Features

Moving up the Colonial civil services ladder in the Caribbean and Africa

Published

4 years ago

2022/10/30

Thilina Walpola

by Sir. Henry Monck-Mason Moore
Last British Governor of then Ceylon

The writer outlines his career prior to his return to Ceylon

Towards the end of 1921 1 went on leave when I met Miss Benson again in London and we became engaged. She was at the time a very brilliant student at the Royal Academy schools to which she had gone after working in the Slade School. Her marriage to me in December of that year put an end to what might have been a great career as a painter. Since my retirement she had done some serious painting again.

We had to cut our honeymoon short, as I was unexpectedly offered the post of Colonial Secretary, Bermuda. It represented promotion only in status, as the salary attached was less than I was drawing in Ceylon, no official house was provided and no passage allowance. After some 18 months I applied for a transfer, regardless of status, to an appointment in some other Colony where we could live on our pay, and in 1924 I was offered the post of Principal Assistant Secretary, Nigeria, which I accepted.

Though ruinously expensive, our time in Bermuda had its compensations. Prohibition had not been rescinded in America, and three ships a week from New York brought shiploads of its thirsty citizens to the hotels and bars of this popular tourist resort. Among them we met many charming people, though it was impossible to return their hospitality in the sort of boarding house in which we were reduced to live. The old Bermudian families lived in a select social circle of their own. Many of them let their charming old colonial type houses for the American season at highly inflated rentals on which they were able to live in great comfort for the rest of the year.

The Chief Justice, the Colonial Secretary and the Chief of Police were the only three imported officials, and it was difficult, if not impossible to get the House of Assembly to improve their conditions of service. The executive had no representation in the lower house – even the Attorney-General, a Bermudian and member of the Executive Council, had to secure a seat in some constituency, before he could sit and introduce Government bills.

The Legislative Council, the upper house, consisted of the Chief Justice as President, the Colonial Secretary and Receiver-General (Treasury and Customs) as official members with two unofficial members who had won their spurs in the lower house. The Governor was always a soldier and commander of the local garrison. He presided over the Executive Council, but took no part in the debates of either house, his proposals being forwarded to the Legislature by way of “message,” and had no powers, other than those of persuasion, of securing his policy being adopted. Any idea of Colonial Office control was bitterly resented and the Assembly has succeeded in maintaining its virtual independence up to the present day.

For me it was a novel and somewhat exasperating experience to have to plunge so abruptly into the whirlpool of local politics in an island where, because of its very smallness, party feelings were easily aroused and personal rivalries were rampant. In retrospect it was no doubt a useful experience for the more controversial political crises in which I was destined to be involved in Kenya and still later in Ceylon.

In Bermuda the franchise was dependent on a property qualification which was jealously guarded by the old Bermudian families. As a result there was in my time only one coloured member of the House of Assembly, and socially the colour bar was complete. Immigration from the West Indies was closely controlled, and the Bermudian Negroes, mostly descendants of emancipated slaves, were generally employed as domestic servants, carriage drivers – no motor cars were allowed in the island – and dock labourers. The growing of fresh vegetables and the Bermuda Lily was in the hands of specially imported Portuguese, who were skilled market gardeners. The colour question, therefore, in my day had not assumed serious proportions.

Nigeria

In 1924, I accepted the post of Principal Assistant Secretary in the Lagos Secretariat, Nigeria, having refused the appointment of Colonial Secretary, Bahamas, where I knew the conditions were much the same as in Bermuda and the cost of living equally expensive. On arrival, as I have already recorded, I found Sir Hugh Clifford was Governor and Sir Donald Cameron Chief Secretary. When Northern and Southern Nigeria were united in a single administration by Lord Lugard, Sir Donald had been responsible for much of the detailed work behind the scene. He was primarily an office man with Southern Nigerian experience and was not persona grata to the Lieutenant-Governors of the North.

Whether for this or for reasons of economy he was not given the status or salary which his duties and responsibilities deserved. Sir Hugh Clifford on his arrival immediately set up a well-staffed and organized Central Secretariat in Lagos, made Sir Donald Chief Secretary, and gave him equivalent status and salary with the Lieutenant-Governors of Northern and Southern Nigeria. As a result Sir Hugh and Sir Donald worked together in great harmony, and were a formidable team.

Sir Donald absorbed much of Sir Hugh’s administrative experience, but at the same time brought his acid intelligence to bear on Sir Hugh’s more exuberant proposals. Before long Sir Donald was promoted to the Governorship of Tanganyika, and was, succeeded by Sir F. M. Baddeley from Malaya.On the announcement that the Prince of Wales was to visit Nigeria and the West Coast Colonies en route to Cape Town, Sir Hugh entered enthusiastically into the preparation of somewhat grandiose plans for his reception. A reception committee was set up of which I became the secretary, while Lady Clifford, who was in London, kept in touch with the Prince’s staff, at St. James’ Palace.

