Editorial

The new normal after six weeks

Published

5 years ago

2021/10/3

While the relaxing, not lifting, of the quarantine curfew which ran for an extended period of six weeks was compelled by socio-economic rather than preventive imperatives, it is obvious that the country cannot let down its guard. Cognizance of this reality by the decision makers is demonstrated by the fact that the “lockdown,” as it was commonly called, has not been totally lifted. The night curfew continues to be in force from 10 pm to 4 am and inter-provincial travel is still not possible. Health guidelines widely disseminated include restrictions on eateries, restaurants, salons and various other social gatherings including weddings, funerals and parties. The whole country without exception will hope that we are gradually returning to normal and the gains of the past two months will not be frittered away as was the case with the disastrous New Year relaxation.

Those of us who left our homes during the weeks of the lockdown, for valid reasons or otherwise, are well aware that the now relaxed restrictions were not tightly enforced. Police did not stop vehicles on the roads and question occupants on where they were headed, except on very few occasions. While the pre-pandemic traffic gridlocks were not in evidence, there nevertheless were a large number of vehicles moving particularly on city streets. While many businesses were closed, several remained open. People must obviously eat and procure their essential supplies so that a total lockdown was neither practical nor possible. Certainly public transport, meaning buses and trains, were not running but it was possible for those not fortunate enough to own a vehicle, be it a car or a motorbike, to find without much difficulty a three-wheeler to get to wherever they needed to go. Most people did not go to work and that accounted for much of the reduced traffic and movement on the roads. But this is now going to change to probably somewhat less than the bad old days. We must wait and see what the availability of public transport will be under this new order and also how employers, whether private or government, will minimize work attendance or insist on workplace presence.

The latest published numbers do reveal a significant decrease in infections and fatalities. But all of us must be fully aware of how quickly this can change as it has both in this country and elsewhere. It is human nature to place the best construction on impending events and there will be the temptation to return at least to near normal. This is most likely to happen for selfish reasons regardless of both personal risk and that to the wider community. Clear breaches of social distancing rules were visible, for example, when liquor shops were permitted to open during the tail end of the so-called lock down; and even physical brawls were seen outside the ubiquitous wine stores. There is no escaping the fact that the cash-strapped government, battling sharp revenue downturns, needed the excise revenues that are a major contributor to state coffers. The decision to reopen liquor shops would have, we believe, been taken totally mindful of the dangers in order to achieve a fine balance. The fact that they were not closed again even in the context of what happened when they were reopened clearly tells its own story.

Of course restrictions, or the lack of them, have their own imperatives. All of us are only too well aware of the sorry state of public transport in this country even in the best of times. Buses and trains are badly congested particularly during peak hours and it will be a job and a half, to use a common colloquialism, to prevent overcrowding and enforce social distancing in them during the new normal effective from dawn on Friday. Although there have been assurances by private bus operators to observe health protocols, accompanied by demands for fare increases on grounds of being compelled to run half-empty buses, how long, if at all, will that last? Like almost all businesses and most ordinary people, bus owners too are feeling the pandemic crunch. So will the police go all out to strictly enforce the rules? Probably not, and if they do, will the bus owners react by withdrawing services? All these are matters that still remain to be seen.

A vitally necessary effort has been made and continues to get the tourism industry restarted to whatever extent present conditions permit. Perhaps this industry, along with self-employed daily paid workers eking out a hand-to-mouth existence, has suffered the most from the pandemic and its economic consequences. There are signs that tourists, particularly from the west, are keen on dodging the forthcoming winter and are tempted to take holidays in warmer climes. They are further enticed by attractive packages on offer. We need not belabor the fact that hundreds of thousands in this country, directly and indirectly, are dependent on tourism for their living. The economic cost to the country as a whole from the drying out of that vital source of foreign exchange is also huge. But how successful these efforts will be even in the context of travel restrictions being relaxed at home and abroad remains to be seen in the weeks ahead. The relaxation of the rules last Sinhala and Tamil New Year was, no doubt, at least partly influenced by the need to give the hotel industry at least the benefits of selling rooms to domestic tourists. But that boomeranged.

