Sunday Island Editorial

The Duminda case

11 September 2016

 

The long awaited verdict in the Bharatha Lakshman Premachandra murder case in which former political grandee Duminda Silva was an accused has been delivered by a three-judge trial-at-bar. This, of course, is not the final word on the matter. The judgment was divided with the presiding judge discharging the accused saying the evidence was contradictory and the accused must have the benefit of the doubt. The convicts have expressed their intention of appealing and there will be further judicial examination of whether the verdict was in accordance with the law. In such matters there is usually no review of the facts. We all know that the appeal process in this country is protracted. How long this will take after the conclusion of a long trial is anybody’s guess. We also know that for many years, in fact decades, nobody has been hanged here and this is unlikely to change at least in the short term. So this is not the end of the story. Many more chapters remain to be written.

What is more important is the question of politicians, leave aside underworld kingpins, bearing arms. The protracted war that was mercifully ended and the JVPs second insurrection resulted in the proliferation of arm in the country on a frightening scale and most of these are unfortunately in the wrong hands. During the long years of the war military deserters and serving soldiers spirited away weapons belonging to the forces and many of these have not yet been recovered. There was a buck to be made in selling these to undesirables and many such bucks have been made. In the worst years of the JVP’s second adventure, there was a real need for the issue of firearms to those at risk and such people – many of them politicians – risked being bumped off. Several such murders in fact did happen justifying arming the vulnerable. In fact, President Jayewardene made the memorable remark that those are risk must make their own security arrangements. The government assisted them with official arms issues.

But in the years after the JVP rebellion was quelled, very little progress was made in recovering the weapons that had been officially issued to politicians for self-defense. Off and on there were media reports of the number of weapons that had not been recovered but such media interest has now waned. While we do know that guns were fired by both sides in the Kolonnawa fracas that led to former political strongman Premachandra’s death, we do not know whether these arms were officially issued either to the politicians involved in the shooting or to their official or unofficial bodyguards. Or were they licensed firearms? All this is information that should be in the public domain. Quite apart from guns, the country situation today does not require veritable armies of armed guards assigned to politicians. Most often such personnel belong mostly to the police and sometimes the forces when there is a serious threat assessment. These personnel often become private armies as was demonstrated in the Kolonnawa shooting that had its semi-finale in the Colombo High Court last week.

It would be edifying to know how big the Presidential Security Division, the Prime Ministerial Security Division, the Ministerial Security Division and other organs responsible for VIP security are. There is no need to labor the fact that the deployment of large armies of men to protect the ever-growing political class would naturally detract from resources available for ordinary law and order functions of the police. This naturally affects ordinary people who pay the taxes that fund these various agencies providing our VIPs with security. It would be foolish for anybody to say that VIPs should not be protected. There are always trigger-happy loonies around and what any one of them might do at a given moment is anybody’s guess. The late Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar was, at least in the public perception, one of the most tightly protected politicians of his day. But yet an LTTE sniper from a neighboring home was able to fell him with a rifle bullet after he emerged from the swimming pool of his private residence. There was a lot of wisdom after the event but the foul deed was done.

The public are certainly happy that the long convoys of vehicles conducting VIPs on the roads are no longer as visible as they were during the time of the previous regime. But that is not to say that they are altogether absent. Such convoys are occasionally seen even now. The blackened glasses of high-end Mercedes Benz and BMWs do not permit ordinary folk to see who is riding them. Whoever they are, we would presume that there must be a threat perception that necessitates security and the people will not grudge them that. After all there is no purpose in crying over spilt milk or in this case spilt blood. But there is definitely a case for re-looking at how big a problem the non-return of officially issued arms is and also whether there are a reckonable number of stolen military weapons afloat.

It is an unfortunate reality in this country that preemptive measures are seldom taken before problems in many spheres assume explosive proportions. The non-return of an officially issued firearm once the threat is over is a far more serious issue that grabbing a cultivator protecting his crop with an unlicensed shotgun or a galkatas as country made firearms are commonly known.