Rajpal's Column

20th February 2000

Government's burning desire is depressing

By Rajpal Abeynayake

They are going to do the madman routine with abandon. Dissanayake has said, "What's going to stop the government from burning down the Ravaya and Lankadeepa offices?'' The man is firm in the belief that the government can do it.

Its magnanimity, and not the law that is stopping him. We are the government and therefore we can burn the Ravaya and Lankadeepa offices. That's Dissanayake's gem.

This government has more media Czars than any other government before it. The media has been drawn and quartered - and a quarter each was despatched to various prize individuals. The first quarter was given to Sanath Gunathilake, an actor, who dabbled with the media with the glee in which a boy manhandled a toy. Halfway through the process , he seemed to be getting bored.

Mangala Samaraweera then took over the media business, and immediately set about determining the tone for his stewardship by saying that "mediamen in Sri Lanka can be bought with a bottle of arrack.'' His idea of a cabinet press briefing was that it was a process by which the government of the day could insult everybody around and get the press to carry it in the next day's papers.

The Mangala/Gunathilake dual- run established the media credentials of the government. "Bash the media'' became the government's media policy and though the government began by using criminal defamation action against the Editors of newspapers there was soon a move towards open roughneck assault of the media. World headline grabbing attacks on the media were launched with men of the PSD tear gassing journalists covering an opposition rally close to Town Hall. By this time, the government had decided that driving fear into the media should be part of established policy.

Sarath Amunugama was then recently appointed the government's third media star. He was the creme de la creme of the lot, until of course another man by the name of S B Dissanayake took over media bashing and proved that the best is usually reserved for the last quarter of the game.

Amunugama, the former censor, came at a time when the government's media policy was becoming the government's only policy.

He came in with a resolve to institutionalise the authoritarian tendencies of the government's media policy. Amunugama is a practised authoritarian and he wears his media guru credentials on his sleeve.

But S.B. Dissanayake, the government's unofficial media guru, must be given the credit for articulating the government's real media policy. Dissanayake voiced the desire to burn the presses.

That way he articulated the real depth of the government's feelings towards the media. The media jihad had begun long ago, but S.B. Dissanayake made things clear with his pyrotechnic mind.

S.B. Dissanayake's incitement to arson has not been contradicted by any of the responsible ministers of the government.

At least there are no express denials though some ministers have said that they don't "think that way'' after questions were asked by the press. Finally this is the press policy of a government that has four press Czars — three appointed, and one unappointed, the last being a last resort , the arrested development type.

The final analysis: A government which appointed four press Czars has a "burn the presses'' policy which is not contradicted and not disowned.

It took a great deal of resources on the part of this government to accomplish this. Four key men, four separate Czars with their own style and own peculiar approaches of attack.

Tailpiece:

Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumarantunga is easy to attack. So says a Lake House pundit. That doesn't come with strings attached. Attack her, and you can have your establishment burnt. It's a small price to pay, really.

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