5th columns

I thought I must write to you, even if you seem to be giving the Green Man a close fight for the title of being the most travelled tourist in the country. Hopefully, you will be back in this little country of ours to read this, having returned from your most recent journeys in Jordan and Kuwait...

I don't know whether you have realised this, Mahinda Maama, but everything in the land that you rule appears to be so expensive these days. At first it was the petrol, then it was the gas, and now it is the price of milk food. From next month bus fares will join the list and nobody is quite pleased about it, Mahinda Maama.

And it just makes matters worse when you have that Bandula chap telling us that he cannot do anything about it. After all, we all quite clearly remember him telling us that given half a chance he would reduce the cost of living before you could say "Mahinda Chinthana". But then, that was when he was wearing a green shirt. I guess you really must send him to a tuition class in economics!

Then, it doesn't help, Mahinda Maama, when there are so many Rajapaksas having plum jobs. You should have followed Satellite's footsteps because she too had parents, siblings and uncles all in one cabinet but they all had different names; there were the Kumaratunges, Bandaranaikes and Ratwattes and no one even realised that they were all one brood. The problem with your clan is that they are all Rajapaksas which is why everyone is raising such a hue and cry. Think about it, will you, Mahinda Maama?

I am sure your job must be that much more difficult, Mahinda Maama, because you have to deal with that group of turncoats from the Green Camp too. But what puzzles me is how they have come to take all the top slots in your regime-are you trying to prove the point that the Blue camp is so short of talent?

Then, there is the small matter of the war. Just when you try to convince everyone that the war is all but over and that we are about to establish our writ all over the North and East through your fantastic district level devolution proposals, that chap Prabha has to spoil the party by sending light aircraft to Katunayake and setting off bombs in the heart of the city.

Unfortunately for you, even the World Cup is over now, so everyone has been brought rudely down to earth instead of watching cricket matches every night and then spending the next day talking about it. Can't you get someone to organise some cricket matches again, Mahinda Maama? That is the surest way to firstly, get rain, and secondly make people forget about the war, the rising prices and the size of the Cabinet.

But then, we know your hands are tied. You have human rights group crying foul on the one hand and Avamangala threatening to take the fight to you with Satellite's secret blessings on the other hand. Then there is Weerawansa sahodaraya who says you should finish the war tomorrow and then there is the Green Man who says you should sack Gota today! Ah, the price you have to pay to stay where you are. With all this bothering you, Mahinda Maama, I don't envy you despite the absolute power at your command...

Yours sincerely,
Punchi Putha
PS-And we certainly don't envy your many excursions to the capitals of the world. If you didn't travel the way you do, how could we keep Mihin Air afloat, after all?

Ah, the price you have to pay to stay where you are!