Ranil: A study in mediocrity

by Francis Perera

Ranil Wickremesinghe is to Sri Lanka what count Tallyrand was to France. Both men labour under a sense of frustration, having failed to reach the top of what is called, 'the greasy pole of power'. They both share one trait in common: a passion to exploit their position to denigrate and damn their homeland when on foreign soil.

The memorial for Tallyrand in the Pantheon has been removed, and today his name is a byword for a renegade in France. Ranil's motive for roving about the globe is patently clear. It is to undermine the best interests of Sri Lanka, and to see that she is consigned to the paraihood of international isolation. He does not have the sense to see that in the long run it is self-defeating.

Nowhere in the world is a traitor respected; in the eyes of the common people he is a moral leper. As president Mahinda has said Ranil has every right to censure the government, if in his opinion, it has committed sins of omission and commission, but that he flouts all norms of decency when on his visits to foreign lands he denounces Sri Lanka for mythical offences.

In Ranil's anti-Mahinda philippics he identifies the President with the State. Such an equation is absurd. Under our constitution President Mahinda is the custodian of the state only for a fixed period of time. It was the late J. R. Jayewardene, Ranil's uncle, who in pursuing his course of aggrandizement, went on to identify himself with the State. Although he did not like Louis XIV of France go to the length of saying, "I am the State", sentiment was manifest in his actions.

It is a pity that Ranil does not hold the noble office of the leadership of the opposition with the seriousness it deserves. It appears that he has appointed a few of his political henchmen to handle most of the onerous tasks that the office entails, while he is engaged in giving vent to his wanderlust.

A leader of the opposition, in a constitutional sense, has the potential of becoming Head of State. In the words of Professor Dicey, the Leader of the Opposition is the shadow Head of the executive, who is awaiting the moment when the swing of the executive pendulum will clothe him with its reality. Unrelenting labour and exertion on the part of the aspirant to the lofty position is called for. But Ranil hopes to get at the palm without soiling his fingers - an impossible feat.

The constitutional methods of fighting the government do not seem to appeal to him. All along he has shown a congenital inability to take the people into his confidence. On the other hand he has shown a penchant for making whirlwind global tours to meet well-known and less well-known foreign leaders in order to prejudice their minds against Sri Lanka. His faith in pseudo-astrologers who predicted that he would be catapulted to power made him the laughing stock of the land.

Ranil shows an affinity with the insect known as the Vespa Valgaris which in a fit of perverseness turns its sting on itself. He is bent on a course of political self destruction. He has proved himself to be a monomaniac going from one state to another with but one topic to be talked about and that one topic bereft of truth. His motive is a sinister one. Wherever he goes he contacts nondescript rightwing organisations, and under their patronage speaks of a non-existent reign of terrorin Sri Lanka. Thank goodness that neither at home nor abroad is any credence to his words. He is seen as a veritable Don Quixote tilting at windmills, pursuing mythical beasts and attacking phantom monsters.

The irony of ironies is that Ranil who leads the party responsible for the genesis of ethnic evidence in the eighties - the attacks on innocent Tamils - is serving the cause of the LTTE, falsely accusing the government of persecuting the Tamils. Here is a situation where the thief himself cries,' thief! thief! A commission of inquiry appointed by a human rights organisation, found Cyril Mathew, a senior minister of the UNP government, guilty of organising attacks on Tamils. The hoodlums be let lose in the city. Went about killing innocent Tamils, looting their homes and setting fire to their business premises.

The bonfires they caused raged all night bathing the city in a lurid light. J. R. Jayewardene who must have had a bird's eye view of the inferno from the balcony of President's House remains strangely inactive. A state of anarchy prevailed in the city and its suburbs for forty eight hours. At last it was the threat of Indian military intervention that compelled President Jayewardene to take steps to stem the tide of violence. The burning down of the Jaffna library by UNP led hooligans is perhaps the greatest act of cultural vandalism perpetrated in South East Asia in the twentieth century. Ranil who was a minister of the government at that time must share the guilt for the dastardly crime committed against the Tamil Community.

