Re-placing people in the story of schooldays

At the launch of the first volume of his memoirs titled ‘Towards One World: the Sri Lankan years,’ the late Justice C.G. Weeramantry did not speak about his book. He didn’t talk about his career. Nothing about things legal or academic. He didn’t touch on commonalities associated with the title. He spoke of his teachers, which is not uncommon. What was special is that he began with his kindergarten teachers. 

People don’t attribute success to all the contributors. Teachers tend to be afterthoughts. Kindergarten teachers are rarely mentioned.  There are others who are forgotten. Justice Weeramantry made me remember Auntry Ranjini, my very first teacher at Joyce Gunasekara’s Montessori. I also remembered my Grade 1 teacher, Mrs Rajapakse. I didn’t remember Margaret though. 

Margaret Samararatne Nona Silva made me remember all these individuals and she also made me recall something that the late Raja Gunasekara told me about ‘distinction’. 

It was in the year 1994. I went to see Mr Gunasekera seeking advice regarding a dispute at my work place. I was young, agitated and quite out of order and blurted out at one point, ‘we can’t let minor staff decide research agenda!’ 

His interjection was soft and came with a wry smile: ‘there are no minor and major staff, surely?’ 

I corrected myself, ‘alright, but non-research staff should not call the shots about research.’ 

What stuck with me was his objection. Today, 25 years later, those words took me to a line in my school song, ‘we will learn of books and men, and learn to play the game.’ Men and women, obviously, but back then when the lyrics were composed there were no female teachers in the school. However, if the word ‘learning’ was read in a broader sense, then ‘men’ would be misleading. Mothers, for example, teach us so much. That’s another story. 

Back to Margaret. She was known as Margaret Anti (the Lankanized form of ‘Aunty’). I don’t know what her job description was. I don’t know everything she did. However, if any Grade 1 boy were to wet his pants or worse, it was Margaret Anti who sorted things out. This much was known.  For the beneficiaries it was probably a major issue that she resolved. 

Time passes. Boys become men and by and by are able to exercise better control over things like bowel movements. In a world where even parents are neglected or forgotten and where the demands of the moment often obliterate all else, it is not surprising that people rarely remember or acknowledge teachers. The Margarets are typically forgotten altogether. 

Margaret’s four sons studied at Royal College including Priyankara who was in our grade. She was mother to seven overall. She was at Royal Junior School for 25 years. For her, undoubtedly, all the children in the junior school were ‘sons’. It was no minor task to be there when they most needed her. She didn’t have a classroom, she didn’t have students to teach, she didn’t have a blackboard and chalk (in that era before whiteboards and marker pens). She was just there. And that counted.

Margaret Anti is now 92 years old. She has lost her sight. She is hard of hearing. Her memory is sketchy. She repeats herself. The moment her school is mentioned, her face lights up. 

‘Raajakeeya vidyaalaya. Mama avurudu visi pahak hitiyaa!’ (Royal College. I was there for 25 years). And she concludes, ‘thunuruwangema pihitayai’ (May you be blessed by the Noble Triple Gem).

Margaret Anti with 'boys' from Grade 1 (1971) -- her youngest son, Priyankara is on the far right

Margaret. Every school, every institution, every town and village has a Margaret in that there are men and women who do things that need to be done but which few would take on. Men and women whose names are known briefly and are forgotten along with their faces and their contributions. I have seen them at the school my daughters attend, for example. The Head Prefects, when delivering votes of thanks at the end of annual prize givings mention them and this pleases me. 

Ten years ago, Justice Weeramantry made me remember forgotten teachers. Fifteen years before that Raja Gunasekara taught me that minor-major is a false distinction. Yesterday, Margaret Anti taught me the meaning of a line in a school song. No, not the part about learning from books and men (and women) but learning to play the game: if we leave out some people from the story, then we are not playing the game as it ought to be played. She helped move the story of my schooldays closer to completion. 

