Law Breakers vie to become Law Makers !

By Nalin Swaris

(March 14, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The above title is from one of several comments I made during a panel discussion on Rupavahini’s ‘Kathiraya’ programme one evening in April 1999. The polling for provincial councils had closed and vote counting had begun. After the shocking violence unleashed on opposition supporters by PA goondas with some ministers egging them on - an opposition supporter, a woman school teacher, was stripped and forced to walk on a main street - it had been decided to have the other provincial council elections on the same day.

Ignore-ant Lawbreakers : 1999

I was one of four participants of the panel discussion. The Chair, a hand-picked government appointee, started the ball rolling by asking me a leading question, “Acharaya thuma, relative to - sapekshava - Wayamba, these elections were less violent, no?” I said “Samavende, Pardon I think this is a strange question. Not relatively, but absolutely, there should not have been any violence at all”. I then continued, “Relative to Wayamba any election would have looked like a birthday party. But there is also a non physical form of violence that politicians inflict on our people. Look at all those posters, not a wall, private or government, not a bus stand, not a lamp post, not even road name boards are spared. Posters were pasted even on municipality signs boards saying “Let’s keep the city-town clean and tidy”! This is environment pollution and visual pollution. It is a violent imposition. People are helpless. There are laws against this but our politicians of every hue could not care less - that’s how dumb or defiant they are”.

“Another thing, I said, “there is a mental aberration called ‘Exhibitionism’ in English that is to say, svayampradarshana rogaya. Politicians do not get one poster with their mug shots pasted, but about ten, twelve are pasted one after the other!” “Probably”, I added, these politicians also think that the “janathava” are “mandha buddhikai” - the people are mentally deficient - and that they would not remember face unless it is hammered in several times”

“But the worst thing is this. These politicians, seem to be unaware even of the most basic principle high school students of civics would know. They do not seem to know where they want to go when they beg for the peoples’ vote. That the National Parliament is the Legislative Branch of the State – viyavasthhadayakaya – where peoples’ representatives are sent to make laws for the country’s good.” These jokerla are asking to be elected ‘to make laws for the people by breaking the law’ – “Nithi kadanno nithi hadanno vende janathavage chandhey illanawa”!

I will bet my last cent - they will break any laws that get in their monetary way. For politicians, all laws are like papadams, always meant to be broken.

The seed of corruption is sown to harvest a hundredfold. The money spent on posters cut outs, hoarding, on paying the catchers who paste and erect and if necessary to crack a few skulls, must be regained by hook or by crook.

When Thilangas punt and Susies run.
Who will be the lucky one?
Geetha’s smile or Ranil’s wile?
The One Shot boy or fav’rite Son?
A villain can also smile and smile

Idem Ditto 2010

That was 1999, eleven years ago. Has anything changed? Some faces have changed. The French have a saying, "Le plus ca change, le plus c'est la meme chose," - "The more it changes, the more it stays the same”. If there has been a change at all, it’s been a change for the worse. Now the country is littered not only with posters but public spaces are uglified with life size cut outs and huge hoardings with inanely grinning exhibitionists. The people want to go about their everyday business in peace without being buffeted by bofoonery at every nook and corner by buffoons.

The other day I turned into Church Road from the Moratuwa-Piliyandala Road. Right there on the very first wall, were posters of the minister of who was dedicated to urban (Un?) development spreading town and city pollution. With so many macho boys and glamour girls, in the race, I suppose he too had to be eye-catching. The photo must have been taken about two decades ago! I drove past thinking, surely, with such an illustrious father and what he has been exposed to, he must have picked up a thing or two about how things are done in more politically mature countries. He did his first studies in the Netherlands in the prestigious international school ‘Nijenrode’, run by the Jesuit fathers. Surely he must have at least heard that in the country of his old alma mater such vulgar display is banned and that politicians must respect election laws. If not, the police will make them. Here, politicians compel the police to break laws!

I drove on looking for the road sign to my destination. I managed to find it with difficulty. Smack in the middle of the 3x4 ft large name board was a poster with a (s)mug shot of the local politician - ‘large as a house’. Not very sporting, I thought. So there you are, these are the guys and the dolls who will be making laws which the citizens will have to obey.

All sorts of slogans are printed together with the mugs, saying how much they are dying to serve the people. Some decades ago a minister who was making a fortune illegally felling and selling timber had this slogan under his benevolent face “Sadahatama mama obage” – ‘I am for you always”. When he went to canvass in his home district some wiseacre had nailed hand written posters on the trees along the route the minister took with this slogan: “Apith sadahatama amathige” - We too are always the minister’s.” This time around the one with serial foreign affairs has a mug shot of his distinguished self with the slogan, ‘Won the World for the Country’! The World? Somey, give him the Cup.

The poor Election Commissioner still suffers post-election trauma stress. Looks like he has given up trying to enforce election laws. He tried though, at the last elections. He appointed a Competent Authority (CA) to prevent media abuse. The CA ruled that ITN stop its after-news propaganda piece. No problem. The programme name was changed, The text writer’s name was changed. The harangue continued. The CA also asked Rupavahini to stop serializing an old documentary on Hitler and the Nazis during the 8 o’clock news. No problem. It was stopped and replaced by an after-the-news Docu-drama on Idi Amin. There were many horribly lurid scenes: savagely machete chopped and slashed, blood drenched corpses piled up in prison yards; hacked off heads kept in deep freezers. The Docu-drama was also shown on day time TV, which little children also watch. There was no warning that some scenes may be very disturbing to the young. How could those sensitive little minds understand such cruelty? Will they not gradually be morally de-sensitised? Or is that what the jokers who select TV features really want? The other Idi Amin film, also repeatedly shown, was ‘The Last King of Scotland’. It was a less revolting Hollywoodised version of the dictator’s violent life and loves.

