letters

Private buses and the passenger

Private bus services though of immense help to the commuters has now become a threat to the passengers.

Whilst thanking the private bus operators for their service to cope with the shortage of state owned buses the service extended by the majority of private buses irritates the commuter, as some buses, majority of them, do not cater to the bus travellers’ basic requirements or comforts which is a requirement by law.

The seating arrangements in some buses do not conform with the requirements, as the leg-room space provided from one seat to the other is not sufficient and the passengers undergo great inconvenience even being seated until his or her journey’s end.

This I believe is because such bus operators want an extra seat to accommodate more passengers, in addition to normal number of rows of seats.

As a result of this passengers undergo discomfort while the bus operator make a fast buck.

Before a passenger bus is licensed for the current year, a fitness certificate has to be obtained from a recognised and authorised motor examiner. I feel suspicious how these fitness certificates are obtained for such buses when the seating arrangements are not in conformity with the requirements.

It is needless to say that these buses are heavily loaded with passengers at all times subjecting the commuters to much suffering.

Apart from this drawback there are no "bells" in some private buses to enable a passenger to warn the driver of the bus to stop to get off the bus at his or her destination forcing the passenger, to shout to warn the driver to stop. His warning sometimes goes unheard by the driver’ cause the conductor’s job is to keep shouting instructing them at one time to go forward from the back entrance and vice-versa when he shouts from the front exit or entrance.

The iron supports or railings provided for passengers when boarding a bus or getting off are not firm enough whilst some private buses do not have any such iron supports at all and the iron supports provided in some buses are shaky and not firmly fixed at the entrance or exit of such buses.

Apart from these lapses most of, or I should say, all private buses stop their buses for long time at every junction, halt to collect as many passengers as they can concerned about the time wasted by the passengers travelling time.

Further tickets are not issued in most private buses and sometimes even if they do issue a ticket, the fare printed on the ticket does not agree with the fare paid by the passenger for his or her destination. The less said about the rude way conductors address passengers the better.

The authorities concerned should exercise more precaution regarding these lapses and request the private bus oeprators to afford a better service to the commuter for either party’s mutual benefit and comfort, and streamline the passenger transport system, without making it a "mockery".

Douglas de Alwis,
Mt. Lavinia.

PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION LAWS

Today, the country is on the brink of national disaster, since both the major political parties have to depend on minority political parties to form governments. The majority Sinhala community is divided and fighting each other to defeat the opposition at a time a war is raging in the north. While the minority racial political parties are capitalising under these circumstances, both politically and economically, demanding unreasonable and undue claims paving the way for the complete annihilation of democracy. Hence, amendments to the election laws are vital if democracy is to survive in Sri Lanka.

Amendments suggested are -

1. Registration of all racial political parties should be cancelled, and no new racial political parties should be registered. Today, there are seven Tamil racial political parties and two Moslem racial political parties on the registers. The Sinhala people who consist of 74% of the population have no exclusive racial political party, and they observe strictly to the letter of the law, the democratic principles, the most important being that no democratic political party should be discriminatory in respect of race, religion or colour. This present situation has created a gigantic political imbalance, and the present so-called ethnic conflict is entirely due to the fact that the government in power publicly announces that there should not be ethnic differences but at the same time recognize and register ethnic political parties and give them political sanction, which is undemocratic and absurd.

2. The P.R. System should be abolished forthwith. This system of representation has created racial, communal, caste, creed, religious and all the wicked discriminatory and divisive factions among peace loving population who were living as relatives, friends and neighbours in the same village. The electoral representative system should be re-introduced in the whole island and the government should not recognize race, caste, creed, religion or colour in any matter concerning elections. As water finds its own level, each racial, caste, creed, religious category will find its own legitimate place in the area or in the electoral district in which they live and in the society in which they are born and bred.

3. The three preferences should be forthwith done away with. There should be only one vote for each individual. The preferences system has brought about all the vicious, wicked, racial, communal, caste, creed, religious and all the other anti-social differences with legal force and gravity.

04. The multi-party system can exist in a very healthy form till the time of the election of the representatives. Once the election is over, the number of members can be determined according to the number permitted by the Constitution. All the members so elected are of equal standing and they are Members of Parliament (M.PP) for the whole country, and they participate with equal authority in the administration of the country. There will be no Government Members or Opposition Members as it exists at present. The animosity, rancour, hatred, anger, bitterness, etc. associated with the present party system will disappear and the Members of Parliament will discharge their duties with equal responsibility for the welfare of the country irrespective of party differences and all the wicked enmity that prevailed will vanish until the next elections. Today, under the prevailing system, there is in reality a government for only 51% of the voters and the rest 49% of the voters are victims of an awful creation, created by the people themselves. The multi-party system has brought all the misery, political cancer, ill-will and anger to the detriment of the progress and welfare of all the citizens to whom this country belongs.

05. The Parliament can follow whatever system it has adopted unanimously. This can be easily done now as party differences under the proposed amendments would completely disappear. The next step is that the Members of Parliament can be divided into a number of groups equal to the number of portfolios necessary. The 'Allocation Committee’ may consist of the Speaker, the Prime Minister and the President. The number of Members in each group can vary. Each group can meet and elect by vote as was done under the Committee System in the State Council Administration, a Minister, and if necessary a Deputy Minister. All Members of Parliament shall have equal rights and privileges. By then all hatred of the party system would have ceased. Each Member of Parliament takes a share of the responsibility for all political decisions taken for the progress of the country until the next general election is held. All the accusations levelled against the previous administrations or individual Ministers or Members of Parliamentary the officers holding high posts as happening today will disappear. The country as a whole will get converted to a 'Dharmishta Samajaya’ which will look after all persons alike. The Fundamental Rights cases in law courts will be minimized, if not completely eliminated.

06. The Committee shall meet once a week or as often as necessary to decide on issues, allocate funds for them which have already been sanctioned by Parliament on the Appropriation Bill of the Ministry of Finance.

07. The same old Committee System of Government can, with all the necessary modifications brought about to keep abreast of the changes that take place in all the spheres of activity may prevail. Bills will be brought into Parliament by different Ministers as is done today, and Members of Parliament will be free-to vote for or against Bills according to their conscience. Today there is no freedom for Members of Parliament to act according to their wishes. They are presumed to have no conscience. All this happens because the Members of Parliament want to foster and promote individual political parties for their personal gains and interests, ignoring the welfare of the country and the state. Once the party spirit vanishes from the House, every Member will be free to act as a National Member of Parliament and he will always bear in mind as to why the voters have elected him.

08. All the other affairs relating to Parliamentary matters will be as at present subject to any changes being done to suit modern conditions and the overall progress and prosperity of the country.

09. There will be no political killings and character assassinations or political violence as is happening today. Members of Parliament will have no enemies. Revenge, hatred, etc. will vanish from this beautiful island. Public functions will have the support and appreciation of all. In short, there will be a complete social revolution. The outlook of all the ethnic groups, whether they be large or small, will change definitely for the better. The voter will be supreme. He shall create or uncreate administration with the correct understanding of the country’s march towards the welfare of all and sundry.

Today, there is complete dictatorship within a democratic framework. The present system of Parliamentary Democracy has killed the development of the country in all aspects.

Before the country plunges into further disaster, every civic-minded citizen and every politician should- make a correct assessment of the present situation of the country and jointly make a sincere and concerted attempt to save Sri Lanka from the present chaotic situation.

Michael de Silva
(Former Senior Deputy Surveyor-General)

On April Fools’ Day
The last laugh is the loudest one!

The PA government (called the Perverse Alliance) has made itself internationally notorious by "monkeying around" (manipulating) with the country’s election process and causing the electors’ to look like fools. If the elected government that’s supposed to democratically serve the electorate actually serves itself only, and then even takes away the electors’ right to a fair vote, the electorate is made to look foolish while the sly government quietly laughs itself silly!

Monkeys’ morality, I call it, this habitual expediency about what’s right or wrong.

Why are they so desperate about winning at any cost, have they done anything criminal or perverse? Why go backward all of the time, huh?

However, the fixing of five provincial council elections for April 1st seems to suddenly mean a lot of things. The outcome would indeed, be a very bad joke for some April Fools!

Secondly, it means that the same lot of gangsters cannot organise themselves with guns and false ballot papers in the identical manner to Wayamba PC because it would be too big and expensive an operation to organise, while also being situated too far away from the "home base" (just Wayamba PC only would have been easy!)

The final irony would be if the sensible electors chased out the PA in all five PCs, making it very true that "he who laughs last, laughs loudest!" April Fools!!

Rohan Jayawardena

For free and fair polls

After the recently concluded elections there has been a great, deal of argument about the conduct of this election. I persenally feel that there is a very simple way of ensuring that future elections are fair and free. This solution has a direct bearing on the remarks made by the Commissioner of Elections a few days prior to the date of the elections that there is no provision in the Elections Ordinance to insist that all voters produce their National Identity Cards before they are issued a ballot paper. One begins to wonder whether such a provision was deliberately omitted when this Ordinance was introduced.

