Power, politicians and people - EDITORIAL

Power blinds and power intoxicates. Too much power in the hands of a single individual, especially in the hands of individual politicians can lead to gigantic errors. 
Not too long ago, a particular president of this country boasted that the only power he did not have under the Constitution was to change a man into a woman and vice versa.

Drunk with power, he attempted to solve the ‘National Question’ in Sri Lanka via a military solution. The war he unleashed lasted nearly 30 years, during which nearly a hundred thousand or more people were killed. The wounds inflicted by that war are still fresh in the minds of both the victims and the vanquishers. No solution has been yet been found to salve the wounds of that war. Instead they continue to fester.
In Germany, a megalomaniac dictator used his power in an attempt to solve what he saw as a worldwide Jewish problem. Over six million Jews as well as Russians said to have died in Hitler’s final solution.

Coming back to our own country, last week; quite out of the blues so-to-say President Gotabaya Rajapaksa announced Ven. Gnanasara Thera - who had been found guilty and imprisoned on Contempt of Court charges - would head a Committee to make a study and implement a pet scheme of his the ‘One Law, One Country’ concept.
Ven. Gnanasara in addition to being convicted of contempt of court charges has also played a lead role in castigating all minority communities in the country and has been accused of leading attacks on minority groups.  
It would appear that the influence of past President Mahinda Rajapaksa is on the wane. That master of PR would never blatantly thrust a person known to have anti-minority feelings to head such an important committee.
But, we should in actuality not be surprised by the sudden announcement. In the past, President Gotabaya has replaced medical experts leading the ‘war’ against Covid-19 with military generals.

A result was the sudden spike in numbers of the public falling victim to the disease. Overall, to date over 542,000 persons have been afflicted with Covid-19 and around 13,760 persons have succumbed to the disease.
We also have the sudden decision to impose a blanket ban on the application of petroleum-based fertilizers pesticides etc., in agriculture. A very good idea, but not the one which could be implemented overnight. 
Today, at the height of the paddy planting season, farmers are on the streets protesting the ban while paddy fields are left unattended. Even those fields which were planted already, do not have the required fertilizer for the newly planted seedlings. Governments about-turn on the ban has come a little too late in the season.

A poor crop will be the result of this short-term thinking. But the men, women and children going to face the consequences of this short-sighted policy will be the nearly 50% new poor (created by the corona virus). Many of whom lost their employment. Many others in the private sector are receiving half wages! Tea, rubber and coconut industries - the backbone of our economy and main export earners will also be hit likewise. 
Can we overcome the effects of drop in foreign exchange earnings especially at a time when our main remittances via expatriate workers has run dry? Are we heading back to the era of bread queues and shortages? Are we to expect empty shelves and food rationing in the near future?

One of the main grouses the people of this country had with the past ‘Yahapalana’ regime was the sale of the country’s strategic assets and the rising cost of living. Today the CoL is way beyond the average citizen.
Inability to repay loans resulted in the port at Hambantota being virtually handed to China. Today government has - we are informed - made arrangements with a US multinational company to hand over electricity generation via sale of shares of the Yugadanavi power plant at Kerawalapitiya. 

To make matters worse, the usual tender procedure system has not been followed, the Cabinet of Ministers were not consulted and everybody, other than a small coterie of people, are in the dark regarding the deal. The situation is so bad that the political parties within the ruling coalition are protesting the move and trade unions have threatened to literally black the country out if government goes ahead with the deal. 
The country is facing a case where too much power is concentrated in a single individual, who apparently has too many things on his plate.