Sunday Times 2
Lone Ranger and Loan Rangers
We are living in times when the success or the ability of a man is gauged by his capacity to obtain a loan or his ability to pay back not so much the loan, which seems far-fetched, but at least an instalment of the loan as per agreement.
A dashing personality in recent times is the dapper Governor of the Central Bank (Cabinet Rank), Nivard Cabraal, who defies all critics prognosticating that the country is on the verge of bankruptcy and Sri Lanka will not be able to pay back the interest payments as demanded. Cabraal does it at the last moment as James Bond does, shooting the villain through his forehead with his last bullet clinging on to a rope while swinging over the hell fires below, saving Britain and civilisation.
Watching all this entertainment on state TV, our mind went back about six to seven decades when the principles of future conduct of our lives were being drilled into us at home and in the classroom. One such saying that has lurked in behind our minds was: ‘Neither a lender nor borrower be’.
Curiosity led us to research the origins of this advice which is totally ignored or rejected in this quarter of the 21st century where radio, TV and print media with active support of patriotic leaders are all for financial disbursements–simply called loans—if ‘development’ is to take place.
The advice against borrowing or lending goes back to William Shakespeare’s Hamlet in which Polonius counsellor’ to the Danish King Claudius gives advice to his son Laertes who is leaving Denmark for France. He says:
Give every man thy ear but few thy voice
Take each man’s censure but reserve thy judgment
Costly thy habit and thy purse can buy
But not expressed in fancy rich nor gaudy
For thy apparel oft proclaims the man….
Neither a borrower nor lender be
For a loan oft loses both itself and friend….
This above all; to thy ownself be true
And it must follow as the night and the day
Thou cannot then be false to any man.
We were not students of English literature at that time to admire the words and thoughts of the celebrated Bard. Instead we were engaged in cutting up toads, rats and the like and wondering about the marvels of nature such as why flowers fornicate and conifers don’t mate. Yet the words of Shakespeare ‘neither a lender nor borrower be’ stuck in our minds through all these years. Not being literati at that time, our reading was confined to those delightful comics, which we were absorbed in even while the maths teacher was labouring over ‘the length of the hypotenuse of a right angled triangle…. We had our different cowboy heroes like Roy Rogers, the hard punching King of the Cowboys; Gene Autry riding a beautiful white horse while strumming a guitar; Tom Mix brawler par excellence in saloons and deadly accurate with his shooting in the wide open spaces.
Our favourite was the Lone Ranger, a masked cowboy atop a beautiful spotless white stallion Silver, with his partner Tonto, a Native American also riding his pet horse. Together, they wiped out many a badman in the Wild West and their good deeds done, the Lone Ranger with his black mask on shouts: ‘Hi-yo Silver!’ Away and they gallop into the horizon. It was good entertainment but involved great risks in those days when ballpoint pens spoiled your writing and comics with their Americanisms spoiled your English.
How did the Lone Ranger enter our thoughts while we were contemplating the subject of borrowing and lending in our ‘hansiputuwa’? Had we mixed up the phonetics: LONE Ranger with LOAN Ranger?
Right now since obtaining a foreign loan for Sri Lanka is considered an invaluable patriotic service to the nation–no matter if the details of the agreement are divulged or not–there are many Loan Rangers visible. The loans can be in cash or kind. Reports speak of Udayaya Gammanpila knocking on the doors of the UAE for oil; Bandula Gunawardena claims to have successfully ‘begged’ a million tons of rice free from China; Basil Rajapaksa claims to have got billions from India and the collateral for loans remains vague. Of course the best known Loan Ranger is the inimitable Governor Cabraal who has been even in his previous role of state minister borrowed from the Xis of China and paid the Shri Modis of India and vice-versa, many a time.
But there is no money in the country today despite all the loans and the Loan Rangers. Power cuts come in sweltering afternoons–Nawala swims in 80 percent humidity and 32 degrees C; the hooting has stopped but still gas is in short supply; power generating stations are being given daily or periodic handouts in coal and fuel and the prices of food items now circulate in outer space. Fundamental reason for all this ‘kollopang’: No foreign exchange despite the Loan Rangers. A wave of Omicron is coming, experts anticipate while the doughty leaders who are supposed to have successfully combated COVID-19 waves have now taken to agriculture. There is more to come. The pharmaceutical industry warns of an impending breakdown in the supply of drugs! Reason: No foreign exchange but not to worry. A long term project to manufacture most drugs needed by Sri Lankans has been launched!
Hi- Yo Lone Ranger and Silver. Come back from the horizon you disappeared into with vials of insulin and Metphormin before we go into the world of nothingness. Our Loan Rangers can’t beat the bad guys.