Ceylon Today Editorial

More Actual Work, Less Room for Mistakes

06 September 2016

Recently, Ceylon Today reported of a government's decision to establish three commissions to actively engage in the reconciliation process in the country. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, two more commissions in addition to the Truth Seeking Commission will be established before the end of this year.

These new commissions will include a Reparations Commission which will deal with compensation for the victims of crime and an accountability mechanism. The Truth Seeking Commission will deal with what happened during the war and the post-war period. Seems like a well thought out, fool proof plan that would actually get some answers and as well as some much needed reconciliation to the country, doesn't it?

But we forget, the citizens of this country, those who were directly victimized by the war or post-war incidents and those who became the audience from the picket fence, have seen many commissions, with goals to find solutions to the ethnic crisis in the country, come and go.

Under the administration of the former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, and during the tenures of other governments as well, we have seen commissions, committees and various task forces being established to find solutions to this issue, which has haunted us since day one. At present, that problem has become a conglomerate of several other problems, creating a one monstrous behemoth of a problem, which we must meet, challenge and reconcile with.

There is a lesson this government must learn from its predecessors. No matter how many commissions or committees are established to engage an issue, it is useless if the individuals are not provided proper motivation or proper plans of action to do their job. This is what crippled all the previous commissions; they were not given proper orders, action plans, funding or proper sense of authority to carry out their work. Thus, they failed and did not achieve any results.

According to the latest reports, the upcoming Truth Seeking Commission will not be based on the South African model. Meanwhile, an eleven-member task force has been appointed by the government to make recommendations on the investigations and complaints. These recommendations will then be submitted and put into action once the three commissions are established.

This task force as well as those appointed to manage the activities of the three commissions have an immense duty at hand. A gargantuan responsibility lies upon their shoulder; to bring justice and catharsis to the many who are suffering from crimes of the past, the victims who have been imprisoned, tortured and torn apart both mentally and physically.

This duty and responsibility is a daunting and impossible task where many a man has failed (so proves all the previous cases). Racism cannot be cleansed and exorcised within our life time, nor while we, as human beings reign supreme. Unless, the entire human race attains a higher stance of intelligence in the next hundred years or so, racism based on territorial behaviour and flight-fight tendencies will play a big role in our lives, seemingly unbeatable and superior.

There is a psychology to our racism which finds its roots down our evolution lines. Racism is a habit which we have learned and passed down the line since we were apes walking on all fours. It is inherent. It is self-taught and self-cultured. It's in our system. We will continue to fear and hate other communities no matter what the exemplary yet singular human mind can come up with. We humans are at the end of the day a stubborn lot who are incapable of rebelling against their self-programmed system.

Yet, that does not mean we have to continue what we are doing (or in some case what we are not doing). This is why the three upcoming commissions have a daunting task at their hand. They cannot sit around warming chairs in air conditioned rooms, committing religiously to the mistakes of their predecessors. "A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools," wrote Douglas Adams. Hopefully, the same mistake is not made by those who will appointed to these three commissions.

Daily Mirror Editorial

There is a place in the sun for Sri Lanka

06 September 2016

Sri Lanka will today launch a powerful move in the battle against climate change, with the installation of renewable solar energy equipment at President Maithripala Sirisena’s private residence amid rays of hope, that about one million households will have solar energy within months. 

The Power and Energy Ministry’s creative and innovative project is already being promoted and launched in the Trincomalee, Ampara, Jaffna and Hambantota Districts. The installation fee could be paid by the households in installments and it would be deducted through their monthly electricity bills to streamline the procedure. In addition, those who cooperate with this eco-friendly move, will be given a reduction in their electricity bills for their house sections, which still obtain electricity.

Most people are reluctant or afraid to change from known procedures, but we need to realise now that the world is changing faster than ever before with digital automation, globalisation and the latest report that the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has created a social robot that has Emotional Intelligence and could communicate with people. Sri Lanka being a tropical paradise, we have solar power for at least 12 hours of the day every day of the year, unlike some countries where long winters give them only a little sunshine or access to solar power during those months.

From the beginning of time, sunlight or solar power has been freely available to anyone who accepted it. The world, now facing an ecological catastrophe due to climate change and environmental pollution, has only now become fully aware of the need to harness solar energy to the maximum. This energy is renewable and causes little pollution and is also less costly than hydro-electricity, coal power or any other source.

According to astronomers our Sun is one of more than 100 billion stars in our galaxy. The sun’s diameter is 1,390,000 km and its surface temperature 5,800K, a unit of measure for temperature based on the Kelvin Scale. In the core the sun is 15,600,000 K. It is by far the largest object in the solar system. It contains more than 99.8% of the total mass of the Solar System.

