Columns
Will Kerry shake a leg to GL’s baila?
View(s):The man in charge of America’s foreign affairs, US Secretary of State John Kerry was on Tuesday slipped an invite to visit Lanka by Foreign Minister G. L. Peiris when he happened to meet him at an informal meeting on the sidelines of the 21st ASEAN Regional Forum in Myanmar.
“I invited him to visit Sri Lanka and see what we have accomplished on the ground during the past five years after the war was over,” Prof. Peiris announced the next day to the media, proud no doubt of having single handedly delivered the impromptu verbal “drop in and see us sometime” gesture, dropped casually in the fervent hope that should Mr. Kerry wipe his global agenda clear and grab the next plane to paradise to see firsthand the awesome miracle of Lanka, the sights he would see, the people he would meet and the well carpeted roads he would travel on to behold the wonder of Mattala airport and the nearby Hambantota sea port, would cause a radical change of heart and make him realise that America had got it wrong all along.
With any luck, who knows, he might even echo the words of an Austrian slip of a girl, Miss Earth 2013 Katia Wagner whose profound thoughts and shrewd observations on Lanka and her people and how she did not see ‘anything bad’ during her brief stay here, was considered worthy enough to make the all important headline news in the government owned English Sunday newspaper on August 3rd, when she exclaimed politely at a beauty contest held in Kalutara: “Nice country, nice people. West should not judge Lanka over human rights.”
But then 71-year-old John Kerry is not just a pretty face. This hard-nosed veteran legislator whose first memories of his childhood are of him walking with his crying mother through the rubble and shattered glass of their villa in France, bombed and burned down by the Nazi Army under the command of the Austrian born Adolf Hitler, might not explode with confetti of compliments merely because he is royally feted and given the red carpet treatment. Instead, he might take rather a dim view of the evergreen vista painted for his benefit and leave, like Navi Pillay did last year in August, bemoaning ‘the lack of holistic development’.
For what are the achievements five years after the war, that Peiris has to show to make Kerry don his blue suede shoes and shake a leg? When the dark clouds that had engulfed Lanka in a violent thirty-year storm finally drifted away late May 2009, the rainbow that appeared in the northern hemisphere promised a summer sun fest of peace and prosperity and the nation sang Happy Days Are Here Again in one voice. But the euphoria didn’t linger long; and was to vanish when it became clear that though terrorism could be bulldozed and razed out of existence in one emboldened stroke, winning the peace required a more subtle approach. Rock and mortar can be used to rebuild derelict structures but hearts and minds cannot be won when trust lie in ruins and promises remain vain. Peace cannot be powdered with a pestle and moulded to one’s own design.
True, billions of dollars borrowed after hocking future generations’ welfare have created the miracle of Lanka. Mega projects have sprouted like mushrooms and have transformed the landscape beyond recognition but do the supposed benefits flow to the people. Roads and highway projects are initiated and executed at breakneck speed but do the masses really use the expressway for a crippling toll tax and lack of motorway worthy vehicles inhibits its usage. Only the rich and the company funded crowd can bypass the traffic that clog the normal roads the masses are forced to use. Perhaps in time to come the future generations may well enjoy them all but even that is debatable for by that time, the state of the art showcases may have become redundant in a world given to rapid change. Only one thing is clear. That in the guise of development, corruption thrives and the driving zeal to propel these projects to fruition is not to bring significant benefits to the masses but to fill politicians pockets at the nation’s expense.
Nay, if Mr. Kerry is shown these baubles as the high points of achievement Lanka can boast of after the war drum fell silent five long years ago, you can bet your bottom buck that he will not be impressed enough to have a change of heart. Furthermore if this is all that Mr. Peiris has to show his American counterpart, Secretary Kerry need not pack his overnight bag and get a freebie courtesy of the Lankan government and visit the country to get the low down.
He could have the complete dossier on each one of these mega projects, including colour photographs, satellite imagery, confidential documents, even how much illicit commissions were made and by whom and in which bank vault it is presently stashed, on his desk at the press of a button. It is hard to imagine that the learned law professor Peiris could display such an amazing degree of naivety to even think that the American would be impressed by a few buildings and three expressway as if he were one from the boonies.
