Ceylon Today Editorial

BLOODIED FOOTPRINTS AND LG ELECTIONS

12 February 2017

While the Joint Opposition continues staging the protest demonstrations against the government that we have editorially warned on several occasions it would do, the fifth columnists of the pro-MR faction continue to resort to its clandestine efforts to destabilize the government and make every possible attempt to reduce its votes before the Local Government (LG) elections are held. All of this of course is aimed at de-legitimizing the government in the eyes of the public whilst simultaneously trying to make President Maithripala Sirisena appear to be a man who does not honour his word. We've heard of the moles inside government, inside the SLFP to be precise, spreading false rumours about the Party's Central Committee agreeing on the prospect of the President seeking re-election as Executive President once again in 2021 and paradoxically wanting him to agree to the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), including those in the JO faction, fielding only one common candidate for the LG elections.

We know that this idea has been floated after the waters were tested a month ago at a meeting between the JO faction's SLFP LG leaders and former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Naturally then, the MR moles in Sirisena's Government will next be pushing for those men to be fielded as SLFP candidates hoping that the CB Bond scandal will be adequate to exploit on the campaign trail and break United National Party (UNP) votes. The Police and Commissions continue making a lot of noise but delivering nothing by way of convictions in the scores of bribery and corruption charges against pro-MR politicians. These issues will be damp squibs at election time and will not erode pro-MR faction votes at the LG elections. Former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga was quick to release a denial that the SLFP CC had agreed on President Sirisena going for re-election. Should their plans work out, one result could be a weaker UNP in Parliament because pro-MR LG nominees can end up seeking election to Parliament in 2020, giving MR the upper hand in Parliament in addition, hopefully, from their point of view, paving the way for an SLFP Prime Minister too.

Marginalizing Ranil Wickremesinghe is what the game is all about. Hence the merciless wielding of the CB Bond issue weapon, the rice price issue which according to outstation correspondents is largely being triggered by pro-JO rice retailers/suppliers and the SAITM issue. A look at rice prices in Bangladesh will show that the average price of rice in that country works out to over Rs100 a kilo and is no issue, social, economic or political.

We learn that the government is biding its time with cases against the MR faction until the very eve of the LG elections...and that includes the bloody massacre at the Welikada jail by men in army uniform, the assassinations of media men and politicians and alleged financial wrongdoings by members of the Rajapaksa clan.

What observers feel is that there can be a spate of convictions just before the LG elections which will put some key JO players inside the 'safe house' in Welikada resulting in a considerable whack at their election campaign.

Quite amazingly, not one of the JO antics seems to be making any inroads into the apparent stability of the government. But looks can be deceptive. Civil society players who helped bring this government to power have realized that they have two options: One is to campaign against the man they helped bring to power and thus help his predecessor return to power. Or they can keep out of the campaign and help this government gain more victories at the LG elections.

The President has often said he will do away with the Executive Presidency but this paper has not been so lacking in common political sense to have not realized the fact that pledges are always subject to deferral though that does not necessarily mean it will not be kept, especially in the context of a nation and its government being under siege by forces which have been clearly part of the impunity under which murder, mass and savage State-sponsored murder such as the Welikada jail massacre, the Thajudeen case that has left a trail of phone calls to the then President's own office, the Avant Garde case and scores of cases involving underworld killers and narcotics smugglers whose names are linked to the former regime.

There also is the fact that ex-LTTE killer Pillaiyan, chief suspect in the killing of Tamil politician Joseph Pararajasingham in 2005 is behind bars. There is the Thyagarajah Maheswaran killing, days after the then State Intelligence Service reduced his security.

The JO will be going to the polls with the woof and warp of its flag rather more bloodier than that of the UNP and certainly leagues ahead of the undeniable integrity of the essentially 'Sirisena' following in the SLFP.

Weekend Nation Editorial

Let them be

12 February 2017

Colombo is never short of open public spaces for people to come, chill, catch up with friends, speak their hearts out to their lovers, and even to have some alone time.

Sometimes, seated under a tree, staring into the world with fresh air fanning your face is better than being in a closed, air-conditioned room with many people around.

But are these open spaces really ‘open’ to the public in its true sense.

Last week, the Nation came across instances where couples were chased out of the Viharamahadevi Park. They were chased by Civil Defence personnel who were patrolling the premises.

