The way forward

The Presidential elections are over but the final results are still coming in as you read this column. This is written on the day of the elections, but I am confident that the people would have voted to safeguard national security and the unitary state. Having said that, I must add that, unless we are very vigilant and committed, there is a possibility that the unitary state could be replaced by a federal state. Though Tamil terrorism has been defeated, Tamil separatism and Tamil racism are kicking hard from London with the intervention of the government of Cameron, or if you insist the government of Elizabeth Windsor.

The English (British for the political analysts, political scientists and the other pundits) high commissioner in Sri Lanka was visibly involved in the election campaign, though not directly, travelling around the country. He was ably assisted by the American ambassador and later towards the end of the campaign they were joined by the European Union, which had earlier imposed sanctions on fish trade. The High Commissioner and the US ambassador had met Minister Basil Rajapaksa on Wednesday, and the former has apparently told that his country would work for lifting of sanctions at the EU. It is not known what England did at the meeting of the EU, which decided to impose economic sanctions.

It appears that the envoys are trying to establish good relationships with Sri Lanka. However, having known England for more than two hundred years and US for more than one hundred years, the majority of Sinhala people are suspicious of the meetings. It may be that the Government of Sri Lanka wanted to counter the rumours that are spread in fashionably called social media by meeting the envoys. Whatever the reasons may be the Government of Sri Lanka should be careful when meeting present day Doyles.

Terrorist attack in Paris

It is ironical that on Wednesday there was a terrorist attack on a satirical newspaper in Paris, where Chandrika Kumaratunga who mentioned of Mr. Prabhakaran in Jaffna had apparently studied. We do not attach any importance to her claim that she studied at Sorbonne, without being awarded a degree, as the university is not groomed in the tradition of Mahavihara or Abhayagiriya or even Nalanda in Dambadiva. In any event the terrorist attack in Paris is not a satire, and we in Sri Lanka have had more than our share of "satire" for more than twenty five years.

I am sure that the terrorist who masterminded the Paris attack is a mister or may be even a monsieur and we should thank Chandrika Kumaratunga if she could distinguish between a mister, a monsieur and a monster. A monsieur in London or Paris is very often a monster in Kotte and monsieur Prabhakaran who was nurtured and nourished by London finally had to end his life in Nandikadal Lagoon surrendering to the present day Parakramabahu VI of Kotte.

We had identified the present day Don Juan and Dona Katherina long time ago, when some of the pundits speaking on behalf of the unitary state were for a federal state, and the fate of the monsieur would have been different if they were in power.

The attack in Paris is nothing but one of a series of violence by Muslim Chinthanaya on Greek Judaic Christian (GJC) Chinthanaya, or if one wants to imitate Huntington a clash of civilizations though the concept is not clear. However, it does not mean that the GJC Chinthanaya is innocent, and it can be said that most of the problems in the world during the last five hundred years are due to that Chinthanaya.

It is the Western foreign policy led by the Americans that is responsible for the mess that the whole world is in, and the Muslim Chinthanaya unlike most of the other Chinthanayas is capable of challenging the GJC Chinthanaya militarily.

As far as Sri Lanka is concerned, London would not give up easily and is behind Tamil racism and Tamil separatism. Tamil racism was created in the early decades of the nineteenth century with the establishment of the Legislative Assembly, which evolved to Tamil separatism in the forties with the elections to the first Parliament.

However, C. Suntheralingam had come with the concept of Eelam (Eylom as he spelled it) much earlier.

The Tamil separatism was baptized politically in the forties and with the establishment of Ilankai Thamil Arasu Kadchchi (the so called Federal Party) in 1949 it began its campaign for a separate state.

The Vadukoddai resolution of 1976 saw the culmination of this movement. By that time Tamil terrorism that is nothing but the armed extension of Tamil separatism had come into existence and Monsieur Prabhakaran finally became the sole representative of the Tamils as recognized by the TULF as well as the TNA later on. It is only Tamil terrorism that has been defeated, and Tamil separatism and Tamil racism continue to exist. If we are to go forward we must defeat Tamil separatism and finally Tamil racism and it cannot be done by kneeling down to London, Washington or Paris that define the cultural triangle of the "educated" Sri Lankans.

The West applies pressure on the Sri Lankan government through various means and their agents could be found both inside and outside the government.

It is said in certain quarters that the foreign policy of the government became a mess after certain people were called back from places such as Geneva and Paris. Some of them helped Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa at the Presidential elections and more than a vigilant eye has to be kept on them. The Sri Lankan foreign policy is not in a mess. As said previously it is the American policy following that of their cousins in England, which is responsible for the problems in Sri Lanka as well.

The political scientists and political analysts who have been trained in the Western universities, Peradeniya being one of them, would proclaim that we are in a mess simply because the Western countries bring so called human right violation charges against Sri Lanka in Geneva on a half yearly basis, following the half yearly examinations some schools used to have about sixty years ago.

The Western countries would stop their nonsense in Geneva if the government of Sri Lanka is prepared to implement the thirteenth amendment and go beyond that. This policy is called thirteen plus and it is said at one time Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa had promised to go beyond the thirteenth amendment.

It is clear that whether he promised this or not, some delegates had promised the thirteenth amendment to the Western countries that in turn acted favourably to Sri Lanka.

Social media

The advocates of the thirteenth amendment are in the Cabinet and among the so called political scientists who were promoted mainly by government media and some Cabinet ministers who themselves were federalists few years ago, but now follow the President reluctantly, but it is high time to drop them, as the people do not want the thirteenth amendment implemented.

We have to be concerned also of so called social media, another term created by the Western intellectuals to give it a pseudo democratic appearance, which propagated nothing but lies. It is believed that the facebook information was uploaded in London and this again proves that unless we have our own systems of knowledge we are vulnerable to attacks by the Western system of knowledge.

It is unfortunate that the young generation in general has become slaves of what is known as IT, but in the name of information they receive pattapal boru (blatant lies) though not of the same order as Western science. The pattapal boru of Western science are mere guesses that have been successful to a certain extent, but the pattapal boru in cyberspace are nothing but naked lies.

The nationalistic minded people who have some knowledge of information technology should address this problem, while those who are interested in politics should concentrate on ditching the politicians in the government and the pundits who are promoted by these politicians, who still advocate implementation of the thirteenth amendment that paves the way to federalism.

Nalin De Silva

09-01-2015

From Keppetipola Nilame to PRESIDENT RAJAPAKSA

t was in 1815 that the Sinhala English Pact or what is known erroneously as the Kandyan Convention was signed. As we have often said there were two very important clauses in the Pact, without which the Sinhala leaders would not have signed it. The English promised to rule the country according to Sinhala siritha (law) and to protect and safeguard what they called Buddhagama and Devagama or in other words Sinhala Buddhist culture. However, the English being gentlemen, the way they introduced themselves, breached the Pact even before one could say Brownrig.

The result was our first independence struggle against the colonialist rule of the English over the entire island, though from 1506 onwards Sinhala people had fought against the Portuguese, the Dutch and the English in different areas at different times without surrendering. The Sinhala people were not defeated at war and finally they signed a Pact with the English on how the country should be ruled.

