rapa
06-15-2007, 11:43 AM
Opposition and UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe’s flair for wisecracking is unrivalled. He may drop a clanger or two—or more than that in some cases—when he strays into subjects like history in his political speeches, just like any other brick-dropping politician. But, once in a way, he demonstrates his ability to clean bowl even the most vociferous political toreadors in the rival camp. Remember how adroitly he humbled the fiery Red ‘guy’, who got the author of The Old Man and the Sea wrong.
On Wednesday, he came out with a pithy remark while addressing the diplomatic corps in Colombo. He told the US Ambassador in Colombo Robert O’ Blake that there was an ugly American in this country. The suave diplomat may have been taken aback. For, not even the diehard anti-American elements like our Samasamajists use that derogatory term these days. (LSSP firebrand Prof. Tissa Vitarana has become Uncle Sam’s blue-eyed boy. Enamoured of his APRC ‘majority report’, Americans have stopped saying ‘better dead than red’—at least in this country. Strange bedfellows!) Without keeping Mr. Blake in suspense, the UNP leader said immediately afterwards that the ugly American was none other than Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse.
However, Mr. Wickremesinghe’s humour was only a feint. This was his killer hook: He said his party would take to the streets in protest against the government, which, he claimed, was leading the country down the path to a failed state. The government’s military campaign against the LTTE had, he declared, come a cropper and the economy was in dire straits. He also lambasted the government for its failure to arrest the deterioration of the human rights situation and urged it to get the international community to arrange for a ceasefire and to work towards a negotiated solution.
War is hell and the mother of all crises. A political solution is the best way out, as any right thinking person will agree. But, Mr. Wickremesinghe, like all other advocates of a negotiated settlement, has chosen to remain silent on the be-all and end-all of any peace process—the willingness of the LTTE to give up Eelam. The implication of what Mr. Wickremesinghe is reported to have said is that President Mahinda Rajapakse is not capable of extricating the country from the mire it is trapped in.
"President Rajapakse is not a William the Silent," he has said. Let there be no argument about that. Then, who is Sri Lanka’s William the Silent? Never mind that! What if the people listen to Mr. Wickremesinghe and vote his party into office by any chance? Will he be able to deliver the goods?
Our experience with politicians of all hues has been rather disappointing. They are like the guards of a king’s harem. They have seen how it is done and they know how to do it. But, when given an opportunity, they cannot do it! The reason is only too well known. In 1994, Ms Chandrika Kumaratunga wanted state power to resolve the conflict. She was elected to power but she pathetically failed to honour her promise. Then in 2001, Mr. Wickremesinghe asked for power to end the war. He was given it. And what did he do? True, he managed to create a situation where there was absence of war—not to be confused with peace. But, he maintained that no-war situation through sheer capitulation to the LTTE, which had a field day. It got everything it wanted for the next phase of war and made a mockery of the law of the land. When the police arrested a group of LTTE cadres carrying arms in a so-called government controlled area in the East, the LTTE abducted a group of soldiers demanding the release of its cadres, who had committed a non-bailable offence. In the end, they were granted bail! The UNP kept its fingers crossed while the LTTE was killing people in their hundreds, extorting money from civilians, forcibly recruiting children and targeting armed forces and the police.
Finally, the LTTE, having indicated its willingness to agree to a federal solution in Oslo, put forth its ISGA demand, which the UNP-led UNF government couldn’t grant. Then, it unilaterally suspended talks and spurned the counter proposals of the UNF. President Kumaratunga sacked Prime Minister Wickremesinghe’s government and the UNF lost the general election in 2004.
The UNP is trying to have us believe that but for the sacking, it would have steered the peace process to a successful conclusion. But, evidence points to the contrary. The LTTE ruined whatever chances Mr. Wickremesinghe may have had of becoming President in 2005, by engineering a polls boycott in the North and the East. If the LTTE had wanted to resume negotiations with the UNF, it should have facilitated Mr. Wickremesinghe’s victory by allowing the people trapped in the areas under its jackboot to vote. The LTTE’s message was loud and clear: It didn’t want any more negotiations with the UNF.
Therefore, how could Mr. Wickremesinghe claim that he would be able to resolve the conflict through negotiations, if he were to be voted back to power? Worse, he has already conceded that the LTTE cannot be crushed militarily! The international community may look so powerful to the law abiding citizenry but it has proved to be too impotent to make the LTTE fall in line. The only way available for Mr. Wickremesinghe to revive the peace process will be to grant the LTTE an ISGA, from where Eelam will be only a short hop. Unless the ISGA is granted, the LTTE will go back into the attack mode. And how does the UNP Leader propose to face such an eventuality? The international community will only pay lip service to the need to defeat terrorism, while urging ‘both parties to return to the negotiating table.’
Nothing describes the manner in which the SLFP and the UNP politicians have sought to resolve the conflict better than a pithy local saying, which roughly put into English means: Changing pillows as a cure for a headache! How many political pillows we have changed so far! The headache is still far from cured. What Mr. Wickremesinghe suggests is another ‘pillow change’.
It is high time both President Rajapakse and UNP Leader Wickremesinghe came to terms with the fact that the LTTE has rejected both of them. Neither of them is a darling of the LTTE. We only hope that they will join forces to solve the problem without compromising the national security interests so that there will be an honourable peace.
The real problem, the warring politicians should realise, is neither ugly Americans nor the not so ugly Sri Lankans but the bad terrorists, who are hell bent on destroying them all. On seeing how the southern politicians, driven by their greed for power, are going for one another’s jugular, turning a blind eye to the real danger, Prabhakran must be laughing his head off in the Wanni jungles.
