An open letter to the 3 Lakshmans-Lakshman J.K. and P.
Dear Lakshmans,
Your silence is deafening. The public perception that you represent gentleman politics is under siege. Your respectable background and studious intellect is fast eroding to deceitful decay. Your sojourn into politics with intent to uphold democratic traditions is under public scrutiny since your inner silence - the silence of the eyes, the ears, the tongue, the mind and the heart - is indicative of smarm than character.
Why?
"Politics for most" said Johnson "are nothing more than a means of rising in the world". We know you don't belong to this creed. Whilst your Earstwhile and embattled cabinet colleagues are thick and blind to all what went wrong at Wayamba, you who represent honesty, dignity and pacifism, have opted to remain silent. The fraud of Wayamba is now well documented. Vote rigging and stuffing of boxes reached hysterical heights. Any hogwash of even a tiny semblance of defence of the event that transpired will border on deceit if not, hypocrisy. Your silence in the midst of overwhelming evidence, not hearesay, is therefore of concern to all the decent folk living in this country.
You come from decent family background, moral upbringing, sound education and alma maters of the highest academic tradition. Those teachers who taught you at Trinity and St. Thomas' must surely be reeling in shame at your muffled reaction. And, we Sri Lankans who look upto you as the last vestiges of a civilized people can only sulk sheepishly at your dubious double standards as do, the thousands who know you personally as sensible nice people. The violence and fraud that has been perpetrated on the poor folk of Wayamba opposed to the government you serve, indicates to those of us who view politicians with contempt and skepticism, that the end of the road is near and democracy now in its' death-bed will soon be nailed in the coffin of autocracy and will be buried for good in Sri Lanka.
Come on Lakshmans, stand up and be counted. You don't represent the scum that has gotten into our civil lives, the pollies of the liquor licence and the Pajero, the dishonest and the incompetent, the rakes that met amorphous from arrack to whisky without knowing the difference and all that is associated with the ignoble profession of politics, and of those who come to serve but serve only themselves, in the end. Our parliament needs intellects not nincompoops, professionals not imbeciles, thinkers not idiots, doers not murderers, decent representatives not hooligans. Some of your colleagues-and this is across the party divide-are not even 'O' qualified, so to speak. How they are expected to promulgate laws is beyond ones comprehension. Have a look at Singapore, that dynamic and vibrant city and you know what I mean!
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People know you to be the few gentlemen left in the game. But are you? Yes, staying silent, sends the signal that you too are willing to reach a low in human decency to cling on to the realms of power without any shame. Cant you see the system eroding beyond redemption? The only right that our poor folk have is their vote. And every now and then they have this opportunity to discard those of you behaving as vagabonds and rascals by the scruff of the neck - and now, this right too is blatantly and unashamedly robbed of them to an extreme as seen never before. Not even God has the right to usurp the right of vote from the people! |
Are we to believe that you too buy into the often repeated argument we hear that violence and rigging was carried out by the UNP before and thus justify these unwary acts now? We did not vote for your government to perpetuate the injustices of the past. You will agree that such foolish argument will only add legitimacy to some future despot carrying out such frauds to Machiavellian heights with even greater imagination. Please stop this rot and save our motherland from further peril before its too late.
Today it is the plebeian vote. Tomorrow it could be the judiciary, the last bastion of hope in our beautiful nation. If you must shirk this responsibility, then go back to your professions and wealth and save us from the falsity of hope that there still are men of virtue in our midst. Go back to your school and tell the youngesters about your brief experience. Tell them that they have no future here and they should go search for greener pastures. Have courage to tell them that what you learnt in the playing fields got you nowhere and it was a waste of time. Tell them about the games our rulers play where winning at all costs is the emphasis and that they are not to clap anymore as the winners go by. Be frank and ask them to contribute to some distant economy as they hold no future here. You must have better things to do than defend the lie. The bias, the cheat and the thug, all for a bit of power and position!
In mature democracies around the world, exalted people 'resign' to save their good name from blemish. But, this noble word left our shores and our political lexicon a long time ago - yes, when was the last time we had one of our politicians resigning? But, if resign you shall not, the least you can do for our people is to stand up and speak out, and speak out loud so that we can hear. Tell us that you will lead and not be led by the ignorant minions around you.
As far for the rest of your creed, lets not talk for they matter only to their little worlds of opportunism and importance, inconsequential to the plight of our millions. The country will do better without them but without you, our historic past will slide irretrievably from despair to disaster.