A minor point, perhaps. A major lesson, nevertheless. 

malindasenevi@gmail.com. www.malindawords.blogspot.com.

This article was first published in the DAILY NEWS [January 16, 2020]

OTHER ARTICLES IN THE SERIES 'In Passing...'

When we stop, we can begin to learn

Routine and pattern can checkmate poetry

Janani Amanda Umandi threw a b'day party for her father 

Sriyani and her serendipity shop

Forget constellations and the names of oceans

Where's your 'One, Galle Face'?

Maps as wrapping paper, roads as ribbons

Yasaratne, the gentle giant of Divulgane

Katharagama and Athara Maga
Victories are made by assists
Lost and found between weaver and weave
The Dhammapada and word-intricacies
S.A. Dissanayake taught children to walk in the clouds
White is a color we forget too often
The most beautiful road is yet to meet a cartographer

The Eldest: a story written on face and in eyes

Read more

What is your preference, citizen: pillow talk or public concerns?

Should public figures have private lives? This is probably a question that has been asked and answered countless times across time and space. 

A related question would be ‘can public figures have private lives?’ Again an old question but one to which the ‘possible’ response has and is becoming increasingly muted courtesy technological innovation and surveillance complexities that are hard to notice and even harder to keep track of. 

It is not the case that people didn’t know about others’ lives prior to privacy-wrecking innovations.  People talk. People notice. People put two and two together. People perceive. People draw conclusions. And if the perception are negative, all other factors being equal, it could cost the perceived. 

Politics is an unforgiving vocation when it comes to privacy. This negative is known and politicians probably weigh the possible fallout against the potential benefits. Some have little to hide. Others who have skeletons, do their best to keep the cupboards locked and give the impression that there are no cupboards and no skeletons either. Some are careless. Some try to cover up and get away with it, either because they are clever or have the necessary leverage. Some make things worse by attempting to conceal the in-concealable. Regardless, in general, the old adage, ‘there’s no such thing as bad publicity,’ seems to have held.

The original question, then, is one that is as much about ‘the public’ as it is about politicians. The key word is ‘should’. Should or should not, that’s the question that needs to be considered. If the public and the private are for all intents and purposes inextricably entwined, do we consider them to be one and the same? Even if the lines are blurred, don’t we have a choice about which element to privilege in our considerations, either the private or the public? 

Let’s leave aside the despicable and utterly unethical nature of UNP parliamentarian Ranjan Ramanayake’s conscious practice of recording phone conversations. Let’s leave aside the childish after-the-fact defense of ‘exposing the system.’ Essentially the content in leaked tapes can be divided into two broad categories: a) that which is of relevance to the general public since institutions, processes, representatives and officials are implicated, and b) that which is strictly personal and has such relevance. 

There are no sanctions when it comes to the perusal of such things. To each his/her fascination, one could argue. The problem here is that there’s content that’s of serious public concern and content that’s not. The fascination with the latter could trivialize, displace and even make irrelevant the former.  

We need to acknowledge, as flagged at the beginning, that ‘the sordid’ can have a bearing on the political, it can damage a personality and the party/coalition and even ideology to which the particular individual subscribes. That ‘political’ element however is of marginal worth when one considers the larger implication of the leaks.

The sexual dalliances of any individual is his/her business. If anyone is interested in what another person does behind closed doors that’s voyeurism. ‘Political voyeurism’ if one wants to call it that, is cheap. It can cause damage to the ‘seen’ but it doesn’t exactly cover the ‘seer’ in glory. 

Take the sordid allegations that Prageeth Ekneligoda leveled at Patali Champika Ranawaka. Is it anyone’s business? Was it all true, in the first place? Ranawaka didn’t care to respond at the time, but he cannot be faulted. Those who pen such notes crave response, after all. The reason why it all became serious was the fact that Ekneligoda disappeared or was disappeared. If he was indeed disappeared, then the immediate question is, ‘who had a motive?’ If the allegations were true, then Ranawaka had a motive, we could surmise: vengeance. However, to even name Ranawaka as a suspect, one has to be able to conclude that no one else had any motive to get rid of Ekneligoda, for vengeful or other reasons. The truth is that Ekneligoda made many enemies. He was, all things considered, a shady character and not only because keyhole-journalism was one of his passions (note: such journalism doesn’t require one to peep through keyholes or — a vivid imagination and a deranged mind are adequate ‘journalistic’ tools).