In the midst of all these preparations Sir Hugh had something in the nature of a nervous breakdown and for six weeks retired up country for a rest to await the arrival of Lady Clifford. At the last moment, owing to an outbreak of smallpox in Lagos, the visit was almost abandoned altogether, but eventually this difficulty was overcome by re-arranging the itinerary so that the visit to Lagos was made after the quarantine period had expired.

As a result Sir Hugh alternated between periods of deep depression and high exaltation, and it was on the latter note that eventually he accompanied the Prince throughout his visit. A contributory factor was that he knew by this time that he was to become Governor of Ceylon, a stepping-stone to the Governorship of Malaya, which had been his life long ambition.During the last few weeks, between the departure of the Prince of Wales and Sir Hugh’s own departure on leave prior to taking up the Ceylon appointment, his behaviour became suggestive of some form of mental instability, and it was reported by some of his friends to the medical authorities that they were apprehensive that he was suffering from delusions.

What steps, if any, were taken to report this to the Colonial Office officially I do not know. In view of the tragic end to his brilliant career when Governor of Malaya, one is left wondering whether this could have been in any way avoided.In 1927 I was promoted to Deputy Chief Secretary in succession to Sir Shenton Thomas, who was appointed Colonial Secretary in the Gold Coast from which he went later to Singapore as Governor and became a Japanese prisoner of war on the fall of Singapore. By that time Sir Graeme Thomson had succeeded Sir Hugh Clifford as Governor of Nigeria, and my wife and I were naturally delighted at again serving under him and Lady Thomson, whom we had known so well in Ceylon.

They had had, I believe, a difficult time in British Guiana, where Sir Graeme had introduced some constitutional reforms in the teeth of much local unofficial opposition. As a result he seemed to have lost some of his early vigour, though he early initiated a new housing scheme for Government servants, which was long overdue. He appointed two committees for Northern and Southern Nigeria and I was fortunate in being appointed Secretary to both. He also took the revolutionary step in those days of appointing a woman member to each. This was a wise move as by that time more and more wives were coming out to join their husbands during their tours of service, which had been prohibited or greatly restricted in the past.

As a result my wife and I had the opportunity of making, extensive tours in the two provinces and seeing something of out-station life, which was a welcome change from the somewhat suburban atmosphere of Lagos. Later Sir Graeme fell seriously ill with an internal haemorrhage, and when I left in 1929 to take up the appointment of Colonial Secretary, Kenya, he was lying in bed in Government House on the danger list. He subsequently recovered but I don’t think he was ever quite the same man again.

Kenya

In 1929 we arrived in Nairobi to find the Governor Sir Edward Grigg in London and my predecessor Sir Edward Denham on leave preparatory to taking up the appointment of Governor of Jamaica. So the Chief Justice, Sir Jacob Bath, was acting as Governor and continued to do so till the return of Sir Edward Grigg. Kenya was in the throes of much political agitation owing to the demand of the Indians to be put on a common roll with the European elected members instead of an Indian communal roll. At the same time the European elected members were pressing for closer union between the territories of Kenya, Uganda, and Tanganyika.

Mr. Amery, the Secretary of State for the Colonies in the Conservative Government, was a strong advocate of such a policy, and had privately instructed Sir Edward Grigg to prepare the ground for it. With the support of Lord Delamere, the leader of the Settlers, an imposing new Government House, designed by Sir Herbert Baker, had been built on lines suitable for the accommodation of a Governor-General of the three territories.

Neither Uganda nor Tanganyika were enthusiastic over this proposal, as they were apprehensive of domination by White Settler opinion. The controversy was referred to London where an Inter-Parliamentary Committee advised against any immediate action without, closing the door to its further consideration in the future. By this time the world economic depression was threatening and Lord Delamere himself realized that the scheme must be put into cold storage till economic conditions were more favourable. With the advent of Lord Passfield as Secretary for the Colonies under the Labour Government, a White Paper was issued which gave the agitation its quietus.

The Indians at first boycotted both the Municipal and Legislative Council elections but eventually accepted a communal role, which enabled them to take their part in municipal and legislative activities. It was in this super-charged atmosphere that I found myself, as, Colonial Secretary, Leader of the Official majority in the Legislative Council, in which I made my first appearance with some trepidation, as neither in Bermuda nor Nigeria did I have any experience of the rough and tumble of parliamentary debate.

