Editorial

Give And Take

Published

4 years ago

2021/04/11

Sri Lanka heads into the Sinhala and Tamil New Year at a time of difficulty and hardship unprecedented in our contemporary history. Covid 19 has cost us much, as it has cost nearly all countries in the planet. There have been claims that the worst is over and we continue to hope that this is correct. But that is not something that can be said with certainty. However a semblance of normalcy has returned although sections of the community, such as those dependent on tourism, continue to suffer hardship. Nobody can claim that the economy is in good shape with the rupee plunging to a historic low of Rs. 200 to the U.S. dollar. This must reflect both on the import bill and on external debt servicing and repayment. But tea prices remain good and the weather has been fair. While we can take comfort that we have not yet defaulted on our massive debt servicing and repayment obligations, the situation is far from rosy with our ability to raise new loans at interest rates that are not exorbitant declining by the day.

Although the ever-rising cost of living continues to impose hardship on both the poor and the middle class, this has been something that has been always with us for a very long time. Although incomes have grown, prices have grown much faster and we know too well that the value of money is now a fraction of what it was. This has particularly hurt savings and the prevailing low interest rates have dealt a kidney punch to large numbers of retired people dependent on interest income for their livelihood. While grumbling continues, people have learned to cope as best as they can. Despite all the negatives, the rulers continue to project a bold front. But there is no escaping the reality that the government has rapidly lost popularity since the last elections, both presidential and parliamentary.

No ban on New Year travel has been imposed although there are inherent risks, in the covid context, of large numbers of people going home to their villages from crowded urban centers they work in. This has been a long-held tradition and it would be a brave government that would interfere however much prudence dictates otherwise. While most people wear masks while moving around in public places, enforcing social distancing in crowded public transport will be next to impossible. Thus the powers that be have resorted to the easier way of leaving the choice to the good sense of the people rather than enforcing strict rules controlling movement. Although other countries have seen spikes of infection by being lenient on holiday travel, Sri Lanka will hopefully have better luck post avuruddhu.

We run on this page today a contribution from the Pathfinder Foundation of Mr. Milinda Moragoda, our High Commissioner-designate to New Delhi cautioning the government against taking too strong a stance on import substitution – a direction in which it is clearly moving. Given Moragoda’s political orientation, Pathfinder may be seen to be sticking its neck out by advocating a hemin hemin policy. Nobody would reasonably object to government imposing certain import bans to encourage local production as in the recent case of turmeric. There is no debate that we must grow crops that we can rather than import them. But governments must always strike the right balance between the interests of producers and consumers. When Prime Minister Dudley Senanayake pushed a massive food production drive during his 1965-70 government, he used to say at public meetings in agricultural areas that enormous foreign exchange expenditure was being incurred for the import of potatoes that some foreign experts had once-upon-a-time said cannot be economically grown here.

But Welimada farmers disproved them. Thereafter potatoes have been successfully grown even in Jaffna although we have not achieved self-sufficiency. “Why should we pay farmers in potato growing countries for their produce when we can pay that money to our own farmers?,” the prime minister used to ask. “But when we enforce a policy to ensure that our cultivators got the money flowing abroad, our opponents accuse the government of kicking the poor man’s ala hodda.” This was also true of chillies and onions where import substitution policies worked to benefit local farmers although at a cost to consumers. Jaffna farmers garlanding one-time Agriculture Minister Hector Kobbekaduwa with onions and chillies when he ran for president against J.R. Jayewardene was testimony to this policy. But it has not worked as successfully as it might have where local sugar production was concerned. Despite this country being endowed by conditions enabling sugar cane growing, we are nowhere near self-sufficiency although different governments have used tariff barriers to ensure better prices to domestic cane growers. Unfortunately we have a local sugar industry which makes more money out of its potable alcohol byproduct than from its sugar.

We have to be always conscious of the trade balance and cannot forget that Europe and the USA are the biggest markets for our garment industry. The ongoing restrictions on motor vehicle imports has no doubt saved us much foreign exchange but we cannot butter our bread on both sides by adopting one sided trade policies. That there must be give and take is a fact of life and it would be useful for the concerned authorities to take note of the Pathfinder perception that “openness to trade improves the tgrowth, employment and income trajectories of economies.”

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Editorial

Waiting for Godot?

Published

15 hours ago

2025/04/23

Sahan Weerasooriya

Wednesday 23rd April, 2025

A four-member committee has been appointed to study the report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) that probed the Easter Sunday terrorist bombings (2019). It comprises a Senior Deputy Inspector General (Chairman), the DIG of the CID, Director of the CID and the Director of the Terrorism Investigation Division. It is reported to have set up several subcommittees. Based on new evidence that may emerge, fresh investigations will be launched, the Police Media Spokesman has said.

Thus, the NPP government, too, has chosen to kick the can down the road, so to speak. All signs are that the committee and its subcommittees will take a month of Sundays to study the PCoI report, and fresh investigations to get underway on the basis of their findings and observations could go on until the cows come home.