The problem with the Ekneligoda story and the politics that ensued is that the claims are not substantiated. Secondly these unfounded allegations had an extremely negative impact on Ranawaka’s family, including two daughters of schooling age. Thirdly there is no evidence of Ranawaka having had anything to do with Ekneligoda. 

So we have wild speculation. So we have speculation painted as fact. So we have ‘facts’ used to attack Ranawaka politically. As things stand it is highly unlikely that the Ekenligoda piece in and of itself could cause any significant damage to Ranawaka. Even if he did have something to do with Ekneligoda’s disappearance, it is not the truth of the narrative but the damage it has done to Ranawaka and his family that could have generated ‘motive.’ Lots of ‘ifs’ there, take note. 

What is interesting here is selectivity. The allegations were made when Ranawaka was a minister during the second presidential term of Mahinda Rajapaksa. That camp didn’t utter a word then; some in the then Opposition did make some noice. The pohottuwa camp resurrected  Ekneligoda’s article only AFTER Ranawaka moved to the Yahapalana Coalition. And those in the then Opposition who had made an issue of it went silent. 

Thus, it all came down to political loyalties (or otherwise). Not even the sordidness (which itself wasn’t proven and which in any case is certainly not a public-interest matter).

All this is what we expect from politicians in a political culture that’s childish at best and even then only sporadically and an absolute stink at worse. What of the public though?

Why do the public mimic politician? Conversely, is it that the politician is a true representative in that he/she mirrors the priority-confusion and a preference for the sordid on the part of the represented?

The more serious issue pertaining to Ranawaka is the allegation that he fled the scene of an accident which involved a vehicle he was allegedly driving and the allegation that he deliberately misled the law enforcement agencies. Note, ‘allegations’. Remember, presumption of innocence. Such pertinent issues are seldom raised. It’s no different from the behavior of those making a song and dance about ‘war crimes’. Allegations. Presumption of innocence. Such caveats are not flagged. 

Still, this accident-issue is surely more important than the spawn of Ekneligoda’s warped mind. And yet, Ekneligoda wins the day. The personal elements in the leaked tapes win the day over everything that point to serious decay in the institutional and processual arrangement of the state.  

Whose fault? Well, if we want to enjoy the ‘personal’ circus then let’s surrender ourselves to a long sojourn in a land where mismanagement, misappropriation, misrepresentation and other such vile creatures have a ball and rake in the bucks from the public kitty. Let’s not complain.

This was first published in the DAILY MIRROR [January 16, 2020]

malindasenevi@gmail.com. www.malindawords.blogspot.com.

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When we stop, we can begin to learn

The best teachers graduate into friends. The best teachers graduate their students into friends. The best teachers are friends from the get go, even if they may not state, make obvious or imply the fact. The best teachers, teach; friendship has nothing to do with it. The best teachers recognize those students who have the potential to teach and impart knowledge and wisdom without reservation. 

I don’t know how to define ‘best teacher.’ Some teachers are unforgettable. Some lessons remain. Sometimes it is best to leave assessment and definition aside and just talk about teachers.  

Karunatissa Athukorale taught Sociology at the University of Peradeniya. He is officially retired now but lectures postgraduate students. He never taught me. He would have had I not left before I was supposed to. He taught my friends. When they graduated he recruited some of them as part time research assistants to help him on some study he had been commissioned to conduct. I met him through them and eventually was also roped into the project.

He was ‘Tissa Sir’ because that was what everyone called him. About his teaching I only know through anecdotes. My hunch is that the best lessons were taught outside of the lecture rooms, in particular during field visits where groups of students were tasked to study particular social issues. 