What does this mean? Are not couples free to be themselves in a public area? Is holding hands or having an arm around a shoulder bad ? Should closeness between people be regulated and kept under surveillance.

There are many reasons why people choose to come to parks. There are several who come there to have one-to-one talks, which they cannot have in their homes, or workplaces.

There have been occasions where couples have been caught being really intimate to the point that parents have to take their kids to another section of the premises.

However, the majority of those who come there just want to spend some time with their loved ones, even if it just by being silent.

How can they be themselves when they know that every movement of theirs is being watched? Hugging a person is not equivalent to copulating. It does not even come close.
One cannot generalize all youngsters. You cannot judge the entire generation just because of a handful of them. Holding the hands and seated under a tree should not be the reason for them to be asked to go out.

In case, if the intention of the couple to do more than just talking, then they would have chosen a secluded environment. They would have even opted to rent a room. They would not be roaming around in a park, which is open from all sides.

If the intention was to meet secretly, without the knowledge of family or relatives, the park is still not a good place. It is public, and they could bump into someone they know.
On the other hand, another question which arises from this is that how could a uniformed man be the arbiter on morality and decency?

The Sri Lankan Constitution recognizes the freedom of association and the freedom of movement.

However, the fact is that we now live in a world where it is hard to have personal space, thanks to smart phones, social media and cheaply available data networks.

There have been many occasions where matters discussed behind closed doors had become viral within minutes.

Our Facebook walls are often filled with videos of unsuspecting people caught on camera while making a fool of themselves.

Today’s era of smart phones and social media has nothing personal about it.
The bitter truth is that each and every individual, knowingly or unknowingly is being monitored. No one likes being monitored or watched.

In 2001, the Americans protested against the Patriot Act through which the people had to provide personal information, including details pertaining to the usage of credit cards.

This was soon after the 9/11 attack. But the people did not want the government to have their information because they did not like to be monitored and watched.

This was way before Facebook and Twitter took the internet by storm. Today over one billion people are on Facebook and more than 100 million people use Instagram every month.

According to statistics, the world population is approximately 7.5 billion, which means one out of seven people are active on a social media site.

Many of them share their locations and places where they have checked in on their Facebook statuses.

What they do not realize is that these facilities on their social media sites allow them to be monitored without their knowledge, or consent.

Thanks to Facebook, people keep a track of where you are and what you are doing. While you may share these information for the fun of it, on the flipside, it allows you to be monitored.

Therefore, inadvertently, you allow yourself to be monitored.

Coming back to the Viharamahadevi Park, yes, it is necessary for security officials to be on the alert. But should they be alert for issues concerning lovers?

Should they intrude when two innocent couples are sharing an intimate moment? This is clearly invasion of privacy. After all, growing up years in one’s life are some of the most memorable, in their diverse manifestations in music, drama, friendships, love affairs, and activism. No one has the right to rob youth of these experiences, least of all, self-proclaimed uniformed minions guarding a do it yourself code of morals.

Today’s youngsters are innovative and smart. Indeed, there are the blacksheeps. But blacksheeps don’t represent a generation.

Let them be free. Everyone has a right to love, and love is what binds us together.
Allow them to enjoy the fresh air under the tree while gazing at each other, lost in each other’s world.

Sunday Times Editorial

Medical misadventures

12 February 2017

The issue of a private Medical College refuses to go away. It seems the flavour of at least the week gone by after undergraduates marched the streets facing police water-cannon. The Sri Lanka Medical Council (SLMC) is due to go to a superior court, the medical trade union (GMOA- Government Medical Officers’ Association) is howling in protest and political parties are joining hands to offer stubborn resistance to Government moves to allow fee-paying students at private institutions to become doctors. The public watches in dismay.

The latest upsurge of protests came after a Court of Appeal verdict rejecting the SLMC objections to a private medical institution (SAITM) offering medical degrees. The long ongoing campaign to block these Government moves, begun with the previous administration and being continued with the incumbents in office, continues. The SAITM issue is plagued with allegations of bribery and corruption, intimidation, irregularities, ‘incest’ and vested interests involving ministers, doctors, health officials and business interests best left to the President and the Supreme Court now to unravel. But it also involves an issue that goes beyond SAITM – that of private medical universities.