Keppetipola Nilame gave leadership to the independence struggle, however there were even then some Kalusuddas or Sinhala people who had been conditioned to support the English and probably to think like the latter, and with their aid and also of course with superior military power the English were able to defeat the uprising. Though the Kalusuddas were produced on a mass scale after the establishment of English schools it is clear that since 1506 there had been Kalusuddas among the Sinhala people. Keppetipola Nilame was killed by the English, definitely not in the name of good governance, and what is more the males over twelve years in Uva Vellassa were massacred by the godfathers of good governance.

Sinhala Buddhist culture

Since 1506 the Sinhala people have been fighting to regain the Sinhale and the Sinhala culture that they were familiar with. The main objective of all these struggles has been to win back due recognition to Sinhala culture and especially to Sinhala Buddhist culture. However, people such as Ranil Wickremesinghe are ignorant of this and they wanted to commemorate the five hundredth anniversary of the arrival of the Portuguese. In fact Ranil proposed to celebrate the occasion when he was the Prime Minster for about two years under Chandrika Kumaratunga but the people displaced him from the position of the Prime Minster and also Chandrika Kumaratunga from the Presidency before 2006 (5). Mahinda Rajapaksa became the President in 2005 and stopped all those nonsense of worshipping colonialism by the Kalusuddas and the Kalusuddis.

If we confine ourselves to the period after signing the Sinhala English Pact we find a number of patriots who had given leadership to our independence struggle. As Gunadasa Amarasekera has argued Anagarika Dharmapala was not a mere Buddhist revivalist upasaka but a leader who gave leadership to a political movement. The movement was nothing but the nationalist movement that had the aim of giving due recognition to Sinhala Buddhist culture. As Amarasekera has stated 1956 was nothing but a revival of the Dharmapala movement. Amarasekera's conjecture can be extended and we could state that 1956 was in effect a continuation of the independence struggle against the English who had the support of the Kalusuddas and Kalusuddis.

The official language act wanted to give due recognition to the Sinhala language replacing the English of the Suddas and the Kalusuddas. However the Marxists and Liberals alike, who are instructed by the West through their theories and concepts, opposed the Official Language policy, and finally joined hands with Tamil racism that had been established and nourished by the English since the establishment of the Legislative Assembly in the early decades of the nineteenth century.

The independence struggle since the latter part of the nineteenth century has concentrated on cultural colonialism, which is maintained in Asia, Africa and South America through Western knowledge imparted using schools, universities, and now media especially the television and to some extent cinema and Literature. Anagarika Dharmapala gave leadership to the fight against cultural and economic colonialism after the second major independence struggle against political and economic colonialism by Veera Puran Appu, Gongalegoda Banda. It has to be emphasized that the Bhikkus were the instructors behind all these struggles, who were identified by the English as the yellow peril.

The Liberals, Marxists and others who are merely agents of colonialism ignore the cultural component of Western colonialism that came into existence in the latter part of the fifteenth century. Western colonialism has three components, namely political, economic and cultural and the Western theories concentrate only on the political and economic components.

The Sinhala people who have no inclination to theorize have understood by intuition the cultural component and unlike the "sophisticated" educated people who are nothing but imitators, have understood Tamil racism as the major instrument used by the English to maintain colonialism in the country. The SLFP that was established in 1951 along Liberal lines was converted to a party based on nationalism fighting against colonialism with an emphasis on the cultural component around 1954 during the time of Minneriya election. The party adopted the Sinhala Language policy and after that it worked towards being the party of nationalism (Jathikatvaye Pakshaya).

"Dharmishta Rajya" concept

However, the Party was defeated in 1977 due to misguided "socialist" economic policies and JR Jayewardane came to power through his "Dharmishta Rajya" concept, which was nothing but a camouflage to cover up his pro colonialist policies, similar to the good governance cry of the non nationalist forces to undermine the struggle for freedom by Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa. The Sinhala people were cheated by JR Jayewardane with the "Dharmishta Rajya" concept and he went on to establish a semi autocratic state and by 1989 the SLFP was in doldrums.

Mrs. Bandaranaike was the leader of the Party and Mr. JRP Sooriyaarachchi the secretary. Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa had formed a committee to commemorate the late Mr. Bandaranaike and they wanted to organize a meeting for the purpose. However, Mrs. Bandaranaike was not in favour of the idea as she thought that people would not attend the meeting due to "yahapalana bheeshanaya" of the UNP, but the committee was looking for a speaker. The speakers were not found in dozens in those "bheeshana" good governance days of R Premadasa, and Messrs. Mahinda Rajapaksa and SB Dissanayaka came to our home to invite me to deliver the first Bandaranaike Memorial Lecture. I spoke on "Panashaye Daruwo" (children of fifty six) to a crowd that overflowed the BMICH, to the satisfaction of Mrs. Bandaranaike, and as Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa has admitted it was the beginning of a new era.

Unfortunately the children of Mr. and Mrs. Bandaranaike were not children of fifty six and at various times they had left the party of their parents to join other parties. In the early nineties when the SLFP was gaining strength mainly due to its nationalistic policies and the organizational abilities of Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa, Western powers and their agents in Sri Lanka including Rajitha Senarathne who is familiar with PRRA that was formed to annihilate the JVP, but who quotes Trotsky now to proclaim that he would march differently but fight together with the JVP against the SLFP, wanted to change the nationalistic policies of the SLFP. It is clear that Rajitha Senarathne from his Janawegaya days has been against the nationalistic policies of the SLFP and he wanted to destroy the JVP then due to its pseudo nationalistic policies after the Indo-Lanka Accord. Now he fights with the JVP that has dropped its pseudo nationalistic policies just as much the leaders of the JHU have done, against the nationalistic policies of the SLFP.

However, Chandrika Kumaratunga was able to capitalize against the seventeen year rule of the UNP and became the President of the country in 1994. Her policy of ending the war was by giving more than one third of the country to "Mr. Prabhakaran" through so called peace talks based on Western knowledge that the LTTE cannot be defeated. The common man did not allow her to do so and finally elected Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa as the President of the country. Mr. Rajapaksa continued with the nationalistic policies of the SLFP and defeated Tamil terrorism at Nandikadal in 2009. It is clear that he would continue to defeat Tamil racism that is operated by England from London through the dispersed Tamils living there and the rest of the Western countries.

Western colonialism

The West wants to defeat Mr. Rajapaksa and give him the same treatment given to Keppetipola Nilame as he has fought against Western colonialism. They want to punish the Defence Secretary, the officers and the soldiers of the armed forces through a so called internal domestic inquiry or "domestic war crime tribunal" that has been promised by Maithripala Sirisena who is only a puppet of Chandrika and Ranil who in turn are agents of Western colonialism, following the way the English massacred the Uva Wellassa people. Those who want a "change" are looking for a blood bath massacring the nationalistic forces in the country.

