Another Admiral to be docked as CID busts spin-off Navy abduction racket

Rear Admiral A. Guruge

24 March, 2019

The now famous CID investigation into the abduction and murder of 11 youth by a Navy extortion gang, helped sleuths to break open a secondary racket involving a separate group of naval personnel, including high ranking officers, to abduct businessmen for ransom

In June 2010 the gang robbery unit of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) led by its OIC Inspector Nishantha Silva commenced an investigation into a suspected abduction for ransom racket run by Naval intelligence teams at the time. As investigations into the case of 11 missing youth believed to have been abducted by the group intensified over the years, explosive revelations in court recently implicated Naval top brass including several celebrated former Commanders of the Navy.
But perhaps now in a remarkable plot twist, through evidence unearthed by the CID during investigations into the disappearances, the Police sleuths have been led to yet another group of Navy intelligence officers embroiled in possible abductions including its former Chief of Intelligence Rear Admiral Ananda Guruge.

During the magisterial inquiry into the case of two abducted businessman from Wellampitiya, Colombo in 2009 IP Nishantha Silva this week informed the Colombo Additional Magistrate Shalini Perera that several officers in the Navy hierarchy including yet another former Commander of the Navy Rear Admiral Jayantha Perera and more importantly Former Naval Intelligence Director Rear Admiral Ananda Guruge who is also interestingly a witness in the case of the 11 missing youth had knowledge of the abductions carried out at the time. The case has now become a spin off from the original investigations in to the 11 abducted youth.

Ironically it was the intelligence unit led by Admiral Guruge at the time that first uncovered the extortion racket being carried out by Naval personnel at the centre of the CID’s now famous navy abductions case involving the kidnapping and suspected murder of 11 Tamil speaking youth from Colombo and suburbs in 2008-2009. Following a tip off about the illegal detentions of the victims at the Navy’s Eastern Command, it was Guruge who assigned Lt. Commander Krishan Welagedara to seek out information about persons being held at Gun Site after being brought there by various intelligence units. In fact it was Guruge that had informed then Navy Commander Rear Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda, about the detainees at Gun Site. While remarkably Welagedara became the CID’s star witness in the youth abduction case, Guruge appears to have now become entangled in a separate abduction case perpetrated by Naval intelligence during the same time period.

While on August 8, 2009 Kasthuri Arachchige John Reid one of the 11 missing youth was allegedly abducted along with the van he was travelling in bearing registration number 56 - 5539 in Wattala, it was this investigation that eventually led to the discovery of yet another abduction. According to the CID while investigating the abduction of Reid who was believed to have been abducted by a group led by the main suspect in the case Lt. Commander Chandana Prasad Hettiarachchi alias Navy Sampath, the investigators were led to the Welisara Navy Camp. A tip off informed the CID sleuths of a disassembled van and its parts being hidden within the camp.

Believing it to be original parts the van used by John Reid, IP Nishantha Silva and his team visited the Navy camp only to eventually discover the vehicle parts were in fact of the van belonging to missing businessman Vadivelu Loganathan and Ratnasami Parmananda who were allegedly abducted in Wellampitiya on January 11, 2009. They also had been in possession of gold sovereigns worth Rs. 2.5 million at the time.

According to information presented before the courts by investigators, obtaining a court order to search in early 2016, parts of a van were discovered in a secured room within the quarters used by Navy Intelligence Officials at the Welisara Navy Camp. How the parts of the van came to be at the camp has now led to former Naval Intelligence Chief Guruge through statements from both defendants and witnesses to the case.

The CID says, according to statements obtained from suspects of the case including Lt. Commander Sumedha Sampath Dayananda and three Naval witnesses who took the van apart, it was Guruge who had instructed it to be dismantled. Claiming the van in which the two businessmen were travelling in before their abduction was found abandoned in the vicinity of the Navy Volunteers Camp in Welisara and believing it may contain explosives, CID said Guruge had given instructions for it to be taken away and have it dismantled in to 72 sections.

According to witness statements, Guruge had also sent in the necessary equipment for the task while also asking the Engine and Chassis number of the van to be scraped off arousing suspicions of the CID. The CID in courts has also questioned the real motive behind the dismantling of the van as neither the Police, Bomb Disposal Unit or the Government Analyst were informed of a possible bomb threat at the time as required. The Navy instead had gone on to dismantle the van at its explosive dumps site on its own accord while keeping parts of the van in the camp till it was discovered in 2016.

Interestingly, the van belonging to abducted John Reid was also discovered by the CID with its engine and chassis number similarly scratched off being used by the camp bearing plate number 6021 registered to the Sri Lanka Navy.

It has also been revealed that it was Guruge who had called in Lt. Commander Dayananda to Colombo for a 15-day operation during the same time period. Dayananda was head of Naval Intelligence in Mannar during 2009. Tracing the phone of Logananthan after his disappearance the CID discovered that they were last used within the Welisara Navy Camp by Dayananda till five days after the duo’s disappearance linking him to the abductions.

The possible connection of Ex-Naval Chief Jayantha Perera in to the case is also being investigated by the CID. Based on a statement provided by Naval intelligence officer Lt. Commander Douglas who was at the Welisara Navy Camp in 2015, he had gone on to inform the Navy Commander at the time - Rear Admiral Jayantha Perera of the presence of disassembled vehicle parts in the camp through photographs and letter signed by Commanding Officer of the Camp at the time Captain Devendra.

According to Douglas’s statement however Perera had not responded to the letter leading the CID to believe he had knowledge of the abductions. Instead Lt. Commander Douglas had been asked by Captain Hewage of Naval Intelligence to leave the matter to them. CID currently has since obtained the letter as evidence.

While Dayananda was further remanded this week, the CID is now on the trail of Rear Admiral Guruge. The CID informed the court that more statements will be recorded and a report produced before the magistrate at the next court date. According to authoritative sources within the CID more heads of former Naval bigwigs are likely to roll in the coming weeks embroiling its intelligence units in yet another high profile abduction case.

Handagama’s Asandimitta: Not mere psychoanalysis; sociocultural, political and economic analysis too

Monday, 25 March 2019 

Handagama: The women’s man

 Lanka’s award winning film director, Asoka Handagama, screened his latest creative work, Asandimitta, before an invited audience in Colombo last week. This was a prelude to its public release, which was to be commenced immediately. 
Handagama is normally considered a ‘women’s man’ because the themes of all his past movies had centred on women who had been victimised by society in one way another. His ‘Channa Kinnarie’ focused on the plight of the single mother working woman. ‘Moon Hunt’ was about a woman who had fallen victim to unfulfilled sexual desires of young soldiers holed up in bunkers when death was the only possibility waiting for them. His ‘Flying with One Wing’ brought to the focus the crude reality faced by women with a different sexuality. ‘The Letter of Fire’, not screened for public viewing, looked at the sad state faced by a professional legal woman when she had to choose between law and her juvenile son, a fugitive from the law. While his ‘Ini Avan’ was on a woman caught up in Sri Lanka’s long ethnic war, ‘Let Her Cry’ dramatised the conflict between two women loving the same man. 

