Features

Healing the nation – A question of leadership

Published

3 years ago

2023/01/1

Thilina Walpola

Deshamanya Dr P.R. Anthonis Memorial Oration

by Dr Nihal Jayawickrama

I am deeply honoured by the invitation of the Lanka-Japan Friendship Society to deliver the Deshamanya Dr P.R. Anthonis Memorial Lecture this evening. I was intrigued by the subject that was assigned to me, since a surgeon’s approach to healing a patient is usually to cut and remove a part of his or her anatomy. I wondered whether I was expected to advocate the same approach to healing the nation.

Coming, as I do, from a family of lawyers, with only one doctor of medicine produced in several generations, it was my brother who knew and worked with Dr Anthonis over many years. Dr Anthonis was one of a small group of brilliant surgeons of the 20th century that included Dr Noel Bartholomeusz and Dr M.V.P. Peries. I have had the good fortune never to have been subjected to Dr Anthonis’s scalpel, but I have had the privilege of meeting him socially, and he always treated me with the utmost kindness. To the memory of that remarkable surgeon, I dedicate my own thoughts on the subject I propose to address, with respect and affection.

‘Healing the Nation – A question of leadership’ immediately raises the question: what is expected of a political leader in a democratic society? Should the leader reflect the views, the fears and the prejudices of the electorate to which he has to return for re-election; or should he determine a path according to his own vision, his own values and his own judgment, and endeavour to lead his electorate along that path? President Jayewardene ruminated on this issue some years after he had left office and wondered how long one could go along with the wishes of the electorate.

A military leader does not have to worry about that, but a democratic leader must because the electors are his main and only support. It was difficult to be re-elected unless the leader continued to enjoy the support of those who had placed him in that position. However, he was willing to make an exception in regard to economic matters where external factors often determined what could or could not be done, however much that might displease the electorate. Incidentally, he had some sound advice for those aspiring to be leaders. Politics, he said, was a “stayers’ race”; a race where a man or woman who does not try to kick his neighbour or jump over him, but stays on till all the others disappear, wins the race. Therefore, he advised aspirants for political leadership that good health was vital: “look after your kidney, nurse your heart, eat little, don’t exercise too much, and in the end, you win the stayer’s race and you become the leader”.

Not being a politician, and not intending to be one at this stage of my life, I am free to disagree with President Jayewardene. I believe that a leader must possess a vision that he pursues with wisdom and integrity, and it is his responsibility to convince his electorate that he is on the right path. At the height of the American civil war, when things were not going well for the North, Abraham Lincoln was advised that he might need to compromise on slavery. Lincoln held firm on the issue of abolition. More recently, Nelson Mandela’s decision to be magnanimous in victory must have enraged tens of thousands of black Africans who had been subjected to oppression and brutality at the hands of the previous white apartheid regime. Yet, both Lincoln and Mandela achieved peace in their respective countries. That, in my view, was the result of leadership.

To establish the parameters for my presentation, I need to define the expression “healing the nation”. To heal is to mend, to reconcile, to rectify, or to restore. It presupposes that the nation is wounded, hurt, or broken. In this context, “the nation” must mean Ceylon or Sri Lanka. However, about a 100 years ago, Anagarika Dharmapala began writing aggressively of the “Sinhala nation”, and in course of time “Sinhala” became the equivalent of “jathiya” or “Lankika”. In 1944, the Communist Party made the first reference to the “Tamil nation”, a term that was finally affirmed in the Vaddukoddai Resolution of 1976.

In the contemporary world, this is not a matter for any real concern. For over several centuries “English” was synonymous with “British”, but today, the nation known as “Great Britain” comprises at least three nations: the English nation, the Scottish nation, and the Welsh nation. Each has a distinct language, religion and a proud culture. Scotland and Wales have their own legislative assemblies and are represented in Westminster in both the Parliament and the Cabinet. Together with Northern Ireland, these three nations constitute the United Kingdom. Similarly, the nation of Sri Lanka includes the Sinhala nation and the Tamil nation and several other communities, and it is to the break-up of that nation that I now turn.

THE BREAK-UP OF THE NATION

When did the break-up of the Sri Lankan nation occur? I would submit that it was not a single event, but a series of events that led to the nation being wounded, hurt or broken. In the first quarter of the 20th century, all the different ethnic communities stood together as Ceylonese in agitating for constitutional reform. However, with the introduction in 1931 of universal adult franchise, and with impending self-government, it was natural that minority communities would become apprehensive of majority rule. There was cause for this. The Sinhala Maha Sabha, established by S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike in 1937, was already engaged in creating a national consciousness among the Sinhalese. Meanwhile, following the election of the second State Council in 1936, the Sinhalese members, together with the European members, succeeded in electing a Board of Ministers that was exclusively Sinhalese – the so-called “Pan-Sinhalese Board of Ministers”.

