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If any compelling reason has to be found to ask the President to resign, the nation’s bankruptcy will do.

Tuesday’s shock announcement by the Central Bank Governor that Lanka will renege on her international USD 51 billion and is bankrupt, hammered the last nail home and sealed the fate of the President and that of his Rajapaksa top heavy Government.

Though couched in economic jargon that the move was to preempt a hard default, it cannot conceal what in ordinary parlance simply means: that the nation is broke. Gone bust due to the reckless squander of its finances and gross economic mismanagement by a regime which, after turning Lanka into a failed state, has lost the right to govern.

Outside, within earshot of the Presidential Secretariat, thousands of people keep a night-and-day vigil demanding the President to resign. The spontaneously sprung protest movement, which began last Saturday at the Galle Face Green, shows no sign of ebbing but rather its rising tide seems to intensify hour by hour.

People Power has dug its heels on the Green for the eighth consecutive day; and neither the midnoon sun that scorches nor the torrential rain that pours has either flayed their spirits or dampened their ardour as they continue to give gusty roar to their singular cry, ‘Gota, go home.’

Elsewhere in the suburbs, in the cities, in towns, in grassroot villages, the mantra is the same. Bereft of gas, of fuel, of food and medicine, of electricity to light their homes, even of milk powder to feed their infants, the masses have been placed on life’s stoic rack and subjected to torture without end. One old man on his way to the queue summed it up succinctly when he told TV news: ‘In the morning we are in the polime, in the afternoon we are in hamathe, in the night we are in kaluware.’

The Government they had brought to office with much fanfare, has callously herded them to the brink of the cliff and shoved them over the precipice. Their mass disappointment with their 2019 saviours, who had promised them the sun, moon and stars, is now complete and final.

They no longer have the time or the inclination to indulge in the political blame game. That time is past. They want change, a real change in the leadership. No more can they place their faith in those who had rained ruin on the nation, and expect them to restore the country to the halcyon days they’d known before. Those responsible for the debacle have forfeited the trust of the people, and not all their glib talk, not all their spin can win back shattered faith again. The people have made up their minds. The die is cast.

But though Bankrupt Lanka faces a USD 51 billion international debt, it has not desisted the Government’s flying white elephant — which has already drained the Treasury of millions of dollars in losses to stay in the air — from planning a new spending spree. While the people writhe in agony due to mass shortages, SriLankan Airlines announced on Thursday it has called for proposals to lease 21 aircraft to expand its fleet. Some are still on cloud nine, impervious to the reality of a grounded Lanka.

The Constitution spells out the state policy that shall guide the President and the Cabinet in the governance of Lanka. Though having no legal force but only of aspirational value, Article 27 pledges the state to establish a Society, one of the objectives of which is “the realisation by all citizens of an adequate standard of living for themselves and their families, including adequate food, clothing and housing.”

Forget the idealist vision of the State providing the people with adequate food and shelter. Today, the Government can barely provide the citizenry with the bare essentials. The official declaration this week of the State’s bankruptcy, under Rajapaksa watch, is the last straw.

If the framers of Sri Lanka’s constitution had failed to include a ‘forfeiture of Presidential office due to gross failure of performance’ clause in its articles, it would have been solely due to the prospect of the nation going bust being too farfetched to contemplate. They would have thought that in the unlikely event of the unthinkable occurring, the penalty of resignation would be obvious. That long before the final buck stopped at the President’s table, the incumbent of that high office would have made his or her graceful exit.

If they had thought that the shining example set by Dudley Senanayake who, a year after being elected to office, resigned as Prime Minister in 1953 after soaring rice prices had plunged the Government’s popularity, would serve as a precedent for future leaders to follow, they have been proved much mistaken.

No Constitutional provision exists to force a President out of office except by bringing an impeachment motion against him in Parliament. But first the motion has to be based on one or more of the grounds specified under Article 38; and, secondly, it must be signed by not less than 150 MPs to be entertained by the Speaker with or without his blessings. Even before considering the third stage which deals with a Supreme Court inquiry and reports, it will be nigh impossible to obtain the requisite two-thirds majority when the Government still commands a comfortable 117 seats in the House.

Despite the solid evidence that he has forfeited the people’s mandate, now apparent to all but him, despite People Power’s loud roar sounding from Point Pedro to Dondra Head with the same reverberating ‘Gota go home’ mantra, if President Gotabaya Rajapaksa still believes he has not lost the mandate to rule, he can test the validity of his belief by submitting it to the People by Referendum as a matter of national importance as provided in Article 86.

If he fails to take this constitutionally available litmus test, if he shrinks from submitting his claim to the mandate to the people’s will, it will only confirm his own worst fears that the nation demands that he must go. The hour’s come, the game’s up.

