By Vishvanath
Sri Lanka may lack foreign currency reserves and other such essentials, but it is never short of issues which crop up at such a rate that one cannot keep track of them. There also occur situations where either the government or the Opposition creates issues to distract the public from their shortcomings or gain political mileage through propaganda offensives, which more often than not get down and dirty and descend to slanging matches. We are witnessing such a propaganda battle.
No sooner had former President Ranil Wickremesinghe been arrested, remanded and released on bail over alleged misuse of state funds during a foreign visit than came the extradition of a group of underworld figures from Indonesia. Focus of the public was shifted from wasteful expenditure to narcotics and organized crime.
The government created a mega media event of the arrival the criminals here and its propaganda stunt became an overkill, with the Opposition scoffing at the presence of Minister of Public Security Ananda Wijepala and IGP Priyantha Weerasooriya, accompanied by a large number of high-ranking police officers, at the BIA, to oversee the arrival of the criminals and greet the police personnel, both Sri Lankan and Indonesian, escorting the extradited criminals. Sri Lankan crime syndicate bosses and their accomplices had been extradited previously, but without Defence or Public Security Ministers and the IGPs going so far as to rush to the BIA on account of their arrival.
The arrest as well as extradition of Sri Lankan criminals operating from overseas, is no mean achievement, for it takes months of meticulous planning to carry out such operations successfully, but what could have been handled carefully to gain a great deal of political mileage was mismanaged on August 30, when some underworld figures, Mandinu Padmasiri, alias ‘Kehelbaddara Padme’, his gang members known by the aliases ‘Commando Salintha’, ‘Backhoe Saman’, ‘Thembili Lahiru’ and Kudu Nilantha, and a woman with her small child who were with them were brought to Colombo from Jakarta, where they were arrested.
Then came the detection of a haul of chemicals described as precursors used in making crystal methamphetamine or (ICE), on a property belonging to a former SLPP local councillor in Middeniya. The police said information elicited from one of the criminals extradited from Indonesia had led to the detection of the stock of chemicals, which had been buried. They also claimed that Kehelbaddra Padme had been planning to set up a crystal meth manufacturing facility in Nuwara Eliya, and the stock of chemicals found in Middeniya was to be delivered there. But the exact location of the factory has not been disclosed. The government politicians and their propagandists swung into action, trying to link the entire SLPP to the ICE racket, and Deputy Minister of Public Security Sunil Watagala went so far as to display, at a hurriedly summoned media briefing, several pictures with SLPP National Organizer Namal Rajapaksa and some persons described as the suspects alleged to have buried the stock of chemicals at issue. The NPP propagandists had a field day at the expense of Namal and the SLPP. But the Opposition lost no time in striking back. It posted some pictures of some NPP politicians with underworld figures, claiming that people were in the habit of posing for photographs with politicians, who could not turn down their requests; therefore, the pictures at issue could not be considered proof of links between politicians and criminals.
The Opposition has also claimed that the two shipping containers where the chemicals believed to be precursors were found had been among the ones, numbering 323, released without Customs inspection in January 2025, at the behest of the government. The government and the police are taking great pains to deny this allegation, but the Opposition, true to form, keeps repeating it. Thus, the government and the Opposition have been accusing each other of having had a hand in importing the stock of chemicals at issue.
The police have said the two containers were not among those whose release is mired in controversy, but the Opposition insists that the police are engaged in a grand cover-up to defend the government; it has asked the police to reveal the exact dates when the containers arrived here and released. The government has said the two containers were inspected before being released, but nothing suspicious was found in them. SLPP General Secretary Kariyawasam, a lawyer by profession, has said either the government’s claim that the containers were inspected is a lie or the allegation that precursors were found in them is false. There is no way both claims can be true at the same time, he has argued.
The government’s efforts to implicate the SLPP in the crystal meth racket have prompted the Opposition to point out that Mohamed Ibrahim, father of two National Thowheed Jamaapth suicide bombers involved in the Easter Sunday carnage (2019) and funding the terror outfit, was a National List candidate of the JVP in the 2015 general election.
General Secretary of the SLPP Sagara Kariyawasam said in a Hiru TV political discussion, Salakuna, on Monday night (08) that the local politician arrested over the chemical stock, had been among about 8,000 candidates the SLPP fielded in the 2018 Local Government elections, and it was not possible to look into the backgrounds of so many individuals, but Ibrahim had been among only 29 NL candidates fielded by the JVP, and it would have been possible for the JVP to look into their backgrounds. Kariyawasam said the SLPP would sue Watagala for defamation.
Tuesday’s parliamentary session became somewhat stormy, with the members of both sides of the House trading accusations over the ICE issue. The government must have expected to put the SLPP on the defensive, but the latter fought back, supported by the other Opposition parties. Its plan to corner and floor the SLPP went awry.
The Opposition has apparently got even with the government on the propaganda front over the ICE issue. The NPP overplayed its hand. It should have waited until investigations into the consignment of chemicals were over to take on its political rivals. Most of all, it failed to realize that the Opposition would make use of the controversial release of 324 containers to bludgeon it. It may also not have thought its attempts to blame the entire SLPP for something a former SLPP local councilor had done would prompt the Opposition to use the National List candidature of Ibrahim would be used against the JVP.
However, the government is likely to go all out to beat the Opposition in the ongoing propaganda battle over the narcotic issue. It says it has some more aces up its sleeve and will play them when the time is opportune. But the Opposition is bound to react with counter allegations. Perhaps, the ICE issue may fizzle out or be eclipsed with something bigger happening sooner than expected.
