Degrees of newsworthiness

Someone who was at the wrong place at the wrong time was assaulted.  Now let’s assume, as has been alleged, that Major Chandana Pradeep was not on duty at that moment.  Let’s assume that he was engaged in some illegal activity.  Let us assume that even though he was an Army Intelligence Officer who could have been carrying out duty-work in off-duty time due to an important development related to the particular brief, he was not doing anything of the sort. 

If all of this or even some of it is true then Major Chandana Pradeep, regardless of his invaluable contribution to the cause of wiping out terrorism, should be charged on account of his transgressions.  Nothing wrong with that.  Discipline in discipline.  Exceptional performance is not akin to a credit balance that allows one to use a debit card for transgression. 

All this is fine. Above board.  Punishable crimes invite inquiry and punishment.  You cross the line and you are stopped.  That’s how it goes in the Army. 

Punishment of transgression, however, is not the preserve of the Army.  It is not only the security forces that have rules and regulations. Every institution has them.  And above all of it is the general law of the country.

The said Army Major was assaulted. That was news.  He said he can’t identify some of his assailants. That too was news and news that invited a lot of commentary. Why did he change his story and who or what was behind the change of position?  Indeed even the Magistrate hearing the case asked this question.  The Magistrate wanted the footage from CCTV cameras to be examined by the Police.  He even instructed the Police to determine whether a charge will be filed against the Major for having lied.  That too was news.

The main two suspects, Malaka Silva and Rehan Wijeratne, were enlarged on bail.  News.  They’re not talked about now.  They’ve gone off the news radar apparently.  That’s ‘news’, i.e. not the fact that they are out of jail but the fact that they’ve gone off the radar.

Whatever the Major was doing or not doing at the JAIC Hilton that night, he was assaulted.  This was not some kind of attempt to execute a ‘citizens’ arrest’ or a Good Samaritan act to stop some heinous crime being committed.  The assailants had no business to throw their weight around in the way they did.  Even if Malaka and Rehan did not throw punches (and they haven’t been cleared of that; the CCTV footage will establish guilt or innocence), they were present and if they didn’t do it, then it was their friends, bodyguards or goons who assaulted the Major.  It is hard to imagine such minions operating on their own initiative.  They can be charged, therefore, at best, on grounds of being accessories after the fact of felony. 

The Major is in the news.  That’s deflection.  That’s sweeping issue under the carpet.  That is wrong.   

If it is not, then the constitution must be amended.  We can have a 19^th Amendment to the effect that Ministerial Brats (or ‘Privileged Brats’) have the license to do as they please, including indulge in any act of thuggery.  Something like vehicle permits for MPs.  The Legal Draftsman can put it down in appropriate language, but we can call it the Double-O Amendment or the Tiger Amendment, because just like James Bond, 007, had the license to kill, so did the LTTE.  Neither was constitutional, but it is best to do things ‘within the law’.  Then it can be monitored and/or regulated.  Like alcohol and tobacco.  Like certain drugs such as cannabis in the Netherlands. If such laws existed, then we can't write that someone who was at the wrong place at the wrong time was assaulted.  We could have said 'Someone who was at the right place at the right time was rightfully assaulted and justice has prevailed!'  We can add 'Hurray!'

For now, though, the news is that Malaka and Rehan are not newsworthy.  That says a lot about the media. 

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Remand is just the first step…

The first step has been taken.  Or rather, it has been made to be taken.  Should have happened a long time ago.  Had Malaka Silva been put in his place or had his father, Mervin Silva, been put in HIS place the first time he broke the law or threw his weight around, the Army Major Chandana Pradeep would not have been assaulted, the Police would not have been subjected to ridicule and the President been spared insinuation of complicity. 

Malaka Silva has surrendered himself, along with friend and fellow-accused, Rehan (son of Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to Turkey, Bharathi Wijeratne, and who has taken the name of his mother’s second husband, the late Mano Wijeratne).  This is not the first time that Malaka has played cowboy.  The entire country knows that he got away with little more than a soft rap on his knuckles due to his political connections.  If he gets away this time with a mere warning or fine it would be scandalous.  The man is a maniac.  He is a threat to everyone’s security.  

