The more plausible explanation is that the behaviours of Lohan Ratwatte, Janaka Tissakuttiarachchi, Kanchana Wijesekara and Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara are all symptoms of a wider malaise- a cancer of lawlessness and lack of any moral standards. This has eaten into the core of this government. It is now too late to remedy that.
When that happens, as with all cancers, they become terminal. That will be the fate of this government too.
When Gotabaya Rajapaksa was marketed to the Sri Lankan electorate two years ago, his credentials to hold the highest position in the land were questioned. His critics pointed out that he had absolutely no previous experience in politics. The response from his minders was that as a military man, he would instill discipline into government.
Two year later, the government he heads is crumbling and its popularity is dwindling by the hour- and there is no discipline whatsoever.
A few months we saw the then State Minister of Prison Management and Prisoners’ Rehabilitation, Lohan Ratwatte storm in to prisons in Welikada and Anuradhapura and intimidate Tamil prisoners. The issue made sensational headlines at the time.
The expectation was that Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the man who promised to ‘change the system’- the system where cronies are protected no matter what and therefore act with impunity and immunity- would act decisively and sack Ratwatte.
Nothing of the sort happened. Ratwatte resigned from his prisons portfolio but continues to this day as State Minister of Gem and Jewellery Related Industries. Predictably, we have heard nothing about an inquiry or disciplinary action against Ratwatte since then.
The loquacious Wimal Weerawansa even praised Ratwatte for the incident suggesting that he had made history saying “Mistakes can happen, but it is important to admit the mistake and resign humbly. There is no such example in the political culture of our country before”.
Never at a loss for words, when asked whether Ratwatte should resign from his remaining portfolio Weerawansa quipped, “why should he? He didn’t steal gems or jewellery”!
These comments reflect the blasé attitude of this regime towards good governance. The culture of protecting cronies, carefully cultivated over a decade of Mahinda Rajapaksa rule is alive and well under Gotabaya Rajapaksa as well and this was demonstrated in several incidents over the past fortnight.
We saw the crude comments made by the uncouth Badulla district parliamentarian Janaka Tissakuttiarachchi in Parliament. When opposition parliamentarians taunted the government quoting Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa’s ‘den sepada’ quote, Tissakuttiarachchi targeted Samagi Jana Balavegaya Matale district parliamentarian Rohini Wijeratne, unleashing a barrage of vile and vulgar double entendre remarks. In the same breadth, he also targeted Ms. Jalani Premadasa, wife of Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa.
If party seniors in the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) were concerned about this behaviour and did not condone it, one would have expected them to admonish Tissakuttiarachchi in private and request him to withdraw his remarks. That would have been the decent thing to do for any leadership imbued with some sense of common courtesy and respect for women.
Instead, in response to the criticism that came his way, Tissakuttiarachchi made another statement, saying that he did not make any vulgar remarks and that he couldn’t help it if a vulgar mind construed the remarks as offensive. His defence was worse than the offence! Clearly, either he had not been spoken to by the party leadership or, worse still, he had been and advised to maintain his stance.
Maintaining the dignity and decorum of Parliament is obviously not high on the agenda for the government. There was further evidence of this when Matara district SLPP parliamentarian Kanchana Wijesekara threatened to manhandle SJB MP Manusha Nanayakkara.
This led to the opposition raising major concerns about the safety of their parliamentarians, boycotting sessions of Parliament and writing to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) regarding the conduct of government MPs. In his complaint to the CPA, Chief Opposition Whip Lakshman Kiriella stated that the attacks by government MPs were malicious and unprovoked, noting that such ‘mafia-type’ behaviour by them was deliberate and done with the intention of deterring members of the opposition from exercising their freedom of speech.
Last but definitely not the least, we have that irreverent personage who dons a saffron robe, Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara, who has now been invested with the title of Head of the Presidential Task Force on the concept of ‘One Country, One Law’. Social media has been awash with two audio clips of Gnanasara berating a monk for daring to oppose his point of view on a social media platform.
The language used is unprintable and is one that is not heard from the dregs of society, let alone from a Buddhist monk. The monk at the other end of the vituperative onslaught from Gnanasara keeps a dignified tone during the entire rant and politely questions Gnanasara’s language. In his diatribe, Gnanasara reveals his true colours, inadvertently making several derogatory references to the Muslim community.
The questions that arise from this are many. Is this person a fit and proper individual to chair a Presidential Task Force on ‘One Country, One Law’ given that he is no expert in the subject of law and has on more than one occasion exhibited a blatant degree of bias towards certain communities and religions?
Gnanasara’s behaviour is hardly surprising. This is a person who was serving a prison sentence for contempt of court, until he was pardoned by former President Maithripala Sirisena. Yet, some had suggested that he was made head of the Presidential Task Force, so he could reform himself and cease to be an embarrassment to the government- a strategy similar to making the worst behaved student the monitor of the class. That hasn’t happened either.
With such boorish and bullying behaviour that is unbecoming of a civilised individual being consistently on public display, why is the government, or Gnanasara’s appointing authority who is none other than President Rajapaksa, maintaining a deafening silence? Is it because they endorse and encourage such tactics because it serves their political objectives? Or, is Gnanasara becoming a law unto himself, untamed even by the trappings of presidential power.
The more plausible explanation is that the behaviours of Lohan Ratwatte, Janaka Tissakuttiarachchi, Kanchana Wijesekara and Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara are all symptoms of a wider malaise- a cancer of lawlessness and lack of any moral standards. This has eaten into the core of this government. It is now too late to remedy that.
When that happens, as with all cancers, they become terminal. That will be the fate of this government too.
