Political Column

Political Column

The out of Court settlement?
By Our Political Editor
Is the second innings about to begin? The government's Interim council proposals are in the charge of Minister of Constitutional Affairs G. L. Peiris, and they are to be despatched to the LTTE sometime soon. But LTTE itself has still not confirmed coming back to the table --even though the news has been that the talks will soon be underway.

The national and international level moves to get the talks back on track have not let-up. Tetsuro Yano the Japanese Senior Vice Foreign Minister was sent yesterday on a repair mission to Sri Lanka to get the two parties back to the negotiating table.

The Sri Lankan government sees itself as having to deliver on two fronts when the talks begin. One is on the Interim Administration issue - by placing a package of proposals for an Interim Administration that will be acceptable both to the LTTE and the political opposition in the South. The other is with regard to development issues in the North and the East. The plan here is to ensure that the international community oversees that aid money is spent properly for the development of the war torn North and the East.

The mechanics for this process of 'overseeing'' is seen as something akin to the ceasefire monitoring mechanism. There were several co-chairmen to the Japan donor conference. The government now envisages a joint body of international representatives from these countries which functioned as co-chairmen, to facilitate the formation of this new body which will oversee the function of the disbursement of aid for the North and the East.

Aid will be utilised by the Sri Lankan government, as the LTTE has not been sanctioned by the international community to utilise this aid, especially after the boycott of the donor conference in Japan.

But sources in government say that the government sees it as its obligation to ensure that aid given is utilised to the satisfaction of the LTTE, which is why the government wants the international community to be in a special body that will oversee the aid utilisation process. Minister Milinda Moragoda met Javier Solana of the European Union to this end for instance, to ensure that the EU nominate a representative for the purpose of overseeing aid utilisation. That's as far as the reconstruction process goes -- but as for the Interim Administration, the government last week agreed to disclose whatever proposals for an Interim Administration in Cabinet before they are despatched for the perusal of the LTTE.

But here again sources in government say that the plan is to present the same proposals for an Interim Administration that President Chandrika Bandaranaike proposed. But the fact is that Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, though she gave an interview to TIME magazine saying that an Interim administration should be granted to the LTTE for 10 years never came up with concrete proposals on the nature and structure of such an Interim Administration. Therefore the inference is that the proposed Interim structure is going to be close to the regional council structure that was proposed by Kumaratunge in her package -- which never got past parliament. But already Kumaratunge has said her package should be used in full and not piecemeal, and that there is no option for taking out segments of it for the convenience of the government and the LTTE.

But what are the real chances of an Interim Administration giving over substantial powers to the LTTE? The government thinking is that if there was no legal challenge to it, even if an Interim Administration was granted against the wishes of the opposition it should still stand the test of time.

How can it be ensured that a legal challenge can be withstood? There has been intense speculation that the government will ensure that a legal challenge is not approved by a hostile court. The Prime Minister said enough is enough about the Chief Justice, when Minister Ravi Karunanayake brought up the issue for instance in Cabinet week before last. Is the Chief Justice being sent the subtle message then that he cannot be partisan and hostile to the government just because he is a PA appointee? If such a message is being sent, it shows the sheer farce in having a court that has been compromised due to the cloud hanging over one of its judges -- in this case the Chief Justice himself.

It is as if the UNF continued to have a compromised Chief Justice, without impeaching him as planned earlier, so that an advantage can be derived by threatening to deal with him. But there is instability in this strategy, being unsure of whether the court will go with the PM or not on matters of great political import. Is this why the Prime Minister said in Cabinet ''enough is enough, we will move to deal with the Chief Justice soon.''

Meanwhile the JVP had taken speculation one step further by saying that the Chief Justice will have to make way for Attorney General Kamalasabaysan who will be made Chief Justice in anticipation of a legal challenge that will be mounted against the Interim Administration proposals. This of course may be paranoia running riot, but the fact remains that there is a good deal of uncertainty over how things will pan out with regard to the Interim Administration proposals which seem to signify an important crossroads in the life of the government and the life of the peace process.

Two flew over the cuckoo's nest
Two significant developments this past week revolved round the personalities of two --- to say the least about them -- very controversial figures in the government. One was S. B. Dissanayake, the Minister of Agriculture and Samurdhi, and the other, Member of Parliament and Tamil National Alliance leader V. Anandasangaree.

So, Dissanayake, who we all know is not a spring chicken, was willing to forfeit his Minister post and his MP post and migrate to Australia? The PA for instance would have liked to have him even further down under than Australia - so is it possible that the Minister made such an offer in the first place?

Apparently he did -- but knowing that he is not a spring chicken it is known almost fully well now that he never really expected that the Prime Minister will accept his letter of resignation.