Eventually I found my feet and was able to establish friendly relations with all sides of the House despite verbal encounters in the debating chamber. But by this time constitutional controversies were temporarily forgotten in the attempt to grapple with the serious financial position of the Colony owing to the world depression.It was at this time that I first met General Smuts when I sat next to him at a dinner given in his honour on his way to attend the World Economic Conference. Speaking from a few notes scribbled on the back of his menu card, he adroitly side-stepped any local controversial issues and won general applause for his statesmanlike and noncommittal appreciation of the situation. I little thought that I was later to be brought into so much closer association with him during World War II.

Owing to the collapse of world prices the European farmers were in serious straits with the banks calling in mortgages and declining to make advances to meet current expenditure. Some relief was afforded by the Government’s establishment of a Land Bank, and by the discovery of alluvial gold in the Kakamega area; many farmers left their wives to run the farms and went to pan gold themselves. But no substantial gold mining materialized, and this proved only a temporary expedient.

By this time Sir Edward Grigg’s term of office was expiring, and I acted as Governor till the arrival of his successor, Sir Joseph Byrne. His relations with Lord Delamere were strained from the first, and the situation was not made easier by the fact that, although a levy on salaries had been imposed on all Government officers and Government expenditure reduced to a minimum, the financial position of the Colony was still very bad.

Accordingly Lord Moyne was sent out by the Secretary of State to report on the situation. His original term of reference was to review the revenue position and its allocation between European, Indian and native services. The natives paid hut and poll tax but non-natives paid no direct taxation other than certain charges for schools and hospitals. Lord Moyne was later instructed to make recommendations for balancing the Budget and recommended the introduction of income tax for all non-natives.

This gave rise to one of the most heated controversies in Kenya’s history. After the Bill had passed its Second Reading by use of the Official majority, Lord Francis Scott and Col Grogan flew to London to see the Secretary of State, Sir Philip Cunliffe Lister, to gain support to alternative proposals proposed by the European elected members.

They were able to induce the Secretary of State to give their proposals a trial, and the Income Tax Bill was dropped. In the event, as the local government had foreseen, some of their proposals proved unworkable and the remainder failed miserably to produce the revenue required. Eventually, after long delay, agreement was reached to the introduction of Income Tax as an emergency measure. It is still on the statute book !

On Lord Delamere’s death, Lord Francis Scott had become leader of the European elected members. As explained above he had in London secured the last minute approval of the Secretary of State to the shelving of the Income Tax Bill. This was hailed with delight as a defeat of the local government. At this awkward moment Sir Joseph Byrne had to go on leave for health reasons and I was left to carry the baby.It was a highly controversial period and later, after Sir Joseph’s return, Cunliffe-Lister flew out himself to visit Kakamega and meet a deputation of the elected members. Unfortunately he was taken seriously ill and lay for days in Government House before he was out of danger. His visit, therefore, did little to remove the tension, particularly as he was unwilling to provide the financial aid on the lines recommended by the elected members.

By 1934 when I left to become Governor of Sierra Leone, Kenya was slowly emerging from the depression. I was first offered the Governorship of British Guiana. But this I refused on the advice once given to me by Sir Graeme Thomson. He had accepted it himself with enthusiasm as he had had high hopes of developing its largely unexplored interior. But he left it disillusioned, and as my experience in Bermuda, though not in the West Indies, had given me some insight into West Indian conditions, I remembered his advice and declined. Soon after Sierra Leone fell vacant, of which Sir Joseph Byrne had previously been Governor. He advised me to accept, which I did.

It was a difficult choice, as it involved leaving our two young daughters in England. For my wife it meant breaking up our home again, and repeating the experience in Nigeria of spending part of the time with me and part with the children. It is the hard price that the Colonial Servant has to pay, but it is the wife who has to pay the hardest price.

In the event unexpected relief came in 1937 by my appointment as an Under Secretary of State in the Colonial Office. Mr. Ormsby-Gore, later Lord Harlech, initiated the idea of bringing in temporarily a junior Governor into the higher echelons of the Home Civil Service instead of bringing in junior officers – known as “Beachcombers” – to work in the lower ranks. It represented a very considerable financial loss and in our case was only rendered possible by the generosity of my wife’s parents.

During my comparatively brief period in Sierra Leone I was able to lay the foundations of a closer administration of the Protectorate, which was somewhat haphazardly administered through a host of minor chiefs. I sent Mr. Fenton – a most efficient officer – to study the local native administration being set up, particularly among the Ondos in southern Nigeria. He prepared a most useful report and its recommendations were being implemented when I left.

