political convictions that we know disagrees with this government, but to disagree is a fundamental right in a democracy, was reason for the ITN to accuse and vilify Viyangoda as a "conspirator" over the screening of the film, "Flying Fish". We stress it is a right of citizens to watch the film and form their own opinion. It can not be the prerogative of the government, to form opinions and thrust them on a society.

We therefore condemn most vehemently the attempt to vilify and disgrace Gamini Viyangoda and demand the ITN tender a public apology for the defaming and threatening media use against Gamini Viyangoda, an independent and a reputed writer and columnist in our public sphere.

Consented to stand with the above statement;

01. Wijeyananda Jayaweera

02. Parakrama Niriella

03. K. W. Janaranjana

04. Kusal Perera

05. Dr. Udan Fernando

06. J. C. Weliamuna

07. Nalaka Gunawardne

08. Melani Manel Perera

09. Liyanage Amarakeerthi

10. Sudharshana Gunawardne

11. Anton Marcus

12. Dr. Sunil Wijesiriwardne

13. Herman Kumara

14. Prasanna Vithanage

15. Dharmasena Pathiraja

16. Dharmasiri Bandaranayake

17. Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne

18. Jayathilaka Kammellaweera

19. Nimalka Fernando

20. Gamini Akmeemana

21. Lionel Bopage

22. Marisa de Silva

23. Saroj Pathirana

24. Upul Wickramasinghe

25. Balachandran Gowtham

26. B. Shanthakumar

27. Fr. Jeyabalan Croos

28. Chulani Kodikara

29. Sr. Noel Christine

30. Uvindu Kurukulasuriya

31. Dr. Nishan de Mel

32. Jake Oorloff

CPC’s hedging blunder Finally the people pay

Namini Wijedasa reports-Sunday, July 14, 2013

Corporation’s debt burden increases; petroleum minister has no clear answer regarding payouts to banks.

The room was packed; the mood fraught. It was November 2008 and the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation’s (CPC) hedging deals were fast going awry.

Ashantha De Mel, then Chairman of the CPC,

Ashantha De Mel, then Chairman of the CPC, sat at the head table. On his right were the Chief Executive Officers of three of the banks – Standard Chartered (SCB), Citibank and Commercial Bank – with whom he had signed hedging contracts. A news conference was about to begin.

The CPC was confronted with making massive payouts to five local and foreign banks. The reason was simple: Because of the way they had been structured, the hedging agreements did not protect the CPC if world oil prices slid down. They would only serve the Corporation as long as the prices go up.

In contrast, if prices fell below a specified figure, the CPC would have to pay the banks the difference between that and the market price — with no limit on the downside. And while the oil price had peaked at US$ 147 per barrel in July 2008, it had fallen to below US$ 60 per barrel around the time of the news conference. It would drop even further in subsequent months, crashing to as low as US$ 30.

Mr. De Mel conducted an impassioned justification of the disastrous hedging deals. He was upbeat, claiming that they would simply restructure the agreements to mitigate the losses. (This didn’t transpire in some of the contracts because of a detail in the formula adopted). Read More

Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu!

July 14, 2013

The blame for facilitating the entry of rapists, killers, cattle rustlers, drug dealers, fraudsters and robbers into politics should be apportioned to the SLFP and the UNP. Out of power, the UNP has behaved for quite some time, but the SLFP continues to nominate criminals of all sorts to contest elections. Nothing explains this situation better than the pithy local saying, bale thiyanakota mole ne; mole thiyanakota bale ne—’when one has power, one has no brains and when one has brains, one has no power’.

JHU leader Ven. Omalpe Sobitha Thera, addressing a party convention the other day took a swipe at the government for having anti-social elements within its ranks. He said the situation had become so bad that the ruling party Pradeshiya Sabha Chairmen were taking bribes even from their counterparts in other areas. The JHU, a constituent of the ruling UPFA coalition, is running with the hapless masses and hunting with the UPFA hounds, but that doesn’t render Ven. Sobitha’s criticism invalid. He has said his party does not nominate criminals. The same is true of the JVP, the TNA, the SLMC, the old left etc. They, too, exercise caution in selecting candidates. It behoves the government to emulate their example.

Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, who is in charge of the Ministry of Truth (in the Orwellian sense), has said that the government does not defend rogues within its ranks as evident from the fact that several UPFA politicians have been hauled up before courts for various offences. But, it has refrained from intervening to secure their release for a different reason; they have become too embarrassing for it to defend. It has sacrificed some of its lawbreakers to assuage public resentment. There are many others of their ilk who have gone scot free by virtue of being in power and they, too, must be made to pay for their crimes. How would Minister Rambukwella explain the government’s refusal to act on very serious allegations the UPFA members of the Kelaniya PS have levelled against Minister Mervyn Silva? The deplorable manner in which the government is handling the Christmas Day murder case against its Tangalle PS chairman and several others has brought the entire country into disrepute.

But for the keen interest the British government has evinced in that case because the victim was a British citizen, the government would have hushed up investigations. It is a crying shame that the case has had to be shifted to Colombo from Tangalle owing to threats to witnesses. Silencing witnesses is half the battle in taking criminals off the hook as is common knowledge. There’s more than one way to shoe a horse!

As a UNP MP very eloquently put it the other day, of animals such as the wild pig, the horse, the bull and the dog, one fears only tusks, hind legs, horns and fangs respectively, but one was scared of all parts of a government politician’s anatomy.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa has recently indicated his government’s desire to modernise penitentiaries with a view to rehabilitating convicted lawbreakers. The government may go ahead with its project to improve the appalling conditions in prisons. But, what does it propose to do with those who should be behind bars but are going places in politics because of their ruling party connections. Before turning prisons into rehabilitation centres, the government ought to ensure that the criminals in the garb of UPFA politicians are sent to jail.

Ven. Sobitha Thera’s campaign to cleanse Sri Lankan politics deserves praise and public support. While saying, Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu wholeheartedly, we venture to suggest that, since the JHU has a deep antipathy towards the kind of candidates the SLFP nominates, it desist from contesting elections on the UPFA ticket and go it alone in protest.

On The Future Of The Tamils In Sri Lanka And Holding Of A Referendum On Eelam

By Selvi J Jayalalithaa -July 15, 2013

Selvi J Jayalalithaa

Dr.Manmohan Singh, Hon’ble Prime Minister of India, I write to you on an issue of serious concern regarding the political future of the Tamil community in Sri Lanka – the possible dilution or even repeal of the 13th Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution.

I had written to you on several occasions conveying the strong sense of outrage and anguish amongst the people and political parties in Tamil Nadu and Tamil people all over the world regarding the ethnic pogrom and genocide by the Sri Lankan Army against the Tamil population in Sri Lanka in the closing stages of the civil war and the failure of the international community to hold the Sri Lankan regime accountable for these acts. I had also pointed out that human rights abuses against the Tamil population continue and Tamils in Sri Lanka are being subjected to harassment, discrimination and torture. I had drawn attention to the fact that there were no signs that Tamils would be given equality of status with Sinhalese and devolved autonomy and democratic rights.

It was in this background that the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly had passed a Resolution on 27th March, 2013, calling for, inter alia, a referendum on a “separate Eelam” amongst Tamils in Sri Lanka and Tamils displaced from Sri Lanka and resident in other countries. While the aspirations of the Sri Lankan Tamils can be realised only through a Tamil Eelam, the process of securing the right to self determination, through the devolvement of democratic decentralisation by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka, should not be jeopardised in any manner. There are disturbing signs that the Sri Lankan Government is not serious about rehabilitating and restoring the lives of the Tamil minority. Read More

Citizen Journalism and the Numbers Game

Image courtesy Hill Post

Padraig Colman-15 Jul, 2013

Kath Noble recently published two articles in The Island, which were reproduced on Colombo Telegraph. [i]

Bring on the Usual Suspects

Some of the reactions to what Ms Noble wrote were depressing but, sadly, not surprising. The usual suspects came up with the usual polemic. Says Dev: “This is absolute rubbish – mere speculations and prejudices! This is a shame on journalism sans facts.”

Many comments on such threads display a similar cognitive dissonance. Commenters seem unable to distinguish between reporting and advocacy, between explanation and justification. Some assume that a view quoted by the writer is the view held by the writer.

Dev calls for facts. It depends what you mean by facts. Colombo Telegraph’s motto is “In Journalism truth is a process”. Dev seems only interested in facts that fit his predisposition but accuses Ms Noble herself of “mere speculations and prejudices”.