Now his latest, Asandimitta, based on a novella by Saman Wickramaarachchi, has been on a completely different theme. It is about a woman born with a genetic code that had given her an extraordinarily large physique. Society normally views such physique as somewhat weird, because it does not conform to the accepted norms of beauty. For such women (and for men as well), it is the source of a mental trauma tormenting them all through their life. If anyone makes an adverse comment on their body or any part of the body, that would be enough to drive them to a deep mental depression that would linger on them for days. Though Handagama had chosen to brand Asandimitta as a movie with a psychoanalytic theme, it is much more than that. It is a fine blend of other analytics, falling into social, cultural, economic and political arenas as well.

Asoka Handagama Asandimitta

Asoka Handagama

Split personalities

The lead character Asandimitta (Nilmini Sigera) is introduced to viewers through her voice when she has a telephone conversation with a filmmaker (Shyam Fernando) who had been one of her school mates. The filmmaker cannot help making the derogatory remark that she had a fat figure during school days. Asandimitta, not offended by his remark, admits that she is still fat, weighing 300 pounds. This is possibly because she had a carefully crafted scheme to take her final revenge on her tormentors. She then confesses that she had killed or helped kill three women and wanted him to use her story in a film.

From there onward, the story is unravelled to viewers from what she tells him. Handagama has portrayed her as a woman suffering mentally, because wherever she goes, other eyes notice nothing but her fat figure; some of them even make lewd remarks about her protruding backside, while some others impulsively touch or pinch her backside. Though she takes those liberties only with a frown, internally, she is a boiling pot that could explode at any time. This continued mental trauma has caused her to suffer from a psychotic condition known as ‘split personality’.

The godly and satanic sides of Asandimitta

A person suffering from split personality imagines different characters and lives in them in an imaginary world. Asandimitta has not received love, respect or recognition throughout her life. It then becomes a morbid desire to have them fulfilled. To do so, she assumes two characters, one called Young Wicky (Dharmapriya Dias) portraying the loving or godly side, and the other, called Old Wicky (W Jayasiri), representing the brutal or satanic side. Young Wicky is a man she sees at the bus station and imagines that he follows her to her house.

Young Wicky is transformed in her mind to Old Wicky whenever she needs to display brutality. She swings from one character to the other, while living her normal life in between. The Young Wicky is of an accommodating type and believes that there is nothing wrong with a man looking after the household, while the woman is at work outside. In fact, it is Asandimitta herself who believes so, to satiate her desire to dominate males. When she makes several demands from him, Young Wicky, who temporarily occupies her, accedes to all of them. When she suggests that they should visit Anuradhapura, he agrees; to Kandy and to Peradeniya Botanical Garden, he still agrees. When she changes the subject and suggests that the roof should be repaired, he agrees to that too. She then tells him that she wants to flirt occasionally, and he agrees to that too. She says that she is fat and like a ball, but Young Wicky says that he loves fat women and likes to play with a ball. If people start laughing at their mismatch, he says he does not care and would laugh at them before they would do so.

From tenderness to rough handling 

Hence, that side of her split personality pleases her in every respect. He is caring, supporting and depending on her. But the Old Wicky side of her split personality is brutish, maltreating and cruel. She desires that too. She starts love-making with loving Young Wicky, who does it with utmost tenderness and care. But the brutish side of her split personality demands something else.  Hence, she does the actual love-making with Old Wicky, who has no consideration for tenderness. After it is over, showing her anger at his crude brutality, she scolds him and asks him to leave her house immediately. But his response is to pull out a dagger and threaten to drive its eight-inch long blade freely into her fleshy body. Since it is she who says so, it is an admission that she is concerned about the vulnerability of her fleshy body to a knife attack. She surrenders herself and patches up the differences with him. In this manner, moving from one personality to the other, she places herself in the best of all the best worlds.

Kali’s shrine

Handagama then brings in social, cultural, political, and economic analytics to the movie. Asandimitta loses her job as a parking attendant, because the rich car owners refuse to pay a parking fee for parking their vehicles on the street. She, without a means to live, laments whether society expects women of her background to sell their bodies. Young Wicky, who is also concerned because they have now lost their only income, suggests that they convert an unused hall in the house to a God’s Shrine. Culturally, people need stories to live by, and one such story is that gods take possession of women, giving them an extraordinary sight. 
Asandimitta pretends that she has been possessed by Goddess Kali, and people flock to her God’s Shrine to have numerous mysteries solved. The modus operandi is that her two sons, who mix with the crowd, surreptitiously pick up the purposes of their visit, and alert her from behind the curtain. She then summons the exact person, pretending that it is Kali who had asked her to do so. A solution is given to him or her promptly, while collecting the offering they make to the Goddess. But this enterprise ends abruptly when one of her sons picks a purse of one of the visitors, and the agitated crowd, now knowing that it is a fake, destroys the shrine. Asandimitta is once again back to where she was.

Lonely Women’s Refuge

Another scheme to make money is hatched by the godly side of her split personality. This time, she uses the social, political and economic agitations of people, especially socially or culturally victimised women, to make money. They form a fake organisation called the Lonely Women’s Refuge, to rope in unsuspecting women in need. Once a victim is identified, she pursues correspondence with her, suggesting that she has an unmarried brother who can take care of her. One such woman uses someone else’s address to write to her.

When Asandimitta and Young Wicky visit the house to make the final killing, they find that it belongs to a rich family, where there are three women living alone. Mother (Anula Bulathsinghala) is disabled and in a wheel chair. Of the two daughters, the elder one (Gayani Gisanthika) lives with her mother because her husband has left her. The younger one (Sandali Handagama) is waiting for any outside contact to surface to overcome her boredom. Both offer a godly chance to Asandimitta and Young Wicky to pursue their crafty scheme, because they are ripe for being roped in. Deceived by a few flattering talks by Young Wicky, the two sisters invite the duo into the house. The real plot begins to unravel inside that house.

