Editorial

10th May 1998

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State mischief

We are at a loss as to what to make of the young Media and Posts Minister Mangala Samaraweera.

First as Minister of Posts he had allowed the postal crisis to stretch itself out for two chaotic months. But we are with him here.

Then we need to appreciate Minister Samaraweera's steadfast stand on the continued harassment of The Sunday Times Consultant Editor Iqbal Athas.

Another 'ambivalent plus' needs to be granted to the good Minister. This time for the welcome he gave to the Colombo Declaration on Media Freedom and Social Responsibility .

Why ambivalent then? What gives us cause to say this is the tantalising way in which the Minister changed shape, soon after he welcomed in a lucid statement the Declaration that entails greater media freedom and freedom of expression. At the same conference and in the same breath as it were, brandishing a copy of the newspaper, he branded 'The Sunday Times' imputing motives to the newspaper for carrying a news item saying the Army would be looking to the schools in a recruitment drive.

The 'Doctor Mangala and Mr. Samaraweera' came out in the Minister when he thought it fit to say 'The Sunday Times' was deliberately carrying false news to create mischief. He asked whether this was responsible journalism and proper media ethics by those who profess media freedom. Let us enlighten him. Yes we did carry such a story on our front page which was further elaborated in our regular 'Situation Report' on an inside page. We maintain that the Army did have plans to go into schools on a recruitment drive. We stand by our story. The Army Commander has confirmed this. But there is a glaring difference to the way in which Minister Mangala Samaraweera put it.

He says we referred to an Army drive to recruit "school children". We never said that. We referred to "school leavers". Minister Mangala Samaraweera surely knows school children from school leavers? One wears shorts, the other longs. He knew, or ought to have known also that our story spoke of an Army exercise to attract "school leavers" in order to give them an opening in a professional career? The Army as a career. What is wrong with that ? The Army Act enables the Army to recruit anyone over 18 years of age and it is done all over the world. Our front page story today gives more details of the Army's recruitment plan in schools.

Why did the Government then have to panic and make an incorrect response? That it panicked when the LTTE propaganda machine carried out a disinformation blitz to make out that the Sri Lanka Government was moving to recruit "school children" into the Army is evident from what followed. Merely because the UN Special Envoy Olara Otunnu was here at the time to probe the LTTE recruitment of children into their cadres why should our government have panicked at our story?

Wouldn't it have been far wiser for the Government to have come out with the truth to which Mr. Otunnu would certainly have had no objection in fact could have had no objection. Instead the Government troika of Ministers Lakshman Kadirgamar, General Anuruddha Ratwatte and Mangala Samaraweera thought it better to deny the whole story lock, stock and AK-47. The Media Minister was unleashed to make 'The Sunday Times' a scapegoat and to get himself all mixed-up between school children and school leavers.

If there was one huge blow to the LTTE's war apparatus in recent times, it was the Foreign Minister's campaign against the LTTE's use of children in this bloody war. That campaign was not only of diplomatic significance, but also of military significance. Moreover, it had social significance. The LTTE's recruitment of "children" came under the scrutiny of the entire world. It was a campaign we unequivocally supported and continue to support. We challenge the Government to deny our support for this campaign.

If the Government chose to panic over an LTTE propaganda blitz from Europe and if it chose as a result to back-track on what was a perfectly legitimate recruitment drive to unnecessarily placate the UN envoy, then to lie or be told to lie and blame us is to say the least, disgraceful and irresponsible conduct by any standard by any Government. Shame.

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