Universal Adult Franchise in 1931 was credited with providing Sri Lanka with a health care system that gave rise to statistics that were the envy of many economically developing, especially in the region and even developed countries. Surveys have shown that giving women the vote in 1931 ensured the people’s representatives paid attention particularly to maternity and neonatal care and paediatric facilities. This required quality medical education and trained nurses and midwives. And what is more, throughout these decades, this relatively high standard of health care has been achieved despite a shoe-string budget from successive Governments.

Alas, scores of doctors trained at State Medical Colleges at the expense of the meagre resources of the taxpayers have left the Health Department to serve in hospitals in foreign countries, distinguishing themselves no doubt, but depriving the country of their own services. Many who went for further education and training, as they should have, never returned. Yes, they paid a pittance in the form of a bond, but what of the place they occupied at the limited Medical College. Who can replace that?

Every year 1,200 medical graduates join the state health service. 2015 figures on the renewal of registrations by the SLMC indicate 27,000 renewals. If for argument’s sake more than 2,000 have left the country over the years, and more than 1,000 are not practising, there are still more than 20,000 in service. But there is a serious maldistribution of doctors in the remote areas where doctors and patients lack adequate facilities and services, not to mention shortages in some specialties.

In the 1980s, the J.R. Jayewardene Government took the first steps in rectifying this anomaly of a shortage of doctors by starting a private Medical College. (Please see ST2 section Page 14). He managed to steamroll political opposition to it.

Today’s crisis also has a political element. It is not limited to downright envy that children of affluent parents can become doctors while others cannot — unless they enter the State Medical College. It is also not limited to the fact a greater influx of doctors will mean more riding the gravy train of private practice. This is a move from a socialist-welfare State struggling to make ends meet, providing free health care without the money to foot the bill for it, and hoping an open economy will take care of the bills and burdens of the State to deliver the goods to the people.

The entire medical education exercise is inexorably linked to the University entrance examination and the current ‘Z’ score system. For many years, when University entrance was on merit, there were accusations that some examiners were partial towards a particular community giving high marks for papers answered in a particular language stream resulting in a greater intake to the Medical Faculty in particular than was in proportion to its population. Others dismissed this with scorn saying they were simply cleverer than the others. Then came standardisation and the quota system to give rural students either in Kilinochchi or Kamburupitiya a better chance of entering universities, but that backfired into a trumped up racial discrimination issue and was said to be the springboard to attract youth to a violent insurgency in the north.

While there can never be a foolproof system in a country where false addresses and documents are produced for entry from primary schools onwards, the ‘Z’ score may have also caused reverse-discrimination by depriving bright students mainly from the cities entering medical school and universities because of quotas given to rural students. Conversely, rural children were deprived of places because city students took temporary residence in the provinces for examination purposes.

Those thousands thus deprived must be given an opportunity of access to higher studies even at a later stage. The Open University opened new vistas for children thirsting for knowledge and a degree, but were kept out of universities due to a corrupted entrance system.

The country is in need of more doctors, though no one really knows what the shortage is. The numbers going abroad for medical studies because they don’t have access to a medical faculty in Sri Lanka is an astounding 500-800 on average a year. It costs them Rs. 2-5 million a year depending on if they go to India, Bangladesh, Nepal or to the United Kingdom. This money has to be met with foreign exchange to the tune of Rs. 15 billion or more. Only half of these outgoing students return to Sri Lanka. These cold statistics cannot be simply ignored. For the GMOA, paradoxically, doctors who pass out of some of the foreign medical schools are not an issue should they sit for the local qualifying examination conducted by the Sri Lanka Medical Council (SLMC).

That is what is at the crux of this debate. Whatever medical education is obtained, the SLMC ought to remain the ‘Gatekeepers’ to the profession, the licensing body for medical practitioners in Sri Lanka. It must sue – and be sued, and take the responsibility for untrained, unqualified doctors unleashed on unsuspecting patients, especially the poor. “Business schools” giving medical degrees that do not meet the required standards will inevitably collapse if their graduates don’t get registration to practise as doctors. In some countries, in the neighborhood as well, politics has crept into the regulation of some private medical colleges tarnishing the otherwise good reputation of the quality medical colleges. That is the last thing that must happen here.