Gotabhaya Rajapaksa who has a flare for organising successful attacks on LTTE Camps is Ranil's bug bear. Thanks to Gotabhaya Rajapaksa's experience as an army officer and his military prowess he has been able to inspire our troops to fight relentlessly and to sweep the eastern province clean of terrorists.

They liberated the eastern province inflicting heavy losses in men and arms to the LTTE. Gotabhaya is first and foremost a man of action.

From the time that he was appointed Defence Secretary he saw to it that our troops kept up an incessant bombardment of LTTE camps and bases.

Our troops who had been demoralised by Ranil's and Chandrika's uninspiring leadership are now jubilant that they have a dynamic leader like Gotabhaya to guide them. He does not expect our worrier soldiers to rest on their laurels.

He wants their next target to be Toppigala. It is a matter of time before Toppigala the LTTE bastion, midway between the North and the East falls into the hands of government troops.

Gotabhaya is undoubtedly the hero of the masses - the darling of youth. People are outraged to read Ranil's outbursts of vituperation against the Defence Secretary. They attribute it to envy - the envy of a politician whose importance to act when action was called for has cost the country dear in men and money. To Gotabhaya goes the credit of boosting the morale of the troops and of instilling the people with confidence in the army's ability to win.

No man is infallible, even the most successful of generals have had to suffer occasional setbacks. The brilliant victories Gotabhaya has won over the LTTE are of no account in the eyes of Ranil. For having suffered one setback he calls upon Gotabhaya to resign. What of Ranil? under his effete leadership the UNP has suffered fourteen defeats at elections, but he has refused to resign. Here is an example of what Shakespeare calls chop logic.

I now give a set pattern of Ranil's reaction to an election defeat.

On the morrow of defeat he submits his resignation from the party leadership well aware that his sycophants will clamour for its withdrawal.

The clamour takes place and Ranil isn't slow in withdrawing the resignation giving as excuse that the masses want him back. People are now used to his modus operandi. This practice is sheer skulduggery.

He recommends that Gotabhaya be replaced by Janaka Perera, a retired army officer. Men must be consistent is what they say or do. When Ranil was Prime-Minister he failed to make use of Janaka Perera's services, and now he has no moral right to speak of his suitability to the post of Defence Secretary. The unscrupulous use of Janaka Perera's name to serve his ends must have caused that gentleman no little embarrassment.

It is only a man of rare integrity who will confess that the views he held were wrong. Such a one is Rajitha Senaratna. He was one who believed that the LTTE terrorists could never be dislodged from the east. The expulsion is now an accomplished fact - a fait accompli. He now says he is happy to have been proved wrong in his thinking. The Rev. Galaboda Gnanissara high priest of the Gangarama Temple a longstanding friend of Ranil, has taken the latter to task for his baseless criticism of the Defence Secretary. Ranil's reaction has been to withdraw his patronage of the temple. The good monk like many other Buddhist dignitaries is pleased that our forces under Gotabhaya's direction have ruined in the terrorists in the east.

All right thinking people are happy to note that unlike in the past the maximum use is made of the fighting potentialities of our servicemen to stamp out terrorism and to clear the path for a negotiated solution to the ethnic issue. All that the good monk asked of Ranil was not to make of it a political issue.

The Report of Ranil's stewardship is not an impressive one. His political sins are as scarlet. The ceasefire agreement he entered into with the LTTE in an arbitrary manner is now observed only in the breach. It is in shameless. The people resented J. R. Jayewardene's unilateral action in merging the northern and eastern provinces. But there was nothing they could do about it at the time because President Jayewardene commanded a steam roller majority in Parliament. After his demise the issue was revived; people clamoured for the de-merger of the two provinces. To honour the memory of his uncle, the late J. R. Jayewardene. Ranil put up a stout defence of the merger. It came to nought.

On a court ