Sunday Observer Editorial

Towards an Exit Strategy

The country has been under a curfew for nearly a month, necessitated by the need to protect the populace from the coronavirus pandemic, which has now caused more than 2.2 million infections and 150,000 deaths worldwide. Thanks to the swift measures spearheaded by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sri Lanka has been spared the agony that many developed countries are now facing. The case numbers in Sri Lanka are still under 250, with only seven deaths. Only a few other countries can claim such a level of success.

Unlike many other countries that realised the danger of COVID-19 rather too late, the Government took a pro-active stance from the very beginning. It formed the Task Force headed by the Army Commander even before the first local case of infection was reported. Ever since, it has been in the forefront of the battle against the coronavirus. As the World Health Organization (WHO) noted, it was a “Whole of Government” approach that enabled Sri Lanka to stay “Ahead of the Curve”. All sectors – Health, Armed Forces, Police, Public Service and Essential Services - mobilized and worked as one to defeat the common enemy. While other countries are coming to grips with contact tracing, our intelligence units had even tracked down the third-tier contacts of infected persons, who in turn were swiftly quarantined.

There is no doubt at all that the almost continuous curfew and the inter-district travel ban had its desired effect. Although more than 30,000 curfew violators were nabbed by Police, at least 11 districts remain free of the coronavirus and some other districts have a very low count of patients. This has prevented what could have been a catastrophe of unimaginable proportions. All those who enforced this curfew deserve plaudits.

However, at some point of time Sri Lanka will have to emerge out of this predicament. With the entire country virtually at a standstill, the damage to the economy caused so far runs into perhaps billions of rupees, if not dollars. The Rupee has fallen making even essential imports more expensive and this cannot be immediately balanced by exports (which will get more rupees) because of the current restrictions in place. Daily wage earners have been hit hard and there is absolutely no income from sectors like railways and passenger transport. This cannot surely go on for more than a couple of months.

With a large part of the country showing no signs of the disease, we can see light at the end of the tunnel. Hence, there is widespread talk of an “Exit Strategy” for Sri Lanka and proposals have been forwarded by a raft of organisations ranging from the GMOA to the Business Chambers. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and others in the forefront of the battle against COVID-19 have also discussed possible post-disease economic and social scenarios. They have already envisioned a new economic climate post-COVID-19, with a firm focus on domestic production as opposed to dependence on imports of foods and other essential items.

An exit strategy is vital, because even countries still reeling from COVID-19 are talking about one. That is the only way to kick start the battered economy. But unlike those countries, we have the advantage of having kept the disease mostly at bay. However, one word of caution. Life is never going to be the same again, at least until a couple of years have passed with no sign of a second or even a third wave of the disease. This could perhaps be the “new normal” as many experts have pointed out.

This means that we have to practise social distancing and other measures for some more time. Whether social distancing is practical in our crowded public transport services and other places is a moot point, but we will somehow have to adapt. In any case, there is nothing wrong in practising hygiene measures such as frequent hand washing for life. The present measures, such as wash basins installed near banks, offices, must continue. The Government and health authorities must also be on guard against any subsequent waves of the disease and make frequent Public Service Announcements in this regard.

With regard to the raging debate in the mainstream and social media and also political circles regarding the possibility of holding the General Election, the Government, political parties and the Election Commission will have to reach a consensus on this matter. As pointed out by former Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, there will be a Constitutional crisis if the General Election is not held on time. A minority Government cannot run the country for several more months without a Parliament to pass the necessary finances, a crucial factor in the present context. We simply cannot afford anarchy at a time like this when all resources have to be mobilized for the common goal of securing the health of the Nation.

We can look towards South Korea, which last week conducted one of the most successful elections held in any country under any circumstances. The authorities there put in place strict social distancing and hygiene measures before and during the elections. We too can learn some lessons from this exercise. For example, political leaders and candidates can address their voters through the electronic media without campaigning physically. We cannot postpone the franchise indefinitely and if this is the new normal, holding the polls with all safety measures in place could be the best option.

SUnday Times Editorial

Risking it all for an election

Typically, in Sri Lanka, even when there is a national calamity, it is politics that seems to dominate the national agenda.

In more recent years, when there was imminent Indian military adventurism into Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and territorial integrity (1987), certain leaders of the then Government scuttled a joint statement from Parliament saying it would give the Opposition at the time some political leverage. When the tsunami ravaged the country (2004), the then Prime Minister was dragged over the coals for ‘Helping Hambantota’. When 17 Opposition MPs joined a wobbly Government to shore up its Parliamentary strength during a crucial stage of the fight against the LTTE, they were branded opportunists for crossing party lines.