‘That’s where we really learned sociology,’ I’ve heard more than one of his students say. There was some sociology I learned from Tissa Sir. He was after all the principal researcher and responsible for analyzing the data we collected. I can’t remember the details of the study but I won’t forget how he spooned up insights from a soup that had both qualitative and quantitative data. The sociology of it all must be lodged somewhere in my head and it probably seeps out now and then. It’s heart-things I remember most. 

Tissa Sir was not exactly a no-nonsense teacher from what I’ve heard and seen. He didn’t suffer sloth. He didn’t cut corners and didn’t go light on those who did. And yet, he was by far the most jovial lecturer in the department. 

One night, in his house in Hantane where several of us ‘research assistants’ had taken up residence, we were in the middle of a discussion on the Catholic Church and whether or not it should inscribe an authentically local culture into all activities. Walter Sumith Pradeep, a Catholic from Kuliyapitiya who argued for such transformation (the rest of us essentially said ‘What is authentically Catholic should not be compromised’), went to get some water. He didn’t get too far. He came back giggling.

‘Saratha pissu kelinava’ (Sarath is playing up).

Sarath Senadheera, dubbed ‘Alaw Yaka’ like almost everyone from Alawwa, was a sleepwalker. The time was 10.10 pm. Tissa Sir hadn’t know about Sarath’s sleepwalking until then. He immediately went into action.

‘Sarath, ehenam yanna laesthi venna (Sarath, then get ready to leave).’

Sarath, ever obedient, quickly got ready. Tissa Sir started the engine of his car. Sarath got in. Tissa Sir asked if Sarath knew where they were going. Sarath said he didn’t know. The he was asked if he had forgotten something.

‘Ow sir, gettuwa vahalane (the gate is closed).’

Sarath opened the gate and got back into the car.

‘Velaava balannako,’ Tissa Sir asked him to check the time.

It was 10.25. Sarath went back into the house, looked at the clock and returned, ‘dan pahata langai sir (it’s almost five o’clock).’

Tissa Sir asked if he was sure and started laughing. We all did. Sarath was duly ‘woken up.’ He laughed too.

Life was not all a laughing matter for Tissa Sir. He took things seriously. He chided me for taking things light at a time when I was not too keen on looking for a job. And no, it was not about money. 

Tissa Sir loved and still loves research. If he turned a fraction of the hundreds of studies he was commissioned to conduct into academic papers or into a comprehensive doctoral dissertation he would be known the world over. He didn’t do that. 

And it is not that he just wanted to money for there’s bucks in research. Money he could make and he did. If and when he had to. He wasn’t attached to it.

I still remember him laughing on one occasion when due to a personal issue he lost every cent he owned. That was a lesson. We bring nothing when we arrive, we take nothing when we leave. Known wisdom, true. And yet, when one encounters it in the form of a life that affirms subscription to the truth of the adage, one stops. Tissa Sir made me stop. And that’s the beginning of learning. 

He wasn’t my teacher, but he taught me. We were always friends but I always called him ‘Sir’. He lives far away and we rarely meet. He loves children and treats all students with great affection, rejoicing in their achievements just as he does over those of his two daughters and son. If I wanted to tell him all the things I’ve written here, he would probably stop me and say ‘let’s have some tea.’ Sometimes, things need to be put on record. So this is it. 

Tissa Sir, you are remembered with great affection. Now laugh! 

This article was first published in the DAILY NEWS [January 15, 2020]

malindasenevi@gmail.com. www.malindawords.blogspot.com

OTHER ARTICLES IN THE SERIES 'In Passing...'

Routine and pattern can checkmate poetry

Janani Amanda Umandi threw a b'day party for her father 

Sriyani and her serendipity shop

Forget constellations and the names of oceans

Where's your 'One, Galle Face'?

