Ran Malak Lesa Deu Bamun Dothin Pidu Mhe Pin Bime… A golden land gifted by the gods…
By Udith Lokubandara, Former MP
The phrase is now been hummed by the people of Sri Lanka more than ever today. The modified version is very catchy and lot of respect to the artist. But do we actually see the depth of these words is a question I have ringing inside of me.
Sri Lanka, the pearl of the Indian ocean is today a burnt out mess. The Ramayana was an epic fun story book I always loved to read in my father’s very spacious library, and the young me would always stare at the wooden ceiling and visualize what it would have been. Hanuman burning every rakshas palace with his burning tail. But never thought I will see the scene live on tv.
Today we see the Presidents house, President secretariat, Temple Trees, being overrun by frustrated youth and disgruntled Sri Lankans. We watched in awe as royal places of reverence were going up in flames. All for what? Why did this happen. The easy and of course very attractive answer would be to start off from 1948 and start the blame game and criticize the politicians and the wrong decisions and so on and so on. But tap into one’s conscience and look for an answer. Truth is, we just couldn’t continue to afford the Rajapaksa’s.
Go Home Gota.
Nandasena Gotabaya Rajapaksa was elected president on the 18th of November 2019. Why? Because his brother could not run for presidency. He was made ineligible by the constitutional amendment to which I myself voted as a member of parliament at that time upon the instructions of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Gotabaya was chosen simply because he was supposed to be a stop gap measure till Namal Rajapaksa the son of President Mahinda Rajapaksa came of age. These instructions were given to Gotabaya and it was this rational why the much more seasoned politician in the family Chamal was not given the chance. Chamal who has a son who is already in politics was not a safe call. You can be a Rajapaksa but still you are a father. So that was not a risk the Mahinda Rajapaksa family was willing to take. Gotabaya on the other hand was ideal with a very uninterested son and an even more uninterested and unambitious wife. But what happened was a disaster.
During my five-year stint as Mahinda Rajapaksa’s private secretary many are the times the two of us had to spend all alone simply because no one else was willing to take the risk of been seen with the former president. During these many moments of isolation President Mahinda has shared many views with me. It rings in my ears how president Mahinda would say in his deep rough reedy voice… ‘the president seat is a right royal messy thing “isay”. Makes people go crazy.’ Two years down the line we saw it happen to his brother. So much so the PMs phone calls were going unattended and the country was slipping down the drain. Leaving the masses to come out and call a spade a spade… GOTA PISSEK.
How To Go Forward
The Rajapaksa family has come this far with their political tact. They will do so in the future and go on but that’s not the question right now. Right now, the question is how to get out of the soup we are in. Sri Lanka has only one opening, reach out for help.
Help us SOS… But help from who…
The world is in a financial crunch. War is raging in Ukraine. America is going through her worst time. Europe has too much on her plate making sure Mr. Putin doesn’t spilling into her borders. The Sheiks are worried what’s going to happen to their investments. Big brother India is in a spin as to how to justify the $4 billion Mr. Modi spent on the Sri Lankan PR gambit. China has no time for Sri Lanka as her major concern now is keeping any more contagious virus cocktailed in labs coming into her lands. Who can do something for the Golden Land Gifted by the Gods?
Sri Lanka is in a split today. I was standing proud chest pumped forward and tapping my personal revolver as if I could gun down any threat to president Mahinda Rajapaksa with the four shots, I had in it when he bellowed loud “there are only two factions in this country from now on… the ones who love the mother land, and the ones who don’t… the ones who love the mother land are with me the ones who don’t are standing against me.” That was in May 2009 Parliament grounds.
Today the situation is the people of the country are screaming on the top of their lungs. “There are only two factions in the country the ones who are backing the Rajapaksa regime for money and the ones who aren’t.” Any person coming forward to speak on behalf of the Rajapaksa family are branded as “slaves”. The hatred shown to this one family is beyond comprehension. In this back drop a solution with the Rajapaksa family involved in the answer is a total taboo today.
Mr. Clean and master brain Ranil Wickramashinghe is getting castrated today as a Rajapksa family stooge. Dullas Alahperuma on the other hand is getting hailed a demi God simply because he stood up to the family. Still the majority is so hell shocked there is talk that Dullas must be a Trojan horse.
