Features

Jackboot cannot salvage Sri Lanka

Published

5 years ago

2020/11/8

Sahan Weerasooriya

Dictatorship will deplete institutional, social, financial and human capital

Kumar David

Gota knows no other way than to talk tough, hand authority to Army Silva and military brass, undermine confidence of civilian authorities and via 20A erase the democratic ethos that has caught on in Sri Lanka since Independence. Mind you, it is true that democracy has landed us in pretty much of a mess; it has empowered racism and been the midwife of economically damaging populism. Yes, Sri Lankan democracy has been a disappointment – look at the composition of Parliament, if we can’t do better than that, I shudder. I will not repeat the all too well-known riposte ‘Democracy is the worst of all systems except for all the others’ because it smacks of smartarse.

I argue Gota’s post-20A authoritarian status and the prospect of it evolving to dictatorship will undermine public Institutions (the military excepted); it may damage relations amongst communities, undermine political stability, drive corrode finance and deplete the nation’s human capital which I call expertise (intellectual base, innovation, expertise and free exchange of ideas). I attempt to show this in as table. We could conveniently place Institutional, Social, Financial and Expertise as four vertical columns and use four sharply concretized contemporary goings-on as rows to depict how authoritarianism will bring Sri Lanka to so a sorry pass. The events or goings-on that I propose to use are COVID-19 (CV), Direct Post-20A outcome, Rebuilding the Economy in the medium term of three to five years and fourthly Political Stability to build my direction-finder Table.

Clearly CV is the dominant issue now and will remain so in 2021-22 and I was intending to make an evaluation when Dr M. M. Janapriya published “Corona Resurgence ….” In Colombo Telegraph on October 31. I have not known of Janapriya but he speaks with the authority of an expert so he must be one though I wish he had offered a sentence or two to help readers locate his professional role. His case can be summarised thus: Victory in the first leg of the fight against CV was commendable but lulled the authorities. A military task force cannot comprehend or lead against so complex a challenge. “Seemingly the task force did not meet for two months”. The spread of CV in India posed a hazard that was neglected. Janapriya then makes two technical points “Viral genome sequencing of the second wave virus seems wanting” and “Realistic numbers of random tests are not being done”. The implication of this critique is that political preoccupation with 20A trumped national interests and furthermore the public is not being told the truth. I endorse the first censure without hesitation but I don’t know enough about the second.

Moving along the first row of my Table, Institutional scores D (poor) to F (failure) because militarisation of the Task Force undermines civilian norms and institutions; Society scores a B in that not much harm will done to relations between communities by CV and there is no visible social unrest against tough anti-CV measures and will remain so unless the second-wave leads to debacle. CV will harm the economy so Finances should score an F but for a reason I will explain later I compromise at D. Since I don’t expect the CV mess to drive away intellectuals or harm innovation in businesses, I leave the last box on the first row at a harmless C. This is the logic behind the first row of my table.

Potentially, rankings on the table can range from A to D and F; don’t dismiss the exercise as a children’s game since it is useful as a compass or as a direction-finder. Readers can change entries, or change the columns and rows to reset the table and reflect their own priorities. The point is to make assessments of the impact of authoritarianism objective and less arbitrary. True the entries are not hard numbers or statistics but filling out the table enforces mental discipline and forces people on whichever side to reason with care.

Having spelt out the barebones of a methodology I can proceed to fill out the rest of the table. The second row considers the direct effects of 20A within the next two years. I rate its Institutional impact (influence on state and corporate institutions, judiciary and apparatus of state repression) bad. The de facto military seizure of the top echelons of decision is Institutionally harmful – vide Egypt, Burma and the Banana Republics. The people of this country are now not capable of mass movements – except pogroms abetted by the police and military against minorities. In the foreseeable future there is no reason to believe the bourgeoise domestically, or internationally China, India or US will abandon Sri Lanka because it is authoritarian or a potential dictatorship. For these two reasons, I rated it B along the second row in respect of both Society and Finances. The C for Expertise at the end of the row is a shot in the dark; honestly, I am not sure whether innovation, smart-business, broad-human talent and intellectual excellence will desert the country in fear of putative dictatorship. On the third row the across the board C rating for the Economic Factor follows from my negative outlook for economic recovery under a dictator; talk of a tough Gotabaya executing wise economic programmes is partisan myth. Finally, every worm will turn one day hence my across-the-board D index on the last row; that is to say, the people will protest against dictatorship at some point in time and then the guns will come out. The D is meant to signal not current but I fear unavoidable future unrest.

It seems that the Gota autocracy which we much fear will be stillborn because of the two points I make in the next paragraph and also because, despite the Sajith Circus bungling the parliamentary vote, there is strong and deep opposition to 20A in the country. Religious orders, civil society and almost the entire intellectual classes have deplored the amendment and condemned its provisions point by point. There is more fear and opposition within the government than the parliamentary vote indicates. Many opportunist ministers who have sold their souls and sold themselves for a portfolio which is their highest aspiration in life are perturbed by 20A for the reason that it tilts the balance against their personal interests or political implications. All this adds up to two opposite possibilities; either the attempted autocracy will be weak and have little clout, or alliteratively driven by its own weaknesses the regime will lash out in ever more pernicious directions.

I would like to close with broad brush remarks about prospects for the post-20A authoritarianism regime in Sri Lanka. The regime’s supporters are over the moon about two expectations: (a) public services will be reorganised, disciplined and put right, (b) economic development of the nation will take off. This is where a simple matrix like the table gives a snap-shot overview of the lay of the land and the direction in which things are likely to go. My take on both accounts is discouraging. There can be no dispute that though the public service inherited from colonial times served Ceylon and the classes that mattered in the post-independence decade, it is now inefficient, dysfunctional and corrupt. Modernising and restructuring the public services and changing the mind set of public servants is a daunting task; it is easy to say Gota and his military cohorts do not have the visions and that the legislature and judiciary (some cases have been dragging on for a generation and the bottleneck in the courts is a nightmare) are useless but the task is gigantic. In the two Asian territories that have top-class government administration, the colonial administration was obliterated by Japanese occupation in WW2 and a brand-new model was burnished and installed in the 1950s and 1960s. Not only is Sri Lanka but in India, Pakistan and all across Africa the public service seems irreformable.

Economic renewal and growth on a capitalist basis, that’s what we are talking about is also a daunting task at the best of times. We need “creative destruction” (Schumpeter), a lot of useless activities, processes and even jobs have to give way. New product lines, new ways of integration into global supply chains, stronger ties with regional economies and the uphill tasks of raising productivity and benefiting from the digital-economy are gigantic challenges. More sharply, at this juncture Sri Lanka is tossed by surging seas and buffeted by stormy winds. The ocean on which ship Lanka is tossed hither and thither is a restless sea of Chinese, Indian and American agitation, and to make things worse no one can be sure how this second and future waves of the corona virus will pan except to say that year 2021 is likely to be another year of little achievement for nation and government.

There is no need to expand on either because so much said about both and the razor thin margin in the presidential election will not change US foreign policy much and will not reduce the intensity of the “Thucydides Trap” that is containing the rise of China as a parallel world power. Gota is unlucky to be buffeted by these two tidal waves so early in his presidency. But it is also an opportunity; if he overcomes both and rises to high presidential stature he would make a mark, but I have argued in this essay is that by showing a mindset much dependent on command thinking and relying on the military Brass as his delivery vehicle, he has lost the plot in advance. Then, we the people, would have given away our democratic freedoms in exchange for nothing.

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Features

Political violence stalking Trump administration

Published

8 hours ago

2026/04/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

A scene that unfolded during the shooting incident at the recent White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Washington. (BBC)

It would not be particularly revelatory to say that the US is plagued by ‘gun violence’. It is a deeply entrenched and widespread malaise that has come in tandem with the relative ease with which firearms could be acquired and owned by sections of the US public, besides other causes.

However, a third apparent attempt on the life of US President Donald Trump in around two and a half years is both thought-provoking and unsettling for the defenders of democracy. After all, whatever its short comings the US remains the world’s most vibrant democracy and in fact the ‘mightiest’ one. And the US must remain a foremost democracy for the purpose of balancing and offsetting the growing power of authoritarian states in the global power system, who are no friends of genuine representational governance.

Therefore, the recent breaching of the security cordon surrounding the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Washington at which President Trump and his inner Cabinet were present, by an apparently ‘Lone Wolf’ gunman, besides raising issues relating to the reliability of the security measures deployed for the President, indicates a notable spike in anti-VVIP political violence in particular in the US. It is a pointer to a strong and widespread emergence of anti-democratic forces which seem to be gaining in virulence and destructiveness.

The issues raised by the attack are in the main for the US’ political Right and its supporters. They have smugly and complacently stood by while the extremists in their midst have taken centre stage and begun to dictate the course of Right wing politics. It is the political culture bred by them that leads to ‘Lone Wolf’ gunmen, for instance, who see themselves as being repressed or victimized, taking the law into their own hands, so to speak, and perpetrating ‘revenge attacks’ on the state and society.

A disproportionate degree of attention has been paid particularly internationally to Donald Trump’s personality and his eccentricities but such political persons cannot be divorced from the political culture in which they originate and have their being. That is, “structural” questions matter. Put simply, Donald Trump is a ‘true son’ of the Far Right, his principal support base. The issues raised are therefore for the President as well as his supporters of the Right.

We are obliged to respect the choices of the voting public but in the case of Trump’s election to the highest public position in the US, this columnist is inclined to see in those sections that voted for Trump blind followers of the latter who cared not for their candidate’s suitability, in every relevant respect, and therefore acted irrationally. It would seem that the Right in the US wanted their candidate to win by ‘hook or by crook’ and exercise power on their behalf.

By making the above observations this columnist does not intend to imply that voting publics everywhere in the world of democracy cast their vote sensibly. In the case of Sri Lanka, for example, the question could be raised whether the voters of the country used their vote sensibly when voting into office the majority of Executive Presidents and other persons holding high public office. The obvious answer is ‘no’ and this should lead to a wider public discussion on the dire need for thoroughgoing voter education. The issue is a ‘huge’ one that needs to be addressed in the appropriate forums and is beyond the scope of this column.

Looking back it could be said that the actions of Trump and his die-hard support base led to the Rule of Law in the US being undermined as perhaps never before in modern times. A shaming moment in this connection was the protest march, virtually motivated by Trump, of his supporters to the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021, with the aim of scuttling the presidential poll result of that year. Much violence and unruly behaviour, as known, was let loose. This amounted to denigrating the democratic process and encouraging the violent take over of the state.

In a public address, prior to the unruly conduct of his supporters, Trump is on record as blaring forth the following: ‘We won this election and we won by a landslide’, ‘We will stop the steal’, ‘We will never give up. We will never concede. It doesn’t happen’, ‘If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.’

It is plain to see that such inflammatory utterances could lead impressionable minds in particular to revolt violently. Besides, they should have led the more rationally inclined to wonder whether their candidate was the most suitable person to hold the office of President.

Unfortunately, the latter process was not to be and the question could be raised whether the US is in the ‘safest pair of hands’. Needless to say, as events have revealed, Donald Trump is proving to be one of the most erratic heads of state the US has ever had.

However, the latest attempt on the life of President Trump suggests that considerable damage has been done to the democratic integrity of the US and none other than the President himself has to take on himself a considerable proportion of the blame for such degeneration, besides the US’ Far Right. They could be said to be ‘reaping the whirlwind.’

It is a time for soul-searching by the US Right. The political Right has the right to exist, so the speak, in a functional democracy but it needs to take cognizance of how its political culture is affecting the democratic integrity or health of the US. Ironically, the repressive and chauvinistic politics advocated by it is having the effect of activating counter-violence of the most murderous kind, as was witnessed at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Continued repressive politics could only produce more such incidents that could be self-defeating for the US.

Some past US Presidents were assassinated but the present political violence in the country brings into focus as perhaps never before the role that an anti-democratic political culture could play in unraveling the gains that the US has made over the decades. A duty is cast on pro-democracy forces to work collectively towards protecting the democratic integrity and strength of the US.

Features

22nd Anniversary Gala …action-packed event

Published

8 hours ago

2026/04/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

The Skyliners: Shanaka Viswakula (bass), Mario Ranasuriya (lead guitar), Daryl D'Souza (keyboards) and Kushmin Balasuriya (drums)

The Editor-in-Chief of The Sri Lankan Anchorman, a Toronto-based monthly, celebrating Sri Lankan community life in Canada, is none other than veteran Sri Lankan journalist Dirk Tissera, who moved to Canada in 1997. His wife, Michelle, whom he calls his “tower of strength”, is the Design Editor.

According to reports coming my way, the paper has turned out to be extremely popular in Toronto.

In fact, The Sri Lankan Anchorman won a press award in Toronto for excellence in editorial content and visual presentation.

However, the buzz in the air in Canada, right now, is The Sri Lankan Anchorman’s 22nd Anniversary Gala, to be held on Friday, 12 June, 2026, at the J&J Swagat Banquet Convention Centre, in Toronto.

An action-packed programme has been put together for the night, featuring some of the very best artistes in the Toronto scene.

The Skylines, who are classified as ‘the local musical band in Toronto’, will headline the event.

Dirk Tissera and wife Michelle: Supporting Sri Lanka-Canada community events, in Toronto, since launching The Anchorman
in 2002

They have performed and backed many legendary Sri Lanka singers.

According to Dirk, The Skylines can belt out a rhythm with gusto … be it Western, Sinhala or Tamil hits.

Also adding sparkle to the evening will be the legendary Fahmy Nazick, who, with his smooth and velvety vocals, will have the crowd on the floor.

Fahmy who was a household name, back in Sri Lanka, will be flying down from Virginia, USA.

He has captivated audiences in Sri Lanka, the Middle East and North America, and this will be his fourth visit to Toronto – back by popular demand,

Cherry DeLuna, who is described by Dirk as a powerhouse, also makes her appearance on stage and is all set to stir up the tempo with her cool and easy delivery.

“She’s got a great voice and vocal range that has captivated audiences out here”, says Dirk.

Chamil Welikala, said to be one of the hottest DJs in town, will be spinning his magic … in English, Sinhala, Tamil and Latin.

Both Jive and Baila competitions are on the cards among many other surprises on the night of 12 June.

This is The Anchorman’s fifth annual dance in a row – starting from 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025 – and both Dirk and Michelle, and The Anchorman, have always produced elegant social events in Toronto.

“We intend to knock this one out of the park,” the duo says, adding that Western music and Sinhala and Tamil songs is something they’ve always delivered and the crowd loves it.

“We have always supported Sri Lanka-Canada community events, in Toronto, since launching The Anchorman, in 2002, and we intend to keep it that way.”

No doubt, there will be a large crowd of Sri Lankans, from all communities, turning up, on 12 June, to support Dirk, Michelle and The Anchorman.

Features

Face Pack for Radiant Skin

Published

8 hours ago

2026/04/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

* Apple and Orange:

Blend a few apple and orange pieces together. Add to it a pinch of turmeric and one tablespoon of honey. Apply it to the face and neck and rinse off after 30 minutes. This face pack is suitable for all skin types.

According to experts, apple is one of the best fruits for your skin health with Vitamin A, B complex and Vitamin C and minerals, while, with the orange peel, excessive oil secretion can be easily balanced.

* Mango and Curd:

Ripe mango pulp, mixed with curd, can be rubbed directly onto the skin to remove dirt and cleanse clogged pores. Rinse off after a few minutes.

Yes, of course, mango is a tasty and delicious fruit and this is the mango season in our part of the world, and it has extra-ordinary benefits to skin health. Vitamins C and E in mangoes protect the skin from the UV rays of the sun and promotes cell regeneration. It also promotes skin elasticity and fights skin dullness and acne, while curd, in combination, further adds to it.

* Grapes and Kiwi:

Take a handful of grapes and make a pulp of it. Simultaneously, take one kiwi fruit and mash it after peeling its skin. Now mix them and add some yoghurt to it. Apply it on your face for few minutes and wash it off.

Here again experts say that kiwi is the best nutrient-rich fruit with high vitamin C, minerals, Omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E, while grapes contain flavonoids, which is an antioxidant that protects the skin from free radical damage. This homemade face pack acts as a natural cleanser and slows down the ageing process.