Higher education in economically advanced countries comes at a financial cost to the undergrad. Many students keep paying their student loans for many years after graduation and while in employment. In Japan, fees are charged according to the parents’ financial status. Scholarships are given in abundance for poor students in universities where fees are charged from those who can afford to, and are willing to, pay. That’s how prestigious private universities, including medical colleges abroad have the funds to provide quality education without waiting for government handouts that are not there.

Sunday Observer Editorial

SAITM: towards consensus on medical standards

12 February 2017

With signs of momentum towards a resolution of the SAITM problem, the report of the Presidential committee to study the SAITM issue will be awaited by all. Leave aside the fact that a medical degree can be a matter of life and death, a degree qualification for any of the scientific and technical professions must have a watertight guarantee of quality if society is to get the best from it.

That guarantee of quality is critical if any profession is to make its best contribution to sustaining and advancing society’s vital infra-structure. Human society’s progress to date – what we fondly call ‘civilization’ – has greatly benefited from the professions, from the most ancient to the vast array of newly evolved ones.

In addition to ensuring that its own contribution to society is up to the best standards, in today’s complex world the medical profession also has the opportunity to collaborate with the other professions and sciences in joint contributions with shared professional benefits. New and expanding avenues of inter-disciplinary collaborations have seen the evolution of hybrid disciplines and technical expertise. Bio-medical engineering is one (lucrative) example.

Each profession must, therefore, not only ensure minimum standards for its best professional output, but must also ensure that its professional standards are on par with standards of excellence of the other, parallel professions. This is why the controversy over the recognition of the medical degree issued by the South Asian Institute of Technology and Management (SAITM) is so complex with so many interested parties.

It is not simply a question of higher educational opportunities for young Sri Lankans. It is that and much more. The looming factor behind the immediate furore is the long-standing social use of education for upward mobility and the desperate search for such opportunities in a country where the education system simply cannot meet demand. Feeding into the SAITM controversy, then, is the politics of state-run free education and industry aspirations to enter a new sector in the search for new markets.

Woven into this conflict is the larger politics of social group interests: the interest of the mass of the people in maintaining the state-supported education system as against intermediary social classes that have the money, seek a quick step up the social ladder.

Trapped in between this interplay of ‘interests’ is the requirement to ensure quality standard in Sri Lanka’s medical degree - as defined by the country’s relevant professional standards body, the Sri Lanka Medical Council.

Sri Lanka’s medical degree began to be internationally respected almost from the inception of the state-run higher education system in the mid-twentieth century. But, the number of doctors migrating from the country were impressive not because of the global demand for specifically Sri Lankan medical expertise. This high outflow was, and is, simply because of the penchant for Sri Lankan doctors (and most other professional cadres) to depart their motherland for greener pastures. This is a typical Third World phenomenon of social migration, more pithily called ‘the brain drain’. The Sri Lankan desire to grab a degree and run, remains.

What this means is that the demand for medical professionals in Sri Lanka will remain high as a result of this continued outflow. A new dimension is the rapid expansion of the economy and the corollary expansion of the middle and upper classes. Far more Sri Lankans today have the cash to go beyond the crowded and un-embellished government clinics and hospitals than thirty years ago. At the same time, the population has also grown, further boosting the market for medical services outside the free health system. Hence, the phenomenal expansion of the private health care industry.

The growing social affluence has also opened up the market for private education which also has expanded phenomenally.

What has not expanded or advanced in step with such infra-structural and social growth is the system of quality regulation which remains under-developed in relation to both, the private health care industry as well as the private education industry. It is of vital importance to the country that these two dynamic and potentially highly innovative industries evolve from being mere industries to being proper service sectors that can actually guarantee quality standards to the nation.

This is why SAITM has got caught up in a tangle of politics and bureaucracy as well as professional concern.

The Sri Lanka Medical Council’s regulatory standards and, surveillance and enforcement capacities need rapid adjustment and upgrade to meet emerging new needs posed by the private health and education industries. And, both, the State-run and emerging private sector medical education systems need to consult and collaborate in devising standard systems for curriculum and training facilities that are mutually compatible.

If the private sector has the advantage of market driven innovation to lead in creativity, the state-supported medical sector has a flexibility of scope for research that is not bound by business bottom lines or diverted by market trends. The SLMC certainly must remain the decider in medical quality but the very process of ‘deciding’ has become complex with the arrival of private medical training, and the SLMC must establish new procedures and templates in its regulatory work.