Don't let this happen. There is some decency left in our country. The time to act or remain silent, has come. The choice is yours. Let posterity not write that 'once upon a time in Sri Lanka there lived 3 Lakshmans to whom it did not matter when it mattered'.
Eddy Cent-Sole/Bert H Wright.
Let's abort the coming crisis
It was with some dismay and a deep foreboding that I read in some newspapers of Sunday the 14th February that Mr. Ranil Wickremasinghe, the Leader of the UNP, is proposing to create armies of a 1,000 strong each, in each of the provinces going to the polls on the 1st of April.
Ostensibly, the purpose is to protect UNP's supporters in particular and the entire electoral process in general, against the depredations that wreaked the Wayamba elections. One is therefore prepared to concede that this proposal is borne out of a genuine commitment to the democratic process. One can also see that it expresses the dominant mood in the country, which is a lack of confidence in the ability of the state apparatus, the police as well as the elections department, to perform their roles effectively. Therefore Mr. Wickremasinghe's proposal appears to be both bona fide and national.
On the other hand, on further reflection, as some fearful consequences that can result from its implementation also become self-evident, the proposal comes across as deeply flawed. These consequences will not only be contrary to those intended but will also most likely set in motion a chain of events which can result in the complete collapse of what little is left of our democratic system.
Let us see what grounds there are for supposing that the latter scenario might unfold.
If the UNP's provincial armies are to perform the task expected of them, which is to counter coercion by the other side, they will have to be comprised mostly of toughs capable of meeting coercion with coercion. It is inevitable therefore that men of violence will be drawn to these armies. Men whose instinctive response to coercion will be a higher level of coercion. These armies are therefore likely to include more than a sprinkling of delinquents, army deserters, local thugs and criminals who will not only mobilize a fearsome explosive potential but will also have a vested interest in spreading violence.
In fact the UNP's armies can easily degenerate into rampaging mobs. Consequently, in next to no time the two opposing forces will be locked into a rapidly escalating spiral of violence. The outcome of such a spiral is easily predictable. The forces opposed to the armies of the UNP will quickly call upon the state's coercive apparatus to their assistance and the UNP's armies will be routed. Not only that. The government's propaganda machine will quickly swing into action and paint the UNP as the offending party, as the party that mobilized mobs to disrupt the electoral process and as the party that had planned even to overthrow the government and stage a coup.
It is even conceivable that the UNP's so called armies will provide the government with the provocation and the opportunity, if the government is so inclined, to abrogate the entire democratic process and put the whole blame on the UNP. Is not the UNP actually playing into its hands and providing it with the ammunition with which to further its malevolent intentions?
If I am a government strategist in the diabolical mould (and I am sure that the government will not rush to recruit my services because it has an abundance of them) I will welcome Mr. Wickremasinghe's proposal with a fiendish glee. I will actually encourage him to build up his armies but making sure that each of them is liberally infiltrated by my agent provocateur. Then at the critical moment I will taunt the UNP's armies into action and spring the trap. The government's security forces will be called in to put down a "concerted attempt by the UNP hooligans to disrupt the polls." The rest is a cakewalk! An attempted UNP coup will have been put down, parliament will be dissolved and the UNP, now reconfirmed as the bad guys, will be routed. Soon thereafter a presidential election will follow, with an outcome more convincing than the one in '94 and the UNP will have no one but themselves to blame.
There is another distressing aspect to this proposal. Let us assume that the UNP's experiment works and that these mini armies perform the role expected of them. When the UNP forms an administration would that not place it under obligation to a coterie of people who though not the most reputable, will have to be rewarded in some form or the other, even with appointments to high office? By relying on toughs from the underworld for realizing its objectives will not the UNP perpetuate its Soththi Upali image, an image from which Mr. Wickremasinghe has promised to deliver the UNP? A UNP administration will then start with a mill stone round its neck and be condemned to repeat the follies that have bedevilled it for years. What then happens to Mr. Wickremasinghe's vision for a clean administration?
