Make politicians also pay for their sins

Tuesday 22nd February, 2022

Former Defence Secretary Hemasiri Fernando and ex-IGP Pujith Jayasundara may be thanking their lucky stars and lawyers for their acquittal in the Easter Sunday carnage cases, but, in the opinion of some legal experts, it is the Attorney General’s Department, which is notorious for botching up prosecutions, that they should be thankful to. While heaving sighs of relief, they must be regretting having ever accepted the posts they held at the time of the Easter Sunday tragedy.

Jayasundara was a good cop, but his rise to the highest position in the police raised many an eyebrow. While some police bigwigs were vying for the post of the IGP, in 2016, this newspaper carried a picture of all of the aspirants nodding off at a meeting. A few weeks later, the most deserving officer was overlooked, and Jayasundara appointed the IGP. All high-ranking police officers were caught napping, and the National Thowheed Jamaath terrorists struck with ease, in April 2019.

There are two kinds of public officials who languish in remand prisons because of politicians––members of the Sri Lanka Administrative Service, and outsiders catapulted to top positions in the public service. Fernando belongs to the second category. He should have known better than to accept the post of Defence Secretary and get too close to President Maithripala Sirisena, who never hesitates to save his skin and compass his political ends at the expense of anyone else.

Now that the judges who acquitted Fernando and Jayasundara, have frowned on the practice of filing cases against public officials alone, shouldn’t action be taken against the key members of the yahapalana government for their failure to prevent the Easter Sunday bombings? While recommending criminal proceedings against Sirisena, the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI), which probed the Easter Sunday attacks, held the entire yahapalana government accountable for the tragedy. The PCoI report says, “The dysfunctional government was a major contributory factor for the events that took place on 21st April 2019. The Government including President Sirisena and Prime Minister [Ranil Wickremesinghe] is accountable for the tragedy.” Curiously, none of the yahapalana politicians have been prosecuted.

Sirisena, who was the Minister of Defence, when the Easter Sunday terror attacks took place, cannot refuse responsibility for the failure on the part of the security establishment to prevent the tragedy, but the police were under a minister representing the UNP. It was the police who received the warnings of impending terror strikes.

Most of the UNP members of the yahapalana government are currently in the SJB, but they cannot absolve themselves of the responsibility for the serious lapses that led to the Easter Sunday carnage. There is no way they can get away with their failure by claiming that President Sirisena did not allow them to work. When the President loses control over Parliament, the Prime Minister emerges stronger than he or she. This, we saw under the Chandrika Kumaratunga government from 2001 to 2004; the then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe became so powerful that he even signed a peace agreement with the LTTE without obtaining permission from President Kumaratunga. Likewise, the UNP and its leaders proved that they were more powerful than President Sirisena by holding on to power despite an attempt by the latter to dislodge their government. Sirisena’s position was weaker than Chandrika’s because of the 19th Amendment, which did away with some vital executive powers of the President. So, the UNP politicians were firmly in control of the government, which failed to prevent the terror attacks in April 2019.

Archbishop of Colombo, His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, has declared that he has lost faith in the incumbent government and the Attorney General’s Department. He has every reason to have done so. He has defended this country vis-à-vis attempts to set up international probe mechanisms. But he has failed to have justice served for the Easter Sunday carnage victims. His disillusionment is understandable. It is hoped that the government will make good on its promise to the Catholic community and all others affected by the Easter Sunday tragedy and ensure that criminal proceedings will be instituted against all those held accountable by the Easter Sunday PCoI, and prosecutions carried out properly.