According to the National Geographic Magazine every hour the sun beams onto earth more than enough energy to satisfy global energy needs for an entire year. Solar energy is the technology used to harness the sun’s energy and make it useable. Today, technology produces less than one tenth of one percent of global energy demand.

Many people are familiar with so-called photovoltaic cells, or solar panels, found on things like spacecraft, rooftops, and hand-held calculators. The cells are made of semiconductor materials like those found in computer chips. When sunlight hits the cells, it knocks electrons loose from their atoms. As the electrons flow through the cell, they generate electricity.

On a much larger scale, solar thermal power plants employ various techniques to concentrate the sun’s energy as a heat source. The heat is then used to boil water to drive steam turbines that generate electricity in much the same fashion as coal or nuclear power plants, supplying electricity for thousands of people.

The National Geographic says solar energy is lauded as an inexhaustible fuel source that is pollution and often noise free. The technology is also versatile. For example, solar cells generate energy for far-out places like satellites in the orbit of the Earth and cabins deep in the Rocky Mountains as easily as they can power downtown buildings and future vehicles.

Daily News Editorial

Protect our envoys

06 September 2016

The physical attack on Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to Malaysia Ibrahim Ansar by a group of LTTE sympathizers should be roundly condemned by all right thinking people and political parties, irrespective of their ethnic labels. The High Commissioner who is a noted career diplomat who had also served a stint in India was only performing his official duties in seeing to the welfare of visiting Sri Lankan dignitaries to the host country. The Ambassador, it is reported was set upon by a group of Tamils outside the Kuala Lumpur Airport where only moments earlier he saw off a small group of Sri Lankan politicians who had been attending the International Conference of Asian Political Parties in Malaysia.

The Tamil groups had been staging protests against the presence of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa who they accuse of war crimes against their community in Sri Lanka. They had been pursuing Rajapaksa from the day he arrived in Malaysia and even stormed a Buddhist temple and allegedly roughed up the chief incumbent, for receiving Rajapaksa at the temple. It is not yet clear if Rajapaksa was responsible for war crimes or any member of the armed forces, for that matter. That decision is left to the appropriate investigative bodies that are soon to be set up to unravel, if indeed, war crimes were committed by the armed forces and those in command.

But it appears that the label has stuck onto Rajapaksa, going by the hostile receptions that he has now become accustomed to, especially in countries where there are large Tamil communities. Alas this visceral hatred towards the former President has had its knock down effect, taking its toll on all Sri Lankans. They (Lankans) today have become persona non grata in several Indian states, particularly Tamil Nadu, where even Lankan pilgrims had come under attack. One also recalls a close relative of Rajapaksa being placed under siege at the famous Thirupathi kovil where he had gone to worship the deities. Hence, it has come to a point where all Sri Lankans, let alone Ambassadors, are facing the risk of grave hostility, if not physical attacks, in countries where Tamils live in sizable numbers.

The government will have to take some drastic measures to ensure there is no repetition of incidents as that which took place in Kuala Lumpur the other day. If not, very soon Sri Lanka too will be in the same predicament as the USA which is compelled today to provide special security to its envoys in countries such as Afghanistan and Libya.

Be that as it may, the Malaysian government should have anticipated the hostility that awaited Rajapaksa, given the sizable Tamil population in that country and from where the LTTE’s chief arms supplier KP was deported not long ago. Equipped with this knowledge it should have taken additional security measures to ward off any untoward incident. This unprecedented physical assault of an Ambassador of a friendly country, on its own soil, is not going to win any kudos for the Malaysian government.

The Lankan government should insist on the Malaysian government to conduct a thorough investigation and expose the culprits behind this despicable act. It goes without saying that a diplomat is the property of the host country while serving his/her stint in that country and all efforts should be made to ensure his/ her well being and protection. The Malaysian government regrettably had been remiss in this regard leaving an Ambassador to its country fend for himself without providing him with the necessary security, knowing the risk he is placed in due to a hostile Tamil community.

For its part, the Sri Lankan government will now be saddled with an additional burden of looking into the security of its Ambassadors and envoys whenever Mahinda Rajapaksa visits countries that are home to a large Tamil population.

