 An old Trotskyite gives the clenched first salute to his departed Sama Samja leader, the late Minister of Science and Technology Bernard Soysa, at the LSSP headquarters. |
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A yet unlocated leak in an oil pipeline in the Colombo Port is threatening large scale marine pollution with several ships warning they would pull out of the Port or avoid it officials said.
The 46 mile pipeline of the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation is more than 40 years old and port officials are blaming the CPC for failing to maintain it properly and delaying in taking corrective action.
But CPC Chairman Anil Obeysekera denying any negligence says the pipeline is some nine feet under water and repair men are doing everything possible to locate and plug the leak.
Accusing port officials of a delay in informing the CPC of the leak which was first spotted on Dec 25, Mr. Obeysekera said they were draining out as much oil as possible from the pipeline but it was a difficult and a delicate job.
Port officials hit back saying they had informed the CPC on Dec 26 but repair crews had moved in some days later.
As the verbal battle added fire to the fuel leak, a marine pollution expert warned that the Colombo Port would lose its reputation as one of the best ports in the region if effective action was not taken to stem the leak and clear the pollution which had spread over some one and a half acres of sea.
Dhanapala Weerasekera Chairman of the Authority for the Prevention of Marine Pollution said he had visited the affected area on Friday and found that the pipe was now blocked with about 10 barrels of oil having been pumped out. But there was still more oil in the pipeline and the SLPA might have to face severe consequences if international marine authorities advised ships to avoid Colombo port because of the pollution.
A shipping agent warned of the additional risk of fire in the areas where fuel had spread and said the ultimate cost of the mishap could run into several millions.
They said steps must also be taken to prevent such lapses in the future.
A movement for the protection of the Colombo Port has warned of tough trade union action if Minister M.H.M. Ashraff does not hold talks with union leaders within a week on controversial plans to privatise the Elizabeth Quay.
A spokesman for the movement which groups about 10 unions including the CMU and the JSS said they had waited patiently till the minister returned from a trip abroad but now they wanted talks within a week on what they see as a planned sellout of a national asset to the multi-national P&O company.
He said unions in other sectors also had assured support for a full scale protest against the sale.
Mr. Ashraff who returned a few days ago from Japan is now said to be suffering from flu and it was not clear when he would be able to begin normal work.
On a request made by the EPDP, President Kumaratunga has agreed to increase the de-centralised Budget allocation for MPs in Jaffna and Kilinochchi districts from Rs. 2.5 million to Rs. 4 million a party official said.
He said an EPDP delegation which met the President recently had explained the crisis faced mostly by people in the Wanni and appealed that an extra allocation be made.
The delegation, including MPs spotlighted travel problems and other restrictions which the President promised to look in to and remedy as and when possible.
Meanwhile two rebel MPs of the EPDP N.R.Ramamoorthy and his brother R. Rameswaran have written to the President alleging that Jaffna's Govt. Agent had not properly used the de-centralised Budget funds.
Complaints of inequalities in public service salary increments during the past two years have prompted the government to appoint a new committee to study the issue and recommend ways of levelling salaries. An official of the Public Administration Ministry said the Cabinet had decided on this last week after it was pointed out that teachers, for instance, had got much bigger increments than public servants in other sectors.
Meanwhile non staff grade public servants will get a 60% pay hike from this month while higher grade officers will get it from July 1, he said.
The funeral of LSSP leader and socialist stalwart Bernard Soysa at Independence Square yesterday was sombre but dignified and in a sense symbolised the dignity and compassion he brought to the world of politics and from which he went gently away.
Among those present was 81-year-old Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike who, though finding it difficult even to walk insisted on coming personally to pay her last respects to an old friend and trusted ally. LSSP frontliners led by acting party leader Batty Weerakoon and scores of red-shirted veterans were also there. But the overall turnout was somewhat disappointing and some observers felt the party could have mustered a much bigger farewell for a man who had served his country for some 50 years and who in the highest traditions of statesmanship had upheld the principles of asking what he could give to the country rather than what he could get from it.
From the school days at Ananda where he risked his father's ire by pawning his elocution Gold Medal to pay the school fees of a poor friend, Bernard Soysa had given his money and time to bring about a more just social order in Sri Lanka. In an era when politics has become largely a dirty game and most politicians are seeking personal gain and glory if not something worse, a precious few of the calibre of Bernard Soysa stood uncorrupted and incorruptible. Thus it was unfortunate that while men who played to the gallery and built personal empires and massive funerals, Bernard Soysa was laid to rest with relatively little fanfare.
