Elections and the Servant of Compassion II

12 January 2019

On January 10, 2015, I wrote a piece called Election and a Servant of Compassion. It was about the political revolution that brought about end to Rajapakse regime and the person who succeeded, Maithripala Sirisena. When I am writing this, another political revolution has taken place in Sri Lanka. And the instigator of political instability (that brought about that political revolution) was Maitripaala.

When I wrote about Maitripala in January 2015, I did not know him well. I only saw him as a person who could make a difference. I alluded to his name--Maitripala-servant of compassion. However, I now realize compassion itself is not enough to move a country forward. In the immediate aftermath of January 8 (2015) political revolution, people in Sri Lanka--I mean politically and socially progressive people--had a desire to steer the country towards true democracy, the rule of law and true reconciliation. Further, people expected hit hard on corruption and abuse of power and bring person who committed those to justice. For me true democracy means democracy beyond elections. For many Sri Lankans democracy means voting at an election. For me democracy should be a ongoing and participatory one by all sectors of the society. True reconciliation means going beyond rhetoric and political speeches: actually to initiate a process for reconciliation and healing. Truth-seeking beyond ethnic divide is very much part of it. However, non of that really happen. While there were initiatives, they were not progressed expediently. They should have been.

I was on a hike on October 26th 2018 in near Lake Luzern when I got a phone call from a friend. She asked me, "did you hear what happened?" I asked, "what?" "Mahinda Rajapakse was just now sworn in as the prime minister." I did not know what to say or how to react. It was moment of shock and disbelief. I was quiet for a while. My immediate reaction was "Oh! OK, I did not know that." The person on the phone kept talking explaining how terrible this can be. After I ended the call, I was thinking how this could have happened--on what legal basis? Of course, I was naiive again. In my country there need no legal basis for things to happen. So, October 26th brought about the series of events that followed creating one of the most unstable political situations in the recent times. There was chaos in the government ministries not knowing whom to report to. There were two prime ministers claiming each of of them were legitimate and the other was not. Overnight officials were fired and new ministers were sworn in. There were ugly scenes in the parliament like no other time in the history of Sri Lanka. All these were due to the child-like, stubborn and backward actions of one person--Maitripaala.

Over last few years my good friend Sunanda Deshapriya often told me about Maitripala and he is still a village agent or a graama sewaka, meaning, he still have the mentality of a village man and trying to run the country with backward village mindset. His reason to unconstitutionally dismiss the sitting prime minister was utterly childish and backward: "I do not like him and I cannot work with him."

But this 1026 incident was a litmus test for our our civil society and the judiciary. In fact, it was the civil society organizations, social media and the judiciary that restored the faith in democracy and the rule of law, finally ending the crisis. In that sense, December 12, 2018 is a also a significant date for the democracy and the rule of law of my country. If the Supreme Court that day gave a different judgement, we should have had irreparably disastrous outcome--we should have dragged ourselves towards a corrupt dictatorship once again.

So, at the end, Maitripala's compassion did not work. He in fact made a total mess. And, quite comically, he still thinks that he has done the right thing. Some lawyers filed case in the SCSL to check whether he is mentally fit to run the country. I think he is a village idiot or gamay pissa. No one knew about this side of him before. He appeared a compassionate and kind man. But he was a mad man, after all. And we elected him to become president. Because, that was the only way we could get rid of a corrupt and dangerous dictator in making. So, have we done the right thing?