The Kuala Lumpur incident, no doubt, will be manna from heaven to the Joint Opposition, the only damper being the non Sinhala nationality of the Ambassador. But this will not deter them from drumming up the issue of Rajapaksa’s security. Already JO spokesman Dullas Alahapperuma has brought up the matter, making a strong case for the reinstatement of the military security of Rajapaksa. There are also different versions given by the JO to the airport incident. Some newspapers quoting JO members who accompanied Rajapaksa stated that the Ambassador had seen off MP Dinesh Gunawardena and WPC Samanmali Sakalasuriya while other reports state that the Ambassador had been accompanying Minister Daya Gamage and Deputy Minister Anoma Gamage. It is clear that an attempt is being made to portray the attackers as being hostile to the members of the Joint Opposition associated with MR and had roughed up the Ambassador for extending courtesies to the members of the JO among the delegation.

Be that as it may, the government henceforth should ensure that our envoys are treated with dignity in the host country. Gone are the days when our diplomats were treated as baggage carriers of visiting political panjandrums. A full report should be called for in respect of the Kuala Lumpur airport incident. Steps should be taken to provide our foreign envoys with additional security in stations where the risk factor exist, in concurrence with the host country.

The Island Editorial

Curiouser and curiouser!

06 September 2016

 

President Maithripala Sirisena waxed eloquent at the SLFP’s 65th session in Kurunegala on Sunday. Calling upon all SLFPers to unite, he made a solemn vow to form an SLFP government. The SLFP, he said, would contest the next local government polls under its own hand symbol. Is it that the UPFA is now kaput? Or, does the President want UPFA constituents to contest under the SLFP symbol?

Intriguingly, President has said he was still an SLFP member when he contested the last presidential election, where he, with the help of the UNP, the TNA etc defeated the candidate of the SLFP-led UPFA, Mahinda Rajapaksa. The first thing he did after being sworn in as President was to sack the then SLFP-led government, consisting of 126 MPs representing the SLFP, about 24 MPs from other UPFA constituents and some UNP crossovers. He did so in keeping with a pre-election pledge that he would make the then Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe Prime Minister (who had only 46 MPs) upon being elected. Thereafter, he prevented the SLFP-led UPFA from winning the last parliamentary polls by making public statements and addresses to the nation aimed at scuttling Rajapaksa’s attempt to become Prime Minister; those utterances demoralised the SLFP voters beyond measure and stood the UNP in good stead. The President successfully thwarted his bete noire’s determined effort to make a comeback as the PM and challenge his authority, but his gain proved to be the SLFP’s loss. After the polls, he prevented a group of 51 SLFP and other UPFA MPs from becoming the official Opposition and, thereby, ensured Rajapaksa would become an ordinary MP. Now, he is vowing to form an SLFP government!

President Sirisena’s act of sacking the SLFP-led administration last year and helping form UNP-led government to achieve his political objectives reminds us of a pithy local saying, which, roughly rendered into English, means breaking an atuwa (traditional paddy storage bin made of strong hardwood) to make a putuwa (chair). When he says he now wants to form an SLFP government one wonders whether he is planning to break the putuwa to rebuild the atuwa!

When President Sirisena sacked the SLFP-led government he declared that he was brininging the two main parties together for the good of the country. He reiterated that claim when he and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe formed what is being flaunted as the national unity government after the last general election. (This power sharing arrangement they craftily adopted to circumvent a constitutional restriction on the number of ministerial posts does not stand up to legal scrutiny. For, the parties that have to come together to form a national government, according to the 19th Amendment, are the UNP and the UPFA, which contested the last parliamentary polls, and not the SLFP which was only a constituent of the UPFA.)

We were also told that the longstanding, acrimonious power struggle between the SLFP and the UNP had been the bane of the country; the two parties had been vying for power at the expense of the national interests, both the President and the Prime Minister said. The way forward was for the SLFP and the UNP to sink their difference and unite, they insisted. That move earned the President and the Prime Minister international acclaim as well. Even some panjandrums of western governments who may not know where on earth Sri Lanka is, sent congratulatory messages. The civil society organisations painted the town red, welcoming as they did the ‘national unity government’, which they claimed was a long felt need to bring about national progress and reconciliation. They also vowed to defend it to the hilt.

Alas, now, President Sirisena wants to bring the national unity government to an end, to all intents and purposes, and form an SLFP government! Have the SLFP and the UNP accomplished their mission––bringing about national reconcilation and progress––for them to consider parting company?

President Sirisena’s assertion that he did not leave the SLFP to contest the last presidential election though he entered the fray as the New Democratic Front candidate and, therefore, he could take over the party after his victory is counterproductive. For, the SLFP dissidents can now follow suit; they can contest the next LG polls from another party without leaving the SLFP and claim they have not violated the party discipline and, therefore, they cannot be sacked.