Ceylon Today Editorial

The POLITICS of SUBVERSION

09 November 2016

Unprincipled politics once again reared its ugly head in a shameless spectacle of disabled former soldiers and policemen being dispersed with water cannon and tear gas when they took the most ill-advised move of trying to break into the Presidential Secretariat premises.

The nation remembers with some perplexity that the issue of these men being given their just demands such as pension rights, especially justified we might say because they have been deprived of their limbs and most of them in any case are either ill-educated or unschooled in any trade to seek alternate employment very easily.

But then, the factor here is that these men who have every moral right to demand pension or some other suitable compensation benefits were given a deaf ear by the previous regime which sent them to the battle fronts to fight their war for them. Surely, a government that asks its people to sacrifice life and limb at the battle front should have in the first place immediately after May 2009 settled this issue once and for all.

To ask a man to place his life on the line against as dangerous a foe as the LTTE, and then renege on the moral obligation to ensure a man without hand or leg has substantial funds to live on and sustain his family smacks of a gross couldn't care-less attitude. It's a heinous offence against human sensitivities.

Now, last week, out of the blue so to say, we have all these lame ex-soldiers and Policemen being brought to Colombo, just as the farmers were just under a year ago, to add pressure on an already besieged government in an apparent attempt to right a wrong.

But tracing back the origins of the wrong, leads one to strange doorsteps. We said a few months ago when the GMOA was persistently making problems of issues not within their domain that such destabilizing strategies were the brainchild of opposition forces intent on bringing this government down through an endless stream of public protest demonstrations aimed at plunging the government into an ever deepening economic crisis by forcing it to bow down to these demands. That, as a government statement said yesterday, smacks of a transparent conspiracy to derail the government. This is not politics. This is subversion. And subversion of a most repulsive nature.

The government was spot on when it said in its statement that this was stage managed by forces intent on creating a divide between the lame soldiers and policemen and the government...and by extension use it to set the armed forces on a confrontation course against the government. All this looks very much like the beginnings of attempts to even mount an Army coup with assistance from sections in the Police force.

This coincides with the surfacing of the AAVA gang that appears hell bent on stoking a racial backlash once again to ensure that this government will not be able to cope with the mammoth economic crisis facing the country.

All this peculiarly happens weeks after the government had in fact been looking into this very issue and delivering just relief to our war-disabled soldiers and Policemen. That Buddhist monks and unidentified sections of society also came out in protest against the government simultaneously adds substance to our claim that this is an entirely stage-managed affair by the government's detractors.

By being forced into acceding to the demands of the soldiers and policemen, the government's budgetary estimates must necessarily now become encumbered with a huge additional supplement to the defence related proposals which , as President Sirisena said will have to be accommodated in February 2017. So, the Opposition on the one hand raises hell on revenue collection efforts such as the VAT and NDT and then in a roundabout strike compels the government into raising, still more money to meet pension demands of the soldiers and Policemen.

This will not end. There will be many more such demonstrations raised against the government in the months ahead, in an attempt to dethrone it before the UNHRC raised the Sri Lankan war crimes issue in March 2017, when those accused of war crimes fear the government will in the ultimate essay sacrifice them to a tribunal. So, not only must this government, from their point of view got to be sent home before that, but its detractors need to be in power to thwart any war crimes tribunal threat against them.

Daily News Editorial

Disabled soldiers and pseudo patriots

09 November 2016

The assurance by the Defence Ministry to the protesting disabled soldiers that their pension rights would be granted even though they had not completed the mandatory 12 years service would be welcomed by all and sundry. The sight of these men who lost their limbs, prostrated on the roads, with stumps where once there were fully grown healthy legs, demanding pension rights would no doubt have moved many a heart. For these were men who lost their arms and limbs to make the rest of their countrymen spared from such a cruel fate. Therefore nobody in their right minds would begrudge or hold it against these valiant men for making their just demand.

Be that as it may, it is also apparent that certain political elements were trying to fish in troubled waters and cause embarrassment to the government. Nay, there were clear attempts to goad these unfortunate men to make a spectacle of themselves in the city causing traffic chaos and inconveniencing commuters and general disruption. For, clearly these disabled men could not have done what they did, lying on the roads, forcing road closures, on their own volition without being guided by a hidden hand with vested interests. There was the inevitable appearance of Joint Opposition stalwart Udaya Gammanpila, like a Cheshire cat, smiling from ear to ear, at the scene of the demonstration and making his standard contribution of how the government was treating the war heroes. In his eagerness to pounce on the situation it may or may not have slipped the mind of the leader of the Pivithuru Hela Urumaya that the outstanding pension rights issue of the disabled soldiers was not of recent origin but a bone of contention dating back to the time of all leaders including his erstwhile boss Mahinda Rajapaksa.