Maps as wrapping paper, roads as ribbons

Yasaratne, the gentle giant of Divulgane

Katharagama and Athara Maga
Victories are made by assists
Lost and found between weaver and weave
The Dhammapada and word-intricacies
S.A. Dissanayake taught children to walk in the clouds
White is a color we forget too often
The most beautiful road is yet to meet a cartographer

The Eldest: a story written on face and in eyes

Read more

Routine and pattern can checkmate poetry

You might spot the 'Smothered Mate' (in 5 moves), 

but is there a quicker and even more elegant way to win?

Dulan Edirisinghe, former National Chess Champion and currently the only chess columnist in Sri Lanka, writes about the game in ways that make the reader sometimes wonder if it’s actually broader philosophical matters that he is principally concerned with. Sure, it’s about chess. There’s ‘chess language’ — Chess positions. puzzles, theory, lore and illustrative anecdotes. And yet, perhaps because any game or in fact anything can yield insights into other things, a bit of unraveling can open a window into a larger universe. Dulan is particularly good at that kind of thing.

Here’s an example. In a piece titled ‘When good moves block better ones,’ Dulan offers a simple experiment made of two positions, almost but not quite identical, and asks the reader to find the checkmate. The first is easy. It’s a classic pattern most chess players are familiar with — the Smothered Mate. In the second the opponent’s bishop prevents the Smothered Mate. 

There is a checkmate though, where an unusual maneuver is employed. It’s elegant. The second puzzle, when solved, shows that the maneuver could not only have been used in the first puzzle, it would result in a swifter checkmate. 

What happened? Dulan explains thus.

‘It’s a cognitive trap. Our pre-existing knowledge inadvertently impedes our ability to reach an optimal solution. Psychologists call this phenomenon “The Einstellung Effect”. In fact, by attempting to solve the above problems, you took part in the chess version of the famous “Water Jar Experiment” conducted in 1942 by an American psychologist named Abraham Luchins.’ 

Sometimes it is an unconscious fascination with routine that traps us. Dulan’s article reminded me of a classic passage in ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’ by Gabriel García. At one point, Fernanda del Carpio misplaces her wedding ring. Everyone looks for it. Finally it is her great grand mother-in-law, Úrsula Iguarán who finds it.

Úrsula, who had long since lost her eyesight, in the course of trying to come to terms with her condition, ‘realizes that all of her family members follow basically the same path each day, performing the same actions and saying the same things and that only when they deviate from routine do they tend to lose something.’ So, she is able to deduce where Fernanda had placed her rings simply by registering what she had done differently that day. The others, perhaps unconsciously subscribing to Úrsula’s theory, simply traced Fernanda’s routine. Úrsula, was one step ahead, for she had discovered the key to finding lost things — outside the routine, away from the given and received.

Routines are convenient. They have their uses. They dull innovation though. At times. In general, we go with patterns because the laws of average are what make them and therefore there’s a greater likelihood of accurate prediction.

But then, what of the poetry that we may miss? Some transcripts are not visible. Some are made to be invisible while others are deliberately kept hidden. The sacred is a secret or is secretive, a friend told me a long time ago. Úrsula’s story tells us that sight does not necessarily give vision. 

Routines and patterns can have blinding effects. Maybe this is why we delight more when the wrecking of routine and the retiring of pattern reveals the world in colors hitherto unimagined. It could also mean that there’s more enchantment in this world than we are ready to believe. All the poetry the world has and needs is already written. It’s in a language we don’t believe exists or that we are too comfortable in routine and pattern to learn.

Expertise and knowledge can work against you, Dulan points out. They can work against enchantment, elegance and the music of the unexpected, one might add. 

This article was first published in the DAILY NEW [January 13, 2020]

malindasenevi@gmail.com

OTHER ARTICLES IN THE SERIES 'In Passing...'

Janani Amanda Umandi threw a b'day party for her father 

Sriyani and her serendipity shop

Forget constellations and the names of oceans

Where's your 'One, Galle Face'?