All the non nationalistic forces have got together against Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa and the nationalistic SLFP, and parties such as SLMC and TNA would not have supported Maithripala if he did not promise them what the government refused to give. If both the government and the opposition rejected their demands they should have said that they would not support either of the two candidates. Those who think that leaders of the JHU would be able to prevent paving the way to an Eelam under a puppet of the Westerners do not know the opportunistic policies of the former. In any event they claim that they could not get the approval of Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa who gave political leadership to defeat the LTTE, for their policies. If that is the case how can one expect them to get the approval of Ranil and Chandrika who signed a so called ceasefire agreement with "Mr. Prabhakaran" and wanted PTOMS, for their policies even if they are genuine.

The Muslims and the Tamils should ignore not only their leaders in Sri Lanka but in the West and unite with the nationalistic forces to defeat Western colonialism. The Muslims should look up to the Palestine leaders who have named a road after Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa and not up to the opportunistic Muslim leaders in Sri Lanka who are only agents of Western colonialism. In any event the Sinhala nationalistic forces would not allow themselves to be massacred nor allow the Westerners to destroy Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa. They have learnt a lot since the days of Keppetipola Nilame. 

Nalin De Silva

02-01-2015

Good governance is a non issue

he massive crowds that gather at the election meetings of Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa clearly demonstrate that the so called good governance is not an issue at all at the forthcoming presidential elections. How many people think that Shirani Bandaranayake is still the Chief Justice of Sri Lanka? Except for herself and the good governance people in the opposition nobody would consider this lady as the Chief Justice of Sri Lanka. Then we have Maithripala Sirisena who considers himself as the secretary of the SLFP.

He probably does not remember many things and he should be allowed to believe that he is still the secretary of his former party that has suspended his membership. Recently he said that he would close down the Katunayake airport on the eighth midnight but later within twenty four hours said that he should be having a “mole amaruwa” (deranged mind) if he had said that he would close down the airport on the eighth midnight. It is left to the readers to decide on the state of mind of both the former Chief Justice and the former secretary of the SLFP.

A former vice chancellor of an old university goes on issuing statements as a member of a forum that has no mass base at all except among a small percentage of readers of English language newspapers, and who writes to the English language press on her own laments on lack of good governance forgetting how she went behind politicians and others to get her appointed as the Vice Chancellor of the University.

Presidential election

The council of a university recommends three persons to the post of vice chancellor and after that it is the President who appoints one of them as the Vice Chancellor. The canvassing that goes behind the scene is the same under all the Presidents we have had since the University Act No 16 of 1978 became the law of the country and the good governance luminaries have forgotten how they were appointed to the elite positions.

Some university lecturers have published a full page newspaper supplement under the title Forum of University Teachers without identifying themselves and giving the impression that the university lecturers as a whole support Maithripala Sirisena.

The cost of these advertisements is enormous and these good governance people should explain to the readers of newspapers whether it is “good governance” to mislead the people by giving the impression that the university lecturers as a whole want to defeat Mahinda Rajapaksa at the Presidential elections, and how these poorly paid academics according to FUTA could spend so much money on advertisements. It may be that some of these good governance academics have “big brains” compared to the “little brains” (podi mola karayo in the words of at least two of them) of people such as me who are none other than “nivatayas” and “thakkadiyas”. I as a “podi mola karaya” challenge these “big brain” academics for a debate on good governance either in Peradeniya or Colombo universities, which are not unfamiliar to me.

JHU leaders

Good governance as I have argued elsewhere is a Trojan horse that brings us the non national forces (vijathika balawega) to campaign against Mahinda Rajapaksa and undermine our sovereignty. If the “big brain” people were to say sovereignty is not a “national” concept I would say that I am happy with the word “nidahasa” which has been protected by the Sinhala people in their history of more than two thousand years. It is the nidahasa and not good governance that has become the dominant issue at the Presidential Elections, as people understand the issues by intuition, in spite of the pundits.

The “peratugami” (not a member of the “peratugami pakshaya” but the initiator) of the good governance movement Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera is not heard of these days and I wonder whether it is good governance to ditch people after “employing” them to do a job of work. The Thera initiated the good governance movement most probably on the advice of “big brain” people and others who are against Mahinda Rajapaksa and defeating the LTTE. Most of the present day good governance people including the leaders of the JHU had been against the “war” at one time or the other and have been advocates of the so called peace movement.

In the early nineties the present day JHU leaders in their previous organisations put up posters against the war and told their followers that “jathiya is a malakandak” (nation is a dead body) that cannot be marketed. They have been oscillating between pseudo nationalism and federalism over the last twenty years or so and one should not be surprised that they are with Mangala Samaraweera, Chandrika Kumaratunga and Co., once again arguing for Tamil racism. They have only recently said that army camps in the Northern province should be removed.

It is the nidahasa of the country that differentiates Mahinda Rajapaksa from Maithripala Sirisena, which is the reason for good governance people get together to defeat the incumbent (and future) President. Mahinda Rajapaksa was able to give political leadership to defeat the LTTE without wavering and dancing according to the tune of the Western powers. On the other hand Ranil Wickremesinghe and Chandrika Kumaratunga signed a so called ceasefire agreement with Prabhakaran giving more than two thirds of the country to the terrorists and the Westerners.

Chandrika Kumaratunga cannot say that she was not responsible for the agreement as it was Ranil Wickremesinghe who signed the agreement on behalf of the government. According to article 33 (e) of the constitution only the President can declare war and peace, and if Chandrika Kumaratunga was against it she could have annulled it. However, she did not do so as she had to obey the High Commissioner for England, which is her second home for all purposes and she was thus against the nidahasa of the country. Further she was responsible for PTOMS, and the JHU leaders have gone back to their early nineties days to be with Chandrika Kumaratunga and Mangala Samaraweera.

It was Mahinda Rajapaksa who gave political leadership to defeat the LTTE, and won nidahasa to the people, in more than one sense, and the vast majority of people unlike the good governance minority have realised this. That is the reason for the ordinary people to rally round the President, wanting Mahinda Rajapaksa to complete the project of defeating Tamil racism operated through the dispersed Tamils, the TNA, the JHU by England led Western powers.

The next step in defeating Tamil racism is based on identifying England as our biggest enemy and getting ready for the economic sanctions that the West will apply after Mahinda Rajapaksa becomes the president for a third time, and also for the various Arab Springs that the West will organise through their “employees” in and outside Sri Lanka. The uncommon opposition that has no declared common policy should declare their policy towards Tamil racism.

Western countries

The JHU has already told the Tamil language press that the armed forces should be removed from the Northern province and the people are interested in finding out the contents of the pacts that Maithripala Sirisena has signed with various political parties and individuals. Maithripala Sirisena should specifically publish the contents of the pact with the TNA. The JHU now has agreed to go with the TNA as demonstrated by their demand to remove army camps, and all these pacts are detrimental to the nidahasa of the country and people are more concerned with the nidahasa than with so called good governance.

It is clear that the non national forces want “good governance” to be the theme at the Presidential elections only to undermine the real problem, which is none other than protecting the nidahasa of the country by defeating Tamil racism maintained by England and other Western countries. The people understand this by intuition and their verdict on January 8th would be to protect nidahasa through the leadership of Mahinda Rajapaksa. 