But there is one achievement that would impress Kerry. But alas we do not have it. Five years of peace have not made the Government stir from apathy to end the ethnic deadlock. Riding high on the military victory against the Tigers, and enjoying unprecedented popularity as a result from the majority Sinhalese, it has fought shy of pursuing the quest for peace fearing, perhaps, possible political fallout if they did.
Though the peace dividend will bring enormous economic and social benefit to all, the Government has so far shown no hurry to risk losing the electoral goodwill born of narrow minded and short sighted chauvinism. Even the holding of the northern provincial elections were done not because the Government had any intention of allowing the minority Tamils some semblance of autonomy with a view to meeting their just grievances but because India applied the necessary pressure and forced the government’s hand.
The Sinhalese, it seems, are still on a jingoist high; and until this pathological disorder is treated, the Jathika Hela Urumaya, Bodu Bala and National Freedom Front and other parasitical parties who live on and suck the life blood of this nation to survive in the political environs, will continue to vehemently oppose even the slightest attempt by any foreign nation to offer relief to a land torn by the forces of discord and to dry the tears of Lanka. What they fail to understand or understand very well but pretend not to fathom in order to keep the Sinhala vote basket well stacked and unshaken for the UPFA to carry it to the next polling market, is that this very intransigence is what will bring the world to our doorstep, give the world the right to interfere in the internal affairs of this sovereign nation and even bring Lanka to her knees in economic bankruptcy.
In the backdrop of all these events and scenarios Lanka’s Foreign Ministry ceased to have a coherent and consistent foreign policy and decisions were taken on an ad hoc basis. Assurances given in 2010 to UN General Secretary were not kept. Delay ensued with the setting up of the Lessons and Learnt Reconciliation Committee and when finally when it delivered its recommendations a great majority of them were not implemented. The excuses piled and finally the world’s patience snapped, leading to the setting up of the UN sponsored war crimes probe. At India’s bidding the Northern Provincial Council was raised from the dead and grudgingly elections were held. But ever since the north voted massively for the TNA, a cold war has ensued between the centre and the province.
So what is the remarkable ground situation in Lanka that G.L. Peiris is so anxious to show off to the US Secretary of State, to impress upon him the achievements Lanka have made during five years of a hard-won peace? In this bleak house we live in, no warming hearth of cheer burn to make us call it home. All the luxury items bought on the credit card are present and conspicuously flaunted as evidence of affluence and achievements but no love is in the air, no joy lives in any heart. Though neighbours can view prosperity hung on the door under the spotlight, they are not welcome inside lest they feel the chill of its down stair walls, and, though there is a party going on in full swing in a room upstairs where mind blowing drugs of every seductive sort are freely available and money is no object, even the residents are debarred entry for the club is for members only.
As things stand the only etchings that will make Kerry tap his toes to GL’s ministerial strain of kaffiringa without the music, is a proven track record of human rights observances; and a genuine effort to realise a lasting solution to resolve the nation’s ethnic issue. Short of it, not all the mega projects or carpeted roads, the rise of a new city from the sea at Galle Face or a single hopper for 250 bucks at the newly renovated Arcade shopping centre will make Kerry dance.