The 1946 Constitution

The fears of the minority communities were set at rest by the Soulbury Commission which recommended the inclusion in the constitution of a package of safeguards. These were:Multi-member constituencies in those areas in which a substantial racial or religious minority lived.Six nominated members of the House of Representatives to represent any inadequately represented interests.

The Senate, which would serve the minorities as an instrument for impeding precipitate legislation, as well as a forum for handling inflammatory issues in a cooler atmosphere.An independent Public Service Commission which would guarantee strict impartiality in public appointments.A prohibition on Parliament from enacting any law which seeks to make persons of any community or religion liable to disabilities or restrictions to which persons of other communities or religions were not made liable, or to confer on persons of any community or religion any privilege or advantage which was not conferred on persons of other communities or religions.

The Privy Council observed that these safeguards in the 1946 Constitution represented “the solemn balance of rights between the citizens of Sri Lanka, the fundamental conditions on which they accepted the Constitution; and these are therefore unalterable”.

At the conclusion of the first general election of October 1947, D.S. Senanayake, the leader of the newly formed United National Party which secured 42 of the 95 seats, formed a 14-member Cabinet in which he included two independent Tamils elected from the northern province: C. Sittampalam from Mannar, and C. Suntheralingam from Vavuniya, and one Malay, T.B. Jayah, from Colombo. Was the formation of this multi-ethnic Cabinet an act of leadership on the part of D.S. Senanayake, designed to consolidate the multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-linguistic nation of Ceylon? Or was it an act of political expediency to convince the British Government that the fear that the minorities entertained of majority rule no longer existed, and that Ceylon was ready and equipped for independence? I am inclined to the view that Senanayake, during whose tenure our national flag was designed and adopted, and who steered clear of language and religious issues, truly desired to maintain the equilibrium of a multi-ethnic state.

On February 10, 1948, Sir Oliver Goonetilleke, presenting an Address of Thanks on behalf of the Senate to the Duke of Gloucester who had opened the first Parliament of Independent Ceylon, exclaimed:

“We are of many races – Europeans, Indians, Burghers, Malays, Moors, Tamils, and Sinhalese. We are of different religions – Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists. We have majorities and minorities. We have, however, been in the past, and we shall be in the future, one nation”.

As a 10-year-old Royal College scout “on duty” outside the specially constructed Assembly Hall, and where the Independence Hall now stands, I was present and saw and heard Sir Oliver express that optimistic hope, although I may not have understood much of what he said.

However, on that February day, I returned home and did two things. I made a replica of the Assembly Hall using cardboard strips and colourful chocolate paper as a substitute for the ralipallan. I also began maintaining scrap books in which I pasted the newspaper reports of that event, and thereafter of all the significant events in the country, including the regular Miss Ceylon contests.

Unfortunately, in that “one nation”, the critical events that followed Independence were often determined by political expediency. This was in sharp contrast to the policies of Lee Kuan Yew who created one of Asia’s most peaceful and prosperous nations out of what he described as “a polyglot collection of migrants from China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and several other parts of Asia”. In barely 30 years, Sri Lanka’s political leaders caused the disintegration of a nation which at Independence had solid foundations of freedom, perhaps more than any other British colony.

Citizenship and Franchise

The new nation’s first target was 211,915 registered Indian Tamil voters. As British subjects who had been continuously resident in Ceylon for at least five years, they were eligible to vote. At the 1947 general election, apart from electing seven candidates of the Ceylon Indian Congress, they had helped to secure the victory of 15 1eft-wing opposition candidates as well. It became a matter of priority for the Government to disenfranchise the Indian Tamil population. Accordingly, Parliament enacted a package of laws which had a profoundly debilitating effect on that community.

The Citizenship Act 1948 established the principle of citizenship by descent, and not by birth, by requiring proof of birth in Ceylon of one’s father, or paternal grandfather and great-grandfather. It thereby deprived the plantation Tamils, 12 per cent or an eighth of the country’s population, of their citizenship. The Indian and Pakistani Residents (Citizenship) Act 1949 made it virtually impossible for them to obtain citizenship by registration since it required proof of uninterrupted residence in Ceylon in the previous 13 years. The Ceylon Parliamentary Elections (Amendment) Act 1949 deprived those who were not citizens of their right to vote, thereby ensuring that by the time of the next general election of 1952, the number of Indian Tamil voters in the seven plantation area constituencies was reduced from 162,212 to a mere 3,191. It became impossible for that community to secure even a single seat in Parliament.

