Features

Probably most brilliant officer the Army ever had

Published

3 years ago

2023/12/3

Thilina Walpola

Ceylon intake into the Pakistan Military Academy to which Jayantha belonged

Lt Col PVJ (Jayantha) de Silva, SL Light Infantry (1941-2023):

Maj. Gen. (Retd.) Lalin Fernando

“Do not stand at my grave and cry; I am not there; I did not die”

Late Lt Col PVJ (Jayantha) de Silva, Sri Lanka Light Infantry, (the oldest regiment in the Army – raised in 1881), served in the SL Army from 1964 to 1987.He sadly passed away in Australia after a fall just short of his 80th birthday.

He was probably the most brilliant officer the Army ever had; some say even a genius. He was also an unwavering, staunch, stubborn patriot as he was unforgiving of those, military or political who faltered. I admired him. He was my very good friend.

Educated at Royal College where he was prefect and Cadet Sergeant, he was also a national basketball player. He was in the first intake of five officer cadets to the Pakistan Military Academy in Kakul in 1964. He, showing extraordinary leadership potential to prove himself among Pakistani cadets from the famed martial races of Punjabis, Pathans and Baluchis being appointed Battalion Junior Under Officer in his final term. He was the first and only one from Ceylon (SL) to be so appointed on the regular long course of two and a half years (It is now a two-year course).

He came third (of over 200 cadets) in the order of merit. The others in the Ceylon intake of five included Srilal Weerasuriya, later General and Army Commander. He later graduated from the Indian Staff College, Wellington, being recommended for Operations and Training, the plum posting for the best achievers. He was excellent in the field and on the staff.

I came across some of his Light Infantry soldiers in Talaimannar on a search operation when on Anti Illicit Immigration duties in the late 1960s. They spoke with pride of their lean, six-foot-tall whipcord strong, platoon commander’s successes. Clearly, he had looked after their every need as indeed the regimental motto “Ich Dien” (I serve) expected him to do – to serve his men. Many senior officers in a politicized army do not understand the motto believing ‘I serve’ means serve politicians!

Jayantha’s extraordinary feats were many and legendary. When the Russians gifted 82 mm mortars after the 1971 JVP Insurgency, Jayantha was the leader of the army infantry team of officers and sergeants chosen to be instructed on the weapon. The Russians took the whole of the first day to introduce the new weapon in the belief that the locals had to learn from scratch probably unaware we were well trained on the British three-inch mortars albeit of WW 2 origin.

At the end of the first day Jayantha asked the bemused Russians to take the next day off. He asked the infantry team to assemble at the Panaluwa range the next morning. The team was taught everything about the weapon including how to fire it by Jayantha. The following morning the Russians were taken to the firing range instead of the weapon training area. The sections of the team then demonstrated the dismantling and assembling of the mortar.

The Russians were next taken to the field firing range where the mortar bombs (shells) were fired. The planned six-week course was over! That was PVJ.

When his SLLI commanding officer Lt Col (later Major General) HV (Henry) Athukorale wanted a regimental museum, he created one almost overnight. He was entrusted with revising the Regimental Standing Orders. When Military Assistant (MA) to the Commander of the Army, Lt Gen Denis Perera, he produced the most comprehensive Army Dress Regulations. All in quick time.

I remember Jayantha as the first ever MA to an Army Commander (Maj Gen Denis Perera) accompanying the Commander on the first of the Army Commander’s bi-annual Inspection team at HQ Task Force One at Pallaly (Jaffna). In the evening at the Officers’ Mess the mood was convivial with the gift of two bottles of whiskey from the Commander helping; but Jayantha was missing.

The next morning as the Commander and his staff left for the airport the Minutes of the inspection, accurate and critical with action to be taken, would be in my hands. This speed of response upset some commanding officers (who complained). They were used to ambling along previously. Now their command deficiencies were pinpointed. The Army was in a resurgent era.

At the Non-Aligned Conference held in Colombo, about 100 heads of state or government, attended. They had each to be given a Guard of Honour at Katunayake whatever time they arrived. Their arrivals were within a short intervals of each other. Jayantha was Deputy to Brig TI Weeratunge (later Army Commander). Brig Weeratunge had time on his hands as Jayantha had organized rehearsals, timings and dress inspections with passion. The ceremonials were outstanding.

The VVIPs arriving included Mrs. Indira Gandhi, Sadat, Makarios (Cyprus), Hafiz al Assad and the eccentric Libyan leader Gaddafi. Marshal Tito arrived in his yacht in the Colombo harbour.

As Commandant of the Combat Training School in Ampara he revamped it entirely. Everything from theory lessons, conduct of field tactical exercises and Standard Operating Procedures were in writing. His successors had only to follow them.

While SL was laboring to match the terrorists early lead in technology, it was to Jayantha that the Army Commander turned to build SL’s first indigenous Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) with a V shaped hull. It proved to be far superior against mines to the imported, much acclaimed South African APC. He did so with a team of technicians from the Electrical and Mechanical Engineers at their Colombo workshop. And he was just an infantry officer.