Killing three women

While having a casual chat over a cup of tea, Young Wicky makes advances toward the elder sister, who also responds positively. This is a part of the scheme they have in mind. The mother in the wheelchair, having smelled what is going to happen, scolds the two sisters for allowing them inside the house. But the two sisters, now sufficiently enchanted by the flattery, defy Mother and ask them to spend the night with them. Young Wicky plans to rope in the elder sister fully, so that Asandimitta and he could drain the family of its wealth. To activate the plan, a crucial requirement is to take the elder sister to bed. 
But Asandimitta’s feminine instincts tell her to protect her man, who is nobody but she herself in a different form, from the sex-starved elder sister. First, she storms the room and warns Young Wicky. Then, not trusting him, she storms the room again, and gets him to promise her that he would not take her to bed. Still not trusting him, she imagines that Mother in the wheelchair, who could now walk, will frighten him away from what he is planning. Frightened to death, Young Wicky hides himself under the bed cover.

When the elder sister visits him in the middle of the night, Asandimitta changes Young Wicky to Old Wicky, who strangles the surprised elder sister to death. The plot now thickens in Asandimitta’s mind, caught up between fear dictated by her loving side and desire to revenge guided by her brutish side. This is one of the most dramatic events which Handagama has created in the movie. While Asandimitta is sitting on the staircase unable to move, Old Wicky, the brute, finishes the job by strangling the remaining two women one after the other.

Trusting unrealistic stories 

The story and the characters are just an imagination in the mind of the main character, Asandimitta. But it is believed by the filmmaker, the police, and the courts. Handagama portrays here a weakness in human beings, who go by stories they have heard, and not by their instincts or rational thinking. If a story is repeated ad nauseam, it is believed to be true. When somebody comes up with a story compatible with the one already believed, they immediately accept it as true, though their rational thinking may tell them otherwise.

The filmmaker, who has been told the truth by the owner of the house where Asandimitta had lived, refuses to accept that it is a story created in her mind. He comes back to reality only when his wife (Yasodha Wimaladharma) plays a trick to force him to rush home to give him a surprise birthday party. But the police and the courts, who go by her story, decide to hang her for a crime which had never been committed. In that way, Asandimitta takes her final revenge of society which had maltreated her. She did not have courage to end her life. But she gets the insane society to put an end to her life by hanging her. Her loud laughter at the gallows is her cruel way of taking revenge.

From imagination to reality

The viewers, who also had taken Asandimitta’s imaginations as reality, are crudely woken up by the last scene in the movie. Young Wicky had in fact not followed Asandimitta in the bus which she had taken to go home. He has instead boarded another bus, and in reality, shared a seat in that bus with a young girl (Rithika Kodithuwakku), who has been reading the novella which Handagama has used for his movie. It brings the viewers back to reality from the imaginary world they had been living till then.

Superb performance by all actors 

Nilmini Sigera, though it is her first appearance in the big screen, portrays a superb performance in the movie. Her facial expressions, conveying different mental states of the lead character, have been wonderful. Handagama has drawn the maximum from all the actors and actresses. A special mention should be made about Sandali Handagama, who appeared in the movie only briefly. Given her talent as an actress, it is now time for her to graduate from minor roles to a major role in a movie.
(W A Wijewardena, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com)  

Bold policy changes needed

Lionel Wijesiri-Monday, March 25, 2019

According to our age-old tradition, we are expected to treat motherhood with feelings of respect and veneration. Modern sociologists, however, believe that such deification of mothers not only has delegitimised the relationship fathers have with children, it also has diminished the immense worth and value of mother and father relationships.

Contemporary motherhood is viewed from a much broader perspective than in previous decades by emphasizing the relational and logistical work of childrearing. Mothering is now no more regarded as the exclusive domain of women. In most societies, however, women not only bear children but also are primary caretakers of infants and children.

Both parents getting involved

In recent years, a number of countries, both developed and developing, have taken steps to promote policies encouraging fathers to spend more time caring for young children, thereby promoting a more gender equal division of care work.

Researched evidence has shown fathers taking some time off work around childbirth are more likely to be involved in childcare related activities than fathers who do not take time off.

One of the steps these countries have taken was to introduce paternity leave and parental leave, on top of the normal maternity leave. This step has given both parents an opportunity to be more involved in their young children’s initial stages of lives.

Paternity leave is the period of absence from work granted to a father after or shortly before the birth of his child so that he can spend some time with his new baby. The leave is normally between 7 days to 90 days depending on the country.

Parental leave is a benefit that provides job-protected leave from employment to care for a child following its birth available to both mothers and fathers.

The entitlements vary around the world. In some countries, each parent is entitled to a certain set amount of leave. Others afford an individual parent the ability to transfer his or her allotted leave to the other parent.

In some countries, parental leave supplements maternity leave, paternity leave, or both. Elsewhere, parental leave replaces maternity leave, paternity leave, or both. Compensation during these periods varies greatly.

The Sri Lankan picture

In Sri Lanka, there is no provision in the law on paid or unpaid parental leave. Paternity leave of three days is limited only to the state sector.

This leave must be taken within three months from the date of birth of the child. Although the workers’ unions have requested that paternity leave should be established for the private sector too, nothing has happened to date.

The duration of maternity leave for mothers in Sri Lanka is 12 weeks (84 days) excluding holidays.
Of these, two weeks maternity leave is before confinement and 10 weeks following the day of confinement. State Sector employees, however, have special privileges in applying for “Half-pay Leave” and “No-pay Leave” in addition to the formal 84 days. It means they can choose to come after 7 months or 10 months if they decide to use those special privileges.

Our neighbours

Let us take a look at two neighbouring countries.

India – In 2017, the Government of India extended paid maternity leave for women employees from the original 12 weeks to 26 weeks. A maximum of eight weeks can be taken before the expected delivery date and the remaining after childbirth.

There is no provision on paternity leave in Indian labour law for private sector workers. On the other hand, a male public servant is granted paternity leave for a period of 15 days before or up to six months from the date of delivery of the child.

Pakistan - Female employees are entitled to a maximum of twelve weeks of maternity leave. Paternity leave for a new father is not provided under the labour legislation for the private sector. However, a male public servant can take paternity leave of a maximum of 10-days outside his leave account immediately on or after the birth of a child.

Both India and Pakistan, parental leave is not available. India is far superior to Sri Lanka in the maternity benefits and paternity leave. Pakistan is better than Sri Lanka in paternity leave.

Practicality

Coming back to Sri Lanka, there are also critics of paternity and parental leave. Some believe if the two privileges are introduced, there will be a huge impact on our economy and the question arises to what extent can our economy bear it. Some others maintain that Sri Lankan workers presently have lot of holidays and leave facilities compared to other countries, and whether burdening the system with more leave is justified at the moment.