Nalin De Silva

22-12-2014

Is the opposition contesting elections

The opposition parties in Sri Lanka consists of UNP, JVP, TNA and few other parties such as the Democratic Party of Sarath Fonseka. The JHU can be now considered as a party of the opposition and in addition there are certain individuals without affiliations to any recognized political party who are identified with the opposition. Maithripala Sirisena belongs to the latter category though he is contesting the Presidential Elections as a candidate of a recognized political party and as the common opposition candidate. It should be mentioned that a candidate nominated by a political party at the Presidential elections or Parliamentary elections or any other elections need not be a member of the political party.

These political parties or the individuals in the opposition do not form a common opposition nor are they babies in politics. The UNP has been in politics for about seventy years and Ranil Wickremesinghe has led the party for about twenty years. The JVP is now more than fifty years old and Anura Kumara Dissanayake is known in the political world for at least twenty five years. The TNA and its predecessors such as the Illankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi (ITAK) the Tamil Congress, Hindu Maha Sabhai, have been in politics since the days of Ponnambalams, meaning Ponnambalam Ramanathan, Arunacahalam and G G Ponnambalam. The JHU and its predecessors, Janatha Mithuro, Thrastha Virodhi Jathika Vyaparaya have participated in various political activities for about twenty five years. Only Sarath Fonseka is relatively new to politics but he is known for his white flag story (sudu kody kathava) since his visit to US in 2009 after the Nandikadal Victory.

It is well known that these political parties and individuals have different political policies and do not constitute one political unit. Neither Chandrika Kumaratunga nor Maithripala Kumaratunga belong to the SLFP at present despite the latter’s claim that he is still the secretary of the party. The elections commissioner has recognized Anura Priyadarshana Yapa as the secretary of the SLFP and the party has suspended the membership of Maithripala Sirisena. The latter’s claim that they will form an all party or national government if accepted means that it will be a government of the TNA and JHU as well. This is not altogether impossible as the JHU is capable of changing its policies opportunistically. The JHU leadership was with the JVP in their school days and then with the Chinthana Parshadaya for a short time, then joined Mangala Samaraweera and his federal politics opposing “war”, then coming to nationalistic policies after realizing that there was an “illuma” (demand) for such politics. They can go back to Mangala Samaraweera politics if they think that there is an “illuma” for federal politics. However, the SLFP under Mahinda Rajapaksa will not be in a so called all party conference, and it should not be forgotten that the SLFP has the biggest mass base at present.

In any event, Maithripala Sirisena has had to sign several pacts and it is clear that there is no common opposition. Let the so called common candidate spell out his policy on the Tamil problem, the devolution of powers to the provincial councils, on the northern and eastern provincial councils, police and land powers etc. This presidential elections is finally on defeating Tamil racism operated through the dispersed Tamils by England and US, and not on “good governance”  and western styled bogus democracy of Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera and his team (not dayakayas) of left out leftists and academic trade unionists who have no existence if not for the publicity they receive from some sections of media. It is England the colonial superpower of yesteryear that established, nurtured and maintained Tamil racism against the Sinhala people (not a so called Sinhala government) to take revenge from the Sinhala people whom they could not defeat at “war” (they annexed the Sinhale or Sinhala kingdom through cunning diplomacy of Doyle in 1815 using a pact that they never wanted to implement) and to destroy the Sinhala Buddhist culture. We would like to know the policy of Maithripala Sirisena on the Tamil problem in general and his strategy of defeating the dispersed Tamil manipulated by England and US.

Ranil Wickremesinghe was not born last year and everybody knows his policy not only on the Tamil problem through the ceasefire agreement but also on giving employment in the public sector which he curtailed and “good governance”. Ven. Sobhitha Thera more than anybody else knows “good governance” of the UNP when he and the late Prof. Sarachchandra were given a “panchakarma” treatment of body massage. However, Ranil Wickremesinghe talks of democracy media freedom etc., as if he was born yesterday and it is clear that he and the others are dancing to the tune of somebody else. However, they do not know that it is the tune of Swan song. Chandrika Kumaratunga who has no mass base at all, (she is not a member of the Mahajana Party or Bahujana Nidahas Party of Rajitha Senaratne and two or three others) is known for her policy on PTOMS and other policies that were directed towards separatism and how she went to Chennai with her late husband who was anti Sinhala Buddhist to the core to discuss with Tamil terrorists. The JVP has had no consistent policy on the Tamil problem from Wijeweera days and they have been wavering between pseudo nationalism and what they understand as Marxism in their history. Their record on democracy is known at least since the late eighties when they threatened to kill those who wanted to exercise their franchise at the elections. The university students know the democracy practiced by the JVP (and the Peratugameens) and it is not known that the JVP has changed its policies this year.

The promises of all these parties and the individuals are nothing but mere statements to fool the people and Sri Lanka under Mahinda Rajapaksa has a better record of “democracy” media freedom etc. than during UNP or Chandrika days not to mention the “democracy” we experienced in the “occupied” areas during the JVP terrorist days. Except for the rhetoric there is nothing substantial in the speeches of the opposition (parties and individuals) and in any event they do not function as one unit. In that sense there is no opposition that contests the Presidential Elections.

There is another dimension to this phenomenon. The opposition is only an “achacharu” of political parties and individuals with different policies and they have been “united” by England and US who are interested in defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa at the Presidential Elections for his stand against Tamil terrorism and his policy on Tamil racism in general. Mahinda Rajapaksa is the most nationalist leader and his record as an anti colonialist is much better than most of the so called Marxists and left of centre pink socialists who are nothing but agents of the west and repressive western knowledge in the final analysis. Thus it is not the so called opposition that is contesting the elections as the opponent of Mahinda Rajapaksa but the western powers led by England and US. Maithripala Sirisena who is the weakest personality in the opposition is only the candidate of England and west not different from Sarath Fonseka of infamous white flag incident. Mahinda Rajapaksa would be opposed by the west led by England and US for the second time and our local boys and girls (guys and gals in American parlance) would be only the stage actors and actresses acting according to the script of present day Doyle s.

Nalin De Silva

12-12-2014

Memorandum of understanding

The memorandum of understanding has been signed between the UNP and some insignificant parties and individuals who are supposed to be members of insignificant organizations, in front of Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera whose organization consisting of academic trade unionists and left out leftists who are in search of a platform to mark their presence to the people through  media politics. If not for media politics nobody would have heard of these organizations. MoU is nothing but a document that declares that a UNP government would be formed with the assistance of Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera and Chandrika Kumaratunga who do not have a mass base at present. It is not known whether Maithripala Sirisena signed as an individual or as the so called secretary of the SLFP. Incidentally according to John Amaratunga the MoU was signed at Victoria Park revealing his colonial way of thinking long after the park was named Viharamahadevi Park. Perhaps John Amaratunga does not recognize Viharamahadevi and her son who were able to unify the country more than two thousand years ago. John Amaratunga is the Chief Opposition of whip of the present parliament whom the UNP would appoint as the Chief government whip if and when Ranil Wickremesinghe becomes the Prime Minister after the 8^th of January 2015.  