Had Jayantha remained in the Army instead of emigrating, he would have worked wonders with technology but he had no far thinking Gen Sundarji (brilliant Indian Chief of Army Staff and the only infantry officer to command the First Indian Armoured Division too) or any brass hat to back him in an unsophisticated army given to sycophancy and later even commanded by one who gifted weapons and ammo to the terrorists.

He could have given the Army a lead in AI too. Instead, his inputs were apparently in the Australian Defence Industry. He was last heard providing (unsolicited?) detailed inputs for Australia’s indigenous aircraft carrier. While Sundarji wrote “Blind Men of Hindustan” as his treatise on Indian Nuclear Policy was not too well received, Jayantha wrote a new Constitution for SL that he insisted I read to know how to resolve our problems. I was tactful in responding.

Jayantha had a Kodak camera with which he recorded many events in camp and on training. I requested him to photograph my wedding and gave him a roll of film. He gave me a whole lot of super wedding photos and returned the film as he was wont to do. When years later he found his camera outdated, he searched for the newfangled parts needed to upgrade it. He could not find any. Jayantha then manufactured them and soon had a camera that was uptodate.

He then sent the drawings of his work to many camera companies. Only Kodak responded. They asked whether he had registered for copyrights. He said no. Kodak asked whether they could come to an agreement about producing the parts. He told them there was no need for an agreement and they could just have it. They asked whether they could use his name. He said it was unnecessary as both knew who did the work!

I first met Jayantha when he was an officer cadet in 1964.I was on a Regimental Signals Officer’s course at Rawalpindi. He would come with four other cadets including Srilal Weerasuriya (later General and Commander of the Army) and stay in my officers’ mess quarters during the rare training breaks. They would each bring their bed rolls and lay it out in the sitting room so they had no problem about sleeping.

They also joined four officers (Capts Kamal Fernando and WM Weerasuriya, Lt SJ Weerasena and me to form a ‘Ceylon Army’ cricket team to play GHQ Pakistan. The five cadets were not very impressive cricketers. We were loaned two Pakistani officers who were not any better. We lost. They had a national player who had just played against the MCC. He scored a century.

The next time we met was in mid-1968 was when we were both appointed Instructors for the first ever Officer Cadets course held in SL at the Officer Cadet School (now the SL Military Academy) at the Army Training Center (ATC) Diyatalawa. We replaced the two instructors who had been there during the first term. This was a most rewarding posting ever as we were in charge of not just new officer cadets but of the promise of the army’s future. This intake, initially of 12, was incomparable.

We were very fortunate that Lt Col (later General and Commander of the Army from the first Ceylon Intake at Sandhurst Denis Perera was first the Deputy (to Col Lyn Wicramasuriya) and then Commandant of the ATC. He ensured that the cadets wanted in nothing. Maj MD Fernando was the Chief Instructor (CI).

We soon discovered that instructor sergeants and sergeant major whose duties were respectively drill and weapons, had been allowed to impose themselves on the cadets in their free time and in the cadets’ mess. A hurried meeting on the first day itself laid down the ground rules. The other rank instructors were told that the accommodation and cadets mess were not in their province and to desist from going there as everything there was the responsibility of Officer instructors alone.

This was a clean break from what had been going on when directly enlisted officers were trained and NCOs ran the roost after close of the days play. Warrant Officer Ahmath (Armoured Corps) was an excellent Wing Sergeant Major.

The cadets had been told to start digging a well at the top of the hill overlooking the Halangode Wewa! This was stopped on the first day itself. The foundation, standards, customs and traditions were set initially by the officer instructors. They were handed down inviolate by Intake One who by the time Intake Two and a volunteer force intake of young officers arrived, had matured enough to govern and set the pattern for the succeeding intakes. The term Beast Billet (for first termers) came into vogue then. Bullying and ragging were not allowed as Intake One had set the standard.

The first three intakes had the founder commander of the Commandos and two Army Commanders including SL’s only Field Marshal and a rifle shooting Olympian who twice contested!

Field training exercises were talked about long after they ended. The first initiative exercise was held in the Passara hills with planters being ‘friendly collaborators’ of ‘cadet saboteurs’, then in Ampara in a tropical thunderstorm at night that made the cadets think the exercise would be called off. It wasn’t. The two instructors accompanied each ‘sabotage’ patrol across flooded paddies and raging torrents near the airport. The third was in Trincomalee.

Conventional warfare exercises were held on Fox Hill, in Gurutalawa and Horton Plains. Jungle training was carried out in the South Eastern jungles off Kuda Oya by the British Far East Jungle Warfare School Malaya-trained Capt (later Major General) Wijaya Wimalaratne and Warrant Officer Jayasinghe, both from Gemunu Watch.

On parade Warrant Officer Dayananda, (Armoured Corps) trained at the Brigade of Guards Drill Depot Pirbright, UK) never failed to say after each rehearsal for the Commissioning parade that every officer must try to match Jayantha’s sword drill standard – that included the parade commander- me!

The rugby team with a galaxy of schoolboy players in Intake Three won the Clifford Cup C Division the first time it entered.