The claim that these armies are intended to practise "non-violence" is too farcical to even deserve comment. Practising non-violence on a mass scale for achieving social or political objectives in the face of extreme provocation by the other side requires spiritual disciplines perfected over a period of years. Before Mahatma Gandhi launched a non-violent campaign he would not only impart intensive spiritual training to his followers over a long period of time but also would himself commence fasting and engage in prayer throughout the campaign. Even then, often his campaigns were aborted, because despite the intensive preparatory spiritual training he enjoined upon his followers, when confronted by provocation on the other side, the infirmities inherent in all human beings quickly surfaced and the satyagrahis retaliated in kind. The suggestion that satyagraha or non-violence can be invoked willy-nilly for political purposes is further proof of the lack of maturity and depth among our politicians.
Therefore, in the light of cold reason, Mr. Wickremasinghe's well-intentioned proposal shows up as a knee jerk reaction, lacking in foresight and wisdom and even from the point of view of his own party's long-term interests, as a strategic disaster.
Having said that, we are still left with the problem which Mr. Wickremasinghe's proposal had been intended to address. How do we deal with the problem of running a fair and free poll?
When it appeared as if we had reached an absolute impasse, President Kumaratunga's gesture in inviting Mr. Ranil Wickremasinghe for talks seemed at first a magnanimous and rare statesmanlike gesture. Sadly however the invitation has been couched in the language of recrimination, more calculated to open old wounds than to start a healing process. The nation has been waiting for years for anyone among our national leaders to rise above the pettiness in which they are enmeshed, make a clean break with the past, and opt for the vocabulary of reconciliation. Alas however the leadership drought seems interminable and our waiting for a Mandela or a Bishop Tutu as rewarding as waiting for Godot.
The President must surely know that there is a widespread skepticism concerning the motives for her gesture, the general view being that she is merely trying to salvage her personal image and that of her administration from the abyss into which Wayamba had plunged it.
All that notwithstanding we still have to work with what we have. It is now really up to the two leaders, President Kumaratunga and Mr. Ranil Wickremasinghe, to cut loose from the culture of pettiness and recrimination and start talking. The mood in the country is such that that any repetition of Wayamba is likely to bring the people on to the streets and drive them to extra parliamentary forms of struggle, with or without the support of Mr. Wickremasinghe's mini armies. It is therefore not only in the interests of the country but in the interests of their own survival as well, for the two leaders to start talking and rapidly to find an alternative to Wayamba.
Neville
Jayaweera,
Nugegoda.
In defence of Ven. Soma Thero
I write with reference to a letter appearing in a daily paper by CS of Colombo 7 condemning the sermons of Ven. Soma Thero.
CS says that Ven. Soma thero finds fault with people of other religions in his sermons. What Ven. Thero reiterates in his sermons the Buddhists should not worship Hindu gods. The followers of Hinduism may have beliefs in their gods with devotion as the base. However deities in Buddhism are a species of beings who are of higher status in name and form. Buddhism expounds that deities are born according to the deeds done and they perish according to their Karma. They are subject to the three characteristics of impermanence, misery and soullessness and are not eternal as Hindu gods are. However, as explained in the books of Hinduism, Hindu gods are not born according to their Karma. Neither do they perish. Hindu gods are a creation of mythical conception and Buddhism does not approve deeds done on misconceptions.
None of the followers of other religions would expect to mix their religions with those of others. Will the followers of Hinduism or Christianity keep the statues of Lord Buddha in their places of worship for the purpose of veneration? If some one tries to do so, will their churches allow it just to prevent hurting other communities?
What Venerable Soma Thero does is explaining the Path pointed out by the Buddhas or Enlightened Ones of all ages for inner growth and development, the Noble Eighthfold Path, which is unique in that it is distinctively Buddhist. No other religion or philosophy has anything to compare with it.
The first step in the Eighthfold Path is the right understanding and there are five hindrances in particular that obstruct right concentration and the Path to deliverance from suffering. They, are called "pancha nivarani". They close the door to deliverance from suffering. They are viz. sense desire (Kam-acchanda), ill will (vyapada), sloth and torpor (thina middha), restlessness and worry (uddhacca-kokkucca), skeptical doubt (vicikiccha). A mind which is obsessed by such detrimental forces cannot concentrate successfully on any object of wholesome nature. Without right effort the five hindrances to mental progress cannot be overcome. The Buddha speaks of three kinds of hallucinations that grip man's mind viz. hallucination of perception, thought and views. When a man is caught up in these hallucinations he perceives, thinks, and views incorrectly. It leads man astray, clouds his vision, confuses him, and deludes him by his own senses.