Maps as wrapping paper, roads as ribbons

Yasaratne, the gentle giant of Divulgane

Katharagama and Athara Maga
Victories are made by assists
Lost and found between weaver and weave
The Dhammapada and word-intricacies
S.A. Dissanayake taught children to walk in the clouds
White is a color we forget too often
The most beautiful road is yet to meet a cartographer

The Eldest: a story written on face and in eyes

Read more

From ‘out of order’ to ‘order’ and justice for all

Ranjan Ramanayake is the entertainment industry, Gotabaya Rajapaksa is in the 'Fixing Things' industry. 

‘And justice for all,’ is the title of a film released in 1979 about a lawyer, Arthur Kirkland (played by Al Pacino), who is forced to defend a guilty judge even as he defended other innocent clients. It’s an ironic title considering a script which brings to question received truths about the US justice system. Indeed, such truths such as equality before he law, unwavering pursuit of the truth, judicial integrity etc., are ‘received’ elsewhere as well. Sri Lanka, for example. 

In what could be called a flipping of the script on multiple counts, Kirkland, in the course of addressing the jury comes up with a classic line. ‘The prosecution is not going to get that man today,’ he exclaims, pauses, says ‘no’ softly and then firmly states ‘because I’m gonna get him!’

All this, after making the basic point that it is the purpose of justice is to prove that the guilt people are proven guilty and the innocent are free. It is, as we all know, it is the defense counsel’s duty to protect the rights of the individual and the prosecution’s duty to uphold the law of the state. The problem, Kirkland point out, ‘is that both sides want to win, regardless of the truth, regardless of justice, regardless of who is guilty or innocent.’

‘My client,’ he scream, ‘the Honorable Henry T. Fleming should go right to ******* jail! The son of a bitch is guilty!’ He insists, ’If he’s allowed to go free, then something really wrong is goin’ on here!’ Judge Rayford interrupts, ‘Mr Kirkland you are out of order!’ And Kirkland retorts, ‘You’re out of order! The whole trial is out of order! That man, that sick, crazy, depraved man, raped and beat that woman there, and he’d like to do it again! He told me so! It’s a show! It’s a show! It’s “Let’s Make a Deal”!

Deal. Who deals. What gets dealt. Who gets the ace, who gets the deuce? We are talking about justice, ladies and gentlemen. Justice for all and not some, and certainly not ‘some’ who have bucks and/or power. We are talking of the pursuit of truth. We are talking of due process. Fair trials. Equality before the law. Ethics and integrity. The abandonment of niceties in favor of justice. For all. 

And therefore we have to talk about systems of recruitment, training, promotion, examination of evidence, cogency of argument and delivery of verdict without inordinate which gives truth a better than average chance.  

The tapes of recorded conversations between UNP parliamentarian Ranjan Ramanayake and several individuals including a judge clearly indicate politicians have got their dirty paws all over the judicial system. Rules are bent, circumvented, encircled, strangled and made irrelevant. This was not unknown. The tapes merely confirmed what was suspected. 

There is obviously a lot of political fallout. Every single person who unwittingly incriminated him/herself will come under a cloud and perhaps subjected to investigation. The silence of political pundits (who alluded to due process when Ramanayake was arrested) on Ramanayake’s despicable behavior of recording phone conversations without consent severely compromises the holier-than-thou positions they take off and on. Their selectivity will not go unnoticed. 

All these are trivial. Sure, some people were made to feel uncomfortable, several politicians and at least one judge have tainted themselves. There could be others who are even at this moment fretting and regretting their past actions. There will be a price to pay, one way or another. 

It will pass. What should not be passed is concrete action to fix the flaws. What is it about the system that allows politicians to pressurize judges? What makes judges squirm? Why are there so many easy ways to tweak the system and extract benefit at the expense of truth and justice? 

The best thing to come out of all this is the urgent need to reform the judicial system. This includes among other things mechanisms to ensure that politician and judge are kept separate. Well, not just politician and judge, but thug and judge, corporate criminal and judge as well. In other words, what is needed is to script back integrity and ethics into the justice system.   