Malaka Silva did not attack just a soldier.  He insulted the entire Army and by extension the Commander-in-Chief, President Mahinda Rajapaksa.  He insulted each and every man and woman who laid his/her life to protect the country from the threat of terrorism.  He insulted every mother and father who lost a son or daughter in that struggle, everyone who lost a spouse and every child who was orphaned.  He insulted every man, woman and child who had for years desperately wanted to live in a land free of checkpoints, bomb explosions and suicide attacks. 

Major Chandana Pradeep was a very special soldier who has carried out numerous and extremely dangerous operations against the LTTE.  He was solely responsible for the capture of the absconding terrorist leader Ram who had survived the final attack in and around the Nandikadal Lagoon.  Malaka is not fit to kiss the dust this Major walks on.  

Malaka and his gang had 6 pistols among them.  We are not a country free from terrorism when a gang of social misfits feel free to strut around thus armed.  It would be silly indeed to think that these self-styled cowboys were juvenile delinquents or young men who haven’t shed their adolescent anxieties.  They are adults. They were armed.  They have been caught on camera assaulting a man.

 

The people of this country have suffered enough at the hands of hooligan politicians.  They were relieved when the LTTE was defeated.  That relief was expressed time and again in the form of multiple victories for the ruling party at numerous elections.  There is gratitude but there was no blank cheque.  And yet, it appears that some people have been cashing the same cheque many times over.  The people have paid. Enough. 

Few, apart from die-hard LTTE loyalists and those who depended on that terrorist in order to secure political goodies, would lament the end of the LTTE.  Few, likewise, would shed tears if Malaka Silva got what he deserves.  They might even thank President Mahinda Rajapaksa.  If, for some reason, the man walks out free, whether we like it or not, he will take it as a sign that he was given a double-o tag of sorts, i.e. license to kill or at least assault.  Few would cheer such an eventuality.  It is something the Government would do well to keep in mind.

 

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Keheliya’s Kehelmal*

Malaka Silva, son of Mervin Silva, Minister of Public Relations and Public Affairs is a thug.  He is rumored to be involved in drug trafficking but rumor is not fact.  If indeed he is, there is either a lack of information to warrant investigation or there’s pressure from above to keep things quiet or the investigation is being carried out in hush-hush ways.  It is rumored that the Army officer who was assaulted by Malaka and his thugs and who is known to be attached to the Army’s Intelligence Unit, was actually on duty investigating drug trafficking and drug traffickers. Those who will connect the dots will do so, but that’s all conjecture. 

What is fact and indeed caught on camera is that Malaka Silva and his gangsters assaulted this officer, causing grievous hurt and necessitating hospitalization.  Police Media Spokesperson, SSP Ajith Rohana has acknowledged that the assault was captured on camera and said that the culprits will be apprehended.  The Army has launched its own investigation.  Two Police teams have been deployed to hunt the man down. 

Meanwhile, even as the nation in one voice calls for the arrest of this thug and wonders about the logic of a soldier putting his life on line to free the nation from the menace of terrorism having to suffer the fate of being banged up a common thug, Malaka Silva calmly visits the Kelaniya Raja Maha Vihare, as a VVIP, bypassing the long queues, to pay homage to the Sacred Kapilavastu Relics and this in a place where over 2,000 policemen were stationed to maintain law and order.  He is photographed, duly and the photographs are published.  Malaka is essentially lifting a metaphorical sarong at the country’s law, law enforcement officers, the judiciary and the general citizenry. 

That’s serious stuff.  Here’s the flip side, and the hilarity that should not provoke laughter but does, perhaps because (for good or bad) we are a nation that can see the funny side of things even in the midst of grim sobriety. 

Mervin Silva, the assailants father with a considerable scot-fee history of intimidation and assault himself, claims that his son would never hit a man in uniform.  According to him, Malaka hit someone who he believed was an ordinary person, whose crime was that although he had a cigarette he was ready to give cigarette-needing Malaka, didn’t have a lighter to go with it.  So Malaka can assault anyone he bums a cigarette from if he didn’t have a lighter as well, provided he didn’t happen to be in military uniform.  Stretch that argument and we have Malaka with a license to assault anyone other than military personnel (who too would be spared only if in uniform).  We should not take Mervin too seriously, for the man thinks the law allows anyone to tie anyone else to a tree.  We should take issue from those who do nothing about it. 

Keheliya Rambukwella now holds the dubious record for besting Mervin at this kind of humor.  At the weekly media briefing on Cabinet decisions, responding to a query, he is reported to have said that the Police didn’t arrest Malaka in Kelaniya because ‘he was on sacred ground’.  Now, had Prabhakaran been spotted worshipping at the Madhu Church and the Army had surrounded the place, would he have been accorded the same privilege?  Let’s assume so.  At some point Prabhakaran would have had to leave or starve.  Let’s assume he chose the former option.  Would not the Army have captured him there and then, or shot him dead if he attempted to fight his way out? 

Malaka Silva walked away.  He would have exited ‘sacred ground’ at some point.  The Police could not have been so blind as to leave a to-safety avenue for the thug.  He could have been apprehended at the gate. He was not.  The police are not stupid.  The people are not stupid.  Keheliya seems to believe that both are stupid. 

Malaka Silva is not an extraordinary citizen.  If I did what Malaka did, I would be behind bars now.  I would have been arrested within the hour of assaulting a senior Army officer.  Malaka is free, still.  That doesn’t say a lot about law enforcement in the country.  It says a lot about Malaka’s and Mervin’s political backers.  It leaves a question:  ‘Who is the President of this country, Mahinda Rajapaksa or Mervin Silva?’

*literally ‘plantain-flower’ but used colloquially to mean ‘balderdash’. 

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Thou art duly warned….!

When the Minister of Public Relations and Public Affairs, Mervin Silva, set out to capture a public servant, he made it a photo opportunity. The media was invited.  TV stations were ‘camera-ready’.  The victim was tied to a tree.  It was reported in the newspapers and the footage was shown on television.  The police did nothing.  The Attorney General did nothing.  The entire justice system shamed itself that day.

In March this year the same minister openly stated that he was responsible for Poddala Jayantha leaving the country.  Jayantha, a well-known media activist was earlier abducted and assaulted.  His assailants are yet to be brought to justice.  While bragging about his role in Jayantha’s exit, this minister also threatened to personally break the limbs of Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, Sunila Abeysekera and Nimalka Fernando.  All four mentioned above have dubious track records in financial dealings as well as being pawns of the LTTE.  All that is irrelevant to the matter of threat and threat-execution.  The law has not pursued these individuals for wrongdoing, but that doesn’t give anyone the right to take the law into his or her hands.

Two days ago, the minister’s son assaulted an Army Major.  He was accompanied by an entourage of thugs.  It is reported that the entire incident was caught on camera.  Police Media Spokesperson, SSP Ajith Rohana in a radio interview last morning told SLBC Chairman Hudson Samarasinghe that this was true, i.e. the assailant, Malaka Silva, son of Minister Mervin Silva was caught on camera assaulting the Army officer.  Statements have been issued, also, claiming that the Police was looking for this thug. 

The man, whose face is familiar to the entire population and ought to be familiar to every single policeman in this country, was photographed worshipping the Sacred Kapilavastu Relics at the Kelaniya Rajamaha Viharaya.  It is known that the police were out in full force to ensure security and to control crowds thronging to pay homage to the Relics.  It is incredible that he was not arrested. 

It is hard to believe that the police do not have eyes.  It is hard to believe they don’t have legs to walk up to this thug and handcuff him.  It is hard to believe that they were ignorant of the fact that he is wanted for assault and battery of a citizen and probably (given context) wanted for other and more serious crimes. 

The father got off scot-free.  Now, for all the pledges of the Police Media Spokesperson, the people cannot be blamed for thinking ‘the son will get away too!’  Indeed, it has come to a point where editorial comments about these acts of thuggery containing demands that the police do their job have been likened to hitting head against brick wall. 

The impotency of the law enforcement authorities clearly indicate a numbing imposed by people in positions of power.  We have to come to some conclusions here.

The police are not sleeping, but pretending to sleep. The Attorney General is not sleeping but is pretending to sleep.  The President hardly ever sleeps, we are told.  He cannot therefore pretend to sleep. 