He does not seem to have grasped that Ms Noble is reviewing a publication[ii] written by someone else. That publication itself surveys various “facts” put forward about the numbers of civilians killed in the final months of Eelam War IV.

When I wrote about the Marga Institute seminar on The Numbers Game, another commenter displayed an ambivalent attitude to facts: “Numbers don’t matter, it is the truth that matters”.

Higher and Lower Continue reading »

‘We want an internationally backed Transitional Administration’

By Paul Newman
15 Jul 2013

Posted 12-Jul-2013
Vol 4 Issue 28

Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam is a third generation Tamil politician from Sri Lanka. He hails from a family of well known lawyers. His father Kumar Ponnambalam, who championed the cause of Tamils in a racist milieu, was gunned down in Colombo in 2000 by unidentified assailants.

A former Member of Sri Lankan Parliament (2001- 2010) and leader of a political party, the Tamil National Peoples' Front (TNPF), Gajen as he is fondly called, is an articulate, out spoken young politician. He is a qualified lawyer, educated in England.

Gajen's demand for an internationally backed Transitional Administration in Tamil areas of Sri Lanka has earned him many enemies

Gajen is a marked man now. His call for an internationally backed Transitional Administration in Tamil areas of Sri Lanka, and his fearless crusade for Tamil rights, often taking contrarian positions to that of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, has earned him many enemies.

In May 2013, four unidentified masked men surveyed his house. The obvious message to him is, “back off, or else…”

But the 39-year-old Gajen, is not the one to heed to such threats. In an exclusive interview to The Weekend Leader, he told Paul Newman, “I work on the basis that I rather be killed than accept the genocide that is being committed on my people.”

Excerpts from the interview:

How do you respond to accusations that you are continuing with dynastic politics without a real grasp of ground level Tamil politics?

I don’t see coming from a “dynasty” of Tamil politicians as an issue, as long as I have the capacity to serve my people in my own right. One’s own personal achievements and failures are what I believe one must be judged by, and not by the family one belongs to.

But quite honestly, I find the suggestion that I have not grasped ground level Tamil politics a little surprising. I say this because I happen to be the only Tamil politician who was born and bred in an elite Colombo background, but who chose to eschew that same Colombo elite thinking and move to Jaffna and settle down there.

In fact, most Tamil elites accuse my politics of compromising their interests and only addressing the interests of the ground level Tamil society.

Do you believe what happened during Eelam War IV was genocide? Is there any hope of international investigations?

Sufficient Consensus To Make PSC Meaningful

By Jehan Perera -July 15, 2013

Jehan Perera

The government’s determination to show progress in regard to a political solution and to improving its human rights image is evident in recent developments. During his recent visit, the Indian National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon is reported to have urged government leaders to keep its promises to India. The Indian government’s position that the government should deliver on its promise to go beyond the 13th Amendment poses a major challenge. It is obvious that a country like India, which is no less than a global great power, and quite possibly a superpower in the near future, cannot accept being made to look being taken for a ride by its close neighbour in the eyes of the world. With President Mahinda Rajapaksa on the verge of taking over the Chairmanship of the Commonwealth, it appears that the government is desirous of demonstrating to India and to the international community that it is taking its international responsibilities more seriously. The government is now making a renewed effort to find a political solution to the ethnic conflict through the process of a Parliamentary Select Committee.

The government has appointed a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to find a political solution that would “empower the people to live together as one nation.” The initial meeting of the PSC was attended only by government members and not attended by any of the opposition parties. The government’s disappointment at this boycott is evident from its appeal to the visiting Indian national security advisor to persuade the TNA to join the PSC. The government appointed 19 members representing the spectrum of opinion on the subject including both hard line nationalist Sinhalese and progressive leftist parliamentarians but with some surprise exclusions, including its own alliance partner the SLMC and Prof. Tissa Vitarana who headed the government’s last attempt to arrive at a political solution. The opposition parties which were allocated 12 members did not appoint a single member and so the first meeting of the PSC could be described as a meeting of a government sub-committee rather than a PSC. Read More

A Method Of Wielding Power By The Same People Who Enjoyed Power In The Centre

By Rajiva Wijesinha -July 15, 2013

Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha MP

Political Machinations: How the electoral system contributes to disfunctionality in regional governance

In a forceful critique of attempts to amend the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution, the Secretary General of the Liberal Party, Kamal Nissanka, also made no bones about the fact that the current Provincial Council system had many flaws. Though the Liberal Party has always been in favour of devolution, we have also noted that there are several things about the 13^thAmendment that need improvement. However we believe that this is best done through comprehensive discussions and consensus, certainly not through contentious piecemeal adjustments.