One employer commented, “Our employees must learn to manage all their issues within present leave structure. I do not think any employee has missed out on supporting their family because we do not have such a leave policy.”

In spite of these adverse comments, the case for greater paternity and parental leave does prevail in Sri Lanka. For example, Henrietta Fore, Executive Director of the United Nations Children’s Fund says, “Positive and meaningful interaction with mothers and fathers from the very beginning helps shape children’s brain growth and development for life, making them healthier and happier, and increasing their ability to learn. It’s all of our responsibility to enable them to fill this role.”

Swedish experience

Since the introduction of the Swedish parental leave reform in 1974, fathers in that country have had the same rights to use parental leave as mothers. Between 2000 and 2003, a research project at the Department of Sociology, University of Gothenburg, focused on fathers who had taken more than four months of paid parental leave.

The approach of the study was mainly qualitative, based upon a combination of a survey and interviews.

A majority of the fathers who answered the questionnaire had been the main caregivers for their children during their parental leave. During the interviews many of the men described their mothers as role models for their fatherhood. The men also described their own partner as both anxious to get back to her work after her own parental leave period and convinced of the importance of a nurturing father.

An early decision to take part of the parental leave probably made it easier for the men to reach workplace agreements. Most of the men described themselves as both nurturing fathers and as sharing housework equally. They stressed the importance of being alone with their child during a long period, to be able to develop a deep relationship with their child.

Three reasons

In this Swedish ideological debate three main different reasons emerged urging fathers to take parental leave: (1) equality between men and women, (2) the child’s right to be with both parents and (3) the possibility of changing traditional gender stereotypes.

The equality point was focused on the need for equal employment opportunities for women. Equal distribution of different domestic tasks between women and men can also be seen as a goal in itself, but it is also a condition for reaching equality in the society as a whole.

The right of the child to have a close relationship with both the mother and father has been a central issue in family policy in Sweden since the 1970s.

The traditional view, regarding fathers as important role models for boys has been questioned, as research results show that fathers are also important in girls’ development.

The third central issue in the debate over the parental leave involved possibilities of changing traditional gender stereotypes. In Sweden, gender roles are fast changing at work and at home. Currently, the country is ranked as one of the most egalitarian countries in the world, with a strong national equality discourse and a relatively high number of men engaging in traditionally communal roles such as parenting and domestic tasks.

To succeed to this level, Sweden didn’t have a magic bullet. It was just a generations-long shift that required trial and error, and a commitment to gender equality from every man and woman in the country.

The brutal reckonings of our time have made clear that in Sri Lanka the current way isn’t working; if we can see that for what it is, there may be hope for us yet. 

Gota’s Presidential Candidacy & The UNP’s ‘Sirisena Nikāya’

By Rasika Jayakody –MARCH 25, 2019

Rasika Jayakody

This year’s Presidential election is tipped to be one of the most dramatic national elections in Sri Lanka—and for no other reason but for the possibility that Gotabaya Rajapaksa will be the Presidential candidate of the SLPP-led alliance.

In anticipation, the Rajapaksa camp is seen vigorously promoting Gotabaya, whose dual citizenship with the US has proved an impediment to any ambitions of the presidency. But an English language newspaper owned by a businessman closely affiliated with the Rajapaksa camp reported last week, that the former Secretary to the Ministry of Defence had on March 6 submitted an application to the US Embassy in Colombo to renounce his US citizenship. 

Another leading Sinhala language newspaper, whose editor is a close associate of the Rajapaksa family reported last week that former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, after extensive consultations with other members of his family, had decided to nominate his brother Gotabaya as the SLPP’s Presidential candidate. As the Rajapaksa family constitutes the politburo of the SLPP, no less, the decision has been widely accepted by the party’s rank and file, including the likes of Vasudewa Nanayakkara, who were initially averse to Gotabaya’s candidacy.

The act of filing an application, however, does not mean that the former Defence Secretary citizenship will be revoked successfully, allowing him to run for the Presidency this year. His application has to be reviewed by the US government, which has the last say in the matter. There is already a strong lobby in the US, exerting pressure on the US government to dismiss Rajapaksa’s application to renounce citizenship.

If the former Defence Secretary manages to get the all-clear in time,  he will be the most preferred Presidential candidate within the SLPP-led alliance. And although he has confidently claimed there is “nothing to worry” about, the matter still hangs in the balance. He is also expected to fly to the US next month for a personal matter, but sources close to him indicated that he would discuss the matter with US authorities during the visit, seeking to clear the conflict over his citizenship within the next two months.

The UNP 

The possibility that Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s will run for President also surfaced at the UNP Working Committee meeting last Thursday (21). Many of party seniors are convinced the SLPP will field the former Defence Secretary, but several of them—these including Sajith Premadasa, Mangala Samaraweera and Navin Dissanayake have pointed out that defeating Gotabaya Rajapaksa would be easier than defeating any other Presidential candidate fielded by the SLPP.

Be that as it may, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who banks heavily on the Sinhala-Buddhist votes, will be a force to reckon with. He has already projected himself as a ‘disciplinarian’ committed to ensuring political stability in the country—at any cost— suggesting that he will have no qualms about ruling the country with an iron fist. Rajapaksa’s modus operandi during his ten-year tenure as the Defence Secretary also lends credence to the belief that he, as a President, will lean towards ultra-nationalism and authoritarianism, leaving little room for dissent, within and without the government.

But Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s role as the Secretary to the Ministry of Defence is marked with serious controversy. ‘White-van abductions’, extra-judicial killings and attacks on journalists took place under his watch. His name is also linked to several high-profile corruption cases that include the MiG deal and the construction of the D. A. Rajapaksa Museum in Hambantota, which is now before the Special High Court. His presidential campaign, therefore, will be dogged with controversy. 

There is a school of thought within the UNP circles, that the party should field a candidate who can ‘match’ Gotabaya Rajapaksa who played an important role in the fallen Rajapaksa administration. The common idea is that the UNP should field a populist nationalist who can disrupt the traditional Rajapaksa voter-base. While the idea seems fancy on paper, the pertinent question remains whether the UNP is in a position to take that gamble — especially after their bitter experience with Maithripala Sirisena.

The UNP’s ideal Presidential candidate must bring to the table a  ‘package’ that is diametrically ‘opposite’ to what the Rajapaksa’s will field, leading people to believe that Rajapaksa-style governance will only lead to chaos in the country. The UNP candidate must have a proven track record in safeguarding the rights of all ethnic and religious communities, and should not in any way, be ultra-nationalist. 