What is now necessary is the need for all of us to exercise commonsense in the new normal that dawned last week. We must all continue to wear our masks outside our homes, despite some discomfort, frequently wash our hands, refrain from unnecessary travel, observe social distancing and continue to take necessary precautions under current conditions. Remember at all times that you can be an asymptomatic covid carrier and behave accordingly.

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Editorial

Carnage, probes and vilification

Published

4 hours ago

2026/06/18

Sahan Weerasooriya

Thursday 18th June, 2026

Social media debates on issues connected to the Easter Sunday terror attacks have got down and dirty, with religious and political leaders becoming targets of scurrilous attacks. The situation is likely to take a turn for the worse. The victims of vilification are without any defence as social media activists are guided by Rafferty’s rules.

Spokesman for the Archdiocese of Colombo Rev. Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando yesterday countered some allegations against Archbishop of Colombo His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith and clarified the Catholic Church’s position on the ongoing investigations into the Easter Sunday terror strikes. He vehemently denied social media claims that the Cardinal had received prior information about the terror attacks from his security personnel deployed by the state and therefore did not attend the Easter Sunday events in 2019. It was only after the 2019 carnage that the Cardinal had been provided with security, and therefore the argument that the VIP protection units had been informed of possible terror attacks and his guards had warned him of the threat did not hold water, Fr. Fernando pointed out. His line of reasoning is logical and compelling.

Rev. Fr. Fernando reiterated that neither the Cardinal nor any other Church leader had ever asked the government to appoint Senior DIG (Retd.) Ravi Seneviratne and SSP (Retd.) Shani Abeysekera to any positions. Only a request had been made that the investigators removed by the Gotabaya Rajapaksa government from the Easter Sunday carnage probe be entrusted with fresh investigations into the tragedy. No particular names had been mentioned, Fr. Fernando stressed when a journalist pointed out that Minister Bimal Rathnayake had told Parliament that the government had appointed Seneviratne and Abeysekera to key positions at the Cardinal’s request. Did the government use the Church leaders’ request as an excuse to appoint two NPP members to senior positions in the public security sector to further its political interests under the pretext of probing the Easter Sunday attacks?

It is not clear from the reports of Rev. Fr. Fernando’s statements at yesterday’s media briefing whether the church leaders support the post-retirement appointments of Seneviratne and Abeysekera and their involvement in the Easter Sunday carnage probe. Their position on the issue would be of considerable interest.

There are compelling reasons why Abeysekera and Seneviratne should have been kept out of the Easter Sunday carnage investigations. In April 2019, they were serving as the Director and the Senior DIG of the CID, respectively, which failed to prevent the terror strikes, and there is a damning allegation that they did not act on the warnings of the impending attacks. Former IGP Pujith Jayasundera and former Defence Secretary Hemasiri Fernando are facing legal action for their alleged failure to prevent the 2019 terror strikes. Therefore, legal proceedings should be instituted against all others who failed to protect lives on Easter Sunday in 2019 despite the availability of actionable intelligence. After their retirement from the police, Abeysekera and Seneviratne became active members of the NPP, and campaigned hard for Anura Kumara Dissanayake in the 2024 presidential race. They were prominent members of the NPP’s Retired Police Collective, which was headed by Seneviratne. They themselves have stated this in two affidavits submitted to the Supreme Court, according to media reports. The government in its wisdom brought these two NPP politicians out of retirement, appointed them as the CID Director and Secretary to the Ministry of Public Security, and entrusted Abeysekera with the task of probing the Easter Sunday terror attacks that the duo allegedly failed to prevent. Sadly, their involvement has severely undermined the integrity of the probe.

