HER WORSHIP THE MAYORESS OF COLOMBO: How Rosy nearly got stuck in the mayoral latrine

But the evergreen Rosy Senanayake nee Ramanayake — aged 60, but who still looks fresh as a dew drenched morning rose, one whom time will not age or custom stale — who won the Miss Sri Lanka contest in 1980 and then graduated from the starlet arena to compete in the world’s ‘aunties contest’ where her good looks crowned her Mrs. World in 1985, was made of sterner stuff. It was apparent that the opposition and the social media had greatly underestimated her. Beneath her skin deep beauty there beat a heart of bravado.
This week she shot back. And demonstrated that she was not just a pretty face, a mannequin showcased in a fashion dress boutique draped in an expensive sari and the pallu or the fall, as it is called in English, wrapped demurely around her shoulders.

Not one glossily made up with lipstick, powder, rouge and black dye on hair with a hint of a tint of eye shadow to complement the full facial fare but a woman of substance who had sacrificed her private life to flit and buzz the social elite’s cocktail circuit but one who had devoted her life to public service and was bent on improving the lot of the thousands living in Colombo’s seedy ghettoes. Not forgetting, of course, her dedication to make more beautiful the nation’s capital city of Colombo. Including the Mayor’s official residence, of course.

But her foes hadn’t bargained for Rosy’s fiery response which left them dumb stricken. Last Saturday, she emerged from the Mayor’s office restroom with all the mayoral broomsticks she could muster to sweep clean the malicious allegations made against her in her bid to restore the official grand old mayor’s mansion to its former glory for posterity’s sake which the former mayor, even after a full-fledged refurbishment made four years ago, had left it in a decrepit state unfit for human habitation.

Addressing a press conference, she made it clear that her opponents had got the figure wrong. She said a charge had been made against her that she intended to spend Rs 5.7 million. That was wrong. It was only Rs 5.2 million; and to prove her assertion forwarded the letter dated the same date issued by the Municipal Commissioner Lalith Wickramaratne who vouched the same. Secondly, it was not merely to renovate one toilette but to renovate six. And not only that. Its was to renovate the entire residence.

She said: “Within a week of coming to office, I consulted a team of architects with a view to refurbishing the Mayor’s residence. It was my intention that this building which has a long history and is of archeological value shoud be preserved. It was a part of a programme to preserve buildings of archaeological value such as the Colombo Town Hall and the Old Town Hall.”

And guess what? She added her proudest boast which Colombo’s rate payers should thank their lucky stars they voted her to office on March 19th this year.

She said, “I chose a private contractor who had worked for me earlier and gave the contract to him. When others suggested that I should call for tenders, I said No. For those who would have tendered for the contract would have put in bids which would have cost the municipality five time more.”

Heavens be blessed. For that’s a saving of over 20 million bucks of tax payers’ money. And furthermore, if the Colombo district’s ratepayers are not already blessed having a mayor they can call Her Worship, she met the claims of her opponents about her latrine expenditure with the utmost disdain. And drove the final stake which laid to rest her opponents complaints.

She said: “I don’t need the Mayor’s bathroom. I have my own private residence with 7 bedrooms and 8 toilets in my husband’s home.”
What more, indeed, can a woman want? When the world’s her oyster, when the Mrs. World crown still sits prettily upon her head even after thirty-three years of winning it? Not to mention, of course, six loos to use in the mayor’s mansion and another seven in her husband’s home with an extra one to flush down with contempt the envious snide remarks of her less fortunate foes?
To paraphrase Shelley, “If beatification is already here, can sainthood be far behind?”

IGNORANCE STRIKES AGAIN: Former Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekera claims he didn’t know who sent him a million bucks cheque which he nevertheless got his bodyguard police constable to encash and give him the money

Former Sports Minister of this Government, Kurunegala District MP Dayasiri Jayasekera stands indicted in the public dock this Sunday morn after the Police filed a B report in a magisterial court on Thursday claiming that he had received a cheque for one million rupees from Walt and Row Associates, a subsidiary company of Perpetual Treasuries owned by the man at the epicentre of the 5 billion buck bond scam Arjuna Aloysius.

According to a statement given by a police officer to the CID, who was attached to Mr. Dayasiri Jayasekara’s security in 2015, it was revealed that, on June 13, 2015 Mr. Jayasekera had asked him, Amila Kumara Herath, to encash a cheque bearing number 566635 which had been issued by Walt & Row Associates. The current account number was 0073900773.
To Dayasiri’s credit he did not deny the allegation but only endangered his credibility when he took the stance of professing ignorance as to the source of the cheque. Even as Ravi Karunanayake denied all knowledge that he was occupying a penthouse suite at Crescat Towers whilst he was the Finance Minister, courtesy of the hospitality extended to him and his family by the new philanthropist in town Mr. Bond, Arjun Bond.

His statement on Friday in Parliament the day after the scandal broke on Thursday was thus:
“There was a cash cheque given during the 2015 election campaign. I was not an MP then. I got many contributions from businessmen during the election campaign and I didn’t know who they all are. If I had known it was from Perpetual Treasuries owned by Aloysius, I would have not taken it.”

The first question that must be asked and answered is whether or no Dayasiri Jayasekera failed to realise that any cheque leaf in any cheque book issued by any bank, has the name of the issuer imprinted on it? Was it mere carelessness on his part not to have noticed who had made a donation to him of a million bucks out of love and that made him make a police constable in his official public paid bodyguard unit to rush to the bank and encash and hand over the dough?

