Saturday 15th March, 2025

There seems to be no end in sight to the ongoing crime wave. Hardly a day passes without an underworld shooting incident reported from some part of the country. The government and the police boast of special operations to neutralize organized criminal groups, but underworld hitmen continue to strike at will.

The latest victim of gun violence is a former prison officer. He was shot dead at his home on Poya Day (13 March). Sridath Dhammika, 61, had served as a Superintendent at the Boossa high security prison before retiring last year.

Dhammika’s killer had not been arrested at the time of writing, and therefore his motive was not known. However, there is reason to believe that the shooter or the person who ordered the killing settled an old score. Underworld characters never forget or forgive their enemies or even those who defy their orders. Prison officers are an endangered breed, especially those who serve in high security jails. In February 2017, an underworld attack on a prison bus left five inmates and two jailers dead in Kalutara.

A large number of powerful crime czars have been held in the Boosa prison over the years. Although these criminals are behind bars, their crime syndicates continue to operate and silence witnesses. Their power is such that in 2020, while being detained in the Boossa Prison, a much-feared underworld figure named Arumahandi Janith Madushanka Silva alias Podi Lassi, and two other underworld characters known as Kosgoda Tharaka and Pitigala Keuma threatened to harm the then President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Defence Secretary General Kamal Gunaratne, and some senior prison officers. They had the audacity to claim that although they were in jail, their hit squads were active and capable of eliminating anyone.

Podi Lassi, charged with possession of narcotics, was released on bail in December 2024. Lawyers who appeared for him told reporters, after his release, that he needed protection because the STF had threatened him with death. We pointed out in an editorial comment that they had craftily left unsaid that their client issued threats to a Head of State and a Defence Secretary. Everybody knew Podi Lassie would flee the country after being bailed out, and he did. Thankfully, he was arrested in India. This is what happens when criminals are granted bail. The Army deserter who sexually assaulted a doctor at the Anuradhapura Teaching Hospital on Tuesday had been granted bail earlier in the day.

Dhammika’s killing is sure to send a chilling message to the prison officer fraternity unless it is found to have nothing to do with the victim’s former job. It is hoped that the police will be able to arrest the killer and establish the motive for the crime fast while leaving no stones unturned in their efforts to track down their missing ‘head’.

It behoves the government to stop concocting conspiracy theories about the rising crime wave and concentrate on devising ways and means of neutralising the netherworld of crime and ensuring public security. Gunmen come, they shoot, and they vanish.

Friday 14th March, 2025

We have heard of power stations being retired when they outlive their efficiency and usefulness and/or become redundant or potentially dangerous. But Sri Lanka is planning to make some power plants take a break, as it were, during the weekends. It has been alleged that a plan is underway to curtail renewable power generation during the weekends because the grid infrastructure cannot handle excess power, especially on Sundays, when there is a lower demand for electricity.

Earlier, the CEB was complaining of a shortfall in power supply, and now it is grumbling about excess power generation.

The National Electricity Consumers’ Association has written to the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL), seeking the latter’s intervention to prevent the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) from causing a grave injustice to the producers of renewable power. It has alleged a sinister plan to boost thermal power generation, which is not only more expensive but also highly injurious to people’s health. It has called for a probe into the alleged move, which, it says, will be a body blow for renewable power generation—the cornerstone of the future power and energy landscape. The power sector is in the clutches of several Mafias, which are not well-disposed towards renewable power generation for obvious reasons. The NPP government was expected to clean up the power and energy sectors, but it, too, is moving along the same rut as its predecessors, whose leaders were accused of lining their pockets at the expense of the public.

Last month’s nationwide power outage, which left the government and the CEB groping in the dark, was first blamed on a monkey and subsequently on excess solar power generation on Sundays. The poor monkey which came into contact with a transformer at a CEB substation in Panadura and perished became internationally known posthumously thanks to the government’s absurd claim!

Now, there is an alleged move to discourage solar and hydro power generation during the weekends. The NPP came to power, pledging to end what it called a 76-year curse that had troubled the country since Independence. Has the so-called curse been renewed under the current administration?

The government and the CEB have not responded to the aforesaid allegation, and their side of the story should be heard. It is hoped that they will provide a clarification without further delay. Their silence will only lend credence to their critics’ claims. The alleged move to reduce renewable power generation during the weekends, in our book, is a solution like the harebrained ones legendary Mahadenamutta (a nitwit posing as a pundit) offered to the problems he was requested to solve.