Jayantha had the very best leadership characteristics starting from unshakable integrity, physical and moral courage, in depth knowledge of his profession including its technical side, initiative, was lightning fast in taking decisions and implementing them. He was fair and just in all his dealings. He was straight, unafraid to speak his mind but not haughty or arrogant, pleasant mannered and adaptive, lean and hard, highly motivated and disciplined. He never spoke of race or religion in the best traditions of the Army. He was first class at everything he had to do in the Army except for playing cricket. He was a true friend and loyal.

He had little patience, never gossiped, was firm, hardly merciful, was uncompromising and not very flexible. When asked by a retired Army commander visiting Australia why he did not want to meet him (the former commander), he said simply ‘You saluted the terrorists’ (during the 2001-3 phony Norwegian sponsored peace initiative).

The question must then be asked why an outstanding mid ranking officer whose early promise blossomed throughout his career abruptly decided to quit the army and migrate to Australia as a Lt Col, when achieving the highest command rank was a probability. Clearly in SL it was not. I cannot think of any army other than SL’s where such an exceptional officer would have been allowed to go without an effort to retain him. Was there an exit interview? I doubt it as at that time the army had lost a lot of its confidence and a few army commanders had openly said the war could not be won, shamelessly contradicting their own appointments.

One had secretly followed treacherous orders and arranged weapons and ammo plus cash in dollars and cement to be given to the LTTE on the treasonable orders of a Commander-in Chief!

As for career planning it appeared that was in the hands of politicians. Shocking debacles followed. Thousands died. No senior commander was punished. Many were promoted. Sadly, it appeared that the deaths of thousands of soldiers and young officers mattered less than the need to protect the guilty Generals.

A guilty conscience pervaded the upper ranks. They did not in many cases serve their men. By 2006 the lessons were well learned, the surviving fighting elements had been to hell and back for decades They were ready to finish it off. They did so with a political leadership that for once made sure the Army and the forces in general lacked nothing to win the conflict.

Jayantha had not been given command of his battalion despite being the most outstanding mid ranking officer not only in his regiment but also in the army to deserve it. When asked, two former Army Commanders, one his intake mate to the Pakistan Military Academy and the other who he had trained, thought it was due to the fact that Jayantha’s last two bosses as Army Commanders (1981-88) made prolific use of his amazing grasp of technology for the army rather than release him to command his regiment, the vital starting point of higher command. This could have happened only in the SL Army as any career plan had to give command of one’s own regiment the highest priority.

It is probable that in many other armies a similar talent would have seen the incumbent given a double promotion straight to Brigadier. All this was not to be. In my humble opinion, had Jayantha stayed on he would have made the best and most effective and successful Army commander albeit in his time, after Gen Denis Perera.

On a personal note, I remember going with my family to Kandy for the Perahera. Jayantha who was the senior staff officer in Central, Command made all the arrangements for our stay. At night he saw that only my elder daughter and I were going out as my wife would stay with our two-year old second daughter. He immediately said he would look after the baby and asked for instructions. On our return about midnight, we saw Jayantha with a pen light torch reading a book having prepared and given the baby her milk on time. In his spare time Jayantha coached the Trinity College basketball team.

When Jayantha left SL, the Army lost her most talented officer, his friends lost a wonderful and close friend. His death in Australia came as a shock to all. The saddest part was that we in SL were sure he would outlive all of us even as most of us had not seen him for nearly 35 years; but he never forgot SL, the Army and us and kept our morale up during the darkest days of the conflict with his unrelenting confidence in final victory.

He will be much missed by all who knew him. May his stay in Samsara be short. He leaves his wife Chintha, daughter Piyumali and son Suresh.

Note

Intake one had the head prefects of Royal, S Thomas’, Kingswood and St John’s, Jaffna, the cricket captain of Ananda and Combined Schools, national rifle firing pool member (and twice future Olympian), three public school athletes, a Nalanda cricketer, vice-captain Royal College rugby, one Royal College rowing team member and a soldier entry who was a national rugby player.

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Features

Preventing grievances from becoming communal

Published

22 hours ago

2026/10/6

Sahan Weerasooriya

Police removing the Thileepan statue

by Jehan Perera

The death sentence on Sivarasa Anojan, a Sri Lankan citizen convicted of blasphemy in Saudi Arabia has taken a central place in national consciousness for the past several weeks. It has been in the headline news since it was first reported last month. There have been many initiatives taken locally to get a more lenient sentencing by the Saudi authorities. There is also an undercurrent that is critical of both the culture and religion from which this sentencing emanates. This also sustains the widespread publicity being given nationally to the issue. By way of contrast, the controversy caused by the forcible removal of the Thileepan statue in Jaffna has not significantly impacted upon the national consciousness. There was only passing mention of the incident in the national media which has been overtaken by other events.

However, in the north and east of the country, and in the diaspora, the removal of the Thileepan statue has become a major issue. It has led to protest marches led by university students and widespread condemnation by civil society and political groups. The issues underlying the Thileepan statue have deep undercurrents in the Tamil consciousness particularly in the north and east which time is unlikely to dispel. The real test of harmony in a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society like Sri Lanka is not whether communities coexist peacefully when nothing controversial is at stake. Rather, the test is how they respond when an event touches their identities and grievances. The death sentence imposed on Anojan in Saudi Arabia and the removal of the Thileepan statue in Jaffna carry the risk of becoming grievances to entire communities.