The private medical training sector must be encouraged by such facilitation to expand even further. The credibility of the private sector depends on its own record of protecting nationally recognized medical education standards and systems. Any attempt to circumvent regulatory processes and cut corners to meet business budgets will not only undermine the private sector’s branding, but, worse, undermine confidence in the country’s quality of health care and professional standards.

Last month’s court ruling shows the intention of the judiciary of pushing the whole controversy along towards some resolution rather than allowing such an important matter to fester. The appointment of a committee by the President and the joint statement by the country’s eight medical faculties inspires confidence that a solution is not far away. Students, doctors and citizens all await it.

Sunday Island Editorial

Way forward for SAITM

12 February 2017

We are glad that the deans of the medical faculties of eight state universities have infused a voice of sanity into the prevailing madness over the SAITM controversy. It was reported yesterday that they had a brief meeting with Higher Education Minister Lakshman Kiriella at the parliamentary complex where they handed a letter which stressed, among other matters, that the Sri Lanka Medical Council (SLMC) must remain the authorized institution for regulating the standards of doctors practicing in this country, its independence safeguarded and students who had qualified at SAITM be justly treated. They have anslo suggested that SAITM students are afforded an opportunity of a few months of proper clinical training followed by an examination by the SLMC in order to determine their competence and that enrolment of new medical students be suspended until outstanding issues are resolved.

As far as we can see, only the dean of the Kotelawela Defence University (KDU) medical school has not signed. There have been allegations, how correct we do not know, that the standards demanded of SAITM have not been applied to KDU. That university is also a fee-levying institution.

What is disgraceful about the controversy that has been swirling around SAITM these recent weeks, where even patients seeking treatment at government hospitals had to pay a price due to a GMOA token strike on that issue, is the double tongued approach of the Joint Opposition. During the previous regime, government scholarships were awarded to SAITM students, according to Prof. G.L. Pieris "on the expectation that SAITM would measure up to required standards". These standards were not met, he now says, but even if the claim were true it’s a essentially a case where the cart was put before the horse. The JO’s present stance has been determined for political advantage and nothing else.

It will also be useful to remember that there probably would not have been a medical faculty at the Kelaniya University (Ragama) but for the fact that the Sri Lanka College of General Practioners, at great cost and energy, set up the private, fee-levying North Colombo Medical College (NCMC). The founders may have had the influence to win the support of then President J.R. Jayewardene, but they got nothing free from the government. Standards of entry were highly competitive and just 100 of over 1000 applicants were admitted in the first year. The late Prof. Stanley Kalpage, the then Secretary to the Ministry of Higher Education and Chairman of the University Grants Commission, told the final convocation of NCMC over two decades ago that many practicing GPs whose children could not win admission to the NCMC were unhappy. One doctor who got his daughter in but whose son failed to make it became an implacable enemy of the NCMC, he said. Following much agitation, with arguments very similar to what we are hearing now, the NCMC was taken over and attached to the Kelaniya University. Many doctors in practice today would not have had that opportunity had the NCMC not been set up. Given the cash-strapped status of succeeding governments, it is an open question whether the Kelaniya University would have had a medical school at all; even if it finally achieved one, it would have been realized much later but for the NCMC core.

It would be relevant to find out how much foreign exchange flows out of this country to pay for Lankans studying medicine abroad. The collective figure over a period of years would run into the billions. The reality is that Sri Lanka lacks the resources to offer university places to all those students qualified for tertiary education especially for entry to the medical and engineering professions and perhaps law. This gap has been met by private fee-levying institutions, often linked to universities abroad. Except in the field of medicine, there has been no protest about the offering of these courses by the private sector.

Dr. Neville Fernando set up SAITM as a commercial venture; but a large number of scholarships are on offer there. Providing a quality education in a discipline such as medicine will not come cheap. But not all students of SAITM come from affluent families with some parents mortgaging homes and property to invest in their children’s education. It wasn’t different during the NCSC controversy, but as Prof. Kalpage observed in his convocation address of long ago, most students there were children of teachers.