What impact will the PCoI report have on the police investigations that have been going on into the Easter Sunday carnage for years? If the police have not already drawn on the PCoI findings and observations in probing the terror attacks, their investigations are likely to be delayed further until the conclusion of the perusal of the document.

One may recall that in August 2021, the Catholic Church demanded credible answers, within one month, to questions regarding the Easter Sunday tragedy. Its ultimatum, given in a 20-page letter, prompted the Gotabaya Rajapaksa government to have the then IGP C. D. Wickramaratne issue a special statement explaining why the probe into the Easter Sunday terror attacks had been delayed. He found fault with those who had handled the police investigations previously.

Wickramaratne’s statement, which shed light on the sorry state of affairs in the CID and other investigative branches of the police, warrants the attention of those who seek justice for the Easter Sunday carnage victims expeditiously. Wickramaratne said the police probes into the terror attacks had been riddled with flaws. Investigators had been in an inordinate hurry to make the bombings out to be the work of a handful of extremists with links to ISIS, and no serious attempt had been made to get to the bottom of the carnage, he said, claiming that they had also taken great pains to prove that all those involved in the terror attacks had been either killed or arrested. Some police officers handling investigations had acted irresponsibly, said Wickramaratne, noting that certain ego-driven investigators had tried to conclude the probes fast, and claim the credit for that; their approach had adversely impacted the criminal investigations.

The PCoI report had been referred to the Attorney General for necessary action, Wickramaratne noted, claiming that the previous investigations had been characterised by a total lack of coordination among the investigation teams, who worked in water-tight compartments. That fact had become evident from the way some incidents had been probed before the Easter Sunday bombings, IGP Wickramaratne said, pointing out that their interconnectedness had gone unnoticed.

Some other factors IGP Wickramaratne adduced to explain the delays in the police investigations in question were the process of ascertaining information from the countries where some suspects were living, and the gathering of evidence pertaining to telephone conversations from 24 June 2014 and analysing them to determine when the dissemination of extremist ideas began in this country and how extremism developed. Among those who aided and abetted the perpetrators of the Easter Sunday attacks were some educated persons and professionals, and given their calibre and social standing, investigations had to be carried out thoroughly if they were to be successfully prosecuted, Wickramaratne said, claiming that it had taken four years to bring those responsible for the bomb attack on the Dalada Maligawa in 1998 to justice, and investigations into the suicide bomb attacks on a religious ceremony held by a mosque at Akuressa in 2009 had taken seven years. The police had been able to carry out those investigations free from pressure, he said.

Cabinet Spokesman Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa has gone on record as saying that the task of disclosing the masterminds behind the Easter Sunday terror attacks should be left to the CID and the judiciary. The government, which promised to name the terror masterminds itself, has made another about-turn! With the investigative process marked by delaying tactics, inaction and deflection, it may not be unreasonable to say that at this rate, justice for the victims of Easter Sunday carnage may be galactic years away.

Editorial

Endless probes and conspiracies

Published

2 days ago

2025/04/22

Sahan Weerasooriya

Tuesday 22nd April, 2025

The sixth anniversary of the Easter Sunday carnage has passed, yet the government has failed to fulfil its pledge to make an earth-shattering revelation about the masterminds behind it. Instead, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has handed over to the CID all volumes of the final report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) that probed the 2019 terror attacks.

The PCoI has not recommended that its complete report be handed over to the CID. It has requested the President to send ‘a complete set of the report to the Attorney General to consider institution of criminal proceedings against persons alleged to have committed the said offences’.

Interestingly, the PCoI report the President has sent to the CID contains some key findings that run counter to the government’s contention that there was a political conspiracy behind the carnage. The report says in Chapter 32: “The original plan of Zahran was to attack the Kandy Perahera. But it was advanced due to the recovery of explosives from Wanathawilluwa and international factors. IS was losing ground in Syria and Iraq and called on its faithful to launch attacks. He was also concerned that the law enforcement authorities may apprehend him soon” (p. 467).

There is a vital document that President Dissanayake should hand over to the CID. It is the report of the Imam Committee, which probed the allegations made in a Channel 4 programme, ‘Sri Lanka’s Easter Sunday bombings – Dispatches’, telecast on 5 Sept., 2023. That presidential committee comprising former Judge of the Supreme Court S. I. Imam (Chairman), former Commander of the Sri Lanka Air Force Air Chief Marshal Jayalath Weerakkody and President’s Counsel Harsha A. J. Soza, has debunked a much-publicised claim by a person named Azad Moulana that there was a link between Sri Lanka’s military intelligence and Zahran’s terror group.

Some critical aspects of the Easter Sunday terror attacks have not been investigated thoroughly. One may recall that three months after the tragedy, Archbishop of Colombo Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, reportedly said, at St. Sebastian’s Church, Katuwapitiya, that the terror attacks had been part of an ‘international conspiracy’. Media reports also said he had lashed out at President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe for lacking the courage to resist the foreign conspiracy to destabilise Sri Lanka. As we pointed out yesterday, he is one of the key witnesses who said in their testimonies before the PCoI that probed the Easter Sunday carnage that there had been a foreign hand/conspiracy behind the terror attacks.