Did the Citizenship Act discriminate against the Indian Tamil community? In my view it did. However, when section 29 of the Constitution was invoked, both the Supreme Court and the Privy Council retreated. In what bore the stamp of classic political judgments they upheld the Act on the ground that it was “a perfectly natural and legitimate function of the legislature to determine the composition of its nationals.” While that may well be so, our Constitution provided that in performing that function, Parliament must not discriminate against a particular community already resident in the country. A million people were thereby rendered stateless.

The problems created by the presence of the Indian Tamils were, of course, sensitive and emotional. Even almost 30 years later, Hector Kobbekaduwa would exclaim, with reference to the 1947 general election:

With universal franchise, the constitution makers thought that the inarticulate peasantry should have their own representatives. But unfortunately, in the hill country, the change was from clay to fire. The Peri Sunderams, the Vythialingams, Natesa Iyers and Fellows-Gordons, and later the Thondamans and Jesudasans and other political adventurers, were swept into power in our areas through the Indian votes. It was a hopeless situation for us. We screamed for justice.

Marginalizing the Tamil community

The substantial disintegration of the nation, however, occurred with a series of politically expedient measures taken by successive governments which were directed at, or had the effect of, marginalizing the Tamil community. These were political decisions that were thought to appeal to the majority of the Sinhalese electorate who believed, as the Mahawamsa claims, that the passing away of the Buddha synchronized with the founding of the Sinhala race; that Sri Lanka was a “Dhamma-dweepa”, a nation brought into being for the specific purpose of keeping alive the message of the Buddha; and had for centuries harboured a historical, yet often dormant, grievance against the Tamils for having settled in a part of this “Dhamma-dweepa”.

One of the earliest of such measures were the government initiated and funded colonization schemes, which at the time appeared to be both timely and desirable. However, they resulted in Sinhalese families from the south being settled in the sparsely populated dry zone in the eastern, north-central and northern provinces. This was viewed by the Tamil community as a diabolical attempt to dilute the Tamil presence and seriously alter the ethnic composition in those provinces. It was argued by Tamil politicians that the government should have first invited the people of the provinces where lands were being distributed to come forward as recipients. Thereafter, people from the other areas would have had their share if there was sufficient land to distribute. This policy, which altered the demographical pattern that existed at the time of Independence, was to lead to violent ethnic conflicts in the colonized areas in later years.

The division of the Sinhalese from the Tamils, commencing at a very young age, began with the implementation of the policy to replace English with Sinhala and Tamil as the medium of instruction in schools. I was fortunate to have entered the primary school before this policy was introduced, and to have had the opportunity to go through school life in the company of fellow students from all the communities and to understand and appreciate their cultures, their strengths, their weaknesses, and their idiosyncrasies. To segregate children from a very young age based on their language was to ensure a permanent division between the two communities through life, with little or no opportunity to interact and understand each other.

That division was compounded when the SLFP and the UNP changed their language policies to that of Sinhala Only as the official language, repudiating one important element of the 1946 constitutional settlement on the basis of which the minorities had agreed to subject themselves to majority rule. For generations, the government clerical service had been a popular outlet for the educated Tamil youth who did not aspire to a university education but sought a habitation and a source of income away from the arid soil of his northern home. He or she was now required to qualify in Sinhala to enter, and thereafter to progress in, the public service.

Between 1977 and 1981, Tamils secured only 4.9 per cent of the vacancies in the government clerical service as against 93.6 per cent for the Sinhalese. The plight they now faced became evident from the case of Kodeeswaran, a Tamil who had been appointed to the General Clerical Service in 1952. He had successfully moved up the salary scale from Rs.1600 to Rs.3780 per annum by regularly passing proficiency tests in Tamil. In 1962, he was denied his increment because he did not present himself for the proficiency test which was now conducted in Sinhala. Many hundreds of Tamil public servants almost certainly found themselves in the same predicament as Kodeeswaran.Kodeeswaran challenged the Official Language Act in the District Court of Colombo. Mr O.L.de Kretser, District Judge, in a carefully considered judgment observed that:

If the members of each community were able to speak, read and write the language of each of the other communities, then it is obvious that the selection of the language of one community as the Official Language could not cause any handicap to the members of the communities whose language was not chosen, however much they resented the fact that their own language was not given pride of place. But every community in Ceylon is not literate in the language of the other communities, and the selection of the language of one community must cause at least inconvenience, if not disability, to the communities who are not literate in that language.