In oppositions to Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s instincts, the UNP candidate should have unwavering faith in parliamentary democracy. He or she should be a mature and resilient leader, with an ability to work with people holding diverse opinions. This should also come with a long-term vision for sustainable and inclusive socio-economic development. The UNP candidate should be a person who can clearly articulate a vision for the country and not be a mere populist who will play to the gallery and seek to placate everyone.

Meanwhile, despite the President’s strained relations with the UNP, he has managed to cultivate a covert ‘Sirisena Chapter’ (Nikàya) at the top tier of the party leadership. They are the ones who speak in full praise of the President and unquestioningly support his every act undermining the duly appointed Cabinet. The reason for this strange affiliation must certainly be linked to business —tycoons that pull the strings from behind the scenes.  It is no secret that these tycoons work closely with President Sirisena and the UNP’s ‘Sirisena Nikàya’, exercising enormous control over both sides.

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How Sri Lankan farmers are taking charge of their destiny

25 March 2019

The whole region around Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka’s ancient capital, is dotted with village reservoirs managed by small-scale farmers.   Referred to locally as tanks, the reservoirs form part of complex irrigation systems in use since time immemorial.   Farm families like that of Priyantha Kumara, a disabled army veteran, rely on them to irrigate paddy in the main monsoon season. 

But Priyantha and his neighbours aspire to more than the basic food security that this system provides. They want a bigger share of the prosperity that people elsewhere in the country are enjoying. To boost the family’s cash income, Priyantha, his wife, mother and father have invested their savings to dig a 5-metre-wide “agro-well” just outside the village and buy a motor pump. 

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• Government promoted the transformation of smallholder agriculture, especially since the end of war in 2009   
• Institutional arrangements for local groundwater governance are largely absent 
• 83 per cent of the agro-wells were constructed without subsidies

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Previously, they sowed millet and sesame on this fertile land but harvested little because of unreliable rainfall. Now, they earn a steady income in the dry season by producing melon, maize, long bean, chilli, onion and cabbage irrigated with groundwater. Priyantha’s family has followed in the footsteps of millions of farmers across South Asia, who have adopted the use of motor pumps for groundwater irrigation to make the transition between hand-to-mouth subsistence agriculture and profitable production of high-value crops. 

Frustrated with the limitations of conventional irrigation systems, growing numbers of Sri Lankan farmers have seized this opportunity, mostly in the country’s northern and eastern Dry Zones. A new IWMI study traces the rapid spread of motor pumps – from 100,000 to 275,000 during the period 2000-2016 – documenting the benefits, while also calling attention to the shortcomings and perils. The government has promoted the transformation of smallholder agriculture, especially since the end of the nation’s civil war in 2009, through various measures – constructing thousands of agro-wells, offering subsidies and credit to facilitate the purchase of drip and sprinkler systems, and providing tax and tariff concessions. Non-governmental organizations and donor-funded projects have also contributed importantly.

Support from the government and civil society has helped leverage local investment. Encouraged by the high-profit margins of cash crop production, farmers have invested heavily from their own resources. The declining costs of agro-well construction and irrigation equipment have helped bring these options within the financial reach of more smallholders. In the IWMI study areas, where landholdings average only about 2.5 acres, 83 per cent of the agro-wells were constructed without subsidies.

The spread of motor pumps has enabled farmers to expand the area under cultivation, diversify beyond exclusive dependence on low-return rice, and greatly intensify production. Rather than just one crop per year, now they can grow two, three or even four, taking advantage of the dry season as well as the periods between the two monsoons. In the area around Anuradhapura, some farmers using motor pumps make up to USD 4,000 from dry-season cultivation on just a few acres. 

A new IWMI study traces the rapid spread of motor pumps – from 100,000 to 275,000 during the period 2000-2016 – documenting the benefits, while also calling attention to the shortcomings and perils

These changes, in turn, have raised household incomes, created employment for landless farm workers and offered new opportunities for women to participate in agriculture – through extended household gardens, for example. This has enabled women to generate more income, translating into better family nutrition and well-being as well as more influence over household decisions, but at a cost in terms of extra demands on their time and labour. 

At the same of time, however, lack of capital to construct wells and buy water pumps has excluded many small-scale farmers from the bonanza. Moreover, the government and civil society schemes have not reached the poor and women in particular to the extent they could have. 

Agricultural transformation poses other challenges as well. Given the rapid spread of motor pumps for irrigation, there is a danger of overusing groundwater, which has not yet been thoroughly researched in Sri Lanka. Another problem is the encroachment of agriculture on forests and nature reserves. 

How then to spread the benefits of groundwater irrigation, while reducing its perils?

One key step is to make wells and irrigation equipment more readily accessible through targeted subsidies and easier access to credit. 

Investment in lining agro-wells with cement or brick is particularly urgent to protect against siltation and wall collapse. Also important are regulatory systems, with standards for well construction and groundwater extraction. 

Institutional arrangements for local groundwater governance are largely absent. One step forward would be to introduce a citizen science approach for monitoring groundwater, especially where intensive cultivation depends on shallow aquifers. A further step would be to support the creation of farmer organizations, which can monitor groundwater and make collective decisions about its long-term management. Only when this happens will Priyantha’s family and many others like them truly be in charge of their destiny. 

The writer is a researcher with the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), reports on a new case study documenting a remarkable agricultural transformation made possible in Sri Lanka by the rapid spread of motor pumps for irrigation.

Photo credit: Hamish John Appleby/IWMI

In Sri Lanka, the new Chinese Silk Road is a disappointment

Ishara S.Kodikara, AFP | Sri Lanka was forced to sell Hambantota's port to China in December 2017.

Text by:Sébastian SEIBT-24/03/2019

Chinese President Xi Jinping has launched the French leg of his European tour to try to drum up cooperation for his global infrastructure project.

Xi Jinping arrived in France on Sunday for a three-day trip in which he hopes to gain French cooperation for his new Silk Road initiative. He already has one European success under his belt, having signed an agreement with Italy a day earlier, in which the euro-zone's third largest economy formalised its support of China’s vast programme of infrastructure investment in more than 70 countries.

For Italian President Sergio Mattarella, the agreement is crucial. Italy is counting heavily on Chinese investments to, among other things, breathe new life into the Port of Trieste, which looks set to be the flagship project of the forthcoming economic cooperation between Beijing and Rome.

A port built from scratch in south Sri Lanka

For critics of the new Silk Road, Washington being the chief one, Italy has "no need" for these investments which, ultimately, could backfire against Europe’s third biggest economic power. The Sri Lankan experience is often highlighted as an example of the dark side of the new Silk Road plan.

In the mid-2000s, Colombo (the commercial capital of Sri Lanka) agreed to let Beijing build a new port from scratch in the town of Hambantota, in the south of the island. It wasn’t yet thought of as part of a new Silk Road -- that programme was conceptualizsed by Xi Jinping in 2012 -- but all the ingredients were there. "Chinese funds and engineers are mobilised to build infrastructure outside China, as part of a partnership that was meant to be win-win: this is the very definition of the rationale of the Silk Road," said Jean-François Dufour, economist and director of DCA China-Analysis. The Chinese president integrated the Sri Lankan project into his Silk Road initiative in 2013.

At the time, Colombo thought it could make a profit from the operation of the port, while Beijing would get a key point of transit in "the very strategic Indian Ocean, through which a large percentage of Chinese commercial ships travel to Europe," the European Union Institute for Security Studies noted in an April 2018 report. The project provided China with a presence in an area of fierce competition between Beijing and the other great Asian power: India.

But in 2015, financial clouds began gathering over the future of Hambantota’s port, which cost $1.1 billion. Sri Lanka was crumbling under the debt, and was unable to repay the more than $8 billion in loans it had taken from China for several infrastructure projects in the country. Furious, Beijing turned up the heat and threatened to cut off financial support to the island nation if it didn’t quickly find a solution. In December, 2017, after two years of negotiations, Colombo finally agreed to turn over the port to China for 99 years in exchange for the cancellation of its debt.

The ports of Hambantota and Trieste: the same struggle?

The concession was humiliating for Sri Lanka, while "the opponents of China, like India, painted the entire operation as a deliberate plan to acquire strategic positions in the region," Dufour said. China was suspected of intentionally strangling Colombo with loans at a 6 percent interest rate, which was much higher than the other lenders - such as the World Bank – from which Colombo had previously borrowed.

Dufour acknowledged that "this episode shocked and pushed countries like Malaysia to reconsider their participation in the new Silk Road”. But he doesn’t see China risking compromising the credibility of its entire investment program for one port in Sri Lanka.
In any case, the episode "is a stinging reminder that the sums invested by China are not donations, but loans with consequences,” the French economist said. Italy should keep the precedence in mind as it signs the Silk Road agreement because the Italian situation bears similarities to that of Sri Lanka, Dufour said. In both cases, the ports had strategic importance for China -- Trieste would be the new gateway to Europe for Chinese goods -- and Italy is already a country heavily in debt, Dufour noted.

Admittedly, Italy is economically much more powerful than Sri Lanka, but "the risk of seeing the port of Trieste get away from Italy remains real," Dufour said. And for a government as nationalist as that of Giuseppe Conte, that would be a major political failure.

SLPP admits split in UPFA, way cleared for smooth sailing of UNP budget 2019

By Shamindra Ferdinando-March 25, 2019, 9:34 pm 

The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), yesterday, acknowledged that contrary to expectations, the UNP could comfortably ensure the passage of budget 2019 at its final reading on April 05.

Matara District MP Dullas Alahapperuma told an SLPP briefing at Nelum Mawatha, Battaramulla, the UNP could overcome the UPFA challenge with the support of the four-party Tamil National alliance (TNA) and a section of SLFP MPs elected on the UPFA ticket.

Alahapperuma described those SLFPers as UNP’s slaves.

The second reading of budget 2019 was approved with a majority of 43 votes.

Alahapperuma, a member of the SLPP team currently engaged in talks meant to work out a common programme with the SLFP, admitted the split in the UPFA group in the wake of the conclusion of the second round of talks.

The first and the second round of SLPP-SLFP were held on March 14 and March 21. The third round of talks is scheduled for April 10 less than a week after the final vote on the budget.

SLPP Chairman Prof. G.L. Peiris, head of the SLPP delegation for talks with the SLFP, who chaired the meeting, refrained from commenting on the split.

Alahapperuma attributed the TNA’s support to the UNP government over the latter giving into the Illankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi-led grouping’s demands pertaining to accountability issues.

TNA Jaffna District MP and party spokesman M.A. Sumanthiran last Friday (March 22) warned the government that his party would haul Sri Lanka before the International Criminal Court (ICC) unless it established a hybrid war crimes court in terms of Oct 2015 Geneva Resolution.

Referring to a recent report in a Sinhala weekly, MP Alahapperuma explained the plight of senior military officers, both serving and retired, unable to secure visas from Western governments over unsubstantiated war crimes allegations. The SLFP said that some of them couldn’t even visit their children studying overseas.

MP Alahapperuma named the officers affected as Major General (Retd) Jagath Dias, Maj. Gen. (Retd) Kamal Gunaratne, Maj.Gen. (Retd) Prasanna de Silva, Maj. Gen. (Retd) Nandana Udawatta and Army Chief of Staff Shavendra Silva.

Former External Affairs Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris explained the crisis the country was facing due to the current dispensation co-sponsoring the latest Geneva Resolution that provided for two more years to fulfill promises made in Oct 2015.

Prof. Peiris discussed how the current head of the United Nations Human Rights Council Michelle Bachelet in her latest report warned Sri Lanka of dire consequences unless the government implemented the Oct 2015 Resolution.

Prof. Peiris said that recent Foreign Ministry claim that Bachelet on March 20 received Marapana’s delegation warmly, appreciated the progress made by Sri Lanka in some of the key human rights commitments arising from HRC resolution 30/1, and reaffirmed her readiness and willingness to continue to work with Sri Lanka closely in further strengthening implementation and achieving progress through technical assistance and support in areas where such assistance was required by Sri Lanka, should be examined against the backdrop of her punitive  report on Sri Lanka.

The meeting took place on the side-lines of the 40th Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

Prof. Peiris questioned the Bachelet’s right to condemn the Sri Lankan judiciary.

Pointing out that Minister Marapana, PC, a former Attorney General had found fault with Bachelet’s report, Prof. Peiris sought an explanation as to why the latest resolution based on that disputed dossier was co-sponsored.

Since the change of government in January 2015, Sri Lanka thrice agreed for foreign judges -in Oct 2015, March 2017 and March 2019, the former foreign minister pointed out.

Prof. Peiris alleged that a TNA delegation led by Sumanthiran had been on a destructive mission in Geneva at the taxpayers’ expense.

Prof. Peiris also questioned the rationale in Mano Tittawela of the Secretariat for Coordinating Reconciliation Mechanism directing Sri Lanka Permanent Representative in Geneva Ambassador Azeez to approve the latest resolution whereas that responsibility should have been exercised by the Foreign Ministry.