The popular call for justification of a Ranil Wickramashinghe presidency is the man talks the language of the IMF and World bank and the international community. But now there is a case where the world feels a bit foul to current acting president Ranil’s accent, the guy is a Rajapaksa stooge. This black mark has tarnished Ranil Wickramashinghe irreparable. All respect he had engineered for himself over the years are now going down. Also, his diplomatic jugglery during the Yahapalana stint is still bitter in the throats of both the Chinese and the Indians. My friends in Delhi and Beijing and even the guys who rarely call from Moscow were of the opinion that they are not in a position to deal with the ace conjuror that Ranil is famed to be. No one is rich enough now to be duped given the world economic crisis we are sitting in. The Arabic countries are in no friendly terms with the snobbish approach they were shown during the Gotabaya regime. Some Arabic diplomats had been even denied a photograph during the head of state courtesy calls. Its to such background that Ranil Wickramashinghe is now coming forward as the temporary representative. The doubts are high of the telephone being answered.
Now the question who knows the lingo? Draw back to 2005. Mahinda Rajapaksa is president. By a slim margin all thanks to the infamous Basil deal. Tiran Alles was beaming from ear to ear. Not dreaming he will be landing himself in jail in the coming years and then landing himself in cabinet with the very same people who will gazette the prisons department under him, fate is funny. But it was this period that saw the Madamulana Mahinda transform himself into Maharaja Mahinda. So, who spoke the lingo then? It was one special person. Mangala Samaraweera. It was Mangala who spoke the lingo. It was he who was instrumental in putting the right words in. But he was sidelined when Mangala was going out of script. Mahinda Rajapaksa being the crafty politician he is played the cards to make sure the linguist in the UNP were all sent in mass exodus to his fold. Now the language was being fluently spoken. The international community was handled by the likes of Rohitha Bogollagama and GL Peris. Even the language to the Sri Lankan masses was handled by like of people like my father W.J.M. Lokubandara and Karu Jayasuriya coming on board. The UNP was working overtime for Mahinda Rajapksa it seemed. When Veluphille Prabhakaran was meeting his waterloo in Nandikadal political opposition to the Rajapksa dynasty was seeing a similar fate it seemed. A royal blood line was being breaded. Family links were getting drawn to the hero king Dhutugamunu and extending to lineage all the way to the Buddha. By 2010 when fresh elections were called riding on the war victory likes of myself were also in parliament not for the UNP my family had represented in local government, provincial and national level for over four decades but for Mahinda Rajapaksa. United Party Vote banks were building the foundations of a 2/3 majority in parliament that will sweep in legislation that gives Maharaja Mahinda the authority to contest in any election as long as the people of the Golden Land gifted by god seemed fit. The lingo was handled. So much so the figures were amazing. Sri Lanka was rocketing herself at a over 8% growth rate. Inflation was held at a single digit. It was a sunshine period. But in the back ground there was a cloud growing at this same speed. The Rajapaksa extended family. I don’t want to bore anyone telling over what we all know.
So, for all who are wondering how to talk us out of the soup pot we are in, it’s clear, all the linguist who made this possible are today in one camp. Prof GL Peris has emboldened himself to second the nomination of Dullas Alahapperuma who was nominated by non-other than Sajith Premadasa. The masses shakers of the dynasty Wimal Weerawansa and Udaya Gamanpilla are independent in their views. The only man who was able to run this country over the last two decades and not invite an international criminal inquiry Mythreepala Sirisena is sitting in discussion with them. The Islam representation of Sri Lanka are united to anything but a BBS uprising. My opinion we got the best language speakers on board. The challenge now making them to speak on behalf of the Golden Land Gifted by the gods. So, with the announcement of Hon. Dullas Alahapperuma as the president candidate and Opposition Leader the graduate from my school of study at the London School of Economics Hon. Sajith Premadasa as prime minister all I wish as a Sri Lankan is for the gods to hear the prayers of the 22million Sri Lankans living in this Golden Land Gifted by God.
(Udith Lokubandara is a former MP and a secretary to Former Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. But he was sacked after he fell out with the PM family on allegations of personal funds being mismanaged during his stint as Mahinda Rajapakas private secretary. Later Prime minister’s Office went on record denying any such allegations.)