While observing that it was a legitimate function for Parliament to decide in what language official business should be carried on, he concluded that the Act nevertheless gave advantage to one community which the other did not have. Accordingly, he held the Official Language Act to be an infringement of section 29 of the Constitution, and therefore void. Once more, the Supreme Court retreated. Chief Justice H.N.G. Fernando avoided the substantive issue and held instead that a public servant in Ceylon had no right to sue the Crown for the recovery of his wages. On appeal to the Privy Council, the Chief Justice’s judgment was declared to be wrong, and the case was returned to the Supreme Court to address the substantive issue. For some inexplicable reason, the appeal was not listed for hearing until the Official Language Act was incorporated in the 1972 Constitution.

The 1972 Constitution marked the crucial decisive stage in the disintegration of the nation. The 1946 constitutional settlement was unilaterally abrogated. The Senate, the nominated members in the House of Representatives, the Public Service Commission, and the section 29 prohibition of discriminatory legislation were all omitted in the new Constitution, along with the judicial review of legislation. Sinhala was granted constitutional status, and Tamil was described as the language of translation. The issue of federalism was not even allowed to be raised. The Federal Party withdrew from the Constituent Assembly because they believed that they were unable to influence in any effective manner the course of its proceedings.

The most untimely introduction in the 1970s of a policy of standardization in respect of university admission was perhaps the final straw. Intended to secure a more equitable distribution, language and district-wise, of the limited number of places available in universities, it resulted in a large number of Tamil students being denied admission to the universities. The effect of this policy, and the enormity of the injustice it caused to the Tamil community, raised this issue to the level of a major human rights problem.

For instance, in 1975, the admissions on a district basis into the medical faculty were 29 from Galle and 29 from Jaffna, whereas on the basis of merit only 18 had qualified from Galle as against 61 from Jaffna. Similarly, on a district basis, Galle and Jaffna each secured 20 places in the science and engineering faculties, while on the basis of merit, 24 should have entered from Galle and 56 from Jaffna. Nothing could have been more frustrating to the educated Tamil youth than his inability to enter the stream of higher education owing to standardization and be diverted away from the mainstream of life in the country. This feeling of despair and non-fulfilment contributed immensely to the emergence of a militant youth movement. The drift to separation was now both rapid and intense, and accompanied by increasing violence. On 27 July 1975, masked gunmen shot and killed 48-year-old Alfred Duraiyappah, the SLFP Mayor of Jaffna.

The Vaddukkodai Declaration

One year later, at Vaddukkodai, on 14th May 1976, the Tamil United Front, together with the Muslim United Front, declared that:

The Tamils of Ceylon, by virtue of their great language, their religion, their separate culture and heritage, their history of independent existence as a separate state over a distinct territory for several centuries until they were conquered by the armed might of the European invaders, and above all, by their will to exist as a separate entity ruling themselves in their own territory, are a nation distinct and apart from the Sinhalese.

It was indeed ironic that Dr Colvin R. de Silva, the architect of the Constitution that abrogated the 1947 constitutional settlement, should have anticipated that this would happen. Addressing Parliament twenty years earlier this is what he predicted:

Do we, does this House, do our people want two nations? Do we want a single State, or do we want two? Do we want one Ceylon, or do we want two? And above all, do we want an independent Ceylon which must necessarily be a united and single Ceylon, or two bleeding halves of Ceylon which can be gobbled up by every ravaging imperialist monster that may happen to range the Indian Ocean? If we come to the stage where, instead of parity, we, through needless insularity, get into the position of suppressing the Tamil people from the federal demand which seems to be popular amongst them at present – if we are to judge by electoral results – there may emerge separatism.

(To be continued next week)
(This is a slightly condensed version of a speech delivered in Colombo in May 2016)

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Features

Counting cats, naming giants: Inside the unofficial science redefining Sri Lanka’s Leopards and Tuskers

Published

16 hours ago

2026/01/12

Thilina Walpola

For decades, Sri Lanka’s leopard numbers have been debated, estimated, and contested, often based on assumptions few outside academic circles ever questioned.

One of the most fundamental was that a leopard’s spots never change. That belief, long accepted as scientific fact, began to unravel not in a laboratory or lecture hall, but through thousands of photographs taken patiently in the wilds of Yala. At the centre of that quiet disruption stands Milinda Wattegedara.

