Editorial

Despite an eerie quiet, the calm after the storm, the country remains in a combustible state.

An extra-constitutional putsch in the making in the cover of what many genuinely believed was a mere ‘peaceful protest’ may have been avoided. South Asia’s oldest representative democracy was in the throes of extinction. The assault on Parliament House seemed the final hurrah, the culmination of the ‘unceasing waves’ we referred to last week, for some.

How had it come to this, the all-powerful Executive President having to flee with no place to hide? Where were those who carried him on their shoulders to high office just the other day? Had he no Intelligence reports of the day of reckoning (July 9) and the fate awaiting him, or was he so naive as to dismiss them with a false sense of security, so cut off was he from the real world and believing himself to be invincible?

Did he underestimate the mood of the soldiery that allowed the President’s House and the Presidential Secretariat to be overrun? Had he no plan for a tactical retreat other than to sneak out through the back door to the nearby naval headquarters and head out to sea on a gunboat? Was he burdened by accusations of ‘war crimes’ so much that he feared for his life in retirement in America if he cracked down on the protests? Whatever it was, he spoilt his copybook as a man who came on the platform of ensuring national security, disgraced in the undignified way he fled.

The constitutional vacuum that prevailed this entire week with his whereabouts kept secret was fortunately filled by a Prime Minister. Many voices, some on the streets like sheep following the shepherds in the forefront, called for his exit as well, blissfully unaware of the consequences to a country without anyone in charge.

The popular uprising morphed into a full-blown revolt, and this has not gone unnoticed by the genuine agitators crying out for a change in the administration. There were those whose political textbooks say the function of a people’s revolution is to awaken the angry masses, bring them to the streets and point them in the ‘right’ direction. The masses would then rise up and more or less take matters into their own hands. All the masterminds with different agendas had to do was set the stage for overthrowing the ‘system’ by priming the pump.

These masterminds have come out of the woodwork, or like a submarine emerged to the surface to grab the fruits of victory much to the consternation of others who believed their opposition was a spontaneous show of disaffection towards a corrupt, inefficient and dictatorial Government drunk with power. Shortages of fuel, cooking gas and ballooning food inflation were the spark that brought them out – they were no longer the ‘silent majority’; they wanted their voices heard. The radical elements, though, do not see this as a non-violent struggle. Their coming-out was witnessed on national television and the media conferences from the President’s House, and the implications may have dawned on many.

As the Government and the country limp back to some sense of normalcy, and the status quo ante, that is not what the ‘Anthima Satana‘ (Final Battle) envisaged by the Marxists of yesteryear, now the battle cry of some hardcore ‘Aragalaists’, expect. How far more are they going to stretch their agitation and test the Constitution, the Rule of Law – and the Armed Forces, remains to be seen.

None of this street drama is going to help bring the next shipment of fuel and gas or medicines, and an economic bail-out to the long-suffering people. There’re miles to go in bringing about economic stability as the country’s first priority in the midst of this political instability.

Gotabaya: From war hero to political zero

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s exit from the political battlefield was an unbelievable turn of events. For an ex-military officer, an acclaimed ‘war hero’ for directing the final assault on one of the world’s most ferocious terrorist organisations, he showed himself up as having feet of clay.

History had a special place for him at least in the annals of this country. Beloved by the majority for preventing the split of this nation, he was, however, loathed equally by separatists in the north and dissidents in the south. He, therefore, hitched his political wagon to the nationalism star as he set about to achieve greater heights in state affairs, his political inexperience seen as a refreshing change by a wider electorate sickened by the machinations of seasoned politicians.

Alas, the political novice got too far ahead of himself once ensconced in high office, a victim of a coterie. Cocooned in the Presidential Secretariat, he became insulated from the everyday problems of his citizens.

A combination of external misfortunes and warped economic policies contributed to his downfall, primarily the COVID-19 pandemic that hit the country’s economy below the belt. Foolhardy and inexcusable decisions against wiser counsel displayed all the flaws of an Executive Presidency. The cocktail provided the poisonous broth for a popular uprising that began with the farmers and ended in Colombo, exploited to the hilt by his detractors.

His insensitivity towards the Muslims during the pandemic and influential voices of the Catholic Church directly accusing him of the Easter bombings of 2019 came back to haunt him during this uprising – many of them being in the vanguard of the protests. The resentment of the extremist elements of the Tamils already harbouring a grudge added to the minority mix. It was then that the Buddhist clergy to whom he paid homage with a genuine sense of reverence, his coalition partners and finally, his own military on whom he spent so lavishly expecting their support, ganged up on the side of the Reformists, and the whole edifice crumbled on him. It was a case of from hero to zero.

He seemed shell-shocked, aloof and in denial towards the end of his days in office. His hurried exit – a desertion of post, was not only humiliating for him, but also for the country of his birth. It was easily better handled; his place in history will now be rewritten in what would be an inglorious and unfortunate new chapter.

It was a true Shakespearean tragedy.