State of flux
View(s):there was a commotion down the road. Kussi Amma Sera and Serapina were at the gate watching a to-and-fro argument between Simon, the often, amiable bakery man on his choon-paan 3-wheeler and Mabel Rasthiyadu over the current political impasse.
“Madam, Sirisena janadipathi gey weda hariyata kara (Madam, President Sirisena did his job correctly),” said Simon. “Wenda beha … wenda beha … Ranil thamai.. thavama agamathi (Cannot be … Ranil is still the Prime Minister),” shouted back Mabel Rasthiyadu.
Interestingly, her “amba yahaluwo” (mango friends) -- Kussi Amma Sera and Serapina – choose not to get involved. Rather, they were watching the unfolding drama, amused.
“Neha Madam, janadhipathi thumata wedakaranna bariwuna Ranil-ekka (No Madam, this crisis was because the President couldn’t work with the Prime Minister),” retorted Simon, who rarely loses his temper. “Agamathi-ta kamathi–naha kiyala, Ranil mahattaya-were ain-karanna-beha, (Just because you cannot work with Ranil, you cannot remove him),” responded Mabel Rasthiyadu.
Not only has the friction in Parliament heated up for the fourth week running, but the crisis has extended to the public as well and also brought public institutions to a standstill. Tourism, the first sector to get affected in a national crisis, has seen many cancellations while potential foreign investors were on ‘wait-and-see mode’. International rating agencies had put Sri Lanka on the ‘watch-list’ while the International Monetary Fund had placed on hold another allocation under a funding arrangement, pending a clearer picture as to who is in control. Western powers were rooting for Ranil’s team – as the legal entity — while the world’s largest two nations, China and India, chose to be more cautious in their approach to Sri Lanka’s crisis.
Sri Lanka, it appears, had broken another dubious record: The country has two prime ministers – both staking a legal claim. The games had begun.
But perhaps the biggest negative was the state of the public service which has all but come to a standstill and this was the focus of a conversation with my friend Kalabala Silva, the often agitated academic.
“I say, the United National Party (UNP) threatening public servants with punitive action if they take orders from what they call ‘a purported government’ is unfair towards officials,” argued Kalabala Silva, in a Thursday morning call.
“What do you mean? The President asserts that Mahinda Rajapaksa is the Prime Minister and the newly-appointed Cabinet is the legal government,” I replied.
“The UNP says that Ranil still remains Prime Minister and that it was also proved in two no-confidence motions against Mahinda Rajapaksa. In this context, they say it is illegal for officials to take orders from anyone other than a Cabinet headed by Ranil,” noted Kalabala Silva.
“Whatever said and done, public officials – like what my colleague Bandula wrote last week – are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea in this drama,” I responded, after which we got into a long conversation on the public service and how eminent officials in the 1970s would have reacted to a situation like today.
Today’s public servant, at the top of the ladder, cannot compare with eminent civil servants – those prominent in the 1960s and the 1970s like Dr. Gamani Corea, D.B.I.P.S. Siriwardene, Dr. Premadasa Udagama, Bradman Weerakoon, Tissa Devendra, Dr. Lal Jayawardena, Dr. Jayantha Kelegama and many others who were respected and stood up to politicians. They knew their ARs and FRs and stood by the rules in whatever circumstances.
Today’s public servants are docile and often do the master’s bidding. Rare is the public official who will stand out of the crowd and challenge a minister’s order, if deemed illegal or unwarranted.
In a 2004 article on the public servant, retired civil servant Tissa Devendra, also a prolific writer, wrote: “In recent times, the bitter rivalry generated by General Elections in Sri Lanka, coupled with the growing grip that politicians exercised over public officers, led to politicians categorising officers either as ‘our men’ or ‘their men’. Accordingly officers of all grades and categories were either given plum positions or consigned to administrative Siberias according to their political masters’ perception of their ‘loyalties’.”
Given today’s model of public service, is it fair for the UNP to go round threatening public servants with punitive action for following orders from what it calls “an illegal government”?
How can they refuse orders from ministers given that for decades, since the late 1980s, top officials have stood by their masters? How are they to decide who is in the hot seat? Shouldn’t that be the role of the judiciary and until such time a clearer picture of who is in charge emerges, shouldn’t they have to follow the instructions of the President, and through him, the President’s Secretary?
Dragging the public official into the politics of the country won’t win many friends in the public sector for the UNP, for, after all they are performing their duties and obligations. If Parliament cannot still decide who is in charge and the President refuses to acknowledge the no-confidence motions presented so far which the opposition UNP claims to have won, how can the public officer decide this?
In today’s context, it is unimaginable for a public official to refuse an order, say from Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa or Ministers Mahinda Samarasinghe and/or Gamini Lokuge. Refuse and they would either be summarily punished or sent to ‘Siberia’ – the administrative service pool. They also run the risk of losing their pension. There may be a few who are courageous enough to challenge the administration; but only a few.
Can they refuse to acknowledge a direct, written order from a minister in the President’s new Cabinet?
The reality is that work in the Colombo-based public service – not so much in the provinces – has come to a standstill because of these dilemmas faced by top public officials who are either secretaries to ministries or heads of departments. Hanging over their heads is the threat from the UNP and the government like the sword of Damocles; damned if they do and damned if they don’t.
As referred to earlier, today’s public service at the top has got so politicised that – rightly or wrongly – they’ll follow what the minister in charge says. Rarely will they oppose any direct order from the top and thus should not be punished even if the UNP wins the day.
Given today’s politically-governed public service, even eminent public servants of the calibre of those mentioned earlier would have had to operate in an environment of ‘serving thy master’ and not stick by the book of rules or quit.
At the gate, there was laughter with Simon and Mabel Rasthiyadu over one of Kussi Amma Sera’s jokes. Most probably it must have been at the political somersault of UNP politician Wasantha Senanayake who crossed over to the President’s ranks to be appointed the Minister of Tourism, had a joy ride to a tourism fair in London, returned and crossed over to opposition ranks. But this week he crossed back to government ranks!
If politicians can’t decide which way they are going, how do they expect public servants to decide!