Meanwhile, it has been revealed that the VIP security divisions had been warned of possible terror attacks on Easter Sunday in 2019 and instructed to withhold warnings from the MPs and Ministers they were protecting. In an editorial comment on 22 July 2025, we pointed out, quoting former SLPP MP Indika Anuruddha Herath, who was an Opposition MP at the time of the Easter Sunday attacks, that the police personnel providing security to him had received warnings of impending bomb attacks but they had been ordered not to inform him of the threat. He was at a church in Negombo when the Katuwapitiya Church was attacked, and it was only after the carnage that he and other MPs had been informed of the warnings. He said that if they had been informed of the threat earlier, they would definitely have alerted the Church leaders and action could have been taken to prevent the carnage. Who ordered the police personnel to withhold the warnings of the terror strikes from the MPs and ministers? This aspect of the security failure that led to the Easter Sunday tragedy must also be thoroughly probed.

The Easter Sunday terror mastermind must be traced and prosecuted, but all those who failed to prevent the terror strikes that claimed more than 275 lives and left hundreds of other seriously injured must also be brought to justice.

Editorial

Cramped cells, fettered rights

Published

1 day ago

2026/06/17

Sahan Weerasooriya

Wednesday 17th June, 2026

Some occupants of key positions in the public service unashamedly display their chameleon-like ability to adapt to changing political circumstances and please new leaders. They do not scruple to trade their professional dignity for expediency. So, it is not surprising that some police officers have chosen to be at the beck and call of powerful politicians, and the police go out of their way to further the interests of the powers that be. Their servility has stood in the way of efforts to depoliticise the police through constitutional safeguards.

Unsurprisingly, the police have resorted to legal action against some Opposition politicians who took up the cudgels for the rights of former State Intelligence Service Director Maj. Gen. (Retd.) Suresh Sallay in CID custody. If the CID had acted impartially and respected Sallay’s rights as a detainee, the need for protests would not have arisen. It was protests that prompted the CID to bite the bullet and rush Sallay to hospital. The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) has reportedly expressed concern about the conditions of the detention cells at the CID headquarters.

Contrary to government claims, there have been no calls for Sallay’s release or an end to the ongoing police investigations into the Easter Sunday terror attacks. Everyone is of the view that the probe must go on and justice must be done to the carnage victims. Protests have been against the alleged ill-treatment of Sallay at the CID headquarters. Criticism of the suppression of the rights of detainees must not be misconstrued as efforts to undermine the judiciary.

Police action against the critics of the CID smacks of a sinister move to suppress democratic dissent. The incumbent government is apparently emulating the previous dispensations that resorted to draconian measures to silence dissent to consolidate their hold on power.

In a democracy, sovereignty resides in the people, who are the ultimate political authority, and they must not be denied their legitimate right to oppose the subjugation of the legal process to the political interests of the government in power. It is antithetical to democracy and amounts to an assault on the people’s freedom of expression for criticism of politically driven investigations and the abuse of suspects under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) to be framed as obstructions of the police or contempt of court.

The PTA allows the Defence Minister to order the detention of suspects arrested by police investigators to further the interests of his or her political party on some pretext or another. However, the abuse of the PTA is not of recent origin. There is hardly any law that has not been abused under successive governments, and the self-proclaimed campaigners for democracy and human rights, were abusers themselves, while in power.

The present-day UNP leaders who have condemned the alleged ill-treatment of Sallay fully endorsed numerous such violations, especially the arrest and prolonged detention of Vijaya Kumaratunga in a dark cell in the early 1980s. The JVP assassinated Kumaratunga a few years later.

The JVP vehemently opposed the PTA, politically driven investigations, etc., as it bore the brunt of repressive practices facilitated by the PTA. But the JVP-led NPP government has not only chosen to use the PTA to suppress dissent but also reached a new low; it has brought two of its active party members out of retirement and appointed them as the CID Director and Secretary to the Ministry of Public Security. Worse, it intimidates those who dare criticise the undemocratic actions of these officers and campaign for the rights of suspects in detention.