When a goat had its head stuck in a pot, Mahadenamutta got the animal beheaded first in a bid to save the clay vessel, which was then smashed, at his behest, to extricate the caprine head! One can only hope that Sri Lanka’s power sector will not suffer the same fate as the proverbial goat. Successive governments have had in their ranks many Mahadenamuttas. The current dispensation is no exception; some of its members are at the butt end of social media jokes, having measured power output in ‘tons’ and speed ‘in light years’!

Curiously, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to attend a ground-breaking ceremony for the construction of a solar power plant in Sampur, during his Sri Lanka visit, early next month. A layman is at a loss to understand why any more solar power projects should be launched if the national grid cannot cope with an increase in renewable power. Will the new power plant to be built also have to idle during the weekends? The government owes an explanation.

There has been a proposal for introducing lower tariffs for power consumed during the weekends to encourage factories, etc., to operate on Saturdays and Sunday, thereby reducing the country’s demand for electricity on other days and helping curtail the expensive thermal power generation. The government should give serious thought to implementing this proposal.

Power corrupts, whether political or otherwise. The PUCSL should launch a stakeholder feedback initiative to consult all those engaged in the power sector, as well as independent experts, on how to increase the renewable power generation and upgrade the grid. The NPP government should launch a power sector clean-up under its Clean Sri Lanka initiative if it is not to be bracketed with its corrupt predecessors.

Thursday 13th March, 2025

No sooner had the International Women’s Day been celebrated on a grand scale here than a female doctor became a victim of sexual assault at the Anuradhapura Teaching Hospital. That barbaric crime, which shook the conscience of the nation, points to the growing vulnerability of Sri Lankan women. Numerous laws have been introduced and ways of means of tackling the scourge of sexual violence have been devised, but there has reportedly been no discernible decline in sexual assault cases, and therefore much more needs to be done to make this country safe for women and children.

The Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) launched a strike in protest against the incident of sexual assault in the Anuradhapura hospital, demanding the arrest of the rapist. It cannot be blamed for resorting to trade union action in a bid to jolt the government and the police into tracking down the suspect and taking urgent action to provide the state-run health institutions with adequate security. However, the doctors should have called off their strike yesterday morning itself when the police announced the arrest of the suspect, and Health Minister Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa visited the Anuradhapura Hospital and ordered that action be taken to make the place safe for health workers. He also urged the Municipal Commissioner in Anuradhapura to clear all unauthorised structures around the hospital. What more did the doctors expect the government to do for the strike to be called off immediately?

All state-run health institutions, especially rural hospitals and Central Dispensaries must be provided with proper security so that doctors and other health workers do not have to worry about their safety. The need for a comprehensive strategy to be formulated to ensure the safety of women including health workers cannot be overstated, but that task cannot be accomplished overnight. The government should be given a reasonable amount of time to do so. It therefore defies comprehension why the protesting doctors did not return to work immediately after the arrest of the rape suspect, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands of ordinary people, who were left without treatment in the state-run hospitals yesterday.

Not to be outdone, some government MPs lost no time in accusing the GMOA of using the Anuradhapura incident to settle political scores with the government. This, we believe, is a baseless allegation. They are trying to have the public see more devils than vast hell can hold. These ruling party politicians are stretching the truth to advance their political agenda; they are apparently trying to turn public opinion against the government doctors, who have threatened a strike in protest against the curtailment of their allowances.

Meanwhile, a health worker has been arrested for sexually assaulting a female patient in a northern hospital on Tuesday. This shows that not even government hospitals are completely safe for women. One may recall that the doctors’ unions did not call for action when a doctor raped a woman and murdered her by pushing her off the sixth floor of a building at the Negombo General Hospital in 2007. The hospital authorities shamelessly hounded a female janitor, named Beatrice, out of her job for giving evidence against the doctor from hell; an employee of a private cleaning company, she was the key witness, and but for her evidence the perpetrator of that heinous crime would have got scot-free. Many health workers ganged up against the witness, who intrepidly stood on the side of the truth. The rapist cum murderer was sentenced to death. This newspaper fought quite a battle to thwart sinister attempts to sack Beatrice.

Rape has been rightly described as a fate worse than death for women. Many rape victims in this country suffer in silence for fear of reprisal and owing to long drawn-out court cases, in which they are humiliated in the name of cross-examination. Some victims, who suffer sexual assault as minors, are married with children when their cases are concluded. This is one key aspect of the issue of sexual violence that needs to be addressed. One can only hope that the recent incidents of rape in hospitals will galvanize the government into doing everything in its power to ensure the safety of women.