The magic that lay in the Rajapaksa name has disappeared. And the Genie has left the lamp. The stage lights are fast going out. The denouement–the final outcome of the tragedy–is tottering towards its long drawn end. And only the final curtain awaits its people-ordained  fall.

Vigil rhapsody on the Green to herald new era for LankaSUNDAY PUNCH SPOTLIGHT ON YOUTH POWER’S BRAVE RESILIENCE Protesters rebuff PM’s offer for talks, say: ‘Just go home’’As midnight falls on Galle Face Green, Young Lanka lie huddled in a makeshift tent defiant against the beating rain, praying for a new dawn, free of the terrible curse that has condemned the nation beyond the pale.They brave the elements like they have braved the threats.  Even before the first protestor had set foot upon the Green last Saturday, the Government had banned entry     to it the night before on the feeble pretext that it was under development. MILLENNIAL GENERATION: Thousands of youth keep vigil to herald long overdue real change in Lanka. Pic by Eshan Fernando They had ignored the ‘Keep off the grass’ sign with the same infectious disdain the people had ignored the emergency law’ curfew the previous Sunday; and reclaimed the sovereignty they had constitutionally delegated to the President and Parliament. Throughout the week, they have felt the pangs of hunger, they have endured the bouts of thirst. They have faced the oncoming monsoon winds blowing hot, blowing cold but it had not changed their resolve. They have suffered protest fatigue but it had made them more resilient. They have left their cosy shelters to rough it out in the forbidding air under a canopy of cloudy climes, waiting undaunted for their star to shine. They have cut their democratic teeth in the dust of the Galle Face Green. Not all the obstacles thrown in their way have swerved them from their avowed course. Their individual strength has been the strength of ten for their cause is just, their conscience clear: Their peaceful mission pure, pristine and undefiled by even a trace of partisan politics. They have shown they will not settle for anything less than the total riddance of family power and its tenacious grip on the nation which has left their lives blighted and the country bankrupt. Theirs is not a protest for food, for gas, for fuel or for medicines. Theirs is something beyond their daily bread. Theirs is the crusading cry for total regime change, echoed in one vociferous roar, ‘Gota, go home.’ And, as they keep round the clock vigil, chanting the same potent mantra to exorcise the body politic its inherent evil, they are not alone. The marathon protest that has continued for over a week without its fire dimming, has attracted the hearts and minds of many who have rushed to keep the flame alive. Iconic Sinhala music artistes like Nanda Malini, Victor Ratnayake and songwriter Prof. Sunil Ariyaratne, along with many other well-known personalities, have joined in the protest to express solidarity with the Galle Face phenomenon. The youth movement has galvanised people of all ages, of all classes and rank, near and afar to make a beeline to the Green to pledge their faith and rekindle the fire. They have moved spontaneously to set up on the Green public lavatories, tents, makeshift kitchens, a library, mobile phone charging centre and a medical centre to cater to their basic needs while a daily stream of well-wishers provides a surfeit of food and drink. And to raise their morale, the rhapsodic power of music lustily rends the air to make all share in the magic of the soul stirring song. The Galle Face Green has now come alive, pulsating with vibrant life. It has been turned into a freethinkers’ pantheon for pilgrimage, beckoning all to come and throw out the false gods they had once worshipped in ignorant awe. It reflects the spirit of the age and symbolizes the nation’s mood for change. Family vigil on the Galle Face Green But they should be extra vigilant from falling prey to the machinations of die-hard masters of political stratagems. Already overtures have been made for talks and the sudden appearance of truce flags in the horizon, portend no good. Rightly the Prime Minister’s call for talks has been rebuffed with the terse reply, just go home. They have struck the right note and there can be no compromise, no letup in the battle to win their just demands. The blood, toil, tears and sweat already shed on this expanse of Green should energise the power of the people’s roar, not dilute or weaken it to a whine. Else they would have been shed in vain. It maybe that the exertions will threaten to wear them down. But those who have forfeited the sceptre and the isle by their ruinous reign, still retain the seat of power; and, thus fortified, can afford to sit it out. But for them, too, inexorable time is running out, as further hardships will trigger wave after wave of unstoppable mass protests. The outcome will depend on which side has the greater resolve to hang on longer. As midnight falls, Youth Lanka lie huddled in tents to bed down for the night, praying to glimpse the distant star twinkle through the gauntlet of ominous clouds hugging the sky.  Already their struggle has reaped rewards. It has sent home the family Finance Minister and the crony Central Bank Governor. It has forced the cabinet to resign. They have been the expendables, temporarily sacrificed like pawns on a chess board to thwart the People’s Gambit and save the greater family interest. People Power has moved heaven and earth to achieve so much in so short a time. To remove the rest of the offending baggage, this ‘one equal temper of heroic hearts’ must remain, ‘strong in will to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.’ LONG LIVE PEOPLE POWER!