As far as the UNP, its lawyers are concerned Sarath Silva is still the chief justice of the country while Mohan Peiris is the de facto CJ. Similarly they must be thinking that Maithripala Sirisena is the secretary of the SLFP while Anura Priyadarshana Yapa is the de facto secretary  of the party. However, unfortunately for the UNP, the agent of the western powers in the country, the removals and appointments have been made according to the constitution of the SLFP. Thus Maithripala Sirisena does not represent the SLFP or even the faction (one or two former SLFPers) that went with him to the opposition. Chandrika Kumaratunga similarly does not represent the SLFP. She and Maithripala Sirisena failed to bring the thirty MPs from the SLFP thus giving their first “broken province” to Ranil Wickremesinghe.

The TNA, JVP and JHU have not signed the MoU thus indicating that there is no common opposition though there may be a so called common candidate. Maithripala Sirisena does not represent a common opposition and as it is he represents at least four oppositions most probably with four programmes. The MoU that has been signed is also not very clear as far as the positions of Chandrika Kumaratunga and the UNP are concerned. The JHU and the TNA will sign pacts or MoU s with Maithripala Sirisena who does not represent a mass base as a member of a party. The JHU are the TNA are trying to deceive the people but finally together with Chandrika they will all agree with the UNP on the programme that will be finally adopted. It is because the UNP is the only party among the groupings that have some mass base though less than 40% of the vote and also due to the fact it gets the blessings of the western powers.

It would be interesting to find out the contents of the MoUs that Maithripala Sirisena would sign with the JHU and the TNA separately though it would be only an academic exercise. What would be carried out is the programme of the west through the UNP and Maithripala Sirisena whatever the leaders of these parties and Chandrika Kumaratunga may be dreaming of.  

Contrary to what Nimal Siripala de Silva has to say the article 37(1), gives the power to the executive president to appoint the prime minister to perform the duties of the President. Also the president can appoint any person whom in his opinion is most likely to command the confidence of the Parliament. The relevant articles are reproduced below.  

43. (3) The President shall appoint as Prime Minster the Member of Parliament who in his opinions is most likely to command the confidence of Parliament.

37. (1) If the President is of the opinion that by reason of illness, absence from Sri Lanka or any other cause he will be unable to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of his office he may appoint the Prime Minister to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the office of President during such period, and may also appoint one of the other Ministers of the Cabinet to act in the office of Prime Minister during such period:

Provided that if the office of Prime Minister be then vacant or the Prime Minister is unable to act, the President may appoint the Speaker to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the office of President during such period.

Under 43 (3) it is not necessary to have a vote in the parliament to elect a prime minister and according to 37(1) the president if the president is unable to function in the post of president for some reason which is not specified he can appoint the prime minister to perform the duties of the President. It is clear that the understanding according to the MoU and probably the other MoUs to be signed to have the present Parliament for two more years until the constitution is amended and to have Parliamentary elections with the amended constitution under a different voting system. However it is clear that for two years nothing will happen to the executive powers of the president though they will be carried out by the prime minister appointed for the purpose.

The plan is clear. If and when Maithripala Sirisena wins he will appoint Ranil Wickremesinghe as the Prime minster without consulting the Parliament under 43(3) as the former could say in his opinion the latter commands the confidence of the opposition. Having appointed Ranil Wickremesinghe to carry out the duties of the president (some who are not clear in conceptual thinking may call him the executive prime minster though there is no such position defined in the constitution) Maithripala Sirisena will declare that for some reason he is unable to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of his office and appoint the new prime minster Ranil Wickremesinghe to to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the post of President. Then Ranil Wickremesinghe will carry out the programme of the west. The UNP which under instructions from the west wanted to curtail the public srrvice and sacked thousands of government employees in July 1980 when they wanted a salary increase of Rs. 300 per month will never increase the salaries of the latter.

The good governance and the rest are mere rhetoric as there is no good governance in the UNP itself. Democracy or whatever should start at home, and by now Tissa Attanayake could have given Maithripala Sirisena some lessons on good governance in the UNP. The MoU talks of law and order and are they going to say that under the UNP and the SLFP of Chandrika Kumaratunga they had law and order in the country. It is not necessary to give the long list of examples for bad governance in their regimes, if I may use the term very much liked by Ranil Wickremesinghe and Maithripala Sirisena would be the nominal executive president of a regime that has Ranil Wickremesinghe functioning as the President. The west may be thinking of buying some SLFP MPs to obtain the two third majority in the parliament but they are only day dreaming.

Chandrika Kumaratunga claims that she could not obtain the two third majority during the time she was the President to abolish executive presidency. If it is true it implies that the UNP was not in favour of abolishing the executive presidency from 1994 to 2005. During this period there was a time from 2002 to 2004 when Chandrika Kumaratunga and Ranil Wickremesinghe governed the country jointly without attempting to amend the constitution and abolish the executive presidency. Instead they jointly signed ceasefire agreement with Prabhakaran contrary to the wish of the great majority of the people. Chandrika cannot claim that she was no party to the ceasefire agreement as it was signed by Ranil Wickremesinghe and not by her. However under the constitution only the president can declare war or peace and Ranil Wickremesinghe who had not been given powers under 37(1) did not have the authority to sign a ceasefire agreement with Prabhalaran. However, Chandrika Kumaratunga who as the president could have annulled the agreement did not do so as it was against the wish of the west communicated through Norway. That was the understanding between Chandrika Kumaratunga and Ranil Wickremesinghe and the present MoU is about the same understanding that would help Tamil separatism through TNA and the dispersed Tamils in the west. 

Nalin De Silva

05-12-2014

Maithripala the prisoner

Maithripala Sirisena appears to be a non starter. He is supposed to be the common candidate but there is no common opposition with a common view. There are at least three oppositions with respect to Presidential elections. The JVP, based on Sarath Silva’s argument, is of the view that the Presidential elections are illegal if Mahinda Rajapaksa is allowed to contest. The JVP is thinking of establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat after an Arab spring, with the support of the western countries, calling the masses to the streets to protest against the so called illegal presidential elections. The government of Mahinda Rajapaksa  needs no instructions to deal with the western inspired revolution (Arab Spring) of the JVP.

The opposition led by Chandrika Kumaratunga thought that at least thirty MPs would cross the floor of the House on the final day of the budget debate and would have wanted the former President to become the Executive Prime Minister within one hundred days from the day of the elections. This opposition thought that they have the majority in the SLFP Parliamentary group and was counting heads and days of the final cross over before the Sinhala New Year. They wanted the former secretary of the SLFP, whose membership of the Party has been suspended by the President of the Party who apparently has the authority to do so as laid down by the constitution of the Party, to be the common candidate on the strength of those who were supposed to cross over. The UNP and Maithripala Sirisena will go on referring to the constitutional secretary of the SLFP and the de facto secretary the way some pundits refer to the de facto Chief Justice, in vain. Ven. Athureliye Rathana Thera was apparently involved in negotiations with the de facto dissolution of the good governance movement of Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera and the academic trade unionists and left out leftists, by promoting the candidature of Maithripala Sirisena. Chandrika Kumaratunga was aiming to become the executive prime minister within hundred days of the elections through Maithripala Sirisena. They were thinking of making use of the present Parliament to amend the constitution, oust Mahinda Rajapaksa loyalists from the SLFP and the government, and getting Maithripala Sirisena to appoint Chandrika Kumaratunga as the Prime Minister first (after making her an MP on the national list) and then the executive Prime Minster, through the amended constitution.    

