Columns

When beggars die, there are no comets seen, said Calpurnia to Julius Caesar shortly before the Roman dictator was done to death inside the Senate.

Though our country has been spared such a ghastly end to any of its leaders, even if they play dictator now and then, there is still the recognised democratic way of getting rid of them—the franchise which the Sri Lankan people have exercised long before independence—to kick out the unwanted.

The last leader, however, did not wait for elections for the country to decide. Just two years before, he had won a resounding electoral victory, and he mistakenly believed that he was firmly in the presidential seat for the next five years, at least.

How wrong he was. Those who had voted him in unceremoniously kicked him out. He soon took to his heels despite his military rank, which he probably considered an all-purpose protective shield against civilian wrath.

He did forget, however, to pack the Rs 17 million he faithfully stored to distribute to the country’s needy—or so he said. But it was sure going to be in safe hands after Deshabandu Tennekoon—now police chief after President Wickremesinghe elevated him to the top, despite widespread opposition in the country and a guilty verdict by the Supreme Court for violating the human rights of a person in police custody, including torture—wanted the money handed over to Minister Tiran Alles.

Why that money was to be passed on is not very certain—at least to me, many thousand kilometres away—unless the minister had an appointment with his bank or banks next on his personal business.

But to our rulers, this is a democratic government, and who is the Supreme Court to keep a good cop down who can round up many thousands of people as “kudu karayas” and “pathayalas” and a few disappearing on the way eating a few bullets for lack or anything more edible—is hardly a matter of public concern to a people brought up on democratic norms, particularly so when the minister in charge himself tells his weapon-bearing guards of the nation’s peace not to hesitate to use the weapons—their arms, that is, not their heads.

So, with a minister like Alles, who appears to be a cross-pollination of “Dirty” Harry and the Sun Dance Kid, even Velupillai Prabhakaran might have remained hidden in the wilds of Vadamarachchi, except there was that small business of some bags of money that needed to be passed on, which surely cost Ranil Wickremesinghe the presidential election nearly two decades ago.

So as we can see all sorts of political leaders—in national dress and business suits—play dictators while professing democracy. Much has been said of the country’s first executive president, Junius Richard Jayewardene, who eased himself into the presidential chair without a by-your-leave from the people.

He kept in his safe signed letters of resignation from his huge UNP majority in Parliament. All that was missing to rid himself of any of them was to date the letter which he would or could do, and hand it over to the Speaker.

It was saying bye-bye in real democratic fashion. That was Junius Richard the First, the untarnished and unvarnished democrat from the early days of the Royal College Cabal, which has grown exponentially and continues to haunt the country, safeguarding its alumni, whether in government or opposition, and crowned with high government office along with other cronies in other circles.

If you need a body count, why, go through the lot during the UNP’s days in the Yahapalana government (and please don’t forget to add Arjuna Mahendran) and other names that can be regurgitated today even from among the Colombo glitterati?

Sri Lanka has seen the emerging scourge of authoritarianism in the last couple of years as the government of a leader catapulted into power, turned a blind eye, as it were, to the determinations of the Supreme Court, our apex judicial body, and presented some of the most outrageous and obnoxious pieces of legislation before the House in living memory.

They trampled on democratic freedoms and human rights, causing widespread alarums at home and abroad, in legal circles, and in international human rights organisations.

In fact, the Supreme Court, on more than one occasion, did pass strictures over many clauses in this collection of what many would call garbage, so badly were some of them drafted, and the government had to hastily withdraw some legislation.

Surprisingly enough, the current minister of justice, Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe, largely responsible for battering the human rights of a populace already assaulted by rising prices and living costs and a media threatened with curbs on its freedoms, is now a candidate in the upcoming presidential election.

It would indeed be a day of mourning for this nation if the same minister responsible for the legislation we have witnessed finds himself in the presidential seat with all the powers that the part-time incumbent head of state has acquired for himself and possibly wants to gather more in the event the people make him more permanent.

But what did come as more than a surprise—surely as
an astonishment more than a surprise to those who heard it—was a remark that President
Ranil Wickremesinghe reportedly made in his speech at the UNP May Day rally.

As incontrovertible evidence of his democratic credentials and of his rule following his surprising elevation to Sri Lanka’s highest position, which has long eluded him, President Wickremesinghe did what Mark Antony did at Caesar’s funeral to convince the Roman people that Caesar was no ambitious leader.

The president reportedly told his UNP multitude that proof of the pudding is in the eating, as they used to say, but there is little pudding to be found in average homes these days thanks to the IMF, the Wickremesinghe government, and advisers.

Anyway, he said that the fact that all major political parties were holding rallies that day was proof enough of the democratic freedoms enjoyed by the people.

If that was meant to be a decisive argument in support of his so-called democratic commitment, it is puerile even to get past his junior school debating team. Even in the first days of the country’s independence, Ceylon has held rallies to celebrate World Labour Day.

For the UNP to disallow it this by banning it would only reflect terribly against a party that is struggling to its feet after its battering nearly four years ago. With elections around the corner, Wickremesinghe and his cohorts would hardly want to show they were shivering in their boots.

With the world looking on, it would have been nothing but churlish to deny these rallies, not that churlishness is not something unknown to the UNP.

But then the people of this country have already had a foretaste of our modern democracy as water cannons and tear gas have been turned on protestors and innocent demonstrators, including two women protestors whose only offence was to hold two placards.

On almost every occasion, court orders have been sought and often obtained by police to ban demonstrations claiming a disturbance of the peace. That sure is democracy in action, exercised by some who can hardly spell the word.

In Shakespeare’s time, beggars died without seeing any comets. In this once resplendent isle, beggared by foul, corrupt, and power-hungry politicians determined to protect their own social and political class with whatever they had, from being eliminated right now by piling goodies—lower prices, higher salaries, state land, houses, and even jobs—as we said about two weeks ago would happen soon.

But even if people of Sri Lanka’s poorer class do not have comets to accompany them in death, they see something else before they die. They see stars when they see their bills. That’s enough to see a myriad in the galaxy.

(Neville de Silva is a veteran
Sri Lankan journalist who was Assistant Editor of the Hong Kong Standard and worked for Gemini News Service in London. Later, he was Deputy Chief-of-Mission in Bangkok and Deputy High Commissioner in London.)