In the case of Anojan, a young Tamil migrant worker, he was first sentenced to five years imprisonment and a fine of three million Saudi riyals over a Facebook comment. Both he and the Saudi prosecution appealed, with the appeal court raising the sentence to death. This has led to public sympathy for him in Sri Lanka.

Appeals for clemency have come from the President, government and opposition leaders, clergy of all faiths and Muslim political leaders. At the same time there is a need to reject attempts to turn the case into a source of anti-Muslim sentiment or collective blame. Peacebuilding therefore has to be within Sri Lanka as well as diplomatic. Religious leaders and civil society in the country should be ready to quell rumour, even as Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu and Christian leaders stand together publicly.

Thileepan Statue

The Thileepan controversy has had a different trajectory. Many Tamils admire Thileepan, the LTTE name of Rasaiah Parthipan, who died on 26 September 1987 after a twelve-day fast. His demands were addressed to India but included matters pertaining to the Sri Lankan government including the release of detainees held under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. The statue put up during this year’s commemoration was removed by police in the early hours of 27 September, a day after the commemoration ended. The government’s legal concern, as articulated by its spokesperson, was the LTTE remains a proscribed organisation and before removing the statue, police had presented facts to the court. But law and memory answer different questions and the depth of Tamil anguish cannot be disregarded.

For many Tamils, remembrance of Thileepan is connected to their sense of loss and historical memory. The memorial has been destroyed and rebuilt more than once, and each destruction has added to the meaning it carries. Many who mourn Thileepan are grieving a young man who died without violence and by his own fast. They also grieve an era of loss of the struggle for Tamil rights and self-determination for which Thileepan has become a symbol. The Office for Reparations Act, No. 34 of 2018, provides for collective reparations and gives the Office for Reparations a role in policies on memorialisation. This does not automatically permit any particular statue, nor does it override laws on public places or proscribed organisations. But it shows that memorialisation is recognised within Sri Lanka’s framework for reparations and reconciliation. There is also a wider question of equality.

The JVP that now leads the NPP government was itself once proscribed when it took up arms against the state in which tens of thousands died, later entered democratic politics, and now for many years has publicly commemorated its own fallen. The opportunity to remember those who died should not belong to one community alone.

A commitment to peacebuilding requires that the same trust that has been given to former militants of one community needs to be given to members of other communities if equal citizenship and equal rights are to have meaning. Further, the Office for Reparations Act provides for reparations through livelihood. It is today a fact that those former LTTE members who went through the government’s rehabilitation process find it difficult to get jobs in the private sector.

Private sector employers are reluctant to come under surveillance for employing former LTTE members. There needs to be equal access to employment and removal of unjustified barriers to reintegration, with targeted public programmes where necessary. Until this situation is realized on the ground, the government needs to consider employing those who went through the government’s rehabilitation process and still unable to find suitable employment.

Continuing Peace

The challenge that post-war Sri Lanka faces, a full 17 years after the end of war, is to strengthen the foundations of trust between communities rather than deepen existing suspicions. Anojan is an individual Sri Lankan citizen facing a severe sentence in another country. His case should not become a reason to blame Sri Lankan Muslims. Thileepan is remembered differently by different communities, but the dispute over his memorial should not become a reason to revive the communal divisions of the past. The cases are also mirror images in an important respect. In the Anojan case, the state is an advocate pleading before another government. In the Thileepan case, the state is the actor whose decision is being judged. The first calls for quiet diplomacy and restraint in public language. The second calls for fairness and explanation, and the burden on the state is heavier.

The common roots of the two cases lie in mistrust that does not belong to one community alone. It has been produced by experiences of discrimination, violence, insecurity and loss that have been interpreted differently by different communities. Grievances turn communal when an individual is seen as a representative of a community, when institutions seem to treat communities unequally, and when people feel their pain goes unacknowledged. Each of these can be addressed. The system change that the Sri Lankan people voted for in 2024 would need to include a government that rejects collective blame, acknowledges grief and explains its decisions openly. It also requires state institutions to act transparently and consistently, so that no citizen feels that the law protects some communities more than others.

This peacebuilding imperative requires enlightened leadership as much as legal authority. It requires leaders who will speak to their own communities against prejudice, even when this is politically inconvenient. It requires religious leaders who will demonstrate solidarity across religious boundaries. And it requires civil society to recognise that peacebuilding is not simply preventing violence after tensions have risen, but is addressing the mistrust and grievances that allow tensions to rise in the first place. Sri Lanka has learned, at great cost, that communal divisions can become much larger than the events that initially give rise to them. The Anojan and Thileepan cases give Sri Lanka an opportunity to demonstrate that it has learned from its past. The test of Sri Lanka’s continuing peace is whether we can address difficult grievances without turning them into communal ones.

