It's time for the President to review his policies

The announcement that salaries and allowances of the President, Prime Minister, Ministers and Members of Parliament are going to be increased two-fold has infuriated the masses burdened with difficulties to make ends meet in their struggle for survival. While the state-media hype projects the “Mahinda Chinthanaya” as beneficial, the reality is that the high cost of gas, electricity, water and all consumer essentials has rendered the philosophy null and void.

The country is hurtling towards abject poverty. There is no political-will whatsoever to enforce price control. The Rupee continues to fall against other foreign currencies. Resorting to issuing high value notes by printing new currency notes is the first indication of the possibility of galloping runaway inflation.

It is believed that members from the UNP will cross over to join the ranks of the government in the capacity of Ministers. If another five members of the UNP join the government, the total will increase to a hundred ministers! A world record. It will cost around five billion rupees annually to maintain this jumbo size Cabinet. When other leaders like Evo Morales of Bolivia have halved his and his ministers’ salaries, when President Ahmadinejad uses his own old car and eats his own home-cooked lunch with no fancy or subsidized lunch, when Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has channelled twenty percent of the oil revenue to be paid to the poor in cash; all these steps are to show the poor masses that the leadership is concerned about them and that they are willing to make sacrifices for their benefit. In contrast our President appoints a jumbo-sized cabinet, increases salaries and allowances and other perks of his ministers, not to speak of duty free bullet-proof luxury cars.

Under the Rajapaksa government, corruption and abuse of power in high office are widespread. The name of a Cabinet Minister is mentioned in a large scale visa racket. Wastage of public funds is rife. The media have also exposed top military brass involved in ill-gotten wealth; an ex-President involved in shady transactions when in office, and more recently, of crooked fertilizer tenders, not to mention the gigantic VAT scandal. Apart from all this, is the stinking garbage strewn island-wide that has now become a frightening health hazard.

Like the previous governments of Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga and Ranil Wickremesinghe the government of Mahinda Rajapaksa does not have effective control of the territory, and hence, our sovereignty is in question. Crime is on the rise at a phenomenal pace as the rule of law is observed more in the breach. The underpaid public service which only gets paltry increases in their salary compared to the salary increases of the President, Prime Minister, Ministers and Members of Parliament is wanting in their performance. Unemployment is growing by the day.

Our foreign policy which was based on the principles of non-alignment brought our tiny island immense respect, prestige, honour and dignity among all nations including the super-powers the US and the then Soviet Union. Today under Mahinda Rajapaksa non-alignment has been discarded and the government is openly aligned to the US, hoping that the US will help it to defeat the Tamil Tigers. Despite Sri Lanka’s votes against Palestine, Iran, Venezuela and Cuba to support the US, in the United Nations, there is no sign of the US helping Sri Lanka to defeat the LTTE. The US together with its allies is in the forefront on the war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan but in Sri Lanka the US discourages war and wants Mahinda Rajapaksa to talk peace to the Tamil terrorists, despite banning the LTTE as a terrorist organization in the US.

In addition, the President himself should intervene and solve the stinking garbage problem before a plague sets in and destroys Sri Lankans on both sides of the ethnic divide. The foreign policy should also be changed to adhere to non-alignment, not by words only but by deeds.

By Saybhan Samat, Rajagiriya