Two eminent retired medical teachers, Emeritus Professor Herbert Aponso who taught pediatrics and Prof. Upali Ilangasekera, a former professor of medicine at Peradeniya, also made pertinent observations in Friday’s issue of The Island. They said that when they were examiners for the Act 16 examinations which Lankans who had acquired medical degrees abroad mainly in Russia and China (and some other countries) had to sit to qualify for registration as doctors here, they had found that the training, curriculum etc. in the countries where they studied was tailored to suit those conditions. The candidates were "awfully ignorant" of health problems and medical needs here. Sometimes they had to relearn and re-sit the exam several times but they had subsequently passed and proved to be efficient medical doctors.

Thus though their initial training had not been adequate by SLMC standards, they were given an opportunity to come up to the acceptable requirements for Sri Lanka, they said. The former professors say that as far as they were aware, SAITM has a curriculum acceptable to Sri Lanka and the institution has been able to attract capable teachers. Perhaps the students have been handicapped by lack of exposure to sufficient clinical training – a matter that could be corrected. They have made the further point that the training that SAITM offers is in no way less (in fact much better) than what they have experienced in the training offered in some foreign countries. Professors Aponso and Ilangasekera suggested that SAITM graduates be offered provisional registration until they pass the ACT 16 exam – the same yardstick applied to foreign medical graduates. Thus a way forward has been clearly identified; it should be applied without caving into various pressures and vested interests as the JRJ government did in the case of the NCMC.

Ceylon Today Editorial

Building reputations harder than improving players

11 February 2017

In an interview in Dubai recently Sri Lankan cricket legend Mahela Jayawardena had this to say about why the Sri Lankan young players coming out do not seem to fit the pattern of the past. "Our domestic cricket is something that is not up to the mark. It is not up with all the other countries. We are producing talented cricketers but they are not at the level where they could step in and play international cricket," Jayawardena said.

Jayawardena was even then someone who knew the value of batting scoring 66 off 103 balls at a strike of 63 showing his ability to wait and score. With his first outing getting his name alongside a world record breaking total (952) showed his class. His remark about what is eating Sri Lanka's game was their domestic structure may have been his experience not having a good overseas record.

The statement made though is a very accurate one, whether it is overseas conditions or home batting is done only one way. The difference is adjusting to conditions. Mahela's overseas average of 35 includes many overseas hundreds; this will prove that it is conditions faced in real situations that will improve the player. Sri Lankan domestic competition was introduced at a time when there was no scope of the country being on stages of Test cricket. The domestic tournament then was meant only as a feature to keep cricket going, from schools to clubs.

In those conditions it may not have mattered very much about conditions and situations; the survival of the fittest would be the mark. With getting on to the international game things needed to be changed. Even after the first appearance in a Test match in 1983 it was taken for granted how the domestic tournament would improve matters of conditioning players for selections. As in the past it went just the same way of players being picked for performances based locally. Yet there was evidence that they were average performers in overseas conditions.

Due to this situation prevailing over cricket in Sri Lanka they are stuck in the quagmire of transition for quite a while. Unless, they manage to find a way out of this situation soon and were to carry on and on, sooner than later they are going to find themselves at the lower end of the rung. It is not that they do not have the players capable of putting things right. But, that experience playing the game the hard way it is played by the countries heading the rakings is what matters most.

If you take the fourth ODI against the South Africans that Sri Lanka lost by 40 runs it shows that those ones being turned into twos, had it happened they could have been on top. It was that same thing right along; the dropped catches and waiting at the wicket without throwing it away were things that went against the Sri Lankans.

The players except for the two or three seniors were all youngsters less in experience. It is this matter in that transition calculation that went on to be the negative factor. What was witnessed as capabilities compared to most youngsters going around, the performances from those Sri Lankans were top class. Lakshan Sandakan, Lahiru Kumara were comparable to most top class bowlers in the world and batters like Kusal Mendis, Dickwella would be welcomed by most captains. They could be classed masterful stroke makers and stars on the field, had they been able to improve their game to a more consistent level.

In actuality from what the captain of the South African ODI team said about the Sri Lankans showed that they were not going to take chances against them. That shows the respect they have, it could be more constant and meaningful had they stood on their toes and tried harder. This is what is meant in the statement made by Sri Lankan cricketing great Mahela that much could be achieved changing that domestic structure.