It is in this light that the former President's statement that the tear gassing of the protesters on Monday by the government could not be condoned under any circumstances, should be viewed. Speaking to journalists following a function at the BMICH Rajapaksa said that the Cabinet during his tenure had already approved measures to solve the problems confronting the disabled soldiers and hence the government's action cannot be accepted. He does not say what these problems were or were they related to the pension rights now being demanded. Rajapaksa was President for 10 years of which a full six years was after the war ended. Hence he had ample time and the power to order that this matter be put right. In any event Rajapaksa owed his popularity and the electoral success that followed the war, to the war heroes, among whom no doubt were some of the disabled soldiers who were demonstrating on the streets of Colombo.

But given that Rajapaksa had no qualms throwing the war winning Army Commander behind bars and got soldiers providing security to the self same Army Commander to kneel on the tarmac of a five star hotel where the latter was holed by after unsuccessfully challenging the maha rajano at the hustings, it is difficult to assume that the former President had thought much of giving pension rights to these disabled soldiers.

Now, after closing his eyes to the plight of these men during his tenure as President, Rajapaksa, as is his wont, has shamelessly seized on the plight of these men to portray himself before the public as a champion of the cause of the disabled soldiers. For there is certainly the hand of the JO behind the protest as seen by the strident rhetoric uttered on behalf of these men by the self proclaimed President of the National Movement to Protect the Rights of War Heroes U. D. Wasantha who is a well known Rajapaksa disciple, doing the latter's bidding at every turn, organising press conferences and what not, to attack the government on the treatment of the country's war heroes.

The government should be alive to the designs of the Joint Opposition to whip up public sentiment, especially involving the country's disabled war heroes, which is an emotional issue, not only with the public, but also the armed forces. The ploy of the JO currently is to exploit the situation where members of the armed forces are arraigned before the courts of law for various felonies. Now it (JO) has opened up another flank to bring the plight of the disabled soldiers before the public and cash in for political gain. Defence Secretary Karunasena Hettiarachchi has already warned of a move by anti- government elements to exploit the situation affecting the disabled soldiers for political gain at a time when the government had already pledged to grant their demand from 2017. In addition there is also a pledge made to make financial provision in the upcoming budget to grant this pension. Hence Monday's shindig on the streets of Colombo can have no basis other than the not so covert designs by vested interests to shamelessly parade limbless men for political advantage.

The Island Editorial

Lanka’s day of shame

09 November 2016

 

Perhaps, no other country in the world has ill-treated its disabled service and police personnel in a more shameful and despicable manner than Sri Lanka. It was with shock and dismay that we watched the police using water cannon and tear gas to disperse a protest march conducted by a group of disabled soldiers and policemen who were denied pensions because they had retired due to permanent injuries before completing the stipulated periods in service. A hunger strike had preceded their march.

What those in power have apparently forgotten is that the country is free from terrorism today because the military, police and the Civil Defence Force personnel fought the LTTE risking their life and limb and many of them lost their arms, legs and eyes in the line of duty. The government must do whatever it takes to grant the justifiable demands of those who suffered disabilities at the hands of terrorists without provoking them into staging street protests.

It is being claimed in some quarters that on Monday police targeted the politically-motivated, able-bodied troublemakers and unfortunately the disabled protesters were also affected in the process. Water cannon have no crosshairs as is common knowledge. There is no way the riot police can target political elements mingling with disabled protesters. They also used water cannon and tear gas indiscriminately, knowing well that disabled persons including retired policemen would be the worst affected. Anyone who claims that the police targeted political activists has taken the public for suckers.

Some defence bigwigs are among those who claim that there was a political hand behind Monday’s protest. The manner in which the issue was handled smacks of a sinister political move; the circumstances that led to the protest march make one wonder whether someone deliberately allowed the situation to get out of hand, while President Maithripala Sirisena was out of the country. The march could have been nipped in the bud if a high ranking defence official had cared to meet the protesters while they were engaged in a fast and given them a written assurance that they would be given pensions. After all, that was what the President had ordered and the Defence Ministry did in the end.

No protest is devoid of politics in this country. There have been instances where protesters got killed due to the involvement of political parties in workers’ agitations. The death of a free trade zone employee due to police shooting during a protest against the Rajapaksa government’s efforts to introduce a private sector pension scheme is a case in point. The then rulers blamed the JVP for instigating the workers. Politics and protests are inseparable. There is reason to believe that necessary conditions were created for the pension issue to evolve into a march and for tear gas and water cannon to be used on disabled soldiers and policemen who tried to enter the Presidential Secretariat. The end result was that President Sirisena incurred public opprobrium.

President Sirisena has publicly complained of being kept in the dark anent certain actions of vital state institutions including the police. His consternation is understandable. The public holds him responsible for everything bad the government does because he was instrumental in last year’s regime change and paving the way for the formation of the present administration.

President Chandrika Kumaratunga found herself in a similar predicament from 2001 to 2004. She was not informed of even the ceasefire agreement between the UNF government and the LTTE before it was inked.

It will be a mistake for President Sirisena to join others in flaying the Opposition activists for Monday’s incident without ascertaining how the unfortunate incident came about even after he had taken action to solve the issue and finding out who was responsible for that.