A funeral is a time for farewell and yet it is also a time for journeying through the realms of memory. Bernard Soysa's funeral yesterday while it was a poignant parting for his socialist comrades and all those who loved and knew him was also a time for the evocation of memories both sad and joyful.
When we went down to the LSSP party headquarters hurriedly to be on time to join the procession to the Independence Square on the final journey Comrade Bernard would take away from the party he succored, away from his relatives and friends and away from his mission for building a better and a more humane world for all of them and his countrymen, the funeral cortege we were told had already left. The place seemed desolate as if it and everything associated with it missed Bernard, the leader and compatriot.
As we followed the route through to the Independence Square with the roundabouts and streets on the way strung with red and white flags and pennants we did so with a sense of anticipation mixed with melancholy. Around 3.30 pm. as we approached through the barriers after identifying ourselves at security checkpoints we saw people still moving towards the Square.
There were many in red shirts and several were older folk who would perhaps have seen through many of the fiery and revolutionary aims of the Sama Samaja Party in days gone by. Bernard Soysa was no doubt part of all that but one cannot readily associate him as being in that mould - he may not have been as charismatic or flamboyant as some of his other outstanding compatriots in politics but he had a great many other virtues to commend him.
A cool breeze wafted across the square and a gentle, welcome drizzle came on as Independence Hall where the funeral casket draped simply in red stood and speeches were made. Acting leader Batty Weerakoon spoke of Bernard Soysa's love outside politics for the arts, music and poetry. He was indeed an erudite gentleman as renowned scientist and Bernard's personal friend described him as he mourned his loss. But as Batty Weerakoon recalled, he was also a large-hearted and generous man who was always at the beck and call of the poor. All in all it was of a man of the gentlest and most gentlemanly disposition that he spoke.
The lighting of the funeral pyre yesterday in a sense signalled the passing away of an era of socialist politics with its great vision of emancipation of the common man . It will be upto those taking on the mantle of the LSSP to follow the lead set for them by one of the last greats of their party standing out as supreme exemplar.
The TULF and the EPRLF on Friday filed writ petitions.in the Court of Appeal challenging the rejection of their nomination papers for the local govt. polls in the North.
The writs seek to quash the decision of the Returning Officer for Jaffna.who rejected the nomination papers on an alleged irregularity in the age submitted in respect of youth candidates as well as the non-attestation of the party General Secretary's signature by a Justice of the Peace.
TULF senior Vice President V.Anandasangari in his petition has cited Returning Officer A.O.M.Nafeel, the Commissioner of Elections, and party leaders M.K. Sivajilingam (TELO), Douglas Devananda (EPDP), S. Sathanantham (PLOTE), Premachandran (EPRLF) and the Attorney General as respondents .
The petitioner stated that the nomination paper of the TULF for the Jaffna Municipal Council was handed over by the party legal secretary to the first respondent and that the nomination paper contained the names of 29 candidates including 12 youth candidates.
It also states the revision of the electoral register operative for the general election is the 1996 register and according to the definition of 'youth' a candidate had to be over 18 years of age on 01.06.1996.
The petitioner adds that the Returning Officer may reject a nomination paper "that does not contain the total number of youth candidates".
The petitioner is advised that the first respondent was not empowered by law to go into the question whether a person nominated as a youth candidate was in fact a "youth" as defined in the Local Authorities Elections Ordinance but the respondent could only ascertain whether the number of persons nominated as youth candidates is the total number of youth required to be nominated.
Britain's monarchy should mark Sri Lanka's 50 years of Independence by apologising for past atrocities and detrimental policies carried out during the colonial rule here, says a leading Sinhala group.
The National Joint Committee is vowing to resist the Government's choice of Prince Charles as chief guest at the Feb. 4 nationwide commemoration. The NJC says it won't back down, unless Queen Elizabeth, Britain's ruling sovereign, or her eldest son on her behalf first officially apologise to the people of Sri Lanka, specifically for a series of recorded massacres of rebellious Sinhalese peasants by British forces in the 19th Century.
"The Queen, representing the government of Britain, must apologise to Sri Lankans before Prince Charles comes," Piyasena Dissanayake, the NJC's Secretary told The Sunday Times. "If he says that he's coming to make this apology, a formal apology, he will be most welcome to do that."