But while several structural changes are desirable, Kamal also noted a very practical problem that I had not seen highlighted before. He wrote that the system ‘had become a method of wielding power by the same people who enjoyed power in the centre. Close relatives of leading politicians were promoted to stand for provincial councils making it a political extended family.’ Read More

A sultan in the making

2013-07-15 23:26:00

During the early months of the Arab Spring which saw the toppling of the autocratic regimes of Ben Ali of Tunisia and Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, an academic at the George Mason University, Jack Goldston, wrote an analysis in the Foreign Affairs magazine, in which he elucidated why some regimes fell and why some others, equally egregious or far worse than their doomed counterparts, were more resilient.

He described those fallen regimes as 'sultanistic regimes', which are built around the larger-than-life image of the autocratic ruler, a sultan, notwithstanding the nominal existence of a Parliament. Sultanistic regimes emerge when a national leader expands his power beyond his nominal constitutional boundaries, at the expense of independent national institutions such as the judiciary, independent public service, and so forth. One could see some striking similarities in the incumbent regime in Sri Lanka.

Those leaders would retain some elements of democracy such as nominal Parliaments, elections, Judiciary, and so forth., but they rule above those institutions, which are in a traditional sense, meant to serve as bulwarks against the concentration of absolute power by one individual or an institution.

Both Mubarak and Ben Ali had subordinate Parliaments, which were in fact served to rubber stamp the whims and fancies of the autocratic ruler. Again, the local similarities loom large.

Mubarak himself was elected in a sham election, hence his interlocutors could argue for the aura of electoral legitimacy of the despot. And Mubarak groomed his son to be his successor. So did Gaddafi, a lesser sultan. Again, the incumbent regime shares those attributes.

Similarities to incumbent regime

Do Not Touch: Nuclear, Chemical And Biological

By Dayan Jayatilleka -July 15, 2013

Dr Dayan Jayatilleka

Does anyone know who made the decision to dabble with nuclear power sources and if that weren’t enough, attempt a tie up with a chemical and biological research institute? To put it more plainly, who even introduced the words nuclear, chemical and biological into the Sri Lankan policy agenda? Why, at a moment when we are under the scrutiny of the USA, would we even use the terms nuclear, chemical and biological, which are terms that trigger extreme apprehension in the world order and especially among those who dominate it? When we – or some of us – are sure that the West is out to get us, why would we provide the best of all possible sticks for them to beat us with?

The lead story of The Island reads as follows:

“Even as India is awaiting Sri Lanka’s response to its offer of a comprehensive nuclear pact, the dispensation in Colombo is reportedly moving in the direction of such a pact with Pakistan, seen globally as a country “with dubious non-proliferation records.” The Hindustan Times claimed in a report today that, “in an apparent tit for tat,” Sri Lanka is moving in the direction of a nuclear pact with Pakistan after India voted against it at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva early this year. At the same time, Colombo is dragging its feet on a similar pact with India by not scheduling talks despite New Delhi’s keenness to conclude the agreement soon, the daily claimed. India had offered Sri Lanka a comprehensive nuclear pact that will deal with all aspects of civil nuclear cooperation, including safety and training of professionals…Official sources here said: “We are yet to hear from them”. Meanwhile, sources said foreign secretary-level talks between Sri Lanka and Pakistan have identified civil nuclear technology as a major area of cooperation. Statements made by Lankan authorities show their intent to negotiate nuclear deals with both India and Pakistan, sources said. Sri Lanka’s overtures to Pakistan are of concern to India…It also has issues with Colombo overlooking its intention to give it the best possible deal….” (‘Sri Lanka Ignores Indian Nuclear Pact, Looks to Pakistan’ S Venkat Narayan, The Island, July 15, 2013) Read More