There are questions that need to be addressed. Why is the Attorney General’s Department like a half-way house for those who aspire to serve on the Supreme Court? Why isn’t the system adjusted so that those who opt to represent clients cannot aspire to hear representations and vice versa, as is the case in Britain for example? Why is there no discussion on the merits and demerits of adversarial and inquisitorial systems of justice? What is the reasons for inordinate delays in court, especially when it comes to land cases? Why have we retained long court vacations, originally instituted so British judges could go home for Christmas and/or Easter? 

We could talk about the career paths of those who made it to the Supreme Court. We could examine their performance in cases concerning high-ranking politicians or when they opined about constitutional matters. It is not impossible to obtain pattern through such exercises. It will not imply guilt of doing wrong, certainly, but it would alert us to the fault lines of the entire system and thereby yield pointers as to what should be done to correct them, especially when it comes to separation of powers.   

The arguments for letting things be are the spawn of ill-willed conservatism, personal interest and sloth. Systems should not be made or protected just to ensure that the interests of certain powerful segments of society are upheld. That, however, is where we stand and it’s not a happy place to be, standing or otherwise. 

The next ‘crisis’ will soon enough displace Ranjagate as it has been dubbed. The number of tapes, the likelihood that the conversations with many others are likely to prompt heated discussion and the political capital that could be made will certainly keep the issue alive. The danger is that the sordid details could get in the way of the more important examination of systemic flaws, separation of powers and a concerted effort by government, opposition, judiciary and the public to set things right. 

Punishment of an errant judge, public outcry over a shady politician with possibly adverse impact on his or her political career etc., are likely. It is not enough, though. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa promised a ‘working nation’. Order was a term he used often in his election campaign. Out-of-order is the term that is now appropriate for many things and persons — the constitution, parliamentarians, institutional apparatus, the procedural corpus etc., and this includes the judicial system, the law enforcement agencies, the entire process of recruitment, training and promotion. 

Forget Ranjan Ramanayake. He is in the entertainment industry. He revels in the publicity. He plays to the gallery. He has no scruples. He is corrupt. He had his moment. It will pass. He will too. 

There’s work to be done to fix things. The easy thing is to treat it all as entertainment. The harder matter is to go beyond the jokes. Go beyond the show. Recognize that deals are made and commit ourselves to putting in place systems that prevent such things from happening. In the end, if we focus on ‘winning’ (whatever it is we want to win), we lose. If, instead, it is understood that there’s something more compelling and of greater value, that the pursuit of truth and the integrity of processes that make for the victory of justice, that the guilty are proven guilty and the innocent are free, then we could have ‘justice for all.’ 

If not, we could, like Arthur Kirkland, retort, ‘I am out of order? No, you are out of order! All trials are out of order! They court is out of order! The judges are out of order! The country is out of order!’

This article was first published in the SUNDAY OBSERVER [January 12, 2020]

malindasenevi@gmail.com

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Alice G Wells: sovereignty, shared interests, some laughs and a question

Alice G Wells, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia at the US Department of State, will arrive in Sri Lanka on January 13, 2020 for a two-day visit. She is to meet with senior government officials and members of civil society ‘to discuss a range of bilateral and regional issues, including “shared interest” in a free and open Indo-Pacific region that fosters prosperity, democracy, justice and human rights.’

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Seriously.

What is ‘shared interest’ in the Indo-Pacific region? The USA has her interests, strategic mostly but there are of course the Washington perennials of resource extraction, securing and defending markets. Alice has on a previous visit (2017) grumbled about Sri Lanka ‘ceding sovereignty to China over the Hambantota Port’. As though that’s any of her business, even assuming that’s what has happened. As though she would give two hoots about sovereignty, considering Washington always privileging US interests over democracy, human rights and sovereignty. 

Once, responding to a question put to her at the think tank ‘Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars,’ she expressed concerns about ‘the crystal clear geopolitical elements of China’s One Belt One Road initiative. As though geopolitical elements are absent in the various ‘initiatives’ of the USA all over the world! So when she talks about democracy, justice and human rights, it is laughable. Seriously. 

Just the other day, her president said he was ready and willing to attack 52 places of historical and cultural significance in Iran. Not a very polite thing to say and certainly not the language used by his predecessors, but then again you can politely bomb a country into the middle-ages, politely attack civilian targets with drones, politely rig elections, politely bribe politicians and officials in countries you want to control, politely arm-twist nations to submit to your will, and politely make sure that entire communities ‘believe’ your version of their realities. Donald Trump’s predecessors were polite. On other counts they were no different to Trump.  

Still, it is funny when a US official talks the language of prosperity (THEIR prosperity, that’s about it), democracy (when they have championed and/or helped put in place or protect monarchies, military juntas, theocracies and other authoritarian regimes), justice (observed in its breach when it comes to non-White people in the USA, for example) and human rights (which, clearly they believe brown people whose countries they invade do not deserve). 

Who are these ‘members of civil society’ she plans to have discussions with, I would like to know. I really hope she names these individuals just so we can figure out what’s what about these kinds of visits. Not that it’s hard to imagine, but the names would reveal much. I have a sneaky suspicion that they are mostly if not exclusively Kolombians, also known as Colombots, Born Again Democrats, Funded Voices, Rent-a-Protest Executives, Candlelight Ladies and other closet UNPers masquerading as liberals and leftists. Ideologically and politically compromised individuals who certainly don’t make up or represent ‘civil society’. That the US State Department deems fit to mention this ‘meeting’ indicates two things at least: a) these individuals are agents of the USA, and b) the USA has no clue about Sri Lankan civil society. Well, it’s her wish, so be it.

What are these ‘bi-lateral’ issues, though? Alice G Wells, back in November bragged that the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) Compact ‘would be launched soon in Sri Lanka.’ Is that what she’s going to talk about with ‘senior government officials’? She probably knows that the draft agreement is currently under review. Is her visit all about getting it done? What kind of carrot-stick strategy is she going to employ during her visit?  

Well, it’s her job, we understand. The USA looks after her interests. With bucks, if that works. With joy-rides if that’s what it takes. With the threat of sanctions, bombs and assassinations too — we’ve seen that happen. 

We know that the USA backed Maithripala Sirisena’s presidential bid. We know that the USA, up in arms over the smallest wrongdoing by his predecessor’s government (of which he was a senior minister), turned a blind eye when it came to Yahapalana corruption, thuggery, political victimization etc., etc. We know that the USA hoped against hope that the Yahapalana candidate, Sajith Premadasa, would defeat Gotabaya Rajapaksa. We know that the USA always has Plans B, C, D etc., to get what it wants. We know that officials are either ideologically aligned with the USA’s ‘vision’ for Sri Lanka or are not averse to being ‘persuaded’ one way or another. We know that the USA can create any number of narratives and get the rest of the world to believe them and even champion them, not least of all because countries such as Sri Lanka do not have the will or the capacity to counter the lies. 

We know that the USA bad mouthed the UN’s human rights body, but that they can and probably will get the European Union and Britain to operate as proxy in furthering its devious designs based on such lies.  We know that such narratives went a long way in getting Resolution 30/1 passed in Geneva. We know that an incompetent, servile and vengeful regime compromised Sri Lanka’s sovereignty by co-sponsoring that resolution. We know how such things are used as bargaining chips to get countries to submit to the USA’s will on so-called ‘shared-interests’. 

All this is ‘par for the course’ as far as the USA is concerned. It’s ‘par for the course.’ Sadly, submitting to US agenda has also been ‘par for the course’ when it comes to governments in countries such as Sri Lanka.  

And therefore, ladies and gentlemen, only one question needs to be answered: ‘What will President Gotabaya Rajapaksa say?’

This article was first published in THE SUNDAY MORNING [January 12, 2020]

malindasenevi@gmail.com

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