Sri Lanka’s wilderness has always inspired photographers. Far fewer, however, have transformed photography into a data-driven challenge to established conservation science. Wattegedara—an MBA graduate by training and a wildlife researcher by pursuit—has done precisely that, building one of the most comprehensive independent identification databases of leopards and tuskers in the country.

“I consider myself privileged to have been born and raised in Sri Lanka,” Wattegedara says. “This island is extraordinary in its biodiversity. But admiration alone doesn’t protect wildlife. Accuracy does.”

Raised in Kandy, and educated at Kingswood College, where he captained cricket teams, up to the First XI, Wattegedara’s early years were shaped by discipline and long hours of practice—traits that would later define his approach to field research.

Though his formal education culminated in a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Cardiff Metropolitan University, his professional life gradually shifted toward Sri Lanka’s forests, grasslands, and coastal fringes.

From childhood, two species held his attention: the Sri Lankan leopard and the Asian elephant tusker. Both are icons. Both are elusive. And both, he argues, have been inadequately understood.

His response was methodical. Using high-resolution photography, Wattegedara began documenting individual animals, focusing on repeat sightings, behavioural traits, territorial ranges, and physical markers.

This effort formalised into two platforms—Yala Leopard Diary and Wild Tuskers of Sri Lanka—which function today as tightly moderated research communities rather than casual social media pages.

“My goal was never popularity,” he explains. “It was reliability. Every identification had to stand scrutiny.”

The results are difficult to dismiss. Through collaborative verification and long-term monitoring, his teams have identified over 200 individual leopards across Yala and Kumana National Parks and 280 tuskers across Sri Lanka.

Each animal—whether Jessica YF52 patrolling Mahaseelawa beach or Mahasen T037, the longest tusker bearer recorded in the wild—is catalogued with photographic evidence and movement history.

It was within this growing body of data that a critical inconsistency emerged.

“As injuries accumulated over time, we noticed subtle but consistent changes in rosette and spot patterns,” Wattegedara says. “This directly contradicted the assumption that these markings remain unchanged for life.”

That observation, later corroborated through structured analysis, had serious implications. If leopards were being identified using a limited set of spot references, population estimates risked duplication and inflation.

The findings led to the development of the Multipoint Leopard Identification Method, now internationally published, which uses multiple reference points rather than fixed pattern assumptions. “This wasn’t about academic debate,” Wattegedara notes. “It was about ensuring we weren’t miscounting an endangered species.”

The implications extend beyond Sri Lanka. Overestimated populations can lead to reduced protection, misplaced policy decisions, and weakened conservation urgency.

Yet much of this work has occurred outside formal state institutions.

“There’s a misconception that meaningful research only comes from official channels,” Wattegedara says. “But conservation gaps don’t wait for bureaucracy.”

That philosophy informed his role as co-founder of the Yala Leopard Centre, the world’s first facility dedicated solely to leopard education and identification. The Centre serves as a bridge between researchers, wildlife enthusiasts, and the general public, offering access to verified knowledge rather than speculation.

In a further step toward transparency, Artificial Intelligence has been introduced for automatic leopard identification, freely accessible via the Centre and the Yala Leopard Diary website. “Technology allows consistency,” he explains. “And consistency is everything in long-term studies.”

His work with tuskers mirrors the same precision. From Minneriya to Galgamuwa, Udawalawe to Kala Wewa, Wattegedara has documented generations of bull elephants—Arjuna T008, Kawanthissa T075, Aravinda T112—not merely as photographic subjects, but as individuals with lineage, temperament, and territory.

This depth of observation has also earned him recognition in wildlife photography, including top honours from the Photographic Society of Sri Lanka and accolades from Sanctuary Asia’s Call of the Wild. Still, he is quick to downplay awards.

“Photographs are only valuable if they contribute to understanding,” he says.

Today, Wattegedara’s co-authored identification guides on Yala leopards and Kala Wewa tuskers are increasingly referenced by researchers and field naturalists alike. His work challenges a long-standing divide between citizen science and formal research.

“Wildlife doesn’t care who publishes first,” he reflects. “It only responds to how accurately we observe it.”

In an era when Sri Lanka’s protected areas face mounting pressure—from tourism, infrastructure, and climate stress—the question of who counts wildlife, and how, has never been more urgent.

By insisting on precision, patience, and proof, Milinda Wattegedara has quietly reframed that conversation—one leopard, one tusker, and one verified photograph at a time.

By Ifham Nizam ✍️

Features

AI in Schools: Preparing the Nation for the Next Technological Leap

Published

16 hours ago

2026/01/12

Thilina Walpola

This summary document is based on an exemplary webinar conducted by the Bandaranaike Academy for Leadership & Public Policy ((https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqZGjlaMC08). I participated in the session, which featured multiple speakers with exceptional knowledge and experience who discussed various aspects of incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) into the education system and other sectors.

There was strong consensus that this issue must be addressed early, before the nation becomes vulnerable to external actors seeking to exploit AI for their own advantage. Given her educational background, the Education Minister—and the Prime Minister—are likely to be fully aware of this need. This article is intended to support ongoing efforts in educational reform, including the introduction of AI education in schools for those institutions willing to adopt it.

Artificial intelligence is no longer a futuristic concept. Today, it processes vast amounts of global data and makes calculated decisions, often to the benefit of its creators. However, most users remain unaware of the information AI gathers or the extent of its influence on decision-making. Experts warn that without informed and responsible use, nations risk becoming increasingly vulnerable to external forces that may exploit AI.

The Need for Immediate Action

AI is evolving rapidly, leaving traditional educational models struggling to keep pace. By the time new curricula are finalised, they risk becoming outdated, leaving both students and teachers behind. Experts advocate immediate government-led initiatives, including pilot AI education programs in willing schools and nationwide teacher training.

“AI is already with us,” experts note. “We must ensure our nation is on this ‘AI bus’—unlike past technological revolutions, such as IT, microchips, and nanotechnology, which we were slow to embrace.”

Training Teachers and Students

Equipping teachers to introduce AI, at least at the secondary school level, is a crucial first step. AI can enhance creativity, summarise materials, generate lesson plans, provide personalised learning experiences, and even support administrative tasks. Our neighbouring country, India, has already begun this process.

Current data show that student use of AI far exceeds that of instructors—a gap that must be addressed to prevent misuse and educational malpractice. Specialists recommend piloting AI courses as electives, gathering feedback, and continuously refining the curriculum to prepare students for an AI-driven future.

Benefits of AI in Education

AI in schools offers numerous advantages:

· Fosters critical thinking, creativity, and problem-solving skills

· Enhances digital literacy and ethical awareness

· Bridges the digital divide by promoting equitable AI literacy

· Supports interdisciplinary learning in medicine, climate science, and linguistics

· Provides personalised feedback and learning experiences

· Assists students with disabilities through adaptive technologies like text-to-speech and visual recognition

AI can also automate administrative tasks, freeing teachers to focus on student engagement and social-emotional development—a key factor in academic success.

Risks and Challenges

Despite its potential, AI presents challenges:

· Data privacy concerns and misuse of personal information

· Over-reliance on technology, reducing teacher-student interactions

· Algorithmic biases affecting educational outcomes

· Increased opportunities for academic dishonesty if assessments rely on rote memorisation

Experts emphasise understanding these risks to ensure the responsible and ethical use of AI.

Global and Local Perspectives

In India, the Central Board of Secondary Education plans to introduce AI and computational thinking from Grades 3 to 12 by 2026. Sri Lanka faces a similar challenge. Many university students and academics already rely on AI, highlighting the urgent need for a structured yet rapidly evolving national curriculum that incorporates AI responsibly.

The Way Forward

Experts urge swift action:

· Launch pilot programs in select schools immediately.

· Provide teacher training and seed funding to participating educational institutions.

· Engage universities to develop short AI and innovation training programs.

“Waiting for others to lead risks leaving us behind,” experts warn. “It’s time to embrace AI thoughtfully, responsibly, and inclusively—ensuring the whole nation benefits from its opportunities.”

As AI reshapes our world, introducing it in schools is not merely an educational initiative—it is a national imperative.

BY Chula Goonasekera ✍️
on behalf of LEADS forum admin@srilankaleads.com

Features

The Paradox of Trump Power: Contested Authoritarian at Home, Uncontested Bully Abroad

Published

2 days ago

2026/01/11

Thilina Walpola

Protests and a vigil have been held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where the shooting of Renee Nicole Good occurred on Wednesday (photo courtesy BBC)

The Trump paradox is easily explained at one level. The US President unleashes American superpower and tariff power abroad with impunity and without contestation. But he cannot exercise unconstitutional executive power including tariff power without checks and challenges within America. No American President after World War II has exercised his authority overseas so brazenly and without any congressional referral as Donald Trump is getting accustomed to doing now. And no American President in history has benefited from a pliant Congress and an equally pliant Supreme Court as has Donald Trump in his second term as president.

Yet he is not having his way in his own country the way he is bullying around the world. People are out on the streets protesting against the wannabe king. This week’s killing of 37 year old Renee Good by immigration agents in Minneapolis has brought the City to its edge five years after the police killing of George Floyd. The lower courts are checking the president relentlessly in spite of the Supreme Court, if not in defiance of it. There are cracks in the Trump’s MAGA world, disillusioned by his neglect of the economy and his costly distractions overseas. His ratings are slowly but surely falling. And in an electoral harbinger, New York has elected as its new mayor, Zoran Mamdani – a wholesale antithesis of Donald Trump you can ever find.

Outside America it is a different picture. The world is too divided and too cautious to stand up to Trump as he recklessly dismantles the very world order that his predecessors have been assiduously imposing on the world for nearly a hundred years. A few recent events dramatically illustrate the Trump paradox – his constraints at home and his freewheeling abroad.

Restive America

Two days before Christmas, the US Supreme Court delivered a rare rebuke to the Trump Administration. After a host of rulings that favoured Trump by putting on hold, without full hearing, lower court strictures against the Administration, the Supreme Court by a 6-3 majority decided to leave in place a Federal Court ruling that barred Trump from deploying National Guard troops in Chicago. Trump quietly raised the white flag and before Christmas withdrew the federal troops he had controversially deployed in Chicago, Portland and Los Angeles – all large cities run by Democrats.

But three days after the New Year, Trump airlifted the might of the US Army to encircle Venezuela’s capital Caracas and spirit away the country’s President Nicolás Maduro, and his wife Celia Flores, all the way to New York to stand trial in an American Court. What is not permissible in any American City was carried out with absolute impunity in a foreign capital. It turns out the Administration has no plan for Venezuela after taking out Maduro, other than Trump’s cavalier assertion, “We’re going to run it, essentially.” Essentially, the Trump Administration has let Maduro’s regime without Maduro to run the country but with the US in total control of Venezuela’s oil.

Next on the brazen list is Greenland, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio who manipulated Maduro’s ouster is off to Copenhagen for discussions with the Danish government over the future of Greenland, a semi-autonomous part of Denmark. Military option is not off the table if a simple real estate purchase or a treaty arrangement were to prove infeasible or too complicated. That is the American position as it is now customarily announced from the White House podium by the Administration’s Press Secretary Karolyn Leavitt, a 28 year old Catholic woman from New Hampshire, who reportedly conducts a team prayer for divine help before appearing at the lectern to lecture.

After the Supreme Court ruling and the Venezuela adventure, the third US development relevant to my argument is the shooting and killing of a 37 year old white American woman by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer in Minneapolis, at 9:30 in the morning, Wednesday, January 7^th. Immediately, the Administration went into pre-emptive attack mode calling the victim a “deranged leftist” and a “domestic terrorist,” and asserting that the ICE officer was acting in self-defense. That line and the description are contrary to what many people know of the victim, as well as what people saw and captured on their phones and cameras.

The victim, Renee Nicole Good, was a mother of three and a prize-winning poet who self-described herself a “poet, writer, wife and mom.” A newcomer to Minneapolis from Colorado, she was active in the community and was a designated “legal observer of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities,” to monitor interactions between ICE agents and civilian protesters that have become the norm in large immigrant cities in America. Renee Good was at the scene in her vehicle to observe ICE operations and community protesters.

In video postings that last a matter of nine seconds, two ICE officers are seen approaching Good’s vehicle and one of them trying to open her door; a bystander is heard screaming “No” as Good is seen trying to drive away; and a third ICE officer is seen standing in front of her moving vehicle, firing twice in the direction of the driver, moving to a side and firing a third time from the side. Good’s car is seen going out of control, careening and coming to a stop on a snowbank. Yet America is being bombarded with two irreconcilable narratives – one manufactured by Trump’s Administration and the other by those at the scene and everyone opposed to the regime.

It adds to the explosiveness of the situation that Good was shot and killed not far from where George Folyd was killed, also in Minneapolis, on 25^th May, 2020, choked under the knee of a heartless policeman. And within 48 hours of Good’s killing, two Americans were shot and injured by two federal immigration agents, in Portland, Oregon, on the Westcoast. Trump’s attack on immigrants and the highhanded methods used by ICE agents have become the biggest flashpoint in the political opposition to the Trump presidency. People are organizing protests in places where ICE agents are apprehending immigrants because those who are being aggressively and violently apprehended have long been neighbours, colleagues, small business owners and students in their communities.

Deportation of illegal immigrants is not something that began under Trump. It has been going on in large numbers under all recent presidents including Obama and Biden. But it has never been so cruel and vicious as it is now under Trump. He has turned it into a television spectacle and hired large number of new ICE agents who are politically prejudiced and deployed them without proper training. They raid private homes and public buildings, including schools, looking for immigrants. When faced with protesters they get into clashes rather than deescalating the situation as professional police are trained to do. There is also the fear that the Administration may want to escalate confrontations with protesters to create a pretext for declaring martial law and disrupt the midterm congressional elections in November this year.

But the momentum that Trump was enjoying when he began his second term and started imposing his executive authority, has all but vanished and all within just one year in office. By the time this piece appears in print, the Supreme Court ruling on Trump’s tariffs (expected on Friday) may be out, and if as expected the ruling goes against Trump that will be a massive body blow to the Administration. Trump will of course use a negative court ruling as the reason for all the economic woes under his presidency, but by then even more Americans would have become tired of his perpetually recycled lies and boasts.

An Obliging World

To get back to my starting argument, it is in this increasingly hostile domestic backdrop that Trump has started looking abroad to assert his power without facing any resistance. And the world is obliging. The western leaders in Europe, Canada and Australia are like the three wise monkeys who will see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil – of anything that Trump does or fails to do. Their biggest fear is about the Trump tariffs – that if they say anything critical of Trump he will magnify the tariffs against their exports to the US. That is an understandable concern and it would be interesting to see if anything will change if the US Supreme Court were to rule against Trump and reject his tariff powers.

Outside the West, and with the exception of China, there is no other country that can stand up to Trump’s bullying and erratic wielding of power. They are also not in a position to oppose Trump and face increased tariffs on their exports to the US. Putin is in his own space and appears to be assured that Trump will not hurt him for whatever reason – and there are many of them, real and speculative. The case of the Latin American countries is different as they are part of the Western Hemisphere, where Trump believes he is monarch of all he surveys.

After more than a hundred years of despising America, many communities, not just regimes, in the region seem to be warming up to Trump. The timing of Trump’s sequestering of Venezuela is coinciding with a rising right wing wave and regime change in the region. An October opinion poll showed 53% of Latin American respondents reacting positively to a then potential US intervention in Venezuela while only 18% of US respondents were in favour of intervention. While there were condemnations by Latin American left leaders, seven Latin American countries with right wing governments gave full throated support to Trump’s ouster of Maduro.

The reasons are not difficult to see. The spread of crime induced by the commerce of cocaine has become the number one concern for most Latin Americans. The socio-religious backdrop to this is the evangelisation of Christianity at the expense of the traditional Catholic Church throughout Latin America. And taking a leaf from Trump, Latin Americans have also embraced the bogey of immigration, mainly influenced by the influx of Venezuelans fleeing in large numbers to escape the horrors of the Maduro regime.

But the current changes in Latin America are not necessarily indicative of a durable ideological shift. The traditional left’s base in the subcontinent is still robust and the recent regime changes are perhaps more due to incumbency fatigue than shifts in political orientations. The left has been in power for the greater part of this century and has not been able to provide answers to the real questions that preoccupied the people – economic affordability, crime and cocaine. It has not been electorally smart for the left to ignore the basic questions of the people and focus on grand projects for the intelligentsia. Exhibit #1 is the grand constitutional project in Chile under outgoing President Gabriel Borich, but it is not the only one. More romantic than realistic, Boric’s project titillated liberal constitutionalists the world over, but was roundly rejected by Chileans.

More importantly, and sooner than later, Trump’s intervention in Venezuela and his intended takeover of the country’s oil business will produce lasting backlashes, once the initial right wing euphoria starts subsiding. Apart from the bully force of Trump’s personality, the mastermind behind the intervention in Venezuela and policy approach towards Latin America in general, is Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the former Cuban American Senator from Florida and the principal leader of the group of Cuban neocons in the US. His ultimate objective is said to be achieving regime change in Cuba – apparently a psychological settling of scores on behalf Cuban Americans who have been dead set against Castro’s Cuba after the overthrow of their beloved Batista.

Mr. Rubio is American born and his parents had left Cuba years before Fidel Castro displaced Fulgencio Batista, but the family stories he apparently grew up hearing in Florida have been a large part of his self-acknowledged political makeup. Even so, Secretary Rubio could never have foreseen a situation such as an externally uncontested Trump presidency in which he would be able to play an exceptionally influential role in shaping American policy for Latin America. But as the old Burns’ poem rhymes, “The best-laid plans of men and mice often go awry.”

by Rajan Philips ✍️