He had for a while now been complaining that Treasury officials Faiz Mohindeen and Charitha Ratwatte are breathing down his neck, and making the funding of his Ministry's work a nightmare.

But then Charitha Ratwatte is dyed in the wool UNP loyalist, so how is it that Ratwatte of all people could be accused of standing in S.B's way? Well, this is what the voluble S. B. Dissanayake said, and he said so before the UNP Executive Committee meeting in Embilipitiya last week. When he was not present in Embilipitiya the Prime Minister smelt a rat and sent an emissary in the form of UNP chairman Malik Samarwickreme to knock some sense into S.B.

Through Samarawickreme it was promised that some measure of action will be taken to streamline Treasury procedures to the liking of the Minister. But the Minister's contention was that it was not done and by Friday he had despatched his letter of resignation to Ranil Wickremesinghe, Prime Minister.

To make a long story short, as soon as he received the letter, the Prime Minister sent emissary Malik Samarawickreme, and then he also made sure that there were some real changes in the Treasury to the liking of S. B. Dissanayake. It was agreed to have another S. B. handling the affairs of the Treasury -- a name sake for good measure. This was S. B. Divaratne who will now oversee all matters concerning the disbursement of the vote to the Ministry of Agriculture and Samurdhi.

In the case of the TULF's Anandasangaree, he held on to his post as TNA leader despite a meeting at the TULF headquarters which was widely rumoured to be a last stand by Anandasangaree when his leadership post was to be taken over by one of the younger Turks in the party. R. Sambandan was determined to pass a resolution declaring finally that the LTTE is but the sole representative of the Tamil people.

But Anandasangaree made the oration of his life, and he said that there is no question of the LTTE being the sole representative of the Tamil people when the TULF did not make such a declaration even when it got a thumping vote that made it the parliamentary opposition way back in the 70s. Anandasangaree's comeuppance was known in political circles before parliament convened late in the week, and when Anandasangaree walked in to the chamber he was accorded an ovation by both sides of the political divide - - government and opposition, in honour of what must have been his "last stand'' which turned out to be one more of his stubborn stands against his own party which seems to have a love hate relationship with him and his fiercely individualistic ways.

Prabhakaran - the movie
Prabhakaran flirts, plays badminton with the lover -- has a lovers spat, and is reconciled as he bleats about with his lovelorn lass. Then he talks to his son who says “appa stop the war will you?” As if that was not mushy enough, the last lines suggest that Prabhakaran who got the rules of his organisation broken so that he could marry his wife (who was abducted from the Jaffna University premises) might just break another rule of the organisation - -which is the pledge that all its members are committed to Eelam.

If that rule is thrown out of the window and Prabhakran settles for something less---- all will be forgiven and Prabhakaran the prodigal, will be a matinee film idol of the Sinhalese, an Amitabh Bachchan sans the goatee and the drop dead looks.

So where does this air? In The Wanni, in Thamilchlevan's Video Training Institute? In Madras, at the LTTE 'madrasa' that teaches of Tamil culture and about the arriving Chola empire?

None of the above of course. This is aired on Rupavahini, courtesy Chairman Ganganath Dissanayake. When we ask the producer/director of this Prabhakaran feel good flick, Saddamangala Sooriyabandara (the man who reads the news with the urgency of an elephant under threat of extinction) he says ''it was all done under orders from top - the Chairman.'' What is the rationale behind the order? He doesn't know.

The government may talk peace with Prabhakaran but isn't it a matter of at least a slight good taste -- not to mention elementary self respect -- to refrain from canonising a man who had ordered the killings of hundreds of civilians at the Central Bank, at the Sri Mahabodhiya in Anuradhapura, and ordered the bayoneting of infants in border villages and the attack on the Dalada Maligawa? Would a people with at least a minimum of self respect or a minimum of just plain brains call for the airing of a program that is a hagiography of a man who has been called one of the 20th century's most prolific killers by The Times in London in their millennium wrap up?

What's also the good sense in romanticising a man who continues to head an organisation that carries out killings of political leaders, of Tamil political leaders (and of course of Sri Lankan intelligence operatives) when there is a peace process that is still in progress?

When Sooriyabandara was asked this question, he says he sees it in different angles, and not necessarily in terms of romanticising Prabhakaran. It maybe the journalism and the sense of impartiality that has been imparted to him by his doting Swedish journalistic sponsors.

The script writer for the Prabhakran drama is Upul Joseph Fernando. Sooriyabandara says neither he nor the scriptwriter sees any heroic qualities being attributed to Prabhakran in the movie. When a man who had carried out the assassinations of a country's President, a neighbouring country's ex - Prime Minister and thousands of other people, literally, is portrayed without reference to any of these killings, what is it called?

The times eh -- and the mores? (What crass kind of nation also insults its people by making last year's most prolific killer of its young men and women, this year’s role model and poster boy?'')

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