Features

Sri Lanka Cricket Bill: Governance reform is not yet a cricket strategy – Part II

Published

22 hours ago

2026/10/6

Sahan Weerasooriya

By Sarath S. Kodithuwakku

President, Institute of Management of Sri Lanka; Senior Professor, University of Peradeniya

(Continued from yesterday)

Representation, Independence and Decision-Making

The membership-based electoral structure should provide representation without becoming a substitute for executive management. The seven Elected Directors would bring the perspectives of the SLC membership into the Board, while the seven Independent Directors would provide additional professional expertise and independence. The model’s effectiveness will, therefore, depend on whether the Board can integrate these perspectives into coherent strategic decisions while maintaining a clear boundary between governance and day-to-day management.

The equal division between Elected and Independent Directors also raises a governance-design question. An even-numbered Board can create a tie. The Bill addresses this directly: in the event of equality, the Chairperson has a casting vote; in the Chairperson’s absence, the Deputy Chairperson has a casting vote; and if both are absent, an Independent Director, elected to preside, has the casting vote. The issue is, therefore, not whether a tie can be resolved, but how this mechanism affects the balance between representation, independence and accountability.

The leadership structure reinforces this balance: the Chairperson is elected from among the Independent Directors and the Deputy Chairperson from among the Elected Directors. The casting-vote arrangement makes the Chairperson’s role and perceived independence particularly important, especially when a major strategic decision divides the two components of the Board.

The Bill’s committee provisions could support a disciplined model of delegation, but implementation will depend heavily on the terms of reference adopted by the new Board. The framework could be strengthened by requiring a published cricket-development strategy, a clear division of powers among the Board, executives and selection committees, transparent principles for major development allocations, and periodic reporting on outcomes across men’s, women’s, schools and domestic cricket. These measures would strengthen accountability without legislating the details of team selection or tournament scheduling.

From Measurement to Strategic Accountability

If the Board is to hold management accountable for strategy rather than simply for short-term results, it needs a performance framework that captures both outcomes and the capabilities that produce them.

SLC should consider requiring an explicit multi-year cricket-development strategy, supported by measurable objectives and an annual strategy review. Such a strategy should identify the development pathway from schools and grassroots cricket through domestic competitions to high performance; define major capability priorities such as coaching, sports science, data and analytics; set resource-allocation principles; and establish indicators against which progress can be assessed.

The purpose would not be to turn cricket into a bureaucratic exercise. Strategic accountability simply creates a disciplined basis for asking whether the organisation is doing what it said it would do, whether its assumptions remain valid, and whether resources are producing the intended results.

From Measurement to Organisational Learning

SLC should, therefore, consider adopting a formal Balanced Scorecard. Rather than measuring success solely through international match results or annual financial audits, the framework could track four interdependent perspectives:

Financial Sustainability:

commercial growth, financial discipline and compliance.

Internal Processes:

domestic tournament quality, development pathways and selector-process integrity.

Stakeholder Value:

grassroots development, school cricket and women’s cricket expansion.

Strategic Capability:

coaching quality, sports science, talent development, data and analytics capability, and the organisation’s ability to convert investment into sustainable performance.

The purpose of such a framework would not be to reduce cricket development to a collection of numbers. Rather, it would create a disciplined process for asking four fundamental management questions:

What did we expect to achieve?

What actually happened?

Why was there a difference?

What should we change as a result?

Evaluating these dimensions periodically would help SLC move beyond performance reporting towards genuine organisational learning.

ICC as a Stakeholder in Governance Reform

The ICC is another important stakeholder whose interests should be recognised in the reform process. SLC’s governance arrangements do not operate solely within Sri Lankan law; they also have to be compatible with the governance obligations associated with ICC membership. The ICC’s Articles of Association require each Member to provide for free and democratic elections (or nominees from outside its members) and to manage its affairs autonomously, without government or other public-body interference in the governance, regulation or administration of cricket.

International experience demonstrates that ICC engagement in member governance restructuring is not unusual. In the United States, after the ICC expelled the old national association for chronic governance failures, the ICC directly oversaw a multi-year project to design a new governance model. The ICC Board formally approved the constitution for a replacement body (USA Cricket) before it was adopted. The resulting structure combined elected constituent directors with independent directors, showing that an ICC-backed framework can accommodate both forms of representation.

In Nepal, the ICC established a Nepal Advisory Group comprising stakeholders from across the game to recommend constitutional amendments, with adoption of the revised constitution and subsequent elections forming part of the conditions for reinstatement of ICC membership.[8] The ICC subsequently facilitated an independent panel that included ICC nominees together with representatives of Nepal’s National Sports Council and the existing cricket administration to map the election process, guidelines and timelines.[9] More recently, in 2026, an ICC delegation visited Bangladesh to engage with stakeholders on governance and electoral matters.[10] The ICC has also reported that its Deputy Chair and another ICC Board representative visited Sri Lanka and met relevant stakeholders to assess ongoing developments, while the ICC Board reiterated the need for elections to be held as soon as possible.

These precedents make the ICC a legitimate stakeholder in considering the governance implications of the proposed Bill. This does not mean that the ICC should determine Sri Lanka’s domestic legislation, nor that every feature of the Bill requires prior ICC approval. It does, however, suggest that early and formal engagement with the ICC would be prudent, particularly where the proposed arrangements concern Board independence, elections, government involvement and the transition to the new governance structure.