All the practical guidance and instructions given by the Buddha to remove mental conflicts due to the unsatisfactoriness of life, are to be found in the Eightfold Path. Lord Buddha has taught that self-purification and self-mastery for final Deliverance, there is no coercion or compulsion by any external agency, there are no rewards or punishments for deeds done or left undone; neither ablution by holy water, nor offerings to any deity, nor worship of gods, the sun or fire. 'Neither nakedness nor matted hair, nor filth, nor fasting, nor lying on the ground, nor dust and soot nor squatting can purify a being who is still perplexed.' Purity and impurity depend on oneself. Things external, whether animate or inanimate, cannot, and do not, grant us purification and deliverance.
It is wisdom that helps us to get rid of the clouded view of things - to see life as it really is, things pertaining to life as arising and passing (udaya- vaya). By a gradual process, gradual training and gradual practice, he rids himself of all defilement, eradicates them and attain Deliverance, the living experience of the cessation of the three root causes of all evil; greed, hatred and delusion or ignorance (loba,dosa, moha) that assail the human mind. These three root causes are thus eliminated through training in Virtue, Concentration and Wisdom (sila, samadhi, panna), the 3 stages of the Path to Deliverance.
Deliverance from mental taints lies absolutely and entirely in one's own hands, not in someone else's be it human or divine. Not even a supreme Buddha can deliver a man from the fetters of existence except by showing him the Path.
It is not possible to dissuade the misguided Buddhists from turning to other religions or trying to mix our religion with other religions, without explaining the difference between that particular religion and ours. I think this explanation of Ven. Soma Thero is what CS has misunderstood. Isn't it the duty of kind and erudite monks to show the correct path to the laymen of their own faith when they blindly wander in the dark?
Gotama the Buddha said thus: "Now this I say, Nigrodha, not wishing to win pupils, not wishing to make you fall from your religious studies, not wishing to make you give up your mode of living, not to establish you in things accepted by you and your teacher as evil and unwholesome, or to make you give up things regarded by you and your teacher as good and wholesome. NOT SO.
"But, Nigrodha, there are evil and unwholesome things not put away, things that have to do with defilements... It is for the rejection of these things that I reach the Dhamma (the doctrine); walking according to which, things concerned with defilements shall be put away, and wholesome things that make for purity shall be brought to increase, and one may attain, here and now, the realization of full and abounding insight." (Udum-barikasihanada sutta, Digha-nikaya, 25.)
Manjari
Peiris
Maharagama
The Minister's boycott
It is good to know that Minister G. L. Peries is thinking seriously about amending the election law. When the UNP called an All Party Conference at the S.L.F.I. Iast year to demand an independent election commission and an independent Police commission it was Minister G. L. Peries who led the boycott against the conference. If he had given his attention and co-operation to those proposals at that time the Government will not be in the plight it is today. The government would have got the credit for making free and fair elections possible instead of going down in history for holding the most violent and corrupt election in this country.
The President and the brains in the Government maintained a sinister silence while the brawn went berserk. It is high time that the brains asserted themselves.
Even at this late stage let's hope Minister G. L Peries will exercise his authority to prevent similar malpractices in the forthcoming elections
Jana Karagampitiya
Murders! Murders!
Murder, Murder, Murder, cold blooded murders!! Last at Hokandara when six persons in one family were killed and now at Ratmalana where father and son have been killed whilst the others in the family escaped narrowly by running away.
There is only one deterrent punishment for this THE IMMEDIATE REINTRODUCTION OF THE DEATH PENALTY.
Even the clergy is now advocating this. What is the Government waiting for? Till MURDER turns to MAYHEM??
The ordinary citizens of this country do not have arms or body guards to protect them.
They depend on the Law and-its stipulated penalties for protection.
Nissanka M. Ediriwiram
National Government
I refer to the discussion on the TNL TV recently with Mr. Sirisena Cooray and further, to Mr. Cooray's ideas and reference to the formation of a National Government in Sri Lanka which will benefit the masses.
I presume every citizen in Sri Lanka will totally agree with Mr. Cooray's idea as this is the type of government which will be most essential to Sri Lanka, if every citizen of Sri Lanka irrespective of whatever race, religion and nationality they belong to, is to benefit and thereby the country to flourish.
I believe all citizens in Sri Lanka are now sick of all these party systems which have now created a fighting atmosphere, with no healthy solution ahead of us.