Another cricketing legend and present chief of selectors Sanath Jayasuriya says that most of our top cricketers came from this domestic structure and it is not the structure's fault. There has to be some sort of problem; structural change is needed as the production of the good cricketer does not take place as it used to. From the time Sri Lanka were accepted to ICC Test level, there was the production line working well, producing one after another first class cricketer, fit to go and make it into the national squad straight from school but it has slowed down too much.

We are not producing enough of outstation or Colombo based players with confidence like Sanath or Dilshan or Upul Tharanga anymore. The people coming through the line need more strength to go into the international level and begin to perform, that is what this delay in the transition is all about. And this is how the transition was seen by sports writer Peter Miller recently: The sun rises. The sun sets. The earth revolves around the sun. The moon revolves around the earth. Sri Lanka is in transition. They all want Sri Lanka to perform and they know the capabilities of Sri Lankan players. do not lose that respect it is harder to rebuild than cricketers.

Daily News Editorial

Boost for Lanka-US ties

11 February 2017

The United States is very much in the news these days, with the global media following every move of the newly installed President Donald Trump. Sri Lankans too are eagerly following events in the US, which does have a large number of Sri Lankan Americans.

The US-Sri Lanka relationship has flourished and endured all these years, although there was a dip in ties during the second term of the previous administration, which differed sharply from Washington on Human Rights and other concerns expressed following the end of the conflict in 2009. The US sponsored several resolutions against Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council, which Sri Lanka lost.

The National Unity Government elected two years ago reached out to the US and has largely been able to mend the fences. Working on the principle that restoring human rights and addressing accountability issues matter mostly to Sri Lankans, not necessarily to the International Community, the Government has been able to win back the confidence of the latter. The authorities have realised that a strong local human rights framework can actually lead to less foreign intervention, a fact that the previous Government failed to grasp. The Government has since co-sponsored a UNHRC Resolution in Sri Lanka. US-Sri Lanka ties and Sri Lanka’s ties with the West in general, are now on a very strong footing.

It was recently reported that US Vice President Mike Pence had spoken over the telephone with President Maithripala Sirisena on taking the mutual ties forward. The President has also written to the US President on a range of bilateral issues. President Trump’s foreign policies that apparently call for less interest and intervention in the affairs of third countries may be beneficial for Sri Lanka in the long term. However, cooperation and mutual interest in areas such as democratic frameworks and institutions, common to both countries, are likely to be enhanced.

It is in this context that we should analyze the comments made during Sri Lanka’s Independence Day celebrations in Washington, D.C. by Acting Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Bruce Wharton who said that “Sri Lanka has the potential to become the next Asian Tiger”. He has lauded the Government's renewed commitment towards reconciliation and the unprecedented level of cooperation between the two countries.

“The United States will continue to stand with you as your friend and your partner. While our level of cooperation today is unprecedented, there is always more progress to be made,” Wharton has said. He has noted that Sri Lanka boasts one of the most strategic maritime locations in the entire Indo-Pacific: at the nautical crossroads of Africa, South Asia, and East Asia, with the Strait of Hormuz to its west and the Strait of Malacca to its east. “Forty per cent of all seaborne oil passes through the former and half the world's merchant fleet capacity sails through the latter, making the sea lanes off of Sri Lanka's southern coast some of the world's most important economic arteries,” Wharton said. This in fact resonates with the Government’s drive to boost operations at the Hambantota international port and also the Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport.

Sri Lankan Ambassador to the US Prasad Kariyawasam has said Sri Lanka looks forward to working with new US Administration to build on the exponential progress of the multi-faceted bilateral relationship, nurtured especially during the last two years. The appointment of Rex Tillerson as US Secretary of State bodes well for Sri Lanka, with his worldview and interactions with world leaders in his capacity as the former CEO of Exxon Mobil, one of the biggest companies in the world. There is no doubt that a meeting between Tillerson and our dynamic Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera will follow soon which will no doubt set the agenda for even better ties. True, both allies and foes of US have viewed with concern the somewhat unconventional foreign policy approaches of the new US President, but the overall status quo on South Asian relations is likely to prevail with Tillerson at the helm of State Department. It needs to appoint new personnel to some of the vacant South Asian desks to streamline this process.