Now that the appalling conditions of the CID’s detention cells have come to light, pressure must be brought to bear on the government to take remedial action for the benefit of all suspects. Most of all, police officers loyal to the ruling party must not be allowed to subject detainees to cruel treatment in a bid to break their will and obtain confessions.

Editorial

A deal that pours oil on troubled waters

Published

2 days ago

2026/06/16

Sahan Weerasooriya

Tuesday 16th June, 2026

The world must have breathed a sigh of relief yesterday following the announcement that the US and Iran had agreed to sign a peace deal soon and begin negotiations in earnest to resolve contentious issues. The peace plan has renewed hope that no more lives will be lost due to military strikes in West Asia; precious assets, especially oil infrastructure, in that part of the world will be safe, and disruptions to global oil supplies will be over.

Interestingly, as US President Donald Trump turned 80, global oil prices which had shot up to extremely high levels, owing to his war on Iran, dropped to about USD 80 a barrel, the lowest since the eruption of the war in February. Upon the announcement of the US-Iran peace deal, WTI, the US oil benchmark, decreased to USD 80 a barrel, and the global oil benchmark, Brent crude, which was about USD 70 a barrel before the conflict and peaked at about USD 120 during the war, dropped to USD 83 a barrel. Share markets surged in Asia. These are very positive signs.

The US-Iran peace deal and the resultant oil price drops could not have come at a better time for developing nations, especially Sri Lanka, which is struggling to stabilise its rupee and shore up its forex reserves.

However, a return of global oil prices to the pre-conflict level of USD 70 a barrel may not be possible in the short term, given some factors, such as the lost production capacity in West Asia, strategic oil reserve replenishment and higher risk premium. The situation may improve sooner than expected if OPEC, the US, Canada, Brazil, etc., care to increase oil production and help stabilise the world energy market, thereby strengthening the global economy, which has shown signs of severe decline due the West Asian conflict.

US President Donald Trump pretends that he has done Iran a big favour by agreeing to a peace deal. However, Trump has apparently made a virtue of necessity. It was difficult for him to go on fighting, particularly in view of the passage of a crucial War Powers bill. Besides, US Vice President J. D. Vance, in an interview with Fox News, has said, inter alia, that Americans were facing economic hardships due to the Iran war; he has expressed hope that energy prices will start coming down shortly much to their relief. This shows that the Trump administration was also badly in need of a peace deal.

The US-Iran peace deal to be signed has been described in some quarters as a birthday gift for Trump. It must have gladdened his heart beyond measure, for his approval rating has plummeted due to his handling of the economy and the Iran war, and his Grand Old Party is expected to perform poorly at the midterm elections in November. One may recall that General Sherman, after completing his March to the Sea, famously “presented” the city of Savannah, the Confederacy’s most important port, as a Christmas gift to President Lincoln, in December 1864. Trump may have expected his military commanders to do likewise and present something like Iran’s Kharg Island to him as a birthday gift, but his plans went awry owing to Iran’s fierce resistance, with Tehran effectively shifting the war to the economic front by using the Hormuz Strait as a strategic lever. So, Trump apparently had to settle for a peace deal as a birthday gift, so to speak.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is obviously not well-disposed towards the peace deal to be inked. He was dependent on the Iran war for political survival. His opponents are closing ranks, and he has court cases to contend with. So, if he carries out attacks on Hezbollah targets again, as speculated in international defence circles, Iran may be compelled to respond, maybe by closing the Hormuz Strait again. In the world of cloak-and-dagger geopolitics, anything is possible. It is up to Trump to ensure that his friend behaves.

World powers have welcomed the peace deal to be signed and praised the US, Iran and Pakistan, which made it possible. They themselves have been reeling from the knock-on economic effects of the West Asian conflict, and it will be in their best interest to do everything in their power to ensure that the peace deal will reach fruition and the Iran war will be a thing of the past.