If you take for example the recent Wayamba election scenario and all the TV discussions as a result, it clearly emphasises that one party is finding fault with the other. It is like the pot calling the kettle black.
We are now tired of all these fairy tale stories. Let us get together and join hands together, as Mr. Cooray says and work for better future of Sri Lanka instead of washing dirty linen and one party blaming the other.
We the masses are now disgusted of all these tell tale stories. Why cannot all parties get together and work for the betterment of the masses with an accepted programme in view. So many governments have come to power but the situation of the poor class, which comprises of a bigger percentage of our population is in the same miserable position.
Let the politicos open their eyes and minds even at this stage and contribute to find a viable solution to form a national government and join hands for the betterment of Sri Lanka.
I believe there are able, genuine and quality individuals in all our parties to make a national government a viable success.
Douglas
de Alwis
Mt. Lavinia.
At the mercy of criminals
In a few weeks time, the nation goes to the polls. We have to elect people for Provincial Councils. We may in the process, get killed or if women, raped. That is the sorry state of affairs in this country of ours.
We citizens are surrounded by rapists and murderers. And as they have the support of some police officers, businessmen and politicians - they keep coming out of jail even if they are convicted.
It is extremely important therefore, to have a different kind of polls before any political election, to prevent murder, molestation and rape.
As a nation we should vote whether we want hanging or putting to death by other means of criminals, brought back. No Buddhist would like to take on this decision by him or herself. So it will be fair to let all adults living in this country decide - whether people convicted of murder, rape, child molestation, drug dealing, dealing in pornography and also persons involved in terrorism should be hanged or given life imprisonment.
We could put a mark against each crime to show our approval of hanging for that particular crime.
Given below, is something I came across in "Points to Ponder" in the Readers Digest of October 1989 written by Patrick J. Buchanan.
A modern society that outlaws the death penalty does not send a message of reverence for life, but a message of moral confusion. When we outlaw the death penalty, we tell the murderer that, no matter what he may do to innocent people in our custody and care, women, children, old people, his most treasured possession, his life, is secure.
We guarantee it - in advance. Just as a nation that declares that nothing will make it go to war finds itself at the mercy of warlike regime, so a society that will not put the worst of its criminals to death will find itself at the mercy of criminals, who have no qualms about putting innocent people to death. "Right from the Beginning" (Little, Brown).
Kalu Menike.
Sri Lankan Memories ?
What a poor show it was - just about forty photographs by about four Sri Lankan born photographers to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Sri Lankan independence! The show organized by the sponsors - International Centre for Ethnic Studies has been very poorly planned and executed. In the first place, the venue did not look at all a suitable place for a photo exhibition of this nature. It reminded me of the out-houses built for the domestic staff on estate bungalows in the mid-forties!
The exhibition should have been held at the Lionel Wendt Gallery which is so easily accessible to those interested. It would have been an indirect tribute to that great artiste - photographer the late Lionel Wendt.
Though some of the pictures were truly magnificent, and I would include Nihal Fernando's and Lakshman Nadarajah's among them, a few could have been taken anywhere in the world. These did not portray either the Sri Lankan landscape or its people or even its culture and traditions - even though the catalogue printed for the occasion titled the exhibition as "Sri Lankan Memories".
Since independence Sri Lanka has produced some of the finest photographers comparable to any anywhere in the world. These include such celebrities as P. J. C. Durrant, Joe Ebert, Joe Perera, B. P. Weerawardena, S.R. Kottegoda, D. C. L. Amarasinghe, M. S. Weerakoon, T. S. U. de Zylva,, Wilson Hegoda, Pat Deckker,, Palitha Rajapakse, Henry Rajakaruna Sena Kotalawala. Every one of them has obtained international recognition by the display of their creativity in pictorial photography. No doubt some of them are not living now, but efforts could have been made to obtain some of their work which this writer is aware are still available.
It would have been not only a fitting tribute to these photographers themselves, but also would have depicted the development of photographic art over the years in the country since independence.
Efforts could also have been made to obtain pictures from the two premier Photographic Societies in the country - The Photographic Society of Sri Lanka and The National Photographic Art Society of Sri Lanka. It is sad to observe that no such efforts had been made.
If such action had been initiated well in advance of the exhibition, there would have been a very representative show with at least about a hundred pictures depicting truly "Sri Lankan Memories" as the sponsors envisaged.
L.H.R.
Wijetunga
Colombo 4