Prof. Peiris recalled the circumstances under which Sri Lanka secured a better result at the March 2014 Geneva session. The former External Affairs Minister pointed out that 12 countries voted against the US led resolution and another 12 abstained whereas 23 voted for. Unfortunately, Sri Lanka meekly succumbed to Western pressure and in the process betrayed the interests of the war winning armed forces.

Quota given to Education not spent - Bimal Rathnayake

METHMALIE DISSANAYAKE- MAR 15 2019

The JVP today (15) apprised Parliament that in the last three years there was a stark contrast in money being allocated for Education and the actual amount spent. This came to light before the Committee on Public Finance (COPF).

JVP MP Bimal Rathnayake who opened the Committee Stage Debate of the Appropriation Bill 2019 on the Education and Higher Education Ministries informed the House that the real expenditure for education from the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 1.04 per cent, 1.34%, and 1.27%  in 2016, 2017 and 2018 respectively.

He pointed out that “When COPF was analyzing as to how these allocations were spent for Education, Higher Education and Skills Development and Vocational Training Ministries it was revealed that the actual spending contradicted the undertaking on the amount to be spent.”

Rathnayake noted that the budgetary allocation for education is limited mainly to textbooks.  However, about 50-60% of that allocation is not being actually spent, he added.

He also said that according to the COPF report, the amount of spending by the Higher Education Ministry on scholarships and subsidies had been curtailed by Rs 882 million in 2018 when compared to 2017.

Slaves built Galle Fort

Entrance to the slave cells, Galle Fort. - Pinterest

Monday, March 25, 2019

The topic of the piece today was triggered by a conversation with the current High Commissioner in Colombo from South Africa, Ruby Marks, who has also posted on her Facebook page this passage, “Calvin Gilfillan, Head of Die Kasteel, affirmed what we suspected-the Dutch conceptualised and supervised, but it was the labour of an estimated 15,000 Africans brought from Portuguese and Dutch colonies, that did the back breaking work of actually building the Fort and the other ones scattered across Sri Lanka. I was shocked by how little was known in Sri Lanka about this. I visited the cramped quarters where the slaves were kept, the dungeons where they were imprisoned, and the cemetery-now a car park where they were buried. And my heart wept.

“Today there are only about 30 Mozambican/Sri Lankan descendants left, and they still try to hold onto the culture through dance and language. In our meeting today, I proposed that the descendants of these African men, who were brought here as slaves and whose contribution has never been acknowledged, should be honoured. And so with their help, we will perform a cleansing ceremony at the dungeon and at the car park where they are buried. We will also unveil a plaque so that their sacrifice and tears will never be forgotten. We will also, with Die Kasteel, arrange a symposium between the Fort here and our Kasteel, and if we can, exchange researchers. I’m determined that the contribution of the people from our motherland, taken against their will to labour in Sri Lanka until they died, will not be forgotten”.

Slavery in Africa

The course of human history is marked by appalling crimes. But even the hardened historian is filled with horror, loathing and indignation on examining the record of African slavery. How was it possible? How could it have gone on for so long, and on such a scale? A tragedy of such dimensions has no parallel in any other part of the world.

The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth). Then more than four centuries (from the end of the fifteenth to the nineteenth) of a regular slave trade to build the Americas and the prosperity of the Christian states of Europe. The figures, even where hotly disputed, make your head spin. Four million slaves exported via the Red Sea, another four million through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean.

Why the Africans rather than other peoples? Who exactly should be held responsible for the slave trade? The Europeans alone, or the Africans themselves?

Even after the abolition of the slave trade in Africa, Colonial powers used forced labour -- such as in King Leopold’s Congo Free State (which was operated as a massive labour camp) or as libertos on the Portuguese plantations of Cape Verde or São Tomé.

The great slaving companies were formed in the second half of the seventeenth century, when the Americas, and other parts of the world which the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) and various papal edicts had reserved to the Spaniards and Portuguese, were redistributed among the nations of Europe.

The whole of Europe - France, England, Holland, Portugal and Spain, and even Denmark, Sweden and Brandenburg shared in the spoils, establishing a chain of monopoly companies, forts, trading posts and colonies that stretched from Senegal to Mozambique. Only distant Russia and the Balkan countries were missing from the pack - and they received their own small contingents of slaves via the Ottoman Empire. The Start of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.

When the Portuguese first sailed down the Atlantic African coast in the 1430s, they were interested in one thing: gold. However, by 1500 they had traded already 81,000 Africans to Europe, nearby Atlantic islands, and to Muslim merchants in Africa.

The ‘Triangular Trade’ in slaves

For two hundred years, 1440-1640, Portugal had a monopoly on the export of slaves from Africa. It is notable that they were also the last European country to abolish the institution -- although, like France, it still continued to work former slaves as contract labourers, which they called libertos or engagés à temps. It is estimated that during the 4 1/2 centuries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, Portugal was responsible for transporting over 4.5 million Africans (roughly 40% of the total). During the eighteenth century, however, when the slave trade accounted for the transport of a staggering 6 million Africans, Britain was the worst transgressor -- responsible for almost 2.5 million. (This is a fact that is often forgotten by those who regularly cite Britain’s prime role in the abolition of the slave trade.)

Information on how many slaves were shipped from Africa across the Atlantic to the Americas during the sixteenth century can only be estimated as very few records exist for this period. But from the seventeenth century onwards, increasingly accurate records, such as ship manifests, are available.
Slaves for the Trans-Atlantic slave trade were initially sourced in Senegambia and the Windward Coast. Around 1650 the trade moved to west-central Africa (the Kingdom of the Kongo and neighbouring Angola).

Slavery and shipping in Dutch Asia

Throughout the Vereenigde Oostindische Company (‘Dutch East India Company’, VOC) empire, mobility and coercion were key elements in mobilizing labour and maintaining imperial order. Throughout the Asian empire of the VOC, various circuits ensured the continuous mobility of coerced labour. These dynamics of slavery and the slave trade seem to have existed before European powers arrived in South and Southeast Asia.

The arrival of the Portuguese, the Dutch and other European trading companies meant the intensification of long-range slave trading networks. The trading companies of the Dutch, English, French and other European nations started to build upon existing trading patterns throughout the Indian Ocean area and Southeast Asia. In this way, European demand for both slaves and Asian commodities resulted in the intensification of the slave trade throughout the Indian Ocean world.

Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the slave trade in Asia was conducted by both European and Asian traders. Gujarati merchants transported enslaved Mozambicans to Daman and Diu. The two major players in Maluku trade, including slavery, were the Chinese and the Bugis. As in Maluku, Chinese slave traders were the major players in the export of Balinese slaves, mostly to Batavia, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Ceylon could perhaps best be described as the second most important region in the VOC empire. After Batavia, the Ceylonese port cities of Colombo and Galle were the most important destinations for the intercontinental shipping of the VOC between Asia and Europe. From the 1660s onwards, three to four ships per year would sail directly to Ceylon from the Republic, while 5 to sometimes 10 or even 15 ships would depart from Ceylon to the Republic via the Cape.

Presence of slaves in Ceylon

Slavery is a little-studied subject in Sri Lankan history for the simple reason that slaves and slavery do not immediately surface in Sri Lankan memory, nor in colonial and indigenous texts. Slavery as such was not new to Sri Lanka, and at least from the Portuguese period onwards, slaves had been actively imported into the island. According to late seventeenth- century censuses, slaves formed the larger part of the urban inhabitants in the coastal port cities.

Tamara Fernando from the University of Cambridge has written on the historical aspects. She states that in 1660, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) transported more than 10,000 slaves from the Subcontinent to Ceylon and Batavia, and the slave trade was an incredibly lucrative side business for VOC officials. Slaves were used for construction work alongside prisoners, mostly as domestic workers for wealthy local and Dutch elites at a time when well-to-do families could have up to 20 slaves. Over time, these slaves were often absorbed into what the historians call the ‘urban underclass’. The proceedings from the Dutch Council of Justice in Colombo, preserve the lives and testimonies of many slaves. These cases were filed by the slaves for their manumission (freedom) or, more tragically, in the case of their murder, rape or abuse.

Commemorating the memory of the victims

In commemoration of the memory of the victims, the General Assembly, in its resolution 62/122 of December 17, 2007, declared March 25 the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, to be observed annually.

The resolution also called for the establishment of an outreach programme to mobilize educational institutions, civil society and other organisations to inculcate in future generations the “causes, consequences and lessons of the transatlantic slave trade, and to communicate the dangers of racism and prejudice.” This piece is captures some facets of the slave trade. An honest remembrance of their unfortunate time in Ceylon would require further committed work. 

Bogeymen Emerging As Saints; Cronyism & 2020

By Vishnu Gupta –MARCH 25, 2019

W. Vishnu Gupta

If cumulative total of promises made by all governments of cronyism since 1953 were fulfilled, Sri Lankan economy would have been ranked number one. Sri Lankans would have been the richest and happiest in the world. Furthermore, country’s name would have changed into “Shangri-La”. What a paradox, the same men and their siblings have begun to hoodwink the masses by revamping the same promises for unsuspecting voters with the hope of winning next presidency.

So far Oligarchies controlling the government and the opposition, vying for power in 2020 in the presidential election and general elections have been very active in confusing the electorate with stories about leading contenders with the help of spin doctors and diehard cohorts. They are in real frenzy in promoting their self-centered preferred candidate. The names surfaced in recent days from both oligarchies are “Bogeymen” responsible for misery imposed on the people of Sri Lanka.  The individuals named so far from both oligarchy camps, have been frantically active in Buddhist temples, Hindu Temples, Moslem Mosques and Christian churches. These are vile individuals driven by greed and insecurity, if all of them loose the opportunity, they are certain that their future is very bleak and perhaps rest of their lives will be spent in heavily guarded prisons. Also, they cherish the idea and take comfort in knowing that if one of them becomes the President or Prime Minister, no matter whatever the party or symbol the loosing contenders of two oligarchy camps will be protected and let off scot-free permitting their hedonistic lives unabated. 

Only in Sri Lanka, bogeymen are introduced to the electorate as saints. Leading Buddhist monks, Moslem Clergies, Hindu Priests and Christian Clergies promote these bogeymen or gongos (Kerala version) or billas (Sri Lankan version) as saints or saviors of the fragmented nation. These clergies wearing different robes must share the responsibility for inflicting misery on the people of Sri Lanka. Some have gone on records for uttering unacceptable judgments on the behavior of these vile bogeymen including one monk demanding a Hitler like figure.  Some of these bogeymen are alleged to have squandered the national treasury, tortured and murdered the citizens, aided and abated criminal activities, laundered money and denied the basic rights of Sri Lankan citizens; food, clothes, shelter and health.  

Democracy is a Mockery 

Sri Lankan Oligarchies since 1953 have made every effort to control power through various schemes. The first and the most everlasting detrimental scheme was conceived by bogeyman SWRD Bandaranaike with the creation of Sinhala Maha Sabah and its obnoxious divisive anti-democratic policies.  Unfortunately, leading Buddhist monks, Ayurvedic Doctors, Teachers, Farmers and a handful of leading labor leaders fell for this self-centered pukkah sahib’s political trap. This gongo threw the dice to become Prime Minister on the shoulders of unsuspecting innocent Buddhist voters but the entire nation have been paying the price until now and it will continue if the people are naïve to elect any of the bogeymen suggested by the oligarchies. The Tamils of Vellala caste, must equally take the responsibility for the injustices faced by Sri Lankans. These powerful blocks of Vellala politicians have never suffered any economic or privilege setbacks due to the actions of oligarchies leading the corrupt government in Colombo. Thousands of civilians and innocent military personnel were killed during the 30 year war that ravaged every region of Sri Lanka. Oligarchies of the south and Vellala Tamil venal leaders understand very well conflict between Sinhalese and Tamils will always keep them alive, active and sustain their corruption fed families guided by hedonism. All vile political parties including that of oligarchies of different hue and color have come to know “CONFLICT IS GOOD” axiom. It feeds their families and supports their nefarious activities with impunity under the bogus and adulterated democracy of the country.   

Masters of diversionary tactics

The bogeymen (Gongos) are the masters of deceits and they are driven by Machiavellian principles. They will always use smoke and mirror techniques to bamboozle the voters in Sri Lanka. For instances; recent debates launched by oligarchies, Vellala Tamil politicians and other chauvinistic politicians on Constitutional council, New Constitution, Elimination of Executive Presidency, Cabinet ministers addicted to drugs, UNHCR reports and Shortage of cabinet ministers. None of these debates are relevant to the development of living condition or standards of average Sri Lankan irrespective of their ethnicity or religion. Yet the venal politicians occupying the parliament of Sri Lanka and presidency have been executing many diversionary tactics to avoid major national issues directly related to upliftment of the masses from economic misery since 1953. In that process these bogeymen and their cohorts are alleged to have ransacked the national treasury, laundered money, built mansions, accumulated wealth for their families and henchmen for many generations. Above all, these bogeymen and their families have fortified their habitat with the help of vile businessmen, professional and administrative groups.  

Alternative to existing malaise 

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