Meanwhile, in a leaked audio clip of what is described as a telephone conversation between Deputy Minister Rajan Ramanayake and SSP Shani Abeysekera, during the Yahapalana government, about the Easter Sunday terror attacks, the latter is heard telling the former something in Sinhala to the effect that Mohamed Ibrahim, a wealthy businessman who was a JVP’s National List nominee for the 2015 general election, cannot be so stupid as not to have known what his two sons, who carried out suicide bomb attacks on 21 April 2019, had been doing. If this audio recording is not fake, the CID should go by Abeysekera’s contention, and interrogate Ibrahim again as part of their efforts to identify the terror masterminds. One may recall that when Ishara Sewwandi, a female accomplice of the gunman who killed underworld leader Ganemulle Sanjeewa in a courtroom at Hulftsdorp, went into hiding, the police arrested and grilled her mother and brother. The question is whether the NPP will allow its former National List candidate to be interrogated.

The government and the CID must peruse all reports on the Easter Sunday terror attacks thoroughly, keep an open mind and follow evidence wherever it leads if the integrity of the ongoing probe is not to be undermined. Politically motivated timeframes must not be imposed on criminal investigations.

Editorial

Easter Sunday carnage probe: More questions than answers

Published

3 days ago

2025/04/21

Thilina Walpola

Monday 21st April, 2025

The sixth anniversary of the Easter Sunday terror attacks, which claimed about 270 lives and left more than 500 persons injured, falls today. Those who have lost their near and dear ones in the tragedy are still crying out for justice. There have been four Presidents and three governments since the savage terror attacks, yet the search for the masterminds behind them is still ongoing.

A few weeks ago, the incumbent NPP government had the public believe that it would reveal something earth-shattering about the terror masterminds soon, but it is now humming a different tune. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has reportedly handed over the report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) that probed the Easter Sunday terror attacks to the CID. We thought the CID had received it much earlier!

There have been more questions than answers regarding the Easter Sunday terror attacks, with a host of claims, counterclaims, about-turns, conspiracy theories, and above all, partisan politics complicating both the investigative process and the quest for justice.

There are two main schools of thought in respect of the Easter Sunday carnage. One insists that the National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ), which carried out the bombings, was used by some politicians and intelligence bigwigs loyal to them to achieve a political goal whereas the other claims that the NTJ led by Zahran Hashim unleashed terror at the behest of the ISIS. The proponents of the first school of thought have been influenced by a call made by a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) that probed the Easter Sunday carnage, in 2019, for further investigations to ascertain whether there had been an attempt ‘to create and instil fear and uncertainty in the country in the lead-up to the presidential election to be held later in the year’. Their opponents have offered a different narrative.

On 19 May 2021, the then Minister of Public Security Sarath Weerasekra told Parliament that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation had confirmed that Moulavi Mohamed Ibrahim Mohamad Naufer was the mastermind behind the Easter Sunday attacks. He said so in response to a statement made by Attorney General Dappula De Livera the previous day that there had been ‘a grand conspiracy’ behind the terror attacks.

Maithripala Sirisena, who was the President at the time of the Easter Sunday bombings in 2019, has said that he conveyed some vital information about the tragedy to the government. He has refused to reveal it to the public, and the government has chosen to remain silent on his claim. BBS General Secretary Ven. Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara Thera has said he knows who the Easter Sunday terror mastermind is, but he will divulge that information only to the President and the Defence Secretary. When Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa, who was a member of the PSC that probed the Eastern Sunday carnage in 2019, was in the Opposition, he told BBC that according to ‘investigative evidence’ he was privy to, India had been behind the terror attacks. He is now the Cabinet Spokesman. It will be interesting to know the other government leaders’ position on his allegation. Curiously, the CID has not recorded a statement from him on his very serious claim.

Meanwhile, the aforesaid PCoI report contains a Chapter on evidence given by eleven prominent persons, who categorically stated they believed that there had been a foreign hand or conspiracy behind the Easter Sunday carnage. Those witnesses are Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, former President Sirisena, former Minister Rauff Hakeem, former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen, former Governor Azath Salley, SJB MP Mujibur Rahman, former SIS Director SDIG Nilantha Jayawardena, former STF Commandant M. R. Latiff, former Chief of Defence Staff Ravindra Wijegunaratne, former SDIG CID Ravi Seneviratne and former CID Director SSP Shani Abeysekera. Claiming that their statements were mere ipse dixits (assertions made but not proven), the PCoI report has said that no such foreign link was found (p. 472). The Commission should have dug deeper before arriving at such a conclusion. It has, however, recommended that certain identified parties be further investigated. This has not been done. Some of the aforementioned witnesses have since made public statements that contradict their testimonies before the PCoI, and they owe the public an explanation.