In the past most emphasis had been laid on Freetown itself, where the educated “creoles” – descendants of the original ex slave settlements – held a monopoly of clerical appointments and trading interests in the West Coast. With the spread of education in the Gold Coast and Nigeria local men were taking their place, while the Syrian traders were successfully ousting them. White collared unemployment was becoming a problem in Freetown, and the interests of the Protectorate natives were of secondary importance to the unofficial members of the Legislative Council.

The development of iron ore at Marampa and the discovery of diamonds and some alluvial gold had revolutionary results, as it became clear that on the development of the mineral resources of the Protectorate depended the prosperity of Sierra Leone, rather, than on the precarious export of palm kernels and palm oil. I also with the aid of the Colonial Development Fund had a circular road driven round the Peninsula which proved to be of great value during the war.

Representatives of the Army, Navy and Air Force, arrived to study sites for aerodromes, flying boat bases, and battery extensions and boom-harbour defences, but little progress had been made by the time I left. I appointed Mr. Beoku Betts, the first Creole to become a member of the local legal department. He became, I believe, a good Government servant despite his having previously graced the Opposition benches in the Legislative Council.

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Features

Aragalaya betrayed?

Published

9 hours ago

2026/05/25

Thilina Walpola

Aragalaya

‘The treason of the intellectuals’ in the age of populism – Part I

Sri Lankans recently celebrated the fourth anniversary of the Aragalaya, which, some believe, ushered in an era of Left populism in Sri Lanka. Left politics in Sri Lanka has been ravaged by a crisis, since the late 1970s. It was basically one of an inability to regain the mass basis the Left lost in the 1977 elections. The Left was pushed out of the coalition government, led by Sirimavo, by the right-wing forces, within it, in the context of the global oil crisis that led to the adoption of austerity measures by the government.

This crisis of the Left exploded with the mass uprising ,known as the Aragalaya, which began with the hashtag campaign ‘Gota Go Home’. The nature of its development has come under scrutiny by critics who allege that hidden international hands orchestrated the movement. Nevertheless, the Aragalaya—which developed into an authentic citizen action—ultimately ended in a counter-revolution. The current JVP/NPP government came to power by riding the wave of public awakening that accompanied the Aragalaya.

Is the JVP/NPP government Leftist?

Even though the Western international media, as part of a strategy to manipulate the JVP/NPP administration from time to time, calls it a left government, it works very closely with the right-wing local capitalist class and international financial agencies.

Subaltern or elite?

While there was some initial attempt to identify the JVP/NPP government’s class basis as ‘subaltern,’ in the face of criticism, this formulation was changed to ‘non-elite’. It is correct that, generally, members of the new regime do not belong to the strata of the political elite of the traditional aristocracy and bourgeoisie. However, it can be argued that those who are holding the leadership of the NPP government are those with the aspiration of becoming the new elite. They are the emerging political elite, representing both the rural and urban petty-bourgeois strata.

The leadership consists of those who have risen to the top in professional fields and the bureaucracy, led by those in the fields of academia, medicine, engineering and technology, law, management, business, accountancy, and administration, alongside those who have traditionally been political activists and trade union leaders. Political power has been captured by these petty-bourgeois class elements that have embraced a technocratic ideology. Rallied around them is the capitalist leadership that directs chambers of commerce and is tied in with international capital.

In essence, the current regime represents an alliance formed between the petty-bourgeois and capitalist groups and international finance capital—an alliance that, by now, has replaced the popular bloc formed with ‘janathawa’ (the people) during the election campaign, leading to the formation of the government.

The new elite represents the heirs of the nationalist-Left tendency of the generation of the ‘56 daruwo,’ represented by the JVP, a social force that Bandaranaike released in 1956. The mainstream of the political change of ’56 came to be represented by Bandaranaike’s own party, the SLFP, whose promise of building a common man’s era fizzled out with the regime, led by Mahinda Rajapaksa, coming to an end in 2015. At long last, true representatives of the rural and urban petty bourgeoisie have assumed political power after a long-drawn-out struggle, however, shedding their Left credentials in the process. This is the generation that Gunadasa Amarasekara, the doyen of jathika chintanaya, controversially hoped would take responsibility for the future of the country. While they have assumed political power, their formulation of, what they call, punarudaya (the Renaissance) seems to be at odds with Amarasekara’s wish to recover the ‘Sinhala Buddhist civilisational consciousness’—a point which requires a separate discussion, at another time.