I am sure that all responsible citizens of this country and all political parties would endorse my suggestion that an amendment to the Elections Ordinance be pushed through Parliament immediately and be law before the pending Provincial Council Elections in 5 provinces. If any political party opposes such an amendment in Parliament it would only mean that it does not wish to ensure free and fair elections in the future. Once this amendment is put through, all violence by any group of persons would come to nought at the polls.

The only way to continue such practices would be JVP style invasion of the privacy of homes to collect Identity Cards of voters and that could be negated by firm action by the Police and Security Services.

One also begins to wonder, if the remarks of the Commissioner of Elections is correct, why there is a column in the Application Form for registration as a voter which calls for the I.D. number of the applicant:

Over to you Leaders of all political parties - do you have the guts to push this amendment through Parliament or do you want this loophole for your own convenience in the future; do you wish to deprive the People of this country of their fundamental rights?

Concerned Voter

The 3rd Millenium

In view of the present controversy about the 3rd Millenium, permit me to say a few words which may clarify the matter.

A millenium is defined as a Thousand years.

(1) The First Millenium therefore, consisted of the first thousand years, i.e. years 1 to 1000 A.D.
The last year of the First Millenium was the year 1000 A.D. (not 999 A.D.)
The last day of the First millenium was December 31st, 1000 A.D.
The First Millenium ended at Midnight on December 31st, 1000 A.D.

(2) The Second Millenium consists of the next 1000 years i.e. the years 1001 - 2000 A.D.
The first day of the Second millenium was Jan 1st 1000 A.D.
The last day of the Second Millenium will be Dec. 31st, 2000 A.D.

(3) The Third millenium will therefore consist of the years 2001 - 3000 A.D.
It will begin on Jan 1st 2001, and end at midnight on Dec. 31st, 3000 A.D. and so on.
All this can be clearly set out in a table as follows:

MILLENIUM BEGINS JAN 1st ENDS DEC 31st

1. First 1 A.D. 1000 A.D.
2. Second 1001 A.D. 2000 A.D.
3. Third 2001 A.D. 3000 A.D.
4. Fourth 3001 A.D. 4000 A.D.
5. Fifth 4001 A.D. 5000 A.D.
ETC ETC ETC ETC

The matter is rather confusing, but a little careful thought will easily clear it up. It is rather surprising that one of the world’s most prestigious publishing houses, LAROUSSE, have made a similar mistake in their Pocket Guide British History. They have included the years 1900, 1800, 1700 etc, as the first years of the 20th, 19th, 18th etc, centuries. This is an error. 1900, 1800, 1700 etc are the last years of the 19th, 18th and 17th etc centuries. I have written to them, pointing out their error. They will no doubt correct them in their next edition.

I hope that what I have written will help readers to settle any doubts they may have.

Douglas Amarasekera
Formerly Professor of Mathematies
University of Ceylon

Lotteries Board: Destiny’s handmaid

A Golden Harvest for the Lotteries Board. I believe for over 6 months the Mahajana Sampath Sweep has had no super prize winners. For a month if there had been no super prize winners the Board makes at 2 draws a week nearly 80 million, on some months a 100 million. Our parliament so packed with verbose M.Ps and the official hierarchy in the highest echelons of state financial authority maintain an unholy silence, why oh why?

I would sincerely suggest that at every draw if there is no super prize winner this money be paid to the state, to the Secretary to the Treasury. The govt. must use this money to build as many well equipped national hospitals, with this money rolling in, the Govt. can well afford that every hospital built will be an Apollo with foreign specialists, if necessary. Why allow private hospitals to line their pockets with multi-millions. May we appeal to the Hon. Deputy Minister of Finance to bring the necessary legal enactment so that a very strong hospital fund be created for building new hospitals with the best equipment. A Cardiac By-Pass may not cost the patient 4 lakhs any more, but a few rupees to pay only his three wheeler fare to the hospital.

O. P. Perera
Colombo 05.

Appreciation
Gamini Fernando

The opening of the Colombo Hilton, over a decade ago by the President of the country, made headline news. It was not the first 5 star hotel with international management to open in Sri Lanka and doubtlessly will not be the last.

The hotel with less than 400 rooms and 3 restaurants was not exceptional by international standards. What was special was, that hidden in the ranks of the many hundreds of workers, was the executive Assistant Manager, a star yet to shine with such lustre as to enwrap the Hilton, the Hotel Industry and Sri Lanka itself in international glory.

Gamini Fernando, Hilton’s General Manager and Divisional Director Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Maldives, Myanmar and Pakistan passed away on the 28th of January 1999 in his office at the ageof 50.

