Thoughts from London

Reverse democracy or pay back time
Colonialists who ruled Sri Lanka left something of their heritage behind as they did in other colonies they enslaved. The Dutch gave us lomprijst, the British gave us democracy. We took the former, embellished it with more spiced dishes, baked it in banana leaf and called it lampries.

We took the latter and embellished it too, in a manner of speaking. If we could not steal ballot boxes then we stuffed them, brandished weapons at polling stations, assaulted political opponents, intimidated voters and made democracy far more like a mafia operation than the ancient Greeks would have ever envisaged.

Now it seems others are cultivating some of our habits, so meticulously nurtured over the years. Only now have they come to appreciate our native genius for bringing politics from a lofty pedestal down to the gutter, where some claim, it belongs.

Obviously influenced by "Third World " economists and developmentalists, some like to refer to this euphemistically as reverse democracy. Decades back some economists realised that poor countries were repaying rich donor nations far more than they received in aid.

In addition, the rich west was attracting professionals and qualified individuals from the poor countries without having to spend a penny on their education. So the poor countries educated them, the rich countries took them at little cost to their coffers.

Euphemisms apart, it is actually pay back time. Some of the former colonies have taken the systems and practices left behind by their earlier rulers and stood them on their head. And they are doing so in ways that the west would have found irritating and insulting.

With hundreds of thousands of people from the old colonies now living, officially or by pretence, in the countries that once lorded over them, the political practices they were taught have returned home in corrupted, and corrupt, form.

Often have we heard that in some parts of Canada, Toronto in particular, some groups threaten and intimidate others of different political persuasions, even physically attacking them. These fighting fanatics are from our part of the world.

At the Oslo municipal elections last year there were stories of intimidation and pressure on individuals to vote for a particular candidate from one of our countries.

One wonders whether the founding fathers of Britain's parliamentary democracy would have imagined even in their wildest dreams that the process they set in motion after battling the powerful monarchy, would be demeaned and denigrated.

Now the United Kingdom that brought us adult franchise before every country in Asia save Japan, is catching the infection. It appears that when John Humphries, the well-known broadcaster went to cast his vote at this month's parliamentary election, he found that some one had got there ahead of him. His vote had already been cast.

Remember the occasion when Hector Kobbekaduwa contested the presidential election against Junius "The Genius" Jayewardene in the early 1980s. Kobbekaduwa, who had been a minister in the Sirima Bandaranaike government of the 1970s and, as Lands Minister, had spearheaded the land reform programme, was a well-known public figure.

Yet when he went to cast his vote, it had already been done in his name, saving him the trouble of voting for himself. Fortunately nobody had thought it practicable to do so in the name of Tony Blair or Conservative leader Michael Howard. The British polling system has still to catch up with the opportunities offered by our inventive genius.

If Blair and Howard were spared the ignominy of having others getting ahead of them, it seems that Jack Straw, who has returned as foreign minister, has not all together escaped being tainted.

It is said that in Straw's constituency 10 votes were registered at an apparently empty flat above a shop owned by one of Straw's key election campaigners. Certainly no blame could be attached to Straw but in this increasingly multicultural society old habits that seem to have paid rich dividends in South Asian elections, die hard.

No wonder there are growing concerns about the reliability and accuracy of voter's lists and the potential vulnerability of the election system to abuse. Three men are to be charged with defrauding the voting system in an electorate called Burnley and police authorities in at least 17 other areas are investigating similar incidents of reported abuse.

It is interesting that some, if not many, of these investigations are in areas where there are substantial numbers of voters from ethnic groups from our part of the world.

Such allegations of fraud did not emerge just at this month's parliamentary election. The Crown Prosecution Service is investigating more charges made during the local government elections last year. At a court trial involving six Labour Party councillors found guilty of systematic voting fraud (stolen or tampered postal votes) Judge Richard Mawrey said such practices would "disgrace a banana republic." Banana republics, as we know, are those dictatorships in America's backyard or farther south, that were propped up by the US dollar and arms.

Some here thought this could equally well apply to Sri Lanka. After all, they claimed, we are a republic (if not entirely democratic and socialist) and our politics was bananas anyway. Thankfully the British voter has not taken to beating up others or running away with ballot boxes like at the Jaffna District Council elections over 20 years ago. But as the ethnic minority vote grows and asylum seekers and other dubious residents become more desperate about their future, Britain is likely to see unexpected and unsavoury developments corrupting the electoral system.

But in some respects the British do not need any lessons from us, though we could teach them a thing or two when it comes to cronyism, belief in one's political infallibility and a condescending disregard by political leaders for the people.

Despite the bloody nose that Tony Blair got from the British people for his arrogant and presidential-style rule, he still cannot resist giving jobs to his cronies or elevating them with peerages and perks of office. The latest story doing the rounds is that a key figure in the circle of high-powered legal friends close to Tony Blair and his wife Cherie, is likely to be appointed Chief Justice.

Sir David Keene, a lord justice of appeal who lent his French holiday chateau to the Blairs, is a strong contender to be Britain's top judge when the current Chief Justice Lord Woolfe retires, possibly this summer, according to London's The Sunday Times.

This has sparked fears of cronyism among a number of senior lawyers here, the newspaper said. If George Bush could pack the Supreme Court with think-a-likes, if not look- a- likes, why should not the man who has come to be known as Bush's poodle, even if his image has become terribly tarnished after the election.

Manipulating judicial appointments? Thank heaven we don't even think of such indecorous gestures.

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