Did anyone hear him say: "Bloody fools!"
The Editorial - The Island
On Wednesday, he came out with a pithy remark while addressing the diplomatic corps in Colombo. He told the US Ambassador in Colombo Robert O’ Blake that there was an ugly American in this country. The suave diplomat may have been taken aback. For, not even the diehard anti-American elements like our Samasamajists use that derogatory term these days. (LSSP firebrand Prof. Tissa Vitarana has become Uncle Sam’s blue-eyed boy. Enamoured of his APRC ‘majority report’, Americans have stopped saying ‘better dead than red’—at least in this country. Strange bedfellows!) Without keeping Mr. Blake in suspense, the UNP leader said immediately afterwards that the ugly American was none other than Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse.
However, Mr. Wickremesinghe’s humour was only a feint. This was his killer hook: He said his party would take to the streets in protest against the government, which, he claimed, was leading the country down the path to a failed state. The government’s military campaign against the LTTE had, he declared, come a cropper and the economy was in dire straits. He also lambasted the government for its failure to arrest the deterioration of the human rights situation and urged it to get the international community to arrange for a ceasefire and to work towards a negotiated solution.
War is hell and the mother of all crises. A political solution is the best way out, as any right thinking person will agree. But, Mr. Wickremesinghe, like all other advocates of a negotiated settlement, has chosen to remain silent on the be-all and end-all of any peace process—the willingness of the LTTE to give up Eelam. The implication of what Mr. Wickremesinghe is reported to have said is that President Mahinda Rajapakse is not capable of extricating the country from the mire it is trapped in.
"President Rajapakse is not a William the Silent," he has said. Let there be no argument about that. Then, who is Sri Lanka’s William the Silent? Never mind that! What if the people listen to Mr. Wickremesinghe and vote his party into office by any chance? Will he be able to deliver the goods?
Our experience with politicians of all hues has been rather disappointing. They are like the guards of a king’s harem. They have seen how it is done and they know how to do it. But, when given an opportunity, they cannot do it! The reason is only too well known. In 1994, Ms Chandrika Kumaratunga wanted state power to resolve the conflict. She was elected to power but she pathetically failed to honour her promise. Then in 2001, Mr. Wickremesinghe asked for power to end the war. He was given it. And what did he do? True, he managed to create a situation where there was absence of war—not to be confused with peace. But, he maintained that no-war situation through sheer capitulation to the LTTE, which had a field day. It got everything it wanted for the next phase of war and made a mockery of the law of the land. When the police arrested a group of LTTE cadres carrying arms in a so-called government controlled area in the East, the LTTE abducted a group of soldiers demanding the release of its cadres, who had committed a non-bailable offence. In the end, they were granted bail! The UNP kept its fingers crossed while the LTTE was killing people in their hundreds, extorting money from civilians, forcibly recruiting children and targeting armed forces and the police.
Finally, the LTTE, having indicated its willingness to agree to a federal solution in Oslo, put forth its ISGA demand, which the UNP-led UNF government couldn’t grant. Then, it unilaterally suspended talks and spurned the counter proposals of the UNF. President Kumaratunga sacked Prime Minister Wickremesinghe’s government and the UNF lost the general election in 2004.
The UNP is trying to have us believe that but for the sacking, it would have steered the peace process to a successful conclusion. But, evidence points to the contrary. The LTTE ruined whatever chances Mr. Wickremesinghe may have had of becoming President in 2005, by engineering a polls boycott in the North and the East. If the LTTE had wanted to resume negotiations with the UNF, it should have facilitated Mr. Wickremesinghe’s victory by allowing the people trapped in the areas under its jackboot to vote. The LTTE’s message was loud and clear: It didn’t want any more negotiations with the UNF.
Therefore, how could Mr. Wickremesinghe claim that he would be able to resolve the conflict through negotiations, if he were to be voted back to power? Worse, he has already conceded that the LTTE cannot be crushed militarily! The international community may look so powerful to the law abiding citizenry but it has proved to be too impotent to make the LTTE fall in line. The only way available for Mr. Wickremesinghe to revive the peace process will be to grant the LTTE an ISGA, from where Eelam will be only a short hop. Unless the ISGA is granted, the LTTE will go back into the attack mode. And how does the UNP Leader propose to face such an eventuality? The international community will only pay lip service to the need to defeat terrorism, while urging ‘both parties to return to the negotiating table.’
Nothing describes the manner in which the SLFP and the UNP politicians have sought to resolve the conflict better than a pithy local saying, which roughly put into English means: Changing pillows as a cure for a headache! How many political pillows we have changed so far! The headache is still far from cured. What Mr. Wickremesinghe suggests is another ‘pillow change’.
It is high time both President Rajapakse and UNP Leader Wickremesinghe came to terms with the fact that the LTTE has rejected both of them. Neither of them is a darling of the LTTE. We only hope that they will join forces to solve the problem without compromising the national security interests so that there will be an honourable peace.
The real problem, the warring politicians should realise, is neither ugly Americans nor the not so ugly Sri Lankans but the bad terrorists, who are hell bent on destroying them all. On seeing how the southern politicians, driven by their greed for power, are going for one another’s jugular, turning a blind eye to the real danger, Prabhakran must be laughing his head off in the Wanni jungles.
Did anyone hear him say: "Bloody fools!"
The Editorial - The Island