His achievements in the Hotel and Tourist Industry are a legion. His absolute dedication, unwavering honesty and professionalism has made him a hotelier of undoubted international rank. Having graduated from the prestigious Institute of Tourism and Hotel Management Bad Hofgastein in Austria, he went on to hold senior management positions in the Inter- continental, Oberoi and Hilton chains. He had experience in numerous countries in Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Europe.

From the time of his assuming duties as General Manager of the Colombo Hilton in 1989, he together with his team developed the Hotel to become a benchmark of professionalism and the highest standards of hoteliering at international level. Hilton International recognized him as the best General Manager in the chain in 1994. He was directly appointed onto the presidential task force to review Tourism in 1997. His achievements were many, but this is not a recording of his achievements in the Hotel field.

It is rather attempt to pay tribute to the man at centre of all this outstanding success. He was despite his very high profile and ability to move with ease in any international forum, or with world figures, a Sri Lankan, a patriot and a simple man. To spend the rest of his life in Sri Lanka was his clear goal. In his mind there was no doubt, that this land of his birth, was the best place for him to spend the rest of his working life and retirement.At a time of many changes and turmoil, even when his beloved Hilton was subject to the destruction of bomb damage he had no second thoughts about staying. He often told me, his staff were the very best he could find in any part of the world. He was a scientific and systematic manager, with the greatest of flair, but also a very loving husband, father and employer. He made no great show of his patriotism but I believe he loved his island’s people as much as did his family and employees.

The happy years of youth, when Gamini lived and played and grew, way to adulthood and unending work to create the man he became. The gift Gamini left behind is his example. Though he grew up with all the love and care of his family and the comfort of its wealth, he was orphaned at the age of 3. His own courage was his greatest ally. His achievements in the hotel trade in the face of formidable odds is the message to all Sri Lankans. If he, the simple Sri Lankan youth, could achieve so much for and in his field, so can any Sri Lankan in any field with the desire and commitment.

His greatest achievement however must be his legacy to children. His own two wonderful children Alexander and Miriam, now adults, able to fit comfortably into the international arena, but sensitive to all around them. And the children of Sri Lanka to whom his example is a beckon of hope to be confident and see beyond the present into a better future. To be created by themselves and their own efforts, overcoming the formidable odds and obstacles at every stage as Gamini did until the very end.

I, who have spent thirty years of my life in the hotel industry, salute Gamini my friend from childhood for all he gave to all of us, in the industry and outside. May God give you the peace you so richly deserve. I will miss you for the rest of my days.

Prasanna W. Jayewardene

Gamini Fernando is no more - may the Colombo Hilton flourish

It was with shock and immense grief that the news of Gamini’s sudden demise was received by his numerous friends in Sri Lanka and abroad. In just a dozen years since he returned to his homeland he not only made an unique mark in the hospitality trade but also endeared himself to several hundreds of people ranging from his staff to clients from all walks of life. He became synonymous with The Colombo Hilton and, in a seemingly effortless manner, established the hotel as the best in the country in every respect. We have heard from many an experienced traveller that The Colombo Hilton was indeed comparable to the best in the world.

Much has been spoken of Gamini’s influence in making The Colombo Hilton truly outstanding. No doubt more will be heard of this now that he is no longer with us. Modest as he was, he spontaneously waved off the compliments paid to him and bestowed the credit on his team. It would be presumptuous to say that the Colombo Hilton will never be the same without Gamini as people will surely emerge to take his place, but Gamini’s name will be etched in the minds of those who knew him as a hotelier par excellence with a personality that would be hard to emulate. May more talented Sri Lankans return to their homeland as Gamini did, to pay their debt of gratitude to the country of their birth that nurtured and cared for them in their youth.

Apart from his almost unparalleled talent in motivating people, his vision, his attention to minute detail, his unflinching courage and optimism in the face of adversity and his total commitment to whatever he embarked on, we will remember Gamini as a humane, enthusiastic and thoughtful individual. He never allowed the stress and strain of his workload to affect his well presented but down to earth approach to all his clients in general and to his close associates in particular.

The occasions on which Gamini deftly did things that gladdened our hearts are far too numerous to recount nor is it appropriate for us to do so.

Gamini’s life did not flicker out but came to an abrupt end whilst at work, in the hotel that he dearly loved and worked his heart out for. The saying that exemplary officers prefer to die with their boots on comes to mind. Our heartfelt sympathy goes out to his family and his colleagues at the Colombo Hilton. Along with all his friends, we will also miss him. May he rest in peace.