More minuses than pluses: the honeymoon is over for the bridegroom

“The best bit of this government is unlike the earlier leaders who while lying through their teeth showed a polite and convincing face to the foreign media the Defence Secretary does not stand on ceremony for these foreign yokels in the media.”
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by Pearl Thevanayagam

(July 04, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Keep it in the family. That’s what I say. If North Korea’s Kim Il-Sung. could thumb his nose at the West and appoint his son Kim Jong Il as leader of the armed forces why can’t our President, who wiped out the LTTE with the unequivocal support of his older brother Gothabaya and his other siblings not to mention Gen. Sarath Fonseka which his predecessors failed to do since they were dilly-dallying with the LTTE, sometimes negotiating and at the same time reneging on promises, enthrone his whole family in parliament?

We see many parallels betweeen the two nations. Both are Socialist Republics. Both Presidents adore the silver screen and ours even twinkled a bit on it. The two countries have an unsurpassing record for curtailing the media. When you harness this wild ass you are in absolute control.

The two countries gained independence in 1948 and today they have a cult leadership contained within the ruling clan. Is it a co-incidence they are also very pally with Russia and China. North Korea had floods and Sri Lanka had Tsunami when both needed the same foreign powers they shunned to step in and salvage them.

Sri Lankans must be terribly unruly by nature (you only have to watch the parliamentary proceedings, election campaigns and of course journalists digging out piffling proclivities of political candidates just in time for the elections) and it is the bounden duty of this government to bring them to heel. These journalists shoot off their mouth and they are loose cannons so it must ensure that Emergency Regulations are re-inforced and strengthened by way of strict media censorship to stop their projectile. In the process you have no choice but to deny them entry to the war zone.

Sri Lankans must be protected from gory scenes of the war (they are such gentle and sensitive creatures for whom the sight of blood and the sound of guns could traumatise them for life) so they had to be denied news of war and its horrific videos of maimed bodies and close-up shootings in the run-up to the victory over the LTTE.

Channel 4 hates our people cocooned from the horrible nightmarish sights of the ravages of war thanks to our government barring the media since the British are exposed through their free media to the atrocities committed in all four corners of the Third World such as Liberia, Congo, Afghanistan, Iraq where they pitted one against the other so they could get oil, minerals and access to ocean produce not to mention get one up over US, their friend and foe, in getting a little piece of the action in military surveillance over India, Iran and other territories in the Indian Ocean.

So what did they do? They exposed those horrific videos of innocent civilians shot at point-blank. All propaganda and a freebie holiday in sunny Sri Lanka.

Otherwise how do you explain the chasing out of moles in humanitarian organizations who actually spy for the CIA, UN and UK’s MI5. You do not take chances with these foreign journalists masquerading as working for NGOs. So throw them all out or deny them visas just to be on the safe side.

Now that our President has firmly enthroned himself he needs to surround himself with advisors. After all Sri Lanka is a Socialist Democratic Republic. No, he cannot take decisions by himself being a democratically elected leader. All that talk about vote-rigging is sour-grapes gossip by those who lost.

Ergo he has a total of 85 cabinet ministers and 40 ministry secretaries. Top heavy you might say but you do not take chances. The President needs all the support he can muster although key ministries are within the dynasty. Then again I say keep it in the family so that by the time it is overthrown it would have amassed a fortune for the next five generations.

The best bit of this government is unlike the earlier leaders who while lying through their teeth showed a polite and convincing face to the foreign media the Defence Secretary does not stand on ceremony for these foreign yokels in the media. Not only does he bury a whole pumpkin in a plate of rice but he tells them where to get off and warns his detractors would be executed.

Now we do not want the international community to think we are a dictatorship. No sirree. With our tradition of equality among diversity we will set up commissions; in our own time. The fact these commissions have to date produced no report for public scrutiny is beside the point. There is doubt-proof evidence thousands were killed both by the armed forces and the rebels. But nobody is allowed to go on record this happened because the government has fool-proof evidence that no media was allowed to record these. Remember this war was without eye-witnesses. The surviving civilians, the aid workers and the foreign media who managed to witness and video events are lying toe-rags. The rebels cried wolf when they were cornered.

As the honeymoon comes to a close, there are rumblings about settling the dowry and paying back the loan for the wedding festivities. The bridegroom is riddled with insurmountable debt, EU is withdrawing GSP+ concessions unless he and his bestmen prove this marriage is for real. Read human rights violations, gagging those great war rumour-mongers from telling it all about the revelers free hands in the bloody rampage across Vanni slaughtering the innocents along with the retreating rebels in their thousand and chasing out the remaining thousands of civilians out into the open falling victim to bombs, shells and rocket launchers. Just to make sure there are no more rebels the groom’s party shot captured youth at close range.

Now North Korea, as of October 11, 2008, was removed from the US list of states which sponsor terrorism. Unlike Sri Lanka, North Korea is co-operating with the UN and shut down its five nuclear facilities. North and South are engaged in meanignful dialogue whereas our President is trying his best to fracture talks with the Tamil parties and even trying to pit one against the other.

While the countries which had decades long internecine wars are rising out of the phoenix this tiny island is regressing by shouting that foreign powers should not interfere in internal affairs except to give them aid unconditionally.

In the absence of any sensible advice from within his cabinet our President is slicing off the country and selling it to China and India who do not care a tuppence for us but racing each other to get stuck into the pudding and hold their dominance in the Indian Ocean island.

Like Brooklyn Beckham who has not worked in his entire life gets a £45,000 toy Ferrari from Harrods, the President, his siblings and his son have apportioned themselves key portfolios over and above their means and knowledge. The AG’s department is under the purview of the President. The judiciary is no longer independent. It should kowtow to the Executive President. He will also have the power to appoint the Judicial Service Commission with a Chief Justice and two other Supreme Court Judges.

Phew, what a country.