My dear Seeni Bola,
I thought I must write to you now because you seem to be in the news again-although I am not sure whether any publicity is good publicity in this instance.
You did stir up a hornet’s nest first by announcing that you would go ahead with plans to set up private universities in the country. Now, that must have been just the incentive for the rathu sahodarayas to pick up their placards and re-invent their slogans, now that they are down and out politically. Why, they even hooted you when you visited Peradeniya but then, given the thick skin that you have, we know that a good Sri Lankan hoot will not even touch you!
Then you seem to have begun some kind of controversy by announcing that varsity lecturers would be given massive pay hikes. Of course we all remember Seeni Bola, that you have a reputation for making statements without thinking of their consequences-who can forget those two years that you served in jail for contempt of the Supreme Court, by trying to talk about ‘balu theendu’!
Because of this very few would have taken your statement seriously, but then the varsity lecturers themselves seem to have done just that. There they were, only a few dozen hours later, holding up posters and demanding an instant wage hike.
That must have surely put you in a spot but worse was in store for you this week-a university student died and everyone was blaming it on the Police until you came along and put forward another theory-that a student leader from the Red camp assaulted him which was probably why he died.
Now Seeni Bola, you left it to our Police Chief to explain matters and he went on to make a right royal mess of that, leaving you with egg all over your face. Why, one day he addresses a press briefing and says that the boy died of natural causes and the very next day he tells the media that it was someone called “Bassa” who dealt the deadly blow. And naturally, people are still confused as to whether it was the “Bassa” or the “Kossa” who did the deed!
You should have known better Seeni Bola, rather than to allow our service chiefs to do the talking. Why, our former Army Commander is now languishing in jail for saying something about white flags, and our former Air Force Commander is at the centre of a row between Israel and Palestine again because of some uncalled for remarks. And then we have our Police Chief making matters worse for you than they already were! Only the retired Navy Commander it seems has kept his mouth shut and that too only because he was moved out from looking after sea routes and asked to mind the highways instead!
Thinking about all these campus types baying for your blood Seeni Bola, don’t you for at least a moment yearn to be in charge of the Sports portfolio which you held in Satellite’s Cabinet, once upon a time?
Why, I was just thinking, had you been the man in charge of Sports these days, you could have been there at the podium in Galle when Murali retired and Mahinda maama himself paid a courtesy call. And then, they recently awarded Susie an Olympic Silver medal instead of the bronze she had originally won in Sydney and you could have been there too, beaming by her side!
But no, Mahinda maama has given you this lousy subject of higher education and you have to tackle uncouth undergrads demanding their pound of flesh and lazy lecturers asking for more money than even the highest paid government servant!
I was just wondering Seeni Bola, whether all this is part of Mahinda maama’s plan to weed out potential challengers from among the Blue camp by giving them messy portfolios to deal with. There is the up and coming Maithripala and he gets the Health Ministry only to be stung by the deadly Dengue mosquito. The other challenger, Nimal was getting too big for his boots so he was asked to look after the waterways! Is this what happened to you too, Seeni Bola?
Anyway Seeni Bola, you need to be careful in what you do in the future. Why, only the other day undergrads staged a protest fast in Pettah (no, not the type of fast unto death undertaken by Wimal sahodaraya who gives it up in less than three days) and all you could do was to cordon off the road and let them starve. Just make sure that there are no more casualties because if there are, you would have to run faster than Susie herself to escape the consequences!
Yours truly,
Punchi Putha.
PS-The more I think about you Seeni Bola, the more I realize that politics is about being in the right place at the right time. Why, had you not been greedy for a ministerial post in the government and not crossed over to the Blues, you would have still been with the Greens and who knows, they would have been speaking about you as the potential successor to Uncle Ranil, instead of that other apparently immature youngster from Hambantota. Don’t you feel the same way, Seeni Bola? |
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