Secondly, it’s true that he was the Chief Minister of the Wayamba Province when the bond scam came to light in February 2015; and when he received his one million bonanza on July 13th 2015, on the day he handed over his nomination papers to contest the August general election. But pause for a second. As the then people’s representative of the Wayamba Province, is he implying that he was totally unaware of Walt and Row Associates, of Perpetual Treasuries, of Arjun Aloysius now in remand, of Arjuna Mahendran now a fugitive? Or did he fail to exercise caution and cast it to the winds in his need to make ends meet, no matter the name of the Greek who sent him a million buck gift?
But with President Sirisena dissolving Parliament and calling for fresh general elections on June 27th 2015, isn’t it also true that Dayasiri had well made known in advance his intention to contest the August hustings and thrown down the glove as a SLFP candidate from Kurunegala even as the former president Mahinda Rajapaksa had announced the same personal intention to make his comeback not from his Hambantota hometown but from the lofty heights of Kurunegala’s elephant rock?

Sorry, Mr. Dayasiri. His puerile excuse that he was only the chief Minister of the Wayamba Province and not a member of Parliament when he accepted the cheque for one million will sadly not suffice. Wasn’t he as the chief minister no less of the entire province the people’s reprehensive, the same representative the people of the Kurunegala District sent to Parliament in August 2015? What’s the difference in accepting a cheque from bond scam Aloysius as chief minister of the North Western Province or as a member of parliament from Kurunegala?

Furthermore Dayasiri’s puerile excuse that he did not know from where the cheque for a million bucks came from, will, also, sadly not do to convince the people, for isn’t there much to be desired as far as credibility goes in the statement he made in Parliament this Friday?
For it’s not worthy, in fact it is totally unbecoming of a people’s representative, be he a provincial councilor or a parliament member, to publicly state that he did not bother to find the identity — although it was clearly printed on the cheque leaf — of this million manna from some perpetual heaven that suddenly floated and fell onto one’s lap? And rushed to send a cop to cash it, as the B report filed by the police on Thursday claimed.

He owes a more credible explanation to the Lanka people for his conduct especially since his subsequent relationship with Aloysius which he did not divulge was revealed in the newspapers.

The SUNDAY PUNCH of Novermber 19th 2017 commented thus:
On Friday the 17th of November last year, JO MP Udaya Gammanpila urged the Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekera — who pole vaulted from the UNP to the Mahinda’s SLFP when Rajapaksa was in power seemed invincible and did a reverse somersault to Maithri’s SLFP when Sirisena won — to clear his name by seeking Speaker Karu Jayasuriya intervention to initiate a probe. Gammanpila’s assertion was that in accordance with the Parliamentary Powers and Privileges Act No 2 of 1953, the Supreme Court could be moved against Perpetual Treasuries owner Arjun Aloysius or anyone else accused of exerting pressure on a parliamentary committee and if found guilty, he or she could face a jail term up to two years.

Minister Jayasekera’s immediate reported response was to say: “Ask my COPE colleagues whether I have said a word in support of Treasury bond racketeers.” Alas, the public have no direct access to his COPE colleagues and inquire from them what the minister said or did not say to them. What a pity, Minister Jayasekera had to wait for so long till the storm blew in his face to reveal his one to one, face to face, behind closed door meeting with primary bond dealer Aloysius at a time when the 5 billion buck bond dealer was the subject of a COPE inquiry of which committee Minister Jayasekera was a member. How more persuading would have been his belated explanation had he taken the public to his confidence and revealed to the nation then, Aloysius’s alleged solicitation of backroom favours from a Government Minister?
Though he made and received 18 calls to and from Aloysius, and only one incoming and one outgoing during the period he served as a member of COPE, he had gone the extra mile to grant Aloysius a private audience with him behind closed doors at his ministerial office. And he had not considered it vital to inform his fellow COPE committee members of the meeting that the man, who was the subject matter of the COPE probe, had solicited his help.

He admitted that there was a “major issue” in the fact that members of the COPE Committee had conversations with Arjun Aloysius. He said, “Yes of course there is a major issue.” But said he found no need to tell anyone that, apart from voice calls on the telephone, he had actually met the man in flesh and blood in the privacy of his ministerial office. Whether it was a one to one meeting or one surrounded by public officials he did not say.
His explanation was: ““Yes I met him once and we spoke on the phone twice. But I don’t think it was needed to declare to anyone that I met him.”

No doubt about it, that in this backdrop, the former SLFP member, the former UNP member, the former Mahinda Rajapaksa supporter, the former Wayamba chief Minister, the former Maithripala supporter after Mahinda fell from grace, the former Sports Minister, and now in no man’s land waiting for the Rajapaksa summons to pole vault to the Rajapaksa camp, Dayasiri Jayasekera certainly owes an explanation to the people who elected him to various offices in good faith.

No man is guilty unless proved otherwise beyond reasonable doubt. But that maxim does not exclude the right of any man to venture forth and declare beyond reasonable doubt his total innocence of the allegations made against him,
And rather than leave damning allegations contained in the police B report filed in a magistrate court this Thursday, which Dayasiri has already admitted its essential truths, the Veritas of its contents that yes, he did receive a cheque for one million bucks and sent a cop to cash it for him but he did not know from whom it came though the issuer’s name is printed on the leaf, the only saving grace left for him is extend to the public a more convincing credible explanation than he did this Friday to Parliament.

Dayasiri must now come clean. If only to prove that Lankan politicians of all colours do not come so ridiculously cheap.
PS: One final question: And this time it’s for you, the reader, to answer: If you suddenly get a cheque for a million bucks from Veley Sudha to be used for any purpose you wish, will you bank it? Encash it through another? Serve on a quasi judicial bench probing Veley Sudha? And keep it secret for three years before the cops come knocking at your door?