The Chandrika opposition worked with “Pivithuru Hetak” of Ven. Athureliye Rathana Thera and was able to convince the UNP opposition, which is the third opposition, that Maithripala Sirisena should be the common candidate. They made their claim on the strength of the intended cross over MPs  and the UNP opposition had to give in.  The western countries support all the three oppositions and for them it is a case of defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa and installing a weak leader as the President or the Prime Minister. They are behind the GTF aspiration of defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa and producing him before a so called international jury. Probably they would like to have Maithripala Sirisena as the President or the Prime Minster as he is the weakest out of the lot. However, the UNP opposition settled for Maithripala Sirisena as the common candidate on two conditions. Firstly they wanted the thirty odd cross over MPs Chandrika and Maithripala were boasting. Secondly the UNP opposition wanted Maithripala Sirisena to appoint Ranil Wickremesinghe as the executive Prime Minster. Chandrika Kumaratunga would have probably agreed to the conditions knowing very well that MoU’s are nothing but statements of misunderstandings. She who promised the JVP to abolish the executive presidency simply threw it to the wastepaper basket according to a powerful minister of the government.  

However, within the last few days the UNP apparently has changed its positions. It is now not thinking of amending constitution, abolition of executive presidency etc., but of installing Ranil Wickremesinghe as the Executive President (not the Prime Minister) within 24 hours of Maithripala Sirisena becoming the President. All these are figments imagination as Maithripala Sirisena has no chance of winning the presidential elections on the eighth of January. In practice nobody wants to abolish the executive presidency but the cat has jumped out of the bag in the case of the UNP. They want none other than Ranil as the EXECUTIVE PRESIDENT. Tissa Attanayke the boy from Hasalaka was telling Maithripala Sirisena the boy from Polonnanuruwa  that the executive presidency should be confined to Kollupitiya and Kurunduwatte, when the two boys met at Siri Kotha on Thursday.  At the press conference Tissa Attanayake specifically said that Ranil Wickremesinghe should be made the executive president within 24 hours under the Article 37(1) of the constitution. The UNP is planning to invoke Articles 43(3) and 31(1) in this regard. The relevant Articles are as follows.  

43. (3) The President shall appoint as Prime Minster the Member of Parliament who in his opinions is most likely to command the confidence of Parliament.

37. (1) If the President is of the opinion that by reason of illness, absence from Sri Lanka or any other cause he will be unable to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of his office he may appoint the Prime Minister to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the office of President during such period, and may also appoint one of the other Ministers of the Cabinet to act in the office of Prime Minister during such period:

Provided that if the office of Prime Minister be then vacant or the Prime Minister is unable to act, the President may appoint the Speaker to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the office of President during such period.

It appears that the UNP strategy is to appoint Ranil as the Prime Minister soon after Maithripala Sirisena takes oaths using Article 43(3), and then get the latter to “abdicate” with the help of 37(1). This implies that Maithripala Sirisena has to admit that he is unable to  exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of his office as the President, on his own, and then appoint the new Prime Minister  who is none other than Ranil to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the executive presidency. Poor Maithripala Sirisena will be nobody after that and the UNP would rule the country with Ranil as the de facto executive president.

It is very unlikely that the Chandrika opposition would agree to this master plan by Tissa Attanayake and the UNP, and most probably would object to it vehemently unless Chandrika Kumaratunga in her usual way decides to treat any MoU as a statement of misunderstanding that should be thrown into the wastepaper basket as soon as possible. If the Chandrika opposition together with Ven. Athureliye Rathana Thera decides to oppose the strategy of the UNP opposition then Maithripala Sirisena will be a non starter.

In any event Maithripala Sirisena is a prisoner of the Chandrika and the UNP oppositions and being a former member of the SLFP, could be expected to be more loyal to the Chandrika opposition than to the UNP opposition. What the UNP should realise is that any MoU or any agreement with locals is only a piece of paper as far as Chandrika Kumaratunga is concerned and the UNP master plan will never see the light of the day, even if Maithripala Sirisena were to win the elections. However, none of these plans would work as it is a foregone conclusion that Maithripala Sirisena is to lose the elections polling  less than what Sarath Fonseka polled last time.

Nalin De Silva

28-11-2014

Defeating Tamil racism

The Presidential Election campaign has given a flying start to Mahinda Rajapaksa with the opposition still looking for the common candidate. It is almost certain that neither Ranil Wickremesinghe nor Chandrika Kumaratunga would be the common candidate as both of them are not favoured by the western countries led by England and US. It is unfortunate that sixty six years after limited independence the opposition led by the UNP is still getting instructions from the former colonial masters. The latest addition to the list of colonial followers is a section of the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) that has become a part of the vijathika balavegaya (non national forces). This section is neither Jathika nor Hela and could be called Vijathika Hela Virodhi Karumaya. They would be leaving the UPFA and the government in a short time and would be lost in political wilderness.

In the meantime the JNP and the Deshahithaishee Jathika Vyaparaya (DJV) that were talking of bringing down the government before the Uva Provincial Elections has made a U turn to support the government after their dismal performance at the said elections. They are overdoing their act now inviting those who had supported and protected the government on a principled position albeit having differences with the government on certain issues, to join them under their banner to protect the government! If one goes through the recent issues of Muragala the journal of the DJV one would realise the change of position of the Vyaparaya. However, we must be happy that this movement has not become part of the vijathika balavegaya like a section of the JHU, thanks to the Uva Provincial elections.

The Presidential elections is an extension of the fight between the Jathika (national) and  Vijathika (non national) forces. This is going to be the Presidential election that would decide whether we defeat Tamil racism or not, and the western countries that have created and promoted Tamil racism will leave nothing unexplored as they know that if Mahinda Rajapaksa is elected this time he would defeat Tamil racism as well. In his first term Mahinda Rajapaksa defeated Tamil terrorism that was sponsored by the western countries and the Gandhi family in India, and put the country on a development programme albeit on the western model. In the second term he consolidated these two and the country is on a development path whether we like it or not. In the third term he has to defeat Tamil racism and engage in developing the economy on the western model gradually turning towards a national model.

The Jathika forces are led by Mahinda Rajapakse while the Vijathika forces have still not found a leader. The western countries prefer Karu Jayasuriya to Ranil Wickremesinghe and Chandrika Kumaratunga and Ven Maduluwawe Sobhitha thera is likely to withdraw with Ven Athureliye Rathana Thera of the JHU if Karu Jayasuriya is given the ticket to contest and lose the Presidential elections. However, the pseudo Sinhala Buddhist leanings of Karu Jayasuriya could go against him when canvassing the support of the TNA and few other Tamil parties. These parties would prefer Ranil Wickremesinghe or Chandrika Kumaratunga but their anti Sinhala policies have been obvious. The west would prefer a minster of the government to Karu Jayasuriya provided they can find one.