This is particularly relevant because the Bill creates two institutional arrangements that deserve careful scrutiny from an autonomy perspective. The Transformation Committee is responsible for managing the transition until the First Board is constituted, while the Nomination Committee, although structurally independent of the SLC Board, includes representatives connected with the Sports Ministry and the National Sports Council. Neither arrangement, by itself, establishes government interference. However, taken together, they make it important that the independence of the incoming Board is demonstrable through transparent procedures rather than assumed from the structure alone.

Given the professional calibre and international exposure of the members of the Transformation Committee, it would be reasonable to expect that the importance of ICC engagement would have been recognised. Although any such consultation has not been evident in the public domain, it is therefore reasonable to expect that the ICC has either already been consulted or will be consulted before the Bill is enacted. Such engagement would allow potential incompatibilities to be identified before the new structure is enacted and implemented, rather than after the fact.

The Transition Is Itself a Governance Challenge

The transition provisions introduce a significant organisational-change challenge. Replacing the existing club- and association-based governance structure with a new hybrid Board and governance architecture is not simply a legal exercise; it is an organisational change programme. The Sri Lanka Cricket Transformation Committee is required to manage the transition until the First Board is constituted and, during that period, to establish rules covering matters including tournament structure, domestic governance, selection committee appointments, committee terms of reference, the Nomination Committee process and the election of the Elected Directors.

Structural reform on paper can encounter resistance from established interests, institutional habits and existing routines. The implementation phase will therefore require a clear change-management framework, including stakeholder engagement, transparent onboarding for Independent Directors, clarification of decision rights, alignment of legacy committees, and careful transfer of information and responsibilities.

Without attention to these organisational factors, cultural friction could undermine the intended administrative improvements. The success of the reform will therefore depend not only on the text of the legislation but also on the quality of the rules, appointments, delegation arrangements and organisational behaviours that follow it.

From Governance Reform to a Cricket Strategy

The Bill deserves credit for addressing how SLC is constituted and for creating places for specialist advice. It should not be dismissed simply because it does not prescribe a batting order or a domestic fixture list. Those are not appropriate tasks for legislation.

Its limitation is more precise: the proposed governance arrangements do not, by themselves, assure the strategic capability of the Board or the quality, independence and accountability of the decisions made beneath it. They establish the architecture. The future Board and management must supply the strategy, capabilities, discipline and learning mechanisms that make the architecture work.

A stronger reform would connect four elements: a Board selected for collective strategic capability; professional cricket management with clear delegated authority; transparent but non-mechanical selection and investment processes; and systematic evaluation of development outcomes. Within the first of these, information technology and computer science should be recognised as distinct from the broader capability to understand and govern data science, analytics and emerging AI-enabled decision support.

Ultimately, the governing question is not only who gets a seat at the SLC Board table. It is whether that Board can build, fund, execute and learn from a credible strategy for Sri Lankan cricket.

References

1. Department of Government Printing, Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka Cricket Bill, Gazette Supplement, Part II of September 25, 2026, issued on 28 September 2026.

2. International Cricket Council. Media release, 15 July 2026, reporting the ICC Board discussion of Sri Lanka Cricket and the need for elections to be held as soon as possible.

3. Sport New Zealand – Ihi Aotearoa. Nine Steps to Effective Governance, particularly Step 1: Define and Agree the Board’s Role; Step 4: Provide Strategic Leadership; Step 5: Employ and Support a Chief Executive; and Step 8: Get the Right People on Board.

4. Cricket South Africa. Governance and management frameworks, including the delegation-of-authority framework, Board committees, Cricket Committee, Cricket Pipeline Committee and CEO accountability.

5. International Cricket Council. ICC Articles of Association, provisions requiring free and democratic elections and autonomous administration without government or other public-body interference. ICC. https://images.icc-cricket.com/image/upload/prd/f7vm88yw1933dc38cgtg.pdf

6. International Cricket Council. “ICC outlines proposed USACA constitution.” ICC, 2017. https://www.icc-cricket.com/news/icc-outlines-proposed-usaca-constitution

7. International Cricket Council. “Approved constitution marks historic landmark for cricket in USA.” ICC, 2017. https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/approved-constitution-marks-historic-landmark-for-cricket-in-usa

8. International Cricket Council. “ICC welcomes Nepal Special General Meeting to adopt revised constitution.” ICC, 2018. https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/icc-welcomes-nepal-special-general-meeting-to-adopt-revised-constitution

9. International Cricket Council. “Independent Panel meet to progress Nepal elections under revised constitution.” ICC, 2018. https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/independent-panel-meet-to-progress-nepal-elections-under-revised-constitution

10. International Cricket Council. “ICC delegation visits Bangladesh to engage with stakeholders on governance and electoral matters.” ICC, 2026. https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/icc-delegation-visits-bangladesh-to-engage-with-stakeholders-on-governance-and-electoral-matters