No Business like Politics

Politics, a Bandaranaieke sibling once said, is the family business. This family business has run down. But politics as a lucrative family business is spreading like AIDS – Assured Impunity Driven System. Want to make easy money? Do politics.

Several years ago, during a summer holiday visit, a friend took me for lunch to a club in Colombo which is named after an Italian island. It was on this Isle that I met him, standing at the bar. He looked prosperous in a gaudy way. He was holding a gold cigarette case and a packet of Dunhill. The top three buttons of his shirt were open revealing a hairy barrel chest and a thick gold chain round his thick neck. He wore gem-studded rings on the ring and forefingers of each hand. The stone on the right hand middle finger ring was a rock. Must serve as a knuckle duster, I thought. He wore a very thick gold bracelet and a thick pirith nuul band, on his left hand. My friend introduced me to the shortish thick set bejeweled man and said that I was now a university lecturer in Holland. Dunhill reacted with surprise:

“Nalin Swaris! How? How, man? You may not remember because I was a primary school tot when you were in advanced level. Kind of hero to us then, cadet sergeant, college hockey team. Remember the Good Shepherd cuties ? All lovely grannies now, machan.” I asked what he was doing. After that I could not get a word in. With mock modesty, he said, “Bit of politics last few years.” Drawing closer. Lowered voice. Knowing look. “Started small. You know buying and selling smuggled hootch. Swaris, you were among the brainy chaps in College. But I was smart, bought for fifty, sold for hundred and made my two percent”. Then I got into auto sales. Made good money, became important in my area. When buggers don’t pay their lease, must have the right men to seize the cars, no? Party noticed. Got nominations. Won. Slowly, slowly, became juniour minister.

Remember how you guys carried away prize after prize on the annual Prize Giving Day? Teachers thought I was a dud and would not make it in the world. How many degrees do you have, machang? “Three”, I said. “So with all those degrees, how much do you make now? Glad I did not waste time studying. Now buddy, big bungalow, marble floors - swimming pool at the back. Before you go, must show you my BMW, latest model - parked outside – chauffer and all.” Sad to say, a few years later, Dunhill’s life was tragically snubbed out.

Humour and Authoritarianism

It is said that authoritarian regimes don’t take kindly to political jokes. But judging by the political cartoons in the daily news papers, things don’t seem to be too bad.
But it would be salubrious if rulers have the capacity to laugh at themselves. Mikhail Gorbachev was one such. He was ousted by Boris Yeltsin in a colour revolution of sorts. Gorbachev became a seniour world statesman and especially American culture vultures loved to invite him for highly paid lectures about his Communist days. He was guest of a Larry King on CNN. Gorbachev was in nostalgic mood, but funny. One thing he tried hard to do, he said, during his Perestroika days was to curtail the rampant alcoholism among Russians. He had passed a law by which purchase of hard liquor was rationed. This led to long queues of people waiting to buy their quota. One man had been standing in the bitter cold for nearly two hours. Exasperated, he told the man behind him “Hold my place I want to go shoot that bastard Gorbachev. The man was back within half an hour. “So soon?”, asked the man in the queue. “Did you shoot the bugger?”. ”No, moaned the would be assassin, “That queue is even longer than this one!”

Thanks to the broadminded JHU, there are no long queues outside liquor stores anywhere in the country or outside JHU headquarters. At a press conference a seniour JHU monk was asked a small question about liquor being served at Temple Trees dansalas. The understanding monk replied,”Ithin, Raja Gedera adiyak dekak dunnate prasnayak nevei ne?” - If a tot or two is served in the King’s Palace it is not a big question, no?”

In Russia, with capitalism came the twin evils, rampant corruption and that export product even to Lanka, prostitution. In Lanka corruption was petty retail rupee business before 1977. Thereafter it became a wholesale trade in dollars. How much would a 10% commission on a multi million dollar mega project deliver? How to catch? The commission is transferred directly to a secret foreign bank account. In Karl Marx’ words, what has overwhelmed national life since 1977, is “a general state of whoredom”.

The Haggling Will Begin

A multi millionaire American business tycoon in his mid fifties made an interesting proposal to a 24yr old gorgeous with very visible assets. “Will you be my mistress for two weeks for a million dollars?” She thought for a while and said “Why not?” Then, the millionaire asked, “How about 500 for tonight?” The young thing shot back indignantly, “What do you think I am, a whore?” Replied the millionaire, “Well, we’ve settled that. We are now haggling about the price”

The nature of Lankan politics has been settled. Now that a new smaller cabinet is expected, the haggling will begin for the most lucrative posts and perks. The people lose their sovereignty the moment they cast their vote. They become beggars with little left to choose till the next elections. In between the foreign junkets. Where to catch? Hasta la Vista, baby, Au Revoir, Arrivederci, Aufwiederschen, Tot Ziens, Yanne Enne, Kanne Bonne, Nalla Savari.

PS. ‘Minister’ is a Latin word meaning ‘servant’. ‘Service’ is also derived from the Latin ‘servus’ and means ‘slave’ Considering the number of ministers maintained at public expense the ordinary citizen is suffering from a ’servant problem’. Sending the poor to slave abroad enriches the Servant in charge, not the people.

(The writer can be reached at jnswaris@gmail.com )