Some of the leftists, who joined the NPP to form the government, seek to justify their choice by claiming that the new regime stands for the two-stage revolution ‘a la Lenin’—that is, first, the bourgeois-democratic stage and then the proletarian-socialist stage; Sri Lanka will achieve industrialisation in the first stage, under punarudaya, or the Renaissance. What is not made clear is how Sri Lanka could industrialise while being under the grip of international finance agencies whose actions, economists argue, from the very beginning of their involvement in the Sri Lankan economy, have preempted even the remotest possibility of the country becoming an industrialised one. With its claim to bringing about economic stability and growth, the government has moved away from serving the genuine interests of the people, and the country, in the fields of economy, polity, and culture, as its critics point out, as briefly outlined in the next section of this article.

It is claimed that the theory of left populism was formulated in opposition to right-wing populism, which furthered the neoliberal agenda. Going by what is outlined below, can the JVP/NPP government be identified as a left-populist one?

Not economic democracy, but autocracy?

Left political parties, groups, and individuals in Sri Lanka widely hold that the crisis of Left politics has been intensified with the current government assuming power. According to their criticisms, the JVP/NPP government is not a Left government.

The current government entered into an agreement on debt restructuring with the IMF based on the conditions imposed by them, despite the expectations of the masses that rallied around the JVP/NPP election campaign and the promises made in its own election manifesto to renegotiate it. Accordingly, placing the larger burden of the haircut of the debt restructuring on the EPF of the working people has been carried out by the JVP/NPP government without any changes to the original plan.

It is apparent that the current government’s economic programme, from its inception, has been directed by the leadership of the representatives of the capitalist class, led by the chambers of commerce. The government has been mainly formulating and implementing government policy, based on the debt provided and the conditions imposed by the IMF and its affiliated institutions, the World Bank and the ADB, rather than on the felt needs of the Sri Lankan people.

An unbearable tax burden is imposed on the people. The government boasts that it has filled the Treasury with trillions of rupees, including the wealth it has exploited, via those taxes. Not only the poor but also the middle classes are oppressed by the unbearable burden of an ever-rising cost of living.

Poverty and malnutrition, which are major determinants of living standards, remain at high levels under the current government. According to official reports, 25 percent of the population lives in extreme poverty, while 80 percent of them live in rural areas. The poverty of the Tamil community, living in plantations, is even higher. Neoliberal economists themselves say that if calculated according to the real cost of living, the population living below the poverty line would be one-third of the total population. Women and children—and among them, girls—suffer the most from all this.

Sri Lanka’s micro-finance and credit crisis has trapped hundreds of thousands of people, mainly rural women, in a deep debt trap through predatory high-interest loans, leading to over 200 reported suicides. Activists have already expressed fears that the Microfinance and Credit Regulatory Authority Act, recently passed by the government, is designed to blame victims and will contribute to the erosion of consumer protections in such a regulatory framework by placing the onus of protection on borrowers. They stress that the Act does not include sufficient provisions to protect micro-finance and credit consumers.

Critics point out that not only our economic sovereignty but also our political sovereignty and security have been compromised by the secret agreements signed by the current government with the global American empire (US-Sri Lanka Security Memorandum of Understanding/Government Partnership Program (2025)) and the regional Indian power (India-Sri Lanka Security Partnership Agreement (2025)).

This government is strengthening relations with Israel—a nation that has embarked on a policy of genocide against Palestinians—and is maintaining cooperation with Israeli intelligence agencies and the military.

The current government has declared the private sector and the market mechanism, not the state sector, as the engine of economic growth at a level surpassing previous governments.

The government has accepted the neoliberal vision of subjugating large areas of social life to the logic of commodification. By allowing the market to behave as it sees fit, people have been subjected to the ruthless control of the market, except in the case of a few essential goods.

Critics have accused the current government of subtly but carefully implementing the privatisation of state-sector institutions, a move that the previous government had withheld in the face of public opposition. Services, essential to the survival of ordinary people and the middle class, such as public healthcare and education, are increasingly being brought under the influence of the market. There is no clear attempt to free passenger transport from the clutches of a rapacious private sector. The energy sector—oil and electricity supply—continues to be driven towards privatisation through fragmentation.

It is instructive here to note what Bhaskar Sunkara, Editor of Jacobin—the popular Left magazine published in New York that strongly backed Zohran Mamdani’s bid for Mayor—has to say on social infrastructures:

“Health care, education, transportation, energy, and telecommunication are not consumer goods but social infrastructures on which participation in modern life depends.

Organizing them through profit-seeking intermediaries that ration by price rather than need introduces predictable distortions. The result is a system that undermines both equality and efficiency. Decades of comparative experience suggest that public provision in these sectors can deliver better outcomes at lower social cost, precisely because it aligns provision with social need rather than purchasing power.” (‘We Need a Socialism After Capitalism,’ Jacobin, April 2026)

Serious damage to the natural environment and biodiversity continues under the current government. Deforestation, fragmentation of wildlife habitats, and human-wildlife conflicts have intensified. The release of protected lands to local and foreign private investors for so-called development, ignoring environmental impact assessments (for example, the Mannar wind farm projects), and the failure to stop illegal land acquisition and sand mining, which have undermined biodiversity, especially in the dry zone, are continuing.

The introduction of a biometric national identity card, funded by an Indian grant, in conjunction with the massive digitalisation programme, launched under the private sector operation, poses a serious risk of being used to unnecessarily restrict individual freedoms and to be used by the Sri Lankan government and foreign states to suppress citizens when necessary. Overall, it is clear from global experience that digitalisation, in the name of national security, is building a surveillance state. (To be continued)

by Kumudu Kusum Kumara

Features

The illusion of foolproof identity: Are even biometrics under threat by AI?

Published

9 hours ago

2026/05/25

Thilina Walpola

For quite a few decades,we have nonchalantly operated under a comforting and standard assumption that our bodies are our ultimate legal deeds. The features of every human body are quite unique. We have been taught that while passwords can be guessed, documents can be forged, and keys can be stolen, the biological architectures of our physical selves remain fundamentally unassailable and distinctly foolproof. Your face, your fingerprints, the unique landscape of your eye, are nature’s barcodes, forged from an intricate mix of genetics and intrauterine chance, utterly distinct to each of us among billions of people. This absolute distinctiveness made “biometrics”; automated methods used to recognise, authenticate, or identify individuals based on their unique biological and behavioural characteristics, the golden child of universally accepted global security. Amongst many other things, they are even trusted to unlock smartphones, provide access to sensitive portals, secure multi-billion-dollar wire transfers, cross international borders, and even safeguard top-secret military complexes.

Yet for all that, a profound and deeply unsettling shift is occurring, even beneath our own feet. The rapid acceleration of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digital cloning technologies has begun to split open this relationship between biological reality and identity confirmation. Today, sophisticated software can replicate human voices with terrifying accuracy using mere seconds of feed-in audio, synthesise flawlessly lifelike videos of public figures saying things they never ever verbalised, and generate artificial fingerprints or facial configurations designed specifically to trick electronic gatekeepers. The comforting illusion that our bodily metrics are fool-proof is perhaps dissolving to quite a significant extent, casting a real-time shadow across the infrastructure of modern trust, even in everyday life.

Beyond the Fingerprint: The Expanding Universe of Identity

To understand the intricacies and depth of the current risks, one must look beyond the traditional hallmarks of identity verification. Perhaps the average person is clearly and deeply familiar with standard facial recognition, thumbprints, and the striking, complex rings of retinal imagery. Indeed, human biology offers an incredibly vast and nuanced spectrum of unique identifiers. Science and industry have quietly harnessed a long list of alternative indices to verify the identities and details of exactly who we are.

Consider iris recognition, which maps the intricate, visible coloured ring surrounding the pupil of the eye, or palmprint authentication, which tracks the expansive system of major lines, wrinkles, and minute ridges across the entire hand. Beyond these lie vascular biometrics, often referred to as vein pattern recognition, which uses near-infrared light to capture the unique layout of blood vessels seen beneath the skin of a finger or palm, a map completely invisible to the naked eye.

Furthermore, behavioural traits have proven just as distinct as anatomical ones. Voice biometrics analyses the physical anatomy of the vocal tract, nasal cavities, and vocal cords to isolate distinct sound frequencies. Gait analysis evaluates the precise, rhythmic mechanics of how an individual walks, tracking joint angles and weight distribution. Even keystroke dynamics, the precise cadence and rhythm with which you type on a keyboard, and ear acoustic geometry, which measures the unique way sound waves echo back out of your specific ear canal, have been successfully deployed to establish undeniable proof of identity.

The Pro Side: Unmatched Convenience and Safety

The historical arguments in favour of biometric systems remain incredibly compelling, which explains their near-ubiquitous adoption. First and foremost is the argument of unmatched convenience. Biometrics elegantly solve the “human error” factor inherent in traditional security appliances. You cannot lose your iris on a crowded train; you cannot accidentally leave your unique vein patterns at home; and you cannot forget the complex “password” of your facial geometry. It is an identity architecture that is permanently attached to the user, eliminating the friction of remembering combinations of symbols or carrying physical keys.

From a general, social and systemic perspective, biometrics have provided an unprecedented layer of objective truth. In criminal justice, fingerprint and DNA databases have exonerated the wrongfully accused, reunited missing children with families, and brought dangerous fugitives to justice based on definitive physical evidence rather than fickle, unreliable human memory. At international borders, automated biometric gates process millions of travellers daily with high efficiency, flagging authentic security threats while speeding up travel for the public. In the financial sector, a glance at a smartphone or a press of a thumb could prevent billions of dollars from being fraudulently stolen in identity theft and sham transactions every year by ensuring the actual account owner is physically present.