11. International Cricket Council. “ICC Board approves governance, membership and member support decisions.” ICC, 2026; see also “ICC Board Meeting,” 2026, reporting ICC representatives’ meetings with stakeholders in Sri Lanka. https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/icc-board-approves-governance-membership-and-member-support-decisions

(Concluded)

Features

Why do they keep crossing? Africa, Europe and long history behind migration

Published

22 hours ago

2026/10/6

Sahan Weerasooriya

A file photo: In the early hours of 30 July 2026, thousands of people attempted to enter Ceuta, the Spanish territory on the northern coast of Africa.

by Viran Maddumage

Assistant Lecturer & PhD (Reading) Macquarie University Australia

Sanduni Rathnayake

Lecturer (Probationary) General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University

The Mediterranean is not merely a border between two continents. It is also a reminder of a relationship between Africa and Europe that was built over centuries; and whose consequences have not disappeared.

There are some borders that people cross with passports. Others are crossed by people who have run out of alternatives.

In the early hours of 30 July, 2026, thousands of people attempted to enter Ceuta, the Spanish territory on the northern coast of Africa. Spanish authorities reported that between 50,000 and 60,000 people entered the enclave irregularly during the crisis. The episode followed a Spanish Supreme Court ruling concerning the immediate rejection at the border of people who arrived by sea. Spanish authorities subsequently moved to restore the situation, while Morocco and Spain intensified their cooperation to prevent further crossings.

Ceuta is a strange place to contemplate migration. It is geographically in Africa but politically part of Spain; and therefore, part of the European Union. Its border is not simply a line separating two states. It is a physical manifestation of a much older relationship between two continents.

And perhaps the most important question is not simply: Why are people trying to enter Europe?

It is: Why does Europe remain sufficiently attractive that people are willing to risk their lives trying to reach it?

From extraction to aspiration

The contemporary migration story cannot be reduced to colonialism. Africans migrate for many reasons: employment, education, family reunification, conflict, insecurity, political conditions, environmental pressures and personal aspirations. Much African migration also takes place within Africa itself.

Yet history matters.

European colonialism profoundly reshaped African economies. In many territories, economic structures were organised around the extraction and export of primary commodities. Roads and railways were frequently constructed to connect areas of agricultural, or mineral production, to ports and external markets rather than to create integrated domestic economies. World Bank historical analyses have documented the extent to which colonial economies were dependent on a limited number of primary commodities and external markets.

This was not merely an economic arrangement. It affected what economies produced, where infrastructure was built, how labour was organised and where the value generated by production was realised.

The Congo Free State ,under King Leopold II, offers one of history’s starkest examples. The territory was subjected to a system of forced labour and violent extraction, particularly around rubber and ivory. Forced labour was legally authorised and coercive systems were used to secure production.

But Leopold’s Congo should not be presented as a metaphor for every African country or every European colonial experience. Colonial rule differed substantially across the continent. The broader point is narrower; and perhaps more consequential: colonial economies frequently connected African land, labour and resources to European markets on terms that privileged extraction and external trade.

Modern scholarship continues to examine the long-term effects of these structures. Research on colonial cash-crop economies, for example, has found that colonial production and infrastructure created lasting patterns of economic organisation, while the benefits of these systems were often geographically concentrated and domestic production linkages remained weak.

The question, then, is not whether colonialism single-handedly caused contemporary African migration.

It is whether a history in which Europe was deeply involved in shaping African economies also helped produce the unequal relationship from which today’s migration patterns emerged.

The language of migration

There is another legacy that is easy to overlook because it has become so ordinary: language.

French is spoken across substantial parts of West and Central Africa. Portuguese remains an official language in several African states. English is widely used in countries whose histories are connected to the British Empire.

These are not simply linguistic accidents.

Colonial rule created institutional, educational and administrative connections that survived independence. Those connections later became migration networks.

France, Belgium, Portugal and other European countries are, therefore, not random destinations for African migrants. Their migration relationships with particular African states have been shaped by history, including colonial connections and post-war labour recruitment. The OECD notes that the composition of immigrant populations in several European countries continues to reflect colonial legacies; France, Belgium, Portugal and the Netherlands, for example, have substantial African-born populations.

This creates something more powerful than a shared language. It creates familiarity.

A young person in an African country may have a cousin in Paris, an uncle in Brussels, a former schoolmate in Lisbon or a friend in Milan. Europe ceases to be an abstract geographical destination. It becomes a place where somebody they know already lives.

Diaspora networks can, therefore, function as social infrastructure for migration. They provide information, contacts, accommodation, employment leads and emotional reassurance. The journey may be dangerous, but the destination is no longer entirely unknown.

Why Europe?

There is an uncomfortable paradox at the heart of this story.

For centuries, European powers travelled to Africa in search of land, labour, markets and resources.

Today, Africans travel towards Europe in search of employment, security, education and opportunity.

The direction of movement has changed.

The unequal relationship has not necessarily disappeared. That does not mean Europe is uniformly prosperous while Africa is uniformly poor. Africa is a continent of 54 states with enormous differences in wealth, governance, opportunity and living standards. Nor is Europe free from unemployment, inequality or social exclusion.

But migration decisions are comparative. People do not need to believe that Europe is perfect. They need to believe that their prospects there are better than their prospects at home. That distinction matters.