Ranil Wickremesinghe in the meantime has blamed the government for not challenging the decision of the European Union to effectively allow the LTTE and its front organisations to collect funds lifting the ban on the LTTE. The EU has also imposed economic sanctions on Sri Lanka by not buying fish from Sri Lanka on flimsy grounds. Ranil Wickremesinghe the man who betrayed the country and especially the Sinhala people by signing the infamous Ceasefire Agreement with the terrorist leader Prabhakaran is now blaming the government for not challenging the EU on lifting the ban on the LTTE. Prabhakaran and Wickremesinghe were the darlings of the westerners and one is dead now.

Has Ranil Wickremesinghe all of a sudden become a patriot? No he is only legitimizing the EU decision to lift the ban on the LTTE. The position of the government is that no international jury, so called united nation human rights and other organisations have  jurisdiction over what happened during the humanitarian operations. The government has already appointed the Paranagama Commission to look into these matters and Sri Lanka is not bound by hearsay evidence of so called NGO (western governmental organisations) activists without supplying hard facts.

Had the government challenged the European Union it would have legitimized the European Union to interfere in the national policies of Sri Lanka. We are in a mess because the UNP governments and the government of Chandrika Kumaratunga (anti Sinhala leader for all purposes who is fit to be the common candidate of the west) allowed the west and India to interfere in our internal affairs. Ranil Wickremesinghe is only continuing with his pro western policies and his letter written to the European Union on behalf of LTTE (legitimizing the terrorists and their sponsors in the west) has to be deplored  by the national forces that excludes the Ven. Ratana faction of the JHU. It is not difficult to identify the wolf (tiger) in sheep cloth.

The clamour of the opposition to abolish the executive Presidency has to be considered in this light. Tamil racism that is maintained by the western countries can be  defeated only by “defeating” those countries. We have to evolve a method to defeat these countries by going against their knowledge that is imposed on us in the field of politics, economics and culture not to mention the other fields such as western science. When we defeated Tamil terrorism we had our own knowledge without getting stuck with United Nations resolutions and so called modern knowledge in politics and warfare.

The government is being led along the garden path by some anti national forces that have come closer to the government during the last few years. However, these forces can be defeated only by helping the government to overcome the defects, and not by joining hands with the westerners themselves. The section of the JHU that is hell bent on defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa has played into the hands of the enemy.

If the executive presidency is abolished at this juncture it will give power to a parliament that would abdicate legislative powers and other powers of the people to the colonial powers in the name of a non existing democracy in the west. The west wants a weak government in Sri Lanka led by a puppet so that they could dictate terms to us. A puppet cannot effectively lead and the words led by a puppet are contradictory. It only means that there is no effective leadership in the country and the leadership is provided by the Ministers of state and foreign affairs in the western countries. Unfortunately for the west the President is elected and not appointed and the people in Sri Lanka can identify not only the enemy but the agents of the enemy as well. 

Nalin De Silva

14-11-2014

The politics of Presidential elections

The opposition is still searching for the common candidate and it is clear that high commissioners and ambassadors of western countries are also involved in the exploration. The common candidate is needed to defeat Mahinda Rajapakse who is not liked by the western countries to say the least. The tacticians in the opposition seem to work on the hypotheses that even a common candidate is unable to win the Presidential elections on the first count and hence to reduce the vote of Mahinda Rajapakse a subsidiary common candidate has to be found to win at least a fraction of the Sinhala Buddhist vote. The opposition wants a second count, meaning counting of preferential vote, in order to implement their “nonagatha” plans.

The Mangala, Ravi,  Kiriella, Wijedasa Rajapakse (MRKW) team of the UNP is against the candidature of Ranil Wickremesinghe as the common candidate. The foursome do not see eye to eye but they are against the candidature of the latter as they know that it will pave the way for Sajith Premadasa to become the leader of the UNP. As Ranil Wickremesinghe is bound to lose the Presidential elections with or without the subsidiary common candidate his days as the leader of the UNP are numbered if he contests.

Ranil Wickremesinghe, the man who has an understanding of Sinhala Buddhist Chinthanaya vis a vis Judaic Christian Chinthanaya does not have the heart to be associated with the former Chinthanaya. He is resented by the majority of the Sinhala Buddhists for signing the treacherous ceasefire agreement with Prabhakaran, and for being too much associated with the western conservatives and liberals. One may think that the liberals and the conservatives are two different species but as far as the majority of the Sinhala Buddhists are concerned there is no difference between them. Both factions subscribe to the Greek Judaic Christian Chinthanaya, a fact that the majority of Sinhala Buddhists grasp by intuition.

MRKW team does not want to be in the UNP under Sajith Premadasa as the leader and they would like to see Ranil Wickremesinghe continuing to be at the helm of the party. Thus they want somebody other than Ranil Wickremesinghe to be the common Presidential candidate whom they think would win the Presidential elections. Their main effort is to field Chandrika Kumaratunga as the common candidate but if they go by Sarath Silva’s argument, which they have endorsed, then Chandrika Kumaratunga has been already disqualified. In any event Chandrika Kumaratunga is not the candidate to win the Presidential elections and the opposition and the western countries have got their calculations wrong. With a Sinhala vote comprising 75% of the population Mahinda Rajapakse is bound to get 55% of the valid vote as he is assured of some Tamil and Muslim votes as well. No candidate would be able to reduce this vote and subsidiary common candidate would only expose the fact that the westerners are behind him.

Chandrika Kumaratunga’s two terms as the President expired before the eighteenth amendment and Sarath Silva has a point if he says that the former has become disqualified. In the case of Mahinda Rajapakse, the eighteenth amendment became law during his second term and as it is he was not disqualified to contest a third time before the amendment was passed. Mahinda Rajapakse’s second term as the President has not expired as he has two  more years to continue as the President. After four years since he became the President for the second time he can express his desire to hold Presidential elections, at which time what is operative is the eighteenth amendment.

MRKW team perhaps without Wijedasa Rajapakse wants the thirteenth amendment implemented completely with police and land powers devolved to the Provincial Councils. Even Ranil Wickremesinghe has declared that the UNP would implement the thirteenth amendment fully implying that police and land powers would be devolved to the Provincial Councils. It is the Northern Province provincial council, and not the others, that wants the police and land powers and it is nothing but a demand of Tamil racism.

The Presidential elections will determine whether the thirteenth amendment would be implemented totally or partially. It is the politics behind the Presidential elections. The western countries would oppose Mahinda Rajapakse as it was under his political leadership that the LTTE, or Tamil terrorism was defeated. However   Tamil racism is not dead as it is supported by the western countries through the dispersed Tamils in those countries. The TNA is only the mouthpiece of Tamil racism and they are being manipulated by the western countries and the dispersed Tamils. The so called diaspora is supposed to mean the dispersed Tamils, with the Biblical word drawing the sympathy of the western Judaic Christian culture towards Tamil racism.

The west encourages the Sri Lankan government to use the word diaspora to describe the dispersed Tamils for two reasons. Firstly it is a cover up for the western countries who are working against the Sri Lankan government of Mahinda Rajapakse with the ultimate aim of producing the latter before a so called international jury after removing him from the post of President of the country. The western countries, especially England, that created and nurtured Tamil racism hide behind the dispersed Tamils to promote Tamil racism against not only the government of Sri Lanka but the Sinhala people themselves.