The Dark Side: When Your Body Becomes a Vulnerability

Despite these immense benefits, the reliance on biological markers has always harboured a fundamental flaw: the absolute permanence of the data. If a hacker steals your credit card number or a critical password, you can easily log online, cancel the account, and generate a completely new string of random characters. The breach is a nuisance, but it is entirely correctable and is fixable. However, if a malicious actor steals the high-resolution digital file containing your retinal map, your facial architecture, or your voice print, you cannot change your body. You cannot reset your eyes; you cannot easily forge a new set of fingers. Once a biometric signature is compromised, it is compromised for the rest of your life.

This permanence creates a highly centralised vulnerability. Biometric authentication systems do not store your actual finger or face; they store a mathematical digital template derived from them. These templates are housed inside vast corporate and government databases, and even universal digital portals. As cyberattacks grow increasingly sophisticated, these databases represent high-value targets for digital thieves. The terrifying consequence is that a single security breach at a major technology company or a government agency could permanently expose the personal physical keys of millions of citizens simultaneously.

The AI Shadow: Faking even the Unforgeable

This brings us to a profound paradigm shift driven by modern artificial intelligence. The traditional and abiding defence of biometrics was that physical traits could not be replicated in real-time. A photograph of a face could not trick a system looking for depth, and a recorded voice lacked the dynamic shifts of live speech. However…, surprise, SURPRISE…, AI has completely shattered these firmly held conventions and inferences.

Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), a class of AI models in which two neural networks compete against each other, are now capable of analysing thousands of images or audio clips of an individual and creating a near-flawless synthetic clone. A clone refers to an exact copy, duplicate, or true genetic replica of another organism, cell, or object. The term applies across several fields and implies an absolutely identical real-life descriptor. Using these tools, fraudsters can create “deepfake” videos that mimic the precise micro-expressions, skin textures, and even the blink rates of a targeted executive, acclaimed scientist, an economist of global repute or even a political leader. In 2024, an employee at a multinational firm in Hong Kong was tricked into paying out 25 million dollars after attending a video conference call where every other participant was an AI-generated digital clone of his real-world colleagues.

Similarly, voice cloning has become a weaponised tool for financial scams. With less than ten seconds of audio scraped from a social media post, AI can synthesise a voice that is indistinguishable from a loved one or a bank official, perfectly matching the acoustic biometrics used by telephone banking systems. Even more alarming is the concept of “Master Prints”: the AI-generated, synthetic fingerprints that combine the most common ridge patterns found across the human population. Much like a master key that can open many different locks, these synthetic prints can trick biometric sensors up to 20% to 30% of the time, completely undermining the premise of absolute individuality.

Implications for the Future: Rebuilding Trust

The realisation that biometrics can be systematically manipulated has immense implications for the future of global society, law, and security. We are stepping into an era where we can no longer trust our eyes or ears to verify the identity of the person on the other side of a digital connection. This breakdown of trust threatens to disrupt not only financial institutions but also the very foundations of democratic systems, where synthetic video and audio can be deployed to frame individuals or fabricate digital evidence.

To survive this environment, the security industry must completely abandon the concept of the commonly used single-factor biometric authentication. The future will require a multi-layered approach. Biometrics will likely be coupled with behavioural signals that change dynamically over time, or physical tokens like cryptographic hardware keys. Furthermore, security developers are engaged in an intense arms race to create “deepfake detectors”; AI systems designed specifically to analyse incoming files for the microscopic digital artefacts left behind by generative software, verifying that a human face or voice is biologically real and is happening in real-time.

Legally and ethically, this shift demands robust new frameworks. Governments worldwide are beginning to recognise that our biological signatures require the same, if not greater, legal protections, as our financial assets. Laws must be strictly enforced to punish the unauthorised creation of digital clones and to compel corporations to encrypt biometric data using advanced, non-hackable methods.

A Balanced Path Forward

Ultimately, and even surprisingly, biometrics are neither a flawless saviour nor an inherent curse. They are powerful tools caught in the crossfire of an abiding technological evolution. They continue to offer unparalleled efficiency and security when implemented correctly. However, the dangerous myth of their absolute infallibility must be permanently laid to rest.