A person crossing the Mediterranean may not be chasing luxury. They may be chasing a job, a university place, safety, family, dignity or simply the possibility of building a future that appears increasingly difficult to build at home.

Research on West African migration similarly identifies economic opportunity, employment, governance, development conditions and existing migration networks among the factors shaping movement.

The Mediterranean as a graveyard

The tragedy is that the Mediterranean has become not merely a migration route, but a graveyard.

The International Organisation for Migration recorded 5,305 deaths or disappearances on migration routes to Europe in 2016. More than 5,000 deaths and disappearances were recorded in the Mediterranean that year alone.

The danger has never meant that people stop moving.

Instead, when legal routes narrow, journeys can become more dangerous.

That is the central paradox of irregular migration: the more difficult it becomes to cross safely, the greater the incentives for smugglers and increasingly dangerous routes can become for people who are determined to leave.

Ceuta illustrates this geography particularly vividly. Spain and Morocco have spent years reinforcing physical barriers and security arrangements around the enclave. Yet the geographical proximity remains. Africa is only a few kilometres from Europe at its closest points.

A fence can prevent a person from crossing.

It cannot, by itself, erase the reasons that person wanted to cross.

Map courtesy BBC

Europe responds with law

Europe is not without a legal response. Indeed, the European Union has spent years developing increasingly sophisticated mechanisms for managing migration and asylum. As of June 2026, the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum entered into application across EU Member States. It establishes common procedures for screening and registering irregular arrivals, asylum processing, responsibility-sharing and returns, alongside safeguards for fundamental rights.

The European Commission has simultaneously emphasised both stronger external borders and expanded pathways for legal migration, including the EU Talent Pool for workers from outside the Union.

The legal architecture, therefore, reflects competing imperatives.

States have a legitimate interest in controlling their borders.

People have rights when they cross borders.

States have obligations concerning asylum and fundamental rights.

And migrants have reasons; sometimes compelling reasons, for moving.

The challenge is that border control addresses the movement of people. It does not necessarily address the conditions that produce the desire to move.

That distinction should be at the centre of the migration debate.

The African dream of Europe

There is a phrase often encountered in discussions about African migration: that Europe represents a promised land, while Africa is left behind.

Such descriptions can be unfair to a continent that contains enormous economic, cultural and political diversity. But the aspiration itself should not be dismissed.

When a young person believes that their best chance of employment, education or security lies thousands of kilometres away, that tells us something about both the destination and the place they are leaving.

Migration, therefore, becomes a form of social commentary.

People vote with their feet; not because migration is always the right choice, but because their decisions reveal how they perceive the opportunities available to them.

This is also why migration matters for the sustainability of states.

If a country’s young people increasingly organise their lives around the possibility of leaving, the problem is larger than the loss of individual workers. Countries can lose skills, professionals, entrepreneurs, researchers and future leaders. Families may become transnational. Communities may depend increasingly upon remittances. And the political question becomes unavoidable:

What kind of country are we building if so many of our citizens imagine their future somewhere else?

Sri Lanka should understand this question.

The circumstances are obviously different from those of African states facing Mediterranean migration routes. Sri Lankan migration is shaped by its own economic, political and historical circumstances, and its principal destinations and migration channels differ considerably.

Yet the underlying question is familiar.

When leaving becomes the most attractive strategy for an ambitious young person, migration is no longer merely an individual phenomenon. It becomes a measure of confidence in the future of the country itself.

Beyond the border

Perhaps, then, Europe should not ask only how to stop people from crossing.

And African governments should not ask only how to persuade people to stay.

Both questions are too narrow.

The deeper question is why a world divided by such profound economic inequalities continues to expect people to remain content on one side of the divide while opportunity is concentrated on the other.

The answer cannot be an open border without regulation. Nor can it be a fortress surrounded by increasingly dangerous seas.

A more durable approach would require investment in economic opportunity, domestic industries, education, accountable institutions and safe and lawful avenues for migration. It would require European countries to recognise that migration management is not simply a security question. It is also an economic, historical and human-rights question.

And African states must confront an equally difficult reality: historical exploitation can explain part of today’s inequality, but it cannot become an excuse for indefinitely postponing the task of building states in which people want to remain.

The Mediterranean will continue to separate Africa from Europe geographically.

But history has already connected them.

The resources extracted from Africa helped build European economies. Colonial languages created enduring institutional links. Diaspora communities now connect African families to European cities. Labour moves in both directions. Capital moves in both directions. Ideas move in both directions.

What crosses the Mediterranean, therefore, is not merely a migrant.

It is history.

The person swimming towards Ceuta is carrying more than a small bag, if they have one at all. They may be carrying the expectations of a family, the memory of an economy shaped by generations of external relationships, the example of relatives who successfully migrated, and the belief that somewhere on the other side of the water there is a future worth risking everything to reach.

Perhaps, that is the question Europe should hear beneath the sound of the waves:

What would have to change so that crossing the sea was a choice rather than a necessity?

(The views expressed are those of the writers and do not necessarily represent those of the institutions with which the writers associated)