Now comes the whiff of Government plans to press for a general election in the midst of a global and local war against a deadly virus. No country in the world, not even where it all started, can really say it is out of the woods — yet.

The Chairman of the Election Commission (EC) has written twice to the President urging him to seek an opinion from the Supreme Court on whether the election can be postponed beyond June 2 which is the last date by which it must be held in view of the dissolution of Parliament on March 2. The reason for writing was obvious; the EC was exploring the need to put off the election for a date after June 2. The President has dismissed this suggestion probably as ‘unsolicited advice’ and asked the EC to make an election date itself.

While ostensibly asking the EC to decide on the date, the Government is seen as preparing the groundwork for an early election — some saying Saturday, May 23 is already earmarked in their minds.

The constitutional problem is that with Parliament dissolved, there is a requirement to hold the election within three months. The practical problem, however, is whether hundreds of party workers can be let loose to campaign and thousands of public servants, police and service personnel can be called to action risking exposure to a virus that cannot yet be declared defeated. That is without counting the millions who will stand in long queues to vote. The entire exercise is scary.

If there is a move to fast forward the holding of a poll, the Government’s indecent hurry comes into question. In a way, the Government is currently experiencing a dream platform to govern; no Opposition in Parliament, the Courts not sitting due to a curfew, Provincial Councils defunct (which is not a bad thing), a critical Press unable to distribute newspapers, and still, the Government not being accused of the closure of these democratic institutions because of a genuine reason — COVID-19.

Thus unhampered in what they want to do, even the distribution of financial handouts to the poor is in the hands of the ruling party with no monitoring and therefore no censure from the EC or civil society groups. Some of the Police orders being rattled off from time to time from its headquarters are legally questionable even though the people are following them faithfully to the Government’s advantage.

The only drawback for the Government is that it cannot pass legislation and pass money. There is a real constitutional question whether the Government has the legal authority to spend money after April 30 when the last Vote on Account lapses. The emasculated Opposition has raised this issue and urged that Parliament reconvenes to rectify this anomaly.

This again, the Government has brushed aside as inconsequential, arguing it has the powers — and with the courts not sitting to test the constitutionality of it all, it is having a free run. The President is in no mood to reconvene Parliament. It betrays the fact that as far as the Government is concerned, the 2015 Parliament is done and dusted and it is a new 2020 Parliament that is being looked forward to.

The EC has announced that it will meet tomorrow (April 20) to discuss the holding of an election in the current environment. On the other hand, the Government wants to ‘strike while the iron is hot’ which translates to taking advantage of the disarray in the ranks of the Opposition. Such a mindset within the Government is reinforced by the very fact that it insisted on the original deadline for the nomination of candidates despite the outbreak of COVID-19 in the country. Usually Governments get termed dictatorships when elections are postponed. In this case, it’s the reverse; it is being accused of rushing an election.

The Government will maintain that it is the EC that must fix the date of the election. The onus is clearly on the EC but writing two letters to the President asking him to clarify matters betrays an over-dependence on its part on the Government to what is essentially a decision that is its and its alone to make.

The Government’s decision to reopen schools on May 11 and universities even earlier has already run into a storm of protests from teachers. The World Health Organisation (WHO) — the UN agency which came under fire for delaying in alerting the world about COVID-19 — has now warned governments worldwide about any premature relaxation of the tough lockdown measures that the peoples of the world are enduring to arrest the virus. “The way down could be as dangerous as the way up”, it has said referring to countries that see a ‘pale ray of sunshine’ in the numbers of COVID-19 victims declining.

The disaster that struck the people of Iran by when an election was held amidst the pandemic must not be ignored. South Korea has just held an election but under tight testing procedures for voters and officials in protective clothing which Sri Lanka is not geared for. There are disturbing reports, too, of those who recovered from the virus in South Korea getting relapses.

When the first patient in Sri Lanka who tested positive for the virus was cleared and the Minister and the nurses kissed her in a glare of publicity, the Government did not bargain for what was to come. At the end of this week there are more than 240 known COVID-19 patients in the country.

Likewise, second waves of the virus are being talked about globally and fresh explosions of cases cannot be ruled out. One must remember Sri Lanka’s testing record for patients is wanting. However acclaimed the country’s handling has been, notwithstanding some early shortcomings, the success must not be reversed due to political agendas.