Secondly the dispersed Tamils are not an organisation as such and there are no office bearers. Any attack on the dispersed Tamils is not focused and the advantage of that is for Tamil racism. It is not difficult to defeat Tamil racism as well, the way we defeated Tamil terrorism but we have to get our act together. We have to be clear in our concepts and be open in attacking the western countries for maintaining Tamil racism. The opposition will never do that and it is hoped that Mahinda Rajapakse in his term will defeat Tamil racism as well. If the first term defeated Tamil terrorism, the second term consolidated that defeat then the third term will see the defeat of Tamil racism with a correct domestic policy on development and a foreign policy on identifying the enemy and calling a spade, a spade.

The subsidiary common candidate would be either Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera or Ven. Athureliye Rathana Thera with the main function being splitting the Sinhala Buddhist vote. It is unfortunate that the JHU, at least a faction of it, is determined to leave the government without understanding the politics of the Presidential elections. The government may not have fulfilled all the expectations during the second term of Mahinda Rajapakse as the President but it was a period of consolidation of the defeat of Tamil terrorism.

The JHU, should not be a party to splitting the Sinhala Buddhist vote and should concentrate on the victory of Mahinda Rajapakse so that he could defeat Tamil racism in his third term. It is not the time for parochial politics and if the JHU is interested in preserving the unitary state and protecting the rights of mainly the Sinhala Buddhists, then they have no alternative but to support Mahinda Rajapakse. If they resort to any other alternative they will only be successful in winning the wrath of the vast majority of Sinhala Buddhists, thus guaranteeing their exit from active politics. 

Nalin De Silva

07-11-2014

The bankrupt opposition

Only some middle class elements living around Colombo city limits would be thinking of a UNP President next year. They would be imagining various scenarios including an insurgency with the help of the JVP during the period after the first count. The JVP has already begun implementing their plans claiming that the forthcoming election is illegal whatever it means. They are with Sarath Nanda Silva and claim that Mahinda Rajapakse cannot contest for a third time. However, it is not clear how the Presidential elections would become illegal simply because Mahinda Rajapakse contests for a third time. Who has the jurisdiction to decide whether the election is legal or not? Is it a former Chief Justice or the leader of the JVP?

We do not know what would be the final outcome at the Supreme Court but if the Courts decide that Mahinda Rajapakse could contest a third time then no matter what the JVP thinks the Presidential elections would be legal. The JVP wants to create the impression that the elections are illegal and organize street fights. The JVP leader has requested the UNP not to contest as the Presidential elections are illegal. It is very unlikely that the UNP would agree with the JVP leader on that and most probably would field Ranil Wickremesinghe as one of the so called common candidates.        

However, the JHU, at least the Ven. Rathana faction, is also of the opinion that the Presidential elections are illegal, and they are supposed to have discussions with Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera on a common candidate. If a political party is against the presidential elections they could boycott the elections. However, if the party is only against Mahinda Rajapakse contesting the election then they could field a common or uncommon candidate against Mahinda Rajapakse. The JVP is boycotting the presidential elections with ulterior motives. As we have said they are interested in capturing power, meaning Anura Dissanayake being made the President of the country, through street fights.

The UNP on the other hand wants to contest the Presidential elections with as many “common candidates” as possible and then force the commissioner of elections to go for the count of the second preference. During the nonagatha period we have already described in these columns the UNP wants to stage their version of street fights. They would be hoping that the JVP would not destroy their plans by resorting to premature street fights.

As it is at least a faction of the JHU would remain with the government, with Ven. Athureliye Rathana    Thera joining hands with Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera who is increasingly becoming isolated from the public. Ven. Sobhitha Thera has some support among a few University Academics who are associated with FUTA and some left out leftists. In the end there is a possibility that Ven. Athureliye Rathana Thera would become the common candidate of this outfit.

The UNP would like to have more common candidates with the hope that Mahinda Rajapakse would not receive fifty percent of the valid vote in the first count. It is in this context that the UNP would oppose a candidate from the TNA or the SLMC. The UNP wants the Muslims and the Tamils to vote en bloc to Ranil Wickremesinghe. Their tactics would be focused on increasing the vote of Ranil Wickremesinghe while reducing the vote of Mahinda Rajapakse. However, what the UNP and their  advisors both local and foreign would forget is that some Muslims and some Tamils would vote for Mahinda Rajapakse. In the final count Mahinda Rajapakse would end up with 55% of the valid vote without going for the second preference at the Presidential Elections.

The TNA has claimed that they were the people who obstructed Yal Devi going to Jaffna (probably with the help of the LTTE) and they would resort to same if the train continues to run to Jaffna. It is clear that the TNA like the UNP and the JVP has run out of slogans and they would have to consult their sponsors in UK, USA and the other western countries. I do not mean only the dispersed Tamils in those countries but the so called statesmen as well.

The government of Sri Lanka is unlikely to accuse the western states for their support to Tamil racism and Tamil terrorism, and they will continue to refer to the so called diaspora. The government cannot be blamed for this position as the western states would deny their involvement in Tamil racism and Tamil terrorism. However, blaming only the dispersed Tamils (so called diaspora) is not going to help the government of Sri Lanka as there is no leadership or organisation that could be identified with the dispersed Tamils.

The government is engaged in a fight with a shadow instead of the real enemy but we have to understand its limitations. The reply to the western states has to be given by the people at the Presidential elections by electing Mahinda Rajapakse as the President for a third time with an overwhelming majority.

The bankrupt opposition was also exposed at the budget 2015. The opposition has no slogans and they cannot mislead the people. There are some trade unionists especially in the health sector with LTTE connections and they would resort to the lies that the LTTE is infamous for. Some of these trade unions for some time had been demanding the special living allowances paid to the public servants be added to the basic salary.

It is exactly this what the government has done in the budget 2015, with the result the basic salary of public servants increasing substantially from 2005 to 2015. With this the pension contribution, and other benefits increase as known to all the public servants. If that is not the case why did the LTTE connected and other trade unions demand that the allowances should be added to the basic salary. Was it to give the person engaged in the subject of salaries some Arithmetical exercises?

To make it worse the trade unions connected with the opposition claim that the special living allowance given to the public servants in the 2015 budget is a compulsory increment that should have been provided anyway. This is as if the UNP had been giving special living allowances to the public servants when Ranil Wickremesinghe was the Prime Minster for a short period and making use of the opportunity to sign the so called ceasefire agreement with Prabhakaran under the auspices of the western governments with Norway in the limelight.

The opposition is bankrupt and has run out of slogans and about to use the misery of those affected  by the earth slip at Haputale, for their benefit. The government should make use of all the facilities available to help the victims and think more radically on the entire plantation economy. The earth slips could be avoided by transferring to some other economy and by depopulating the areas under threat as a long term remedy. The government is in a one horse race at present which is becoming boring to the public and may think of increasing the allowances of the opposition so that they could hire some slogan writers.

Nalin De Silva

31-10-2014