Sooner or later what was caught on camera will go viral on youtube.  It won’t spark a movement to overthrow the Government, for Mervin Silva’s antics and gross violations have also gone viral on youtube.  Things add up though.  Dots are joined.  Credit gets spent.  Worms turn.  Birds come home to roost. 

Every minute that passes without Malaka Silva being arrested, we get closer to a terrible moment where we begin to walk a path we’ve walked twice in the last 40 years.  That is because of Mervin Silva, Malaka Silva and all the other Silvas who have been spared by the law. 

There are crimes of commission and there are crimes of omission.  Neither is spared in the karmic matrix.   There will be loud knocks on the doors of big houses.  The doors may or may not be opened, but if it is not they will be broken down, in violation of the law.  A letter might be delivered.  It would probably contain an 11-word reminder: ‘What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander’.   

 

 

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Arrest this thug!

Taken from www.indi.com (see blogpost on the same subject)

This is not the first time that the son of Mervin Silva, Minister of Public Relations and Public Affairs, has thrown his weight around. It is not the first time that Malaka Silva has violated the law.  It is not the first time he’s played cops-n-robbers with real weapons.  It is not the first time he has earned the wrath of all law-abiding citizens in this country. 

This is not the first time the son of a politician took the law into his hands.  Not the first time that common thugs operated as though political connections have them special powers to browbeat those who crossed their path.  It is no wonder that cartoonists regularly lampoon the generic political figure with pistol, club, knife or other weapon tucked into belt even as the brute is clothed in spotless white. 

Malaks is not out of order.  He is way out of order.  And if he moved from out-of-order to way-out-of-order it is not he but those who treated him with kids’ gloves the first time he erred that are to blame.  First and foremost his father.

Mervin Silva is a colorful politician and even though parents play a massive role in turning children into who they are, they cannot be held responsible for the wrongs they do ('Arrest this thug' is the title of an article I wrote several months ago).  In this case, however, Malaka is his father’s son in word and deed.  Mervin is a known brawler and Mervin is a brawler who has got off scot-free each time he pummeled someone.  ‘Can get away’ is a lesson that Mervin has been able to teach his son because those who had the power to put a stop to such lessons chose to look the other way.  They were in fact providing a classroom for Mervin to teach his son the finer points of thuggery. 

We have to understand, also, that among those who gave the all-clear to Mervin are those who voted for the man at the last Parliamentary Election.  That was endorsement.   This was the harvest that society reaped, but the bitter fruit had to be tasted by some innocent bystander who in all probability did not even vote for Mervin. 

Forget Mervin.  What’s Malaka’s track record?   In 2005, Malaka and his thugs attacked officers on a drug raid at a night club.  In September 2007 he hit Chaminda Senasinghe in his was hit with a pistol butt at the Bistro Latino Restaurant, before his gang of friends kicked and manhandled the fallen man.  His name, moreover, has come up, along with his father’s when big time drug traffickers and drug trafficking is discussed.

These multiple offences would have earned any other person long prison terms.  In comparison, Malaka has been treated like a king or at least a law-abiding citizen who was the victim of circumstances.  If that is the case, then every citizen should be allowed to carry guns. Every citizen should be able to walk into any place with friends and throw their weight around.  If all this is ok, we can get rid of the constitution, the President can resign and a general declaration made public: ‘Everyone for him/herself, good luck all: Anarchy Reigns!’ 

It is no laughing matter.  About ten years ago, Mervin stormed into the Divaina editorial office and threatened everyone, prompting an editorial titled ‘Me ballath bendala damanu!’ (Tie this dog up as well!).  His antics at Rupavahini are well documented, as are his theatrics when he tied a public servant to a tree.  He has raised the bar for thuggery and obnoxious flouting of power.  His son has taken the cue, it seems.  Those who suffer Mervin must now suffer his son.  And these ‘sufferers’ must be made to pay the price.  

Long before that, this thug has to be put behind bars.  He is a threat to peace.  There is no telling what he might do next.  The ordinary citizen cannot be put at risk.  Malaka Silva must be arrested forthwith and punished as would any other person who perpetrates the same infringements would be punished. Anything less will add up to a massive buck that will float up the political ladder and stop where it must.  

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