As artificial intelligence continues to blur the line between the real and the synthetic, our approach to identity must become as dynamic as the technology threatening it. We must stop viewing our physical bodies as unshakable passwords. True security in the modern age will not come from blindly trusting our biological uniqueness. It can only come from our collective vigilance, technological adaptation, and the implementation of robust, multi-layered digital defences that protect the sacred boundaries of who we really are.

by Dr B. J. C. Perera
MBBS(Cey), DCH(Cey), DCH(Eng), MD(Paediatrics), MRCP(UK), FRCP(Edin), FRCP(Lond), FRCPCH(UK), FSLCPaed, FCCP, Hony. FRCPCH(UK), Hony. FCGP(SL)
Specialist Consultant Paediatrician and Honorary Senior Fellow, Postgraduate Institute of Medicine, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka.
An independent free-lance correspondent.

Features

Human-caused leopard deaths soar in Sri Lanka’s Central Highlands, new study warns

Published

9 hours ago

2026/05/25

Thilina Walpola

Wire snares leading cause of leopard deaths

A groundbreaking international study, spanning 17 years, has revealed an alarming rise in human-caused deaths of the endangered Sri Lankan leopard, with the majority of fatalities concentrated in the tea estate landscapes of the Central Highlands.

The peer-reviewed study, titled “Human-Caused Leopard Deaths in Sri Lanka Are Concentrated in Central Highlands’ Estate Mosaics: Evidence From 17 Years of Mortality Records,” was recently published in the prestigious scientific journal Wiley’s Wildlife Letters.

The research team was led by conservation scientist Sanjaya Weerakkody and comprised a distinguished group of local and international researchers, including Vimukthi Gunasekara, Sethil Muhandiram, Try Surya Harapan, Kithmi R. Gunasekara, Bandini Jayasena, John B. Wilson, Prathiba M. Amugoda, Tharika de Silva, Chathuranga D. Hathurusinghe, Ahimsa Campos-Arceiz, and Enoka P. Kudavidanage.

The scientists represented a broad collaboration of institutions, including the Southeast Asia Biodiversity Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Yunnan Provincial Tropical Rainforest and Asian Elephant Conservation Innovation Team in China, LeopardCon Sri Lanka, Oklahoma State University in the United States, the Department of Natural Resources of Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka, and the Tropical Ecosystems Research Network.

Speaking on the significance of the findings, researcher Sethil Muhandiram said the study provides the clearest picture yet of how human pressures are driving leopard mortality in Sri Lanka’s hill country landscapes.

“We found that plantation landscapes, especially tea estate mosaics in the Central Highlands, have become major hotspots for leopard deaths. Most concerning is the widespread use of wire snares, which continue to silently kill leopards and other wildlife,” Muhandiram said.

According to the findings, researchers analysed leopard mortality records from 2008 to 2024 and documented 164 human-caused deaths across the island, averaging nearly 10 deaths annually. More worryingly, the study found that leopard deaths have steadily increased over time, underscoring intensifying human-wildlife conflict in Sri Lanka.

The study identified wire snares as the leading cause of death, accounting for over 62 percent of cases where the cause was known. Many of these snares are believed to have been set for wild boar and other animals but ended up trapping leopards.

“Snaring is now one of the greatest threats facing the Sri Lankan leopard outside protected areas. Unless immediate action is taken to remove snares and strengthen enforcement, these deaths will continue to rise,” Muhandiram warned.

Plantation landscapes, especially tea estates in the Central Province, emerged as the most dangerous habitats for the country’s apex predator.

Researchers found that nearly 47 percent of all recorded leopard deaths occurred in the Central Highlands, while the Nuwara Eliya District alone accounted for 38.4 percent of fatalities, despite covering only a small portion of the leopard’s estimated range.

Researchers warned that the patchwork of tea estates, fragmented forests, villages, and agricultural lands has become a deadly landscape for leopards attempting to move between habitats.

The study also found that adult male leopards were disproportionately affected, a trend scientists caution could have serious implications for breeding populations and the long-term survival of the species.

Sri Lanka’s leopard, scientifically known as Panthera pardus kotiya, is an endemic subspecies found nowhere else in the world and is already listed as endangered.

Muhandiram stressed that conservation efforts must move beyond national parks and include estate landscapes where leopard-human interactions are increasing rapidly.

“Conservation cannot focus only on protected areas anymore. Leopards are surviving in human-dominated landscapes, and protecting them will require cooperation from estate communities, plantation companies, Wildlife authorities, and policymakers,” he said.

The study has further emphasised that leopard conservation in Sri Lanka can no longer focus solely on protected areas such as the Yala National Park, as significant leopard populations are increasingly surviving in estate and rural landscapes vulnerable to human pressures.

Researchers concluded that without immediate and coordinated action, Sri Lanka risks losing one of its most iconic and ecologically significant species to escalating human-induced threats.

By Ifham Nizam