The US and European Union account for more than 75 percent of our exports, but we should strive to increase these numbers. The US is also a very important tourism market for Sri Lanka and the proposed new tourism campaign must focus on the US market in a big way. The anticipated entry of Asian Low Cast Carriers to the US will bring down US-Colombo airfares, making travel easier on the wallet. The US may be half a world away, but people-to-people contact is essential to enhance bilateral ties.

The Government has initiated a three-year programme that will indeed lay the foundation for the country to become the next Asian Tiger. This is a process that will go hand in hand with moves for lasting peace and reconciliation. The US and other friends of Sri Lanka should be close allies in this drive towards prosperity.

The Island Editorial

Polls Chief or NARA head?

11 February 2017

 

Time was when the Sri Lankan polity suffered from polls diarrhoea, as it were. The Rajapaksa government would hold staggered provincial council and local government polls almost annually so much so that people got fed up with them. Today, the country is suffering from polls constipation, so to speak.

The Joint Opposition (JO) tells us that it does not think the much-delayed local government polls will be held this year. Some of its heavyweights made this observation following a meeting with Chairman of the National Election Commission (NEC) Mahinda Deshapriya on Thursday. The NEC cannot be blamed for this situation; it finds itself in a constitutional straitjacket though it is being described as independent. Vital decisions on elections continue to be made by politicians in power.

Many people naively expected the public sector to bounce back after the implementation of the 19th Amendment, which restored the so-called independent commissions being flaunted as a panacea for all ills in state institutions. They deserve to be treated to croton and jak leaves (kos kola) which the incumbent government has urged the public to consume by way of food substitutes.

The incumbent IGP has made a cringeworthy public display of his servility to government politicians; he was caught on camera talking to a minister very obsequiously and promising not to arrest a suspect some weeks ago. The CID and the FCID (Financial Crimes Investigation Division) have been reduced to mere appendages of the government. They are a modern version of the Gestapo. The National Police Commission has been rendered toothless. The Auditor General has incurred the wrath of government politicians for remaining fiercely independent. The self-proclaimed champions of good governance vilify him at every turn and are all out for his scalp. The less said about the Attorney General’s Department the better!

Ruling party politicians heap abuse on upright state officials in public with impunity. The yahapalana government has, through such tactics, succeeded in keeping the public service under its thumb. The judiciary continues to be manipulated by the powers that be and some courts remain open till midnight, during weekends and even on Poya Days, either to remand Opposition activists or bail out government backers.

The high octane performance on the part of the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption to probe the opponents of the government is sadly lacking when complaints are lodged against the yahapalana politicians or their henchmen who are apparently too big to be caught.

Worse, the yahapalana regime has denied the public their franchise though sovereignty is said to reside in them. The local government polls, which help people to have themselves heard at the grassroots level, have been postponed indefinitely and the ruse the government leaders, afflicted with polls-phobia, uses to justify their decision is that the delimitation commission reports are riddled with errors. They have at long last said, under political pressure, that they will gazette the delimitation review committee report shortly. But, the politicians who fear polls will adopt another ruse to put them off again.

What one gathers from the utterances of the Polls Chief is that the NEC is ready to conduct local government elections once the delimitation issues are sorted out once and for all and a clear signal is given by the government. So much for the independence of the NEC! Deshapriya, on Thursday, true to form, ducked a curve ball from a scribe as regards the postponement of the mini polls for political reasons. He only made a cryptic remark, which made us wonder, albeit momentarily, whether he was the Polls Chief or the Head of NARA (National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency). He only said there could be dangerous underwater currents in a seemingly placid ocean. His oceanographic quip would have sounded convincing had he added that people’s franchise, carried by those strong currents, was now stuck in an ocean trench. It is a pity that the NEC is all at sea!

Deshapriya was intrepid enough to withstand political pressure and conduct a presidential election, where a powerful President––Mahinda Rajapaksa––with a two-thirds majority in Parliament, seeking a third term, was defeated and the transfer of power happened smoothly in 2015. He even descended on a state media institution during that election and had a fabricated news item unfavourable to the Opposition candidate corrected immediately. He earned public plaudits for that feat. But, today, he lacks courage even to speak his mind about undemocratically postponed polls. Instead, he is talking in riddles. When he is asked about polls he talks about the sea! Yahapalanaya has proved to be more effective than any other palanaya in gagging public officials.

It is our fervent hope that the affable polls chief will recover from the yahapalana shock soon!