| SUNDAY PUNCH 3
Strange thread on tapestry of death He had made millions smile and laugh with him but his own smile hid a broken heart. Behind his laughter lay pain. The mask he wore on the world’s stage concealed a face wreathed in anguish, an anguish he could not bear to reveal or share. And as millions mourn the death of one of Hollywood’s best loved film stars and comic legends Robin Williams, who hanged himself on Monday the 11th in his bedroom as the walls of despair closed in on him, the question is asked: why was he depressed?  Robin Williams To the world the 64-year-old Oscar winning star had everything a man could want and more. Abundant talent, stardom and fortune. He had captivated Hollywood and Hollywood clamoured for more. At the time of his death, three new movies of his awaited release. He had had a history of drug and alcohol abuse but with rehab help he had managed to kick the habit. But then he had visited an Alcoholics Anonymous centre eighteen hours before his suicide. Why? Was the pressure too much? Could another drink have eased his pain and delayed his untimely death? These are questions that may never be answered. But one fact remains known and clear. The man who brought joy to the hearts of millions died of a broken heart by taking his own life, making his date with his maker at the time of his choosing. The following day, in the early hours of Tuesday the 12th of August much loved Lankan stage, film and television star Rebecca Nirmalie finally lost her battle with cancer just three months short of her fiftieth birthday. Her starring role in the tele drama ‘Veda Hamine’ where she played an Ayurvedic doctor who successfully cures a young man afflicted with cancer, brought her immense popularity and a lasting place in the nation’s heart. But little would she have realised while acting out her role which propelled her to fame, that soon the fates will call upon her to enact the same role in reversed form in real life, when she would be struck down by cancer but have no Veda Hamine to effect a miracle cure for her. She died as the fates had ordained. The following day, on Wednesday the 13th Dr. P.A. Priyangi a specialist attached to the Plastic Surgery Unit of the Lady Ridgeway Hospital applied for short leave to keep an appointment at 1 pm with a cosmetic surgeon operating a beauty clinic in Bambalapitiya. Dark patches under her eyes had been troubling her and she wished to have it removed, with a skin graft. With hopes of regaining her natural beauty and looking younger than her years would suggest, she kept the appointment on time. The appointment fate had made with her with death. Within minutes of her receiving an antibiotic injection, she was dead: Death by negligence.  Rebecca Nirmalie Bizarre, isn’t it? Robbie who beamed happiness to make a living dies of depression. Actress Rebecca who played her most successful role as a woman with the miracle cure for cancer dies in real life of cancer. And Dr. Priyangi who specialised as a doctor of plastic surgery dies while undergoing plastic surgery on her face to clear a trivial blemish under her eyes. Upon the warp of fate, a strange thread has run through to create a common tapestry of their deaths. No matter the mode, no matter the reason, be it depression, terminal illness or vanity the universal design of life remains the same and applies to all at the appointed hour; and reveals that in a world of constant change, the only constant is Death and all life, howsoever lived, returns unto ashes and is equaled in the dust.. Be it atop the citadel tower or in the humblest hamlet, when the summons arrives, all must obey.
SUNDAY PUNCH 2 The price and value of advice In a major departure from its stated stance, the Government last month expanded the scope of the Missing Persons Commission by appointing a foreign panel of three to act as advisors to the local probe committee. The Presidential Commission into Disappearance and Missing Persons chaired by a former High Court judge Maxwell Paranagama with two other Lankans was a purely domestic inquiry and obviously lacked the aura of total impartiality which was required if it ever was to be held up as an effective parallel inquiry to the UN sponsored war crimes probe which Lanka had rejected outright. Understandably it was felt that it was vital to appoint a further panel of international experts who, due to their experience and acceptance by the world body, would add the necessary independent touch. The persons appointed to the foreign panel are Desmond de Silva, a Sri Lankan born barrister-at law, Sir Geoffrey Nice and Prof. D. Crane — people who are deemed to be beyond reproach. Their vast experience in the conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Gaza would provide the legitimacy that the Government so desperately seeks to redeem itself of its anti-UN probe stance. A less well known Indian Human rights activist is also to be appointed to the committee as are two others still unnamed, bringing the total number of international experts to six. It should also be borne in mind that the three new members should also possess impeccable records. If not and the others already appointed resign in protest, then it will be egg on the government’s face, something the government can well do without. The United National Party chief Ranil Wickremesinghe raised the pertinent question in Parliament earlier this month as to how much the exercise will cost the Lankan public. After all, good expert advice does not come cheap and the people have the right to know how much will be paid in the form of fees and other expenses to the six panelists. The government is still to answer his question. However, a few days after the relevant gazette notification was published expanding the Missing Persons Committee with the setting up of the International Advisory Panel, the Government spokesman and Information Minister Keheliya Rambukwella said the three foreign experts will only act as “advisors” and will not have a direct role in the investigations. “They will be in an advisory capacity,” Rambukwella told reporters in Colombo. “That does not mean that we have to take their advice. It is up to us.” What an awful shame and pity it would be if their valued and highly paid advice is only taken if and only if it happens to coincide with the Government’s own already formed and set opinion. If this is to be the attitude that will be taken by the government, as already expressed it will be by the government official spokesman even before the committee has been properly constituted, then it will appear that what the government is seeking is not a group of independent experts to forward their considered independent expert opinion which would meet the credibility test but a bunch of yes men to deliver a handsomely paid endorsement of the government’s own declared prejudices.
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