Letters to the Editor
View(s):Something’s rotten in the state of Sri Lanka
Seemingly, following the church massacres last April, there are a growing number of Christians as well as sympathizers who seem to understand better the miracle following Christian martyrdoms of the 21st Century – (although it sounds rational when critics say that the Lankan Catholic hierarchy should exercise a degree of restraint in public announcements and pronouncements).
Fortunately after the Easter Sunday killings, religious convictions continue to bind many of the faithful, but are also underlined by either a sense of resignation to the powers of ‘karma’, or in acceptance of the will of the Lord, as in ‘Insha Allah’…
Poor Sri Lanka is once again Asia’s Teardrop.
It is indeed pathetic, but primarily rooted in the ongoing political struggle for power. Hopelessness is voiced or sensed everywhere – except from among the glittering-rich or those unashamedly imitating them. Hard-earned or easily gained foreign cash is so ignorantly disposed of in trying to be like the Joneses’ next door!
Most of the TV advertisements cater to the happily rich. Are they the majority of whom Lanka could remain proud of? Young couples struggling to survive and their aspiring families are brainwashed, mesmerized or artfully held spellbound in front of the TV – watching puppy-love soap operas in Sinhala, if not imported TV serials. What proportion of these series are in accord with Lankan culture, tradition, religious and moral values or language and simple lifestyles akin to daily living or how the nation’s majority survive? Artificiality, outdoor glamour and ‘copy-catting’ have become the style. Eating out with family or friends within glass houses has become fashionable even in distant urban towns.
TV channels hardly emphasize educational or informative transmissions, but overload popular presentations with unlimited advertising. Hardly any time is allotted for success stories from technical, agricultural, horticultural, responsible fishery, water conservation or wastage, use of wind and solar power, livestock care and production, conscious disposal of waste, recycling for benefits from energy resources, community development projects for small-scale income generation among rural poor to motivate and stimulate our students in directing their attention on national wealth linked to national development. What about investments in our industries and the plantation sector including inland paddy cultivation and incentives to support manpower resources?
Among the rest of the masses, regardless whether Sinhala, Muslim, Tamil or Hindu, Buddhist or Christian, the naked truth is starkly evident.
Care to chat with your auto-driver, say a polite hello to a stranger at the marketplace, or pause at a bus-stop, and the chorus repeats as though from a national dirge. Strangers will instantly spot you from the crowd and politely address you as a visitor from abroad. At a Keells supermarket in Maharagama, an aged gentleman gently told my spouse and me, “You must be on a visit. Don’t settle down here. Our country is a mess. No hope – they are all liars.” I smiled but remained dumbstruck.
All schools and places of devotion are under careful security surveillance.
One noteworthy point worth mentioning: our Lankan security staff is well-disciplined, cautious, respectful and dutifully polite, where-ever assigned to duty at day or night. I mentioned it and even thanked them for their courteous conduct to which they smiled in private acknowledgment.
The capital, the Kelani temple as well as the Kochchikade roundabout are heavily fortified zones. My grandparents and parents used to accompany me to Kochchikade from Dematagoda, ‘for prayer to the Saint of the Poor to obtain work and bread for all in want’, from when I was about five or six years and when Dad’s Naval HQ was just nextdoor on the waterfront itself.
One Sunday morning walking out of St. Anthony’s, Nittambuwa, my sister’s senior parishioners bluntly enquired from me in near despair: “Would our country continue to remain like this”. Even if the burning issue has reached its maximum, they very well know that neither the poor nation nor its people can find a human redeemer. Rampant corruption, greed, nepotism, favouritism and ugly struggles for political domination reign supreme.
In a TV sponsored Sinhala programme, one learned Medical Prof. wisely fore-warned, “At this rising alarming rate – of desperation and frustration – a majority of our nation’s youth are soon going to end up physically incapacitated and mentally sick.” How terribly sad and unpleasant to hear.
From 5 a.m. each dawn, hordes of uniformed schoolboys and girls patiently wait at wayside bus-stops. Though early in the dawn, the rush has begun to boil over, along our public thoroughfares – only to be repeated before sunset. Traffic control is rare, nil or powerless. Accused and jailed offenders for whatever neglect or fault gain prompt release through intervention by political higher-ups. Defence laws exist to restrain or punish offenders, but political interference has become the norm! Nowadays it has become regular and quite fashionable for political opponents of the same rotten bunch to point fingers at each other about the so-called series of Islamist-ISIS plots and attacks. How come Muslim parlimentarians argue, if a group of us warned in advance of a possible ‘aggression’ from a so-called group, the government and military powers failed to take timely action to bring the suspects to book?
Nearly all of the local TV channels as well as the print media seem aimed to further confuse the majority public at large. This adds to the rising level of disappointment and frustration of people everywhere. Sri Lanka is readying to painfully bleed again. When on the eve of my departure to Rome I asked a beloved Lankan NGO friend, “Can we be hopeful about the upcoming election,” he promptly replied, “it can only become worse.” I hope and pray he will be proved wrong. God help Sri Lanka.
Alex Van Arkadie Rome, Italy
Know your priorities
Page two of the Business Times edition of July 14 under the headline “More Tabs, no lats” prompted me to highlight the fact that our drivers of economy in this country, unfortunately, have not identified the necessary sectors that require development. All schools should be provided with latrines/toilets and proper drinking water facilities before deciding to give Tabs to schoolchildren.
An individual should know his/her priorities. It is similarly true of a nation. We should understand our priorities.
We need not overemphasise the importance of foreign currency earnings. That represents the wealth of a nation. We tend to spend heavily on foreign tourist attraction programmes. But has any policymaker in this country, tested the real ground situation? In the heart of Colombo, the Beira Lake is stinking. One can experience the smell, while travelling by train between the Secretariat Railway station and Colombo Fort Railway station.
How many employees at Railway stations, (particularly at Colombo Fort Railway station) are conversant in English language to properly guide the foreign tourists?
One must experience the hardships a foreign or local commuter faces.The railway stations need to be upgraded. Can we expect the tourism industry to boom in such a set-up? The policymakers should travel around the country, to get first-hand experience before formulating their development plans.
Let the policymakers plan to first put their house in order.
M.Hakim Usoof Gampaha