The Island Editorial

Ward Place mayhem

Saturday 31st October 2015

 

Thursday’s brutal police attack on a group of Higher National Diploma in Accountancy (HNDA) students at Ward Place came as no surprise. Naked force is the means through which successive governments have sought to deal with students’ problems and the present dispensation is no different; it consists of the same political leaders who have failed to resolve the crises in the education sector all these years.

Student protests are not devoid of political agendas. Undergrads are pawns in the hands of some sinister political forces; each and every political party has a student wing. Protests aggravate rush-hour traffic snarls. So, there may have been people who endorsed Thursday’s police action to disperse the protesting students. The ire of the opponents of such brutal action is directed at the police. Thus, the responsibility for such unfortunate incidents is apportioned to the students and the riot police who liberally use batons, tear gas and water canon to make protesters show a clean pair of heels each.

Sadly, the real culprits, the government politicians and the higher education panjandrums get away with their failure to resolve the issues which find expression in aggressive protests. The bankrupt ultra radical, anarchical political elements dependent on student and youth unrest to gain some traction also craftily absolve themselves of the blame for using the youth as a cat’s paw by condemning the police.

The main reason given by the police for using excessive force was that the students had obstructed roads, causing a severe traffic jam. If so, all the police bigwigs responsible for the traffic chaos in the city must be lined up along streets and given the same treatment as students! It was only the other day that they implemented a harebrained traffic plan and held up traffic at Rajagiriya and adjoining areas for hours on end much to the consternation of the public. Political parties also hold demonstrations aggravating traffic congestion in the city and other urban areas. But, nobody gets beaten!

The present government mobilized university teachers and students, among others, to topple the Rajapaksa government. But, today, it does not care to solve the latter’s problems without having their skulls cracked. Protests which lead to police attacks can be avoided if students’ problems are addressed as and when they crop up. A stitch in time, as they say, saves nine.

It is not being argued that undergrads should be considered as having a special right to be on the wrong side of the law with impunity. But, they must be given a patient hearing and their grievances redressed. Or, the government should at least be seen to be making a genuine effort to do so. The main demand of the HNDA students who had a taste of yahapalanaya on Thursday was that the duration of their course of study be made four years instead of three. This is an issue which could have been resolved through negotiations if the government and the higher education authorities had been considerate enough.

Minister of University of Education and Highways Lakshman Kiriella is a man of peace as is common knowledge. He didn’t advocate military action against even the LTTE. He demanded that the Rajapaksa government resort to negotiations and not war in dealing with the Tigers. He went so far as to claim that any fool could wage war—onema gonekuta yuddha karanna puluwan. But, strangely, when students demand negotiated solutions to their problems they are surrounded and beaten up mercilessly. One may say, ‘Onema gonekuta sishyanta pahara denna puluwan’—any fool can assault students! When S. B. Dissanayake, as the Higher Education Minister of the Rajapaksa government, did so, he was raked over the coals. Today, the self-appointed champions of good governance have adopted the same method in ‘solving’ students’ problems!