My dear Mahinda maama,
I thought I must write to you after your Blue party won handsomely at last Thursday’s elections. Congratulations I must say, but I daresay that even you would have been surprised at the extent of your victory.
Of course, we know that you were asking the people for a two-thirds majority and that is not quite what you got, but knowing you I am sure you will be able to come to an ‘understanding’ with some of the Greens, so that you get your two-thirds majority and they get their cabinet portfolios!
I just hope that while you are doing that, those who are trying to cross over will realize that it is a risky business. Why, just ask Rohitha, Milinda or Mano from Kegalle and they will now tell us that getting booted by the people at the next election is quite a high price to pay for a few years of ministerial office.
Of course there are the lucky ones, the likes of Johnny from Kurunegala who crossed over in the nick of time and still managed to top his district list.
I guess you would have to retain his services anyway, because he will be the main prosecution witness against the General who contested against you!
Then there are others like Wimal for instance, who also topped his district list. Now, this chap is clever in what he does but it is worthwhile remembering that all those Reds who crossed over with him have lost, except one other, so Wimal has led them up the garden path, or so it seems. But then, leading people up the garden path is what he usually does…
Anyway, Mahinda maama, now that Wimal has won handsomely and you must reward him with a cabinet portfolio why not give him the Justice Ministry? He seems very knowledgeable about the subject because he has already pronounced the General guilty and stripped him of his parliamentary seats as well. I am sure he will make an excellent Minister of Justice, he could dispense justice with lightning speed!
It might be as good a choice as appointing Mervyn as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, for instance, now that Rohitha has lost out. Just imagine what an ideal choice that would be; why, he would deal with Ban Ki Moon in the same manner that he deals with Sirasa and all our problems with the international community will be over. And, all that he would need are a few buses, a few people and a few stones assembled opposite the UN headquarters in New York!
And speaking of the General, the results show that while the rathu sahodarayas have performed dismally in all districts, polling a little less or little more than five per cent of the votes, they polled nearly twelve per cent in the Colombo district, where the General was contesting.
Doesn’t that show, Mahinda maama, that the man who led the war against terrorism (militarily, of course) still commands some support and sympathy. By incarcerating him and putting him on trial, I do not think you are doing yourself any favours, so think about it, will you, while you ponder what you can achieve with this mandate that you have won.
And while you are thinking of what you could do with your mandate I would like to remind you of your solemn promise to reduce the Cabinet to a maximum of thirty five Ministers. I am not sure what you would do with about a hundred ordinary MPs, especially when they have all been Ministers before, but I do hope you won’t appoint ‘non-cabinet ministers’ and ‘project ministers’ and ‘ministers without portfolio’ just to keep them happy, because that is not why the people voted for your party.
I think you must also realize that part of the reason why the people voted for your party much more than they did for the Greens and the Reds is because those two parties spoke a language they found difficult to understand: about GSP plus, inflation, human rights and good governance and the 17th Amendment, for example. I do hope Mahinda maama, you recognize that these are not dirty words, even if they are not understood by a majority of the voters.
So, Mahinda maama we must wish you well and hope that you deliver on the promise of Sri Lanka becoming the ‘miracle of Asia’. To be fair by you, when you promised to eradicate terrorism, no one believed you but you did so. So, we hope you can deliver on this promise as well.
Yours truly,
Punchi Putha
PS-I know there is a lot of speculation about who will be the next Prime Minister. As Preme would have advised and as Satellite would no doubt agree, the best man for the job is someone who is an ineffective leader with no real chance of reaching the top himself. There is someone like that in the next Parliament, and we both know who that is, but unfortunately he is not in the Blue party, is he, Mahinda maama? |
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