Columns

“Subha aranchi” screamed the two words in posters plastered all over Colombo and elsewhere a day or two before government front runners walked heads held high like the heroic Nelson after the battle of Waterloo.

They had kicked Sri Lanka’s accumulated debt into the long grass so that years later others not guilty of such profligacy or another generation would have to pay larger bills, allowing the present lot to continue to dip their hands into lenders’ tills without much hesitation.

They called it “debt restructuring” to confuse the average citizen, except to realise that they continue to pay through their noses while public funds are liberally distributed in the hope of garnering votes in the coming elections.

Meanwhile, they strut around, covering themselves with garments of glory for having saved the nation, which only they could do. But when the Shylocks come calling the present day Antonios would have long faded into the political sunset.

If this financial huta pata is the subha aranchi (good news) that the nation was asked to await, then it is hardly a scratch on the real subhatest aranchi (if one might coin a bilingual phrase) that hit the country last week.

That aranchi was greeted with far more enthusiasm and national acceptance than the holy grail President Wickremesinghe and his Finance Ministry deputy, Shehan Semasinghe, were peddling in and out of parliament.

An interim order by a three-bench of the Supreme Court suspended from office and functioning as police chief—the most controversial IGP in recent memory— Deshabandu Tennekoon, the only police chief convicted for violation of human rights and particularly for the torture of a suspect in police custody.

That happened some 13 years ago, and today’s citizenry believes that Tennekoon’s visits to Buddhist temples now signify an unexpected transmogrification into respectable conduct that would have been a real subha aranchi.

There has been a galaxy of earlier IGPs such as Sir Richard Aluvihare, John Attygalle, Osmond de Silva, E.L. Abeygoonewardene, Rudra Rajasingham, Ana Senaviratne, Cyril Herat and Stanley Senanayake, to name a few, who added lustre and professionalism, serving with integrity, honesty, evenhandedness, and respect for the constitution, the law and the people.

Can anyone point to a Ceylon/Sri Lanka police officer guilty of torture and violating the human rights of a citizen and convicted of such and later the failure to stop, if not supporting by inaction, the attack by pro-government goons on peaceful demonstrators on Galle Face Green?

What is so amusing, if not so condemnable, is that a police officer found guilty of violating provisions of the constitution and, in fact, international law is elevated to head a service that is responsible for maintaining law and order.

Then he is to launch a campaign called “Yukthiya” to wipe about the country’s bad guys like Wyatt Earp in the days of the American wild west.

Could anything be funnier, if it was not so serious, than a person who denied justice (yukthiya) to a suspect by torturing him while in police custody, leading a campaign that they have named Yukthiya?

I remember there used to be an adage about setting a thief to catch a thief. Wonder whether that is still true.

Three persons are responsible for elevating Tennekoon. They are Public Security Minister Tiran Alles, interim President Ranil Wickremesinghe and Parliament Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena.

The least responsible, in this instance, is President Wickremesinghe. President Wickremesinghe kept on extending the term of the then IGP, a sure sign of displeasure at having to nominate Tennekoon.

Minister Alles, meanwhile, is embroiled in a conflict with Dr. Harsha de Silva, chairman of the Committee on Public Finance (CoPF), over a report of the committee on the highly controversial contract granted to a foreign consortium for the issuance of entry visas to foreigners intending to visit Sri Lanka.

All about this deal, which appears to have remained locked up from public knowledge, erupted when a row occurred at the BIA with a Sri Lankan objecting to some foreigners acting as officials perusing passports and visitors being charged entry fees far above normal charges.

It was only later that it was discovered that the contract with the company VFS, which had been entered into with no other bids called for, was stoutly defended by Minister Alles as a reputable and efficient company like no other.

For those interested in the history of VFS operations in the UK, they might like to refer to the London-based magazine Private Eye of March 28, 2024, known for unearthing hidden and buried stories. The lack of space prevents me from quoting the story in full.

But suffice it to say that in 2007, the British Foreign Office sacked VFS from a contract after a data breach revealed travellers’ personal details and travel plans.

Private Eye carries more recent details concerning a British Home Office contract with VFS.

(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.)