Thoughts from London

Corruption and the demeaning of democracy
Britain’s wartime prime minister Winston Churchill once famously said that “democracy is the worst form of government there is, except every other that’s been tried.”

In many ways Churchill is correct. His cynical view of democracy is not really a condemnation of that political philosophy per se. It is the manner in which that philosophy had been practised over the years in his country and elsewhere that led many like Churchill to question what had for centuries been hailed as the democratic ideal.

Having seen the warts of democracy, Churchill concluded that despite these imperfections, democracy as practised was better because others were infinitely worse.

But if democracy is to be accepted as the better system of government then the principles on which it is founded must not only be respected but indeed faithfully practised.

Remove those underpinnings and the delicate balance on which this system of government is constructed becomes badly distorted. The more underpinnings one removes, the more one violates the principles on which democratic society is structured.

Still, many of those who profess to follow the democratic path and who mouth democratic principles, are equally adept at undermining them in order to achieve power or cling to power.

Some believe that holding elections periodically is sufficient proof of democracy in practice. While regular periodic elections are vital to the functioning of democracy, elections alone often provide just a convenient façade with which to cover heinous crimes against the people.

In fact elections themselves are manipulated to the point that they become a disgrace rather than a legitimate opportunity for people to choose those who should govern them.

Sri Lankans who have seen many an election performed (and I use that word advisedly) over the decades know only too well how low we have sunk.

It is said that a country is democratic to the extent that the guiding principles of democratic government are followed and good governance results.

Now that Sri Lankans have to cope with another election in a few weeks time and possibly a parliamentary election depending on how the winner of the November 17 poll sees the post-election landscape, they would surely have the opportunity of observing the kind of political shenanigans we miss over here.

Sri Lanka inherited parliamentary democracy from Britain where resides what is called the Mother of Parliament. Our system of government underwent change with the advent of Junius “the Genius” Jayewardene whose 1978 constitution radically altered the way we had governed ourselves since independence 30 years earlier.

Even before we broke away from the Westminster system, our political culture was becoming increasingly debased by political parties and politicians who found it a lucrative business as well as a means of imposing their corrupt and crooked will on others.Some might decry the western style of politics as overbearing, time consuming and unsuitable for the developing world. But here in Britain, despite all the faults and shortcomings of its politics, there are effective mechanisms to check abuse and scrutinise closely political behaviour.

To do so requires, on the one hand, laws and regulations and strong and viable institutions to ensure they are observed by those in power and others in political life.

On the other hand, it calls for an effective and vocal opposition and a vibrant media ready to expose wrongdoing and the abuse and misuse of power. Democratic politics is of little value if it rests only on periodic elections and not on the other essential pillars that make up this system of government.

Elections in Sri Lanka have increasingly become a means of throwing out one set of rascals and electing another lot in its place. But this merry-go-round of the corrupt, of disgusting mediocrities and hooligans, goes on and on.

Ineffectual oppositions, slavish media and an indifferent or apathetic public are partly to blame for this unfortunate situation. Right now in Britain the Conservative Party is in search of a new leader, Michael Howard who headed the party, having announced his resignation shortly after losing the parliamentary election earlier this year.

How many party leaders in Sri Lanka have actually quit gracefully because they could not lead their party to victory? In fact a minister resigning on his own volition is surely as rare as trying to squeeze water out of stone as in ancient times.

In the next six weeks the Conservative Party will have a new leader. But not before the two contenders have had to prove themselves before party activists throughout the country, having already run the gauntlet at the annual party conference and two rounds of voting by party MPs.

In the meantime they are under microscopic study by a media looking for fissures in their characters and for past misdemeanours. The young pretender to the ‘throne’ David Cameron has undergone a trial by media in recent weeks. It is all about his personal life and whether he had ever taken drugs.

There were times one wondered whether the media is not going overboard, delving too far into his past as though what he did when he was a high school or university student, smoking a stick of cannabis or something similar, was a crime beyond redemption and should cost him the Tory leadership. He who is without sin should cast the first stone. But then who judges the judges?

Those who defend incessant digging by the British media into the early private lives of their political leaders claim they want leaders who are squeaky clean and beyond reproach. We, on the other hand, tend to accept politicians despite their current disreputable lives, never mind their unsavoury past. Herein lies the difference.

Some politicians openly and publicly conduct themselves like common criminals and thugs. Their progeny follow in the footsteps of the elders in the belief that because their fathers are lawmakers they could be lawbreakers.

Such conduct is not unknown to their political parties, leaders and the public. In fact some even boast that they could conduct themselves as they wish because they are the representatives of the people.
Yet does anybody really care? Do their political leaders act against the corrupt and recalcitrant, the thug and the crook? Or are they more likely to be rewarded because their vote and support matter more than political morality.

On Thursday newspapers here reported the sacking of a senior civil servant because he had spent public money making two trips to promote British manufactures and hosting friends to drinks at a London hotel.
If that deserved a sacking what should be done to our ministers and senior officials in the government and corporate sectors who lavishly spend public funds to entertain or fatten themselves.

Should not such persons be brought to public trial in the same way that former leaders such as Yugoslavia’s Slobodan Milosovic and Iraq’s Saddam Hussein have been brought before criminal courts.

It used to be said that a people deserve the government they get. If the public continues to ignore the past conduct of their politicians, their abuse and misuse of power and elect them to office then they become accomplices in the demeaning of democracy and the political system.

We cannot surely be proud of our place in the index of world corruption. Rather we should be ashamed of ourselves that over the years we have allowed corruption and political thuggery to thrive and stood still while it happened.

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