People’s power and thinking of July 9 - EDITORIAL

People taking the law into their hands is a common sight at queues and at fuel stations. People are frustrated to the brim, but that doesn’t give them the power to behave like hooligans. 
Just the other day at a fuel queue,  in Western Province, some tuk tuk drivers were seen checking customers whether they had tokens when clearly the Army was appointed for the job. It was after a motortist in the queue retaliated and asked what business the tuk tuk drivers had to check tokens that the situation became calmer. 

The rebellion by the people to topple this regime has brought its pluses and minuses. It put the government in its place and even forced a prime minister to resign. But then this trend of promoting youth aggression also must be checked at times; or better now and then. Look at how the queues on both sides of the road are curtailing the traffic on the road. Much of the traffic congestion on the road is  caused by how people are reacting to the fuel crisis. Though people have come up in life and have a means of travelling in their own vehicles the crisis also forces bringing out the worst in people. Have these people who fight in queues really made progress in life or in other words moved in the direction of development? Critics would opine that there is much to 
be desired. 

Columnists writing to this newspaper have often underscored that some Sri Lankans travelling on the newly built highways prove that they cannot match their life progress with that of raised infrastructure in the field of transport. This happens when commuters spit out of the window and even drive in a manner which inconveniences others. How you obey road rules tells a lot about your upbringing and where you are in real life. 

What this writer needs to stress is that Sri Lankans have got a third chance at improving as a nation. We initially had the tsunami, but didn’t the influential people rob off this opportunity which was meant to feed and help the affected? Then we had the Corona virus where we saw death at the doorstep. Very few people changed as individuals and became better humans. But there again we read so much negative information about the pandemic. We saw how the ambitious made a quick buck being involved in serving a cause which catered to those who were desperately in need of medicines and hospitals. 

This rebellion against the regime is the third opportunity coming the people’s way to refine themselves. We should be seeing a system where fuel is given to people in need ahead of those were in the queue. Priority must be given to the needy; occasionally moving away from system of who came first to the queue. Didn’t we see on television how a foreign tourist, who didn’t join the queue, at a fuel station being chased away rather rudely when he went there to obtain diesel? These aggressive individuals may never have understood that its these foreigners who bring in US dollars to the country through their travel here!
We do remember the times of the JVP in the late 1980s and the period of rule by the tiger rebels when people were inconvinienced. Much of those who were agitating were youth and the key factor that caused their down fall was violence. 

What has happened at present is that the roles have been reversed. It’s the youth who are exercising tolerance and patience and the middle aged and the old are not doing too well in the coping up business. The best example was the alleged act by one of the stalwarts of this regime-now not in power- ordering thugs to manhandle peaceful protesters at Galle Face.  
It is said that July 9 is yet again going to be a deciding day in this people’s rebel against the regime. Let’s hope that protesters don’t take the law into their hands because when victory comes faster than expected those who newly acquire power can become blind.