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Without
their trappings
Many of the country's top politicians were invited to attend a reception
held to celebrate India's Republic Day on January 26. Along with
the invitation went a slip of paper which may have been quite upsetting
for many of the politicos. Personal firearms, cellular phones as
well as personal protection officers are not allowed, the little
slip of paper said. It was indeed a refreshing sight to see them
without their cellular phones and armed bodyguards, photographers
at hand to record the event were heard saying.
Centre
of attraction
Cellular phones have a way of making them the centre of
attraction whenever they ring. At last week's Cabinet press conference,
a phone rang just as government spokesman G.L. Peiris was about
to start off the briefing. The Minister requested that all hand
phones be switched off as a practice at all future briefings. Only
in the weeks ahead will we know if the scribes will actually switch
off their phones when they attend the briefing even though it looks
very unlikely.
Interesting
speeches
There were many interesting speeches made at the inaugural
rally of the United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA) at the Town
Hall in Colombo. First it was the JVP leader Somawansa Amarasinghe
making an early appearance on stage and stating that "lajjawa"
and "baya" were no longer existent in our society and
one of the aims of the Alliance was to bring them back.
Then
there was Gampaha district MP Anura Bandaranaike querying why some
government Ministers were asking for the arrest of Mr. Amarasinghe
for the murder of Vijaya Kumaratunga "when his wife doesn't
mind."
And
then there was the Kandy district parliamentarian D.M. Jayaratne
saying that there were people waging war in 67 countries because
they were trying to safeguard their motherland and we were the only
ones harping about peace. So the thousands who attended had their
fair share of entertainment amidst the more serious matters that
were addressed by many of the other speakers.
Confusion
over figures
There was also quite a bit of confusion among the speakers
as to how much the LTTE had grown in strength since the ceasefire
came into effect two years ago.
One
parliamentarian said it had risen from 3,000 cadres to 18,000. Then
JVP MP Anura Dissanayake said it had risen from 4,000 to 18,000
while PA MP Mangala Samaraweera put the figure as having risen from
6,000 to 18,000. At least all three agreed on what they believe
is the LTTE cadre strength today.
Will
weather gods strike back?
Last Sunday's islandwide power failure saw top CEB officials saying
the reason for the blackout was due to lightning striking a transformer.
The news was given wide publicity. But in reality it was a different
matter. Of the two transformers at Kotugoda, one had been shut down
for repairs and as only one was being used, it had shut down due
to a power overload, which led to the blackout.
The
officials were obviously trying to blame the weather gods when the
fault was really a technical matter. We only hope the weather gods
aren't too angry at this leading to more power failures of this
nature.
Thumping
sum
Amidst protests from the CWC against the CEB's decision
to begin the Upper Kotmale project, the CEB is paying a thumping
sum as a monthly rental to hire a vehicle for a senior official
attached to the project.
The CEB has hired a four-wheel drive Montero for Rs. 150,000 rupees
as monthly rental. This is in addition to other expenditure incurred
by the specially set up project office. |
