Editorial

5th July 1998

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Let there be answers

Fire to the fuel

Let there be answers

The country's security situation will soon come in for particular review in the context of the on-going Operation Jaya Sikurui and the planned Provincial Council Elections. In this context the Government has released some maps this week (which we publish today on page 5). What all this indicates is a move towards a controlled media build-up, or perhaps a forerunner, for next week's debate on the Emergency which has to find approval in Parliament and more importantly on the UNP call for a debate on the conduct of the war in the days ahead.

Evidently these maps make a percentage game on the on-going civil war, making it out as a battle for real estate. While one may argue as to whether this is yet another election gundu, or while one may justifiably argue that the Jaya Sikurui operation is indeed a battle for territory, there remains the crucial question of it all boiling down to plain and simple guerrilla war that the country's forces are engaged in.

The LTTE is going for soft targets such as transformers, power plants and human ones like Douglas Devananda. They are doing all in their power to cripple the civil administration in Jaffna by eliminating Tamil political foes like the TULF and the EPDP, those parties who believe in an LTTE-free Jaffna.

Counter-insurgency measures therefore need to be decisive, but it seems the Police are now stretched to the limit and the IGP is at his wits end as he frankly indicates his inability to provide adequate security for the forthcoming PC polls in August.

Meanwhile General Ratwatte has given a November deadline to ensure that the security situation is well within control. But then the General has an awful track record with deadlines! Can we have faith in yet another? We have repeatedly urged that the war should not be waged with political agendas in mind. It is unfortunate that elections to buttress a worthless system of Government vis-a-vis Provincial Councils have now to come in the way of the war. Besides all this, a censorship now shuts the people out from knowing what really is happening in the single most important issue in the country - the war.

May we suggest then a possible way out. First scrap the PC system - one which nobody in the South demanded anyway. Well that does away with elections. Then in place of PCs introduce 'real devolution' of power at the grassroots level, not power to political parties. As a corollary an all-party executive committee system could possibly be put in place, best at the District Council level, with the various units putting their emphasis on development. Does it matter if these proposals may even sound like President J.R. Jayewardene's District Development Councils (DDCs)? What the crying need for today is the implementation of features on administrative and developmental lines, not on ethnic lines. Let there be answers to the development problem of Sri Lanka, not focus only on the ethnic problem — which in fact is a complicated terrorist problem. After all what do we best call the Tamil LTTE attack on the Tamil EPDP leader? An ethnic problem?

Fire to the fuel

Sri Lanka's monopolistic oil giant the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation-over loaded to such an extent with political jobs that some officers have no desks - has added troubles to oily waters in the aftermath of last Tuesday's disastrous and possibly catastrophic oil spill. This is the second biggest catastrophe after the Kolonnawa refinery attack

CPC bosses admit they did not have the modern equipment and the know-how to tackle the crisis when some 72 tons of crude oil leaked out of a broken hose turning the sea black in an area extending from Kollupitya to Lunawa.

According to The Sunday Times probe, the CPC used some unprofessional if not inefficient methods such as trying to pump a counteracting chemical from the seashore in an era when most countries conduct such emergency operations with helicopters and specially trained staff. The chemical pumped from the shore - like some municipal workers spraying DDT in a drain - obviously did little or nothing except to turn a black sea into gold and then brown and leaving people wondering what in hell was coming from the highly polluted water.

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