The priority is to get rid of the virus and reopen the economy. The country cannot afford an outbreak of the virus that looks like being avoided, and then having to spend another Rs. 6 billion on having yet another election if the newly elected MPs are to come to Parliament infected with the virus.

The Island Editorial

Our Culture of Impunity


The BBC recently released an Easter bombing anniversary documentary titled 'Terror in Paradise' which probably attracted tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of global viewers. The highly professionally produced feature depended largely on CCTV footage of what happened in Colombo and elsewhere on April 21, 2019, when a group of fanatics targeted three catholic churches and four hotels killing at least 279 and injuring over 593 people, some of whom were maimed for life. The bombers were caught on camera entering public areas in the luxury hotels where they set off the blasts. The documentary also included interviews with survivors, all of whom had lost loved ones, skillfully interspersed into the film to dramatize the production. Similarly, many comments from Dr. Rohan Gunaratna, former head of the International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research of the Nanyang Technical University of Singapore, were included. What he socked into the film was what most Lankans believed at the time of the massacre and still believe: that the powers that were did not take seriously enough intelligence reports on the impending disaster. The whole country was caught flatfooted as a result.

Archbishop of Colombo, Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith is on record strongly condemning the “culture of impunity” which has for too long existed in this country. A large number of high profile assassinations in Sri Lanka in recent decades remain unsolved to this day. Former President Maithripala Sirisena, then Minister of Defence, has pleaded that he was not privy to the information that had reached senior levels of the defence establishment which was long aware of the existence of the National Thowheed Jamath (NTJ) and the explosive propaganda spouted particularly by its fanatical leader, Zaharan Hashim, and his fellow travelers. Then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has whimpered that he was kept out of the security loop by the president with whom he was bickering bitterly. A dangerous cauldron was first simmering and then boiling in densely populated Kattankudy, the JMT base near Batticaloa for months, maybe years, before the fanatical religious terrorists struck. The authorities were aware of various telltale incidents, in the days and weeks before the disaster hit but did not take them seriously enough to adopt preventive measures. That cost this nation dearly, how dearly we will never know.

The political leaders of the day including Sirisena who should have been impeached for the brazenly unlawful manner in which he dismissed the then government headed by Prime Minister Wickremesinghe. He then appointed a new government under former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, whom he had defeated at the January 2015 presidential election. The constitutional jiggery-pokery of the day included first the prorogation and then the dissolution of Parliament. A full bench of the Supreme Court unanimously struck down the blatantly unconstitutional acts of Sirisena. No matter that it was Wickremesinghe and his United National Party that had made Sirisena's election possible. No matter also that Rajapaksa did not have the necessary numbers in Parliament to command a majority in the legislature. No matter too that it was the self-same Sirisena, for long the general secretary of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), who betrayed his leader soon after a hopper dinner at 'Temple Trees' to run as the common opposition candidate against Rajapaksa. The latter was seeking an unprecedented third term of office; this after he had removed the constitutional barrier of a two-term limit by engineering a two thirds majority in the legislature by highly questionable means.

We recount all this recent history in the context of the fact that a new Parliament is due to be elected, when we do not know. The date has been set and nominations received. But the covid-19 corona virus has upset all the plans of mice and men. When the election of Sri Lanka's 16th Parliament will eventually take place is a wide open question at this time. It is obvious that the government is anxious to hold the election as early as possible on the nominations already received. Whether this will be possible remains to be seen. The Rajapaksa-led Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) is anxious to ride on the coat-tails of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's recent presidential election victory and secure for itself the two thirds majority in Parliament it could not win even after ending the 30-year civil war in 2009. Whether the people of this country will be foolish enough to give anybody such a majority is a matter that remains to be seen. Have they, after bitter experience, not learned the lesson of giving anybody a two thirds majority enabling tinkering with the constitution if not sabotaging it totally?

Ironies never cease in this so-called Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. Former President Maithripala Sirisena, determined to remain in politics in a lesser capacity, is a nominee of the SLPP in the Polonnaruwa district. This despite all the water that has recently passed under the bridges including the Easter Sunday security failures for which he must take full responsibility. Ranil Wickremesinghe, heads the candidate list of the sharply divided UNP notwithstanding his many electoral failures. Many suspicious and dicey characters are on the candidate lists of the major parties. A number of jokers, clothed as independents, have also handed in their nominations lengthening the ballot papers at the taxpayers' expense. When will the electorate ever see the light and elect the kind of government the country needs so desperately? Will our political parties ever give them that choice?