The NJC and its leader, ex-Supreme Court Judge Raja Wanasundera, already at odds with the Government on the Package, via its appointed Sinhala National Commission, has protested officially to President Kumaratunga, and will this week spell out its grievances in a separate letter to the British High Commission in Colombo, Mr Dissanayake said.
Beyond this, it remains to be seen how the umbrella group, comprising 46 Sinhala groups,including the 10,000-strong YMBA - will defy the President and her advisers should they let the Prince of Wales, heir to the British throne, arrive in Sri Lanka as expected without an apology in mind.
The NJC, by its vaguely worded admission, is leaving it to Charles' discretion before determining how to play the next counterstroke.
"We leave it to the good sense of Prince Charles to decide whether, in these circumstances, he should come here or not," Mr Dissanayake said.
"We have not decided as to what we will do if he does come, in spite of our protest. We are, of course, a very peaceful organisation."
The NJC's spokesman likened the scenario of Britain's modern-day royals apologising for excesses carried out in Sri Lanka by past generations of countrymen to the Emperor of Japan's recent apology for alleged atrocities and abuses carried out by his country's invading and occupational forces during the Second World War.
"We can't undo history, but we can't as a nation forget some of the incidents that took place under their regime here in this country", Mr. Dissanayake said. "They [the British] should at least have the courtesy to apologise to us for what their grandfathers or great-grandfathers did. They have not done that."
He was referring to the ruthlessly crushed Sinhalese uprisings of 1818 and 1848, in which thousands of unarmed peasants, many of them women and children, are known to have perished at the hands of the British.
According to Mr. Dissanayake, other measures executed under 150 years of British rule have taken a far-reaching toll. He cited, as an example, the 1897 Waste Lands Ordinance that left much of the Kandyan peasantry, whose legacy of dispossession can be seen in the area today, landless.
"Fifty years of independence is a momentous occasion for Sri Lanka," he added. "But then now, the big man who comes to grace this occasion is a man representing an imperial government which destroyed our history, our culture, our language, our religion - everything that we hold dear. So how can we respect a man like that?"
In Mr. Dissanayake's view, the Government should have instead considered a blue-blood from a traditionally friendly country to do the honours on Feb. 4. Either King Sihanouk of Cambodia or King of Thailand, nations with which Sri Lanka has maintained long cultural and diplomatic ties, would have been an ideal choice as Chief Guest, he said.
A spokesman for the Sri Lankan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, citing security reasons, declined to confirm whether Prince Charles would be making an appearance on the big day. For that matter, a ministry spokesman also declined to release the names of those foreign dignitaries who had accepted invitations from Sri Lanka to attend the upcoming commemoration.
But, according to a news agency report from London on Monday, Buckingham Palace has announced that he is indeed going ahead with the planned visit, despite the NJC airing its protest.
Meanwhile, The Sunday Times has learned that advance teams from Scotland Yard and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office were in Kandy recently, the site of the commemoration, to reconnoitre security at official venues.
The long standing vacancies to the Court of Appeal were at last filled with the promotion of two High Court Judges to the appellate court by President Chandrika Kumaratunga. Colombo High Court Judges Dharmasiri Jayawickrama and P.H.K. Kulathilaka have been officially informed of their appointments, but a date is to be fixed for their swearing in.
The vacancies arose in the Court of Appeal some months ago after the then President of the Court of Appeal D.P.S. Gunasekara was promoted to the Supreme Court and the resignation of Appeal Court Judge R. Ranaraja.
Legal sources pointed out that this is the second time that High Court Judge Shirani Thilakawardena has been overlooked in promotion to the Court of Appeal, the first being in mid 1997 when Judges Upali de Z. Gunawardene and T.B. Weerasuriya were promoted to the Court of Appeal.
A team of representatives of the Jain Commission which investigated the Rajiv Gandhi assassination will arrive in Sri Lanka shortly to obtain some of the vital documents related to the case which is in the possession of a leading businessman in Sri Lanka.
The businessman who has had trade dealings with Indian companies also is linked to a key political party here.
The businessman when contacted said that initially when the Jain Commission investigations began, the commission had sought clarification from him, but thereafter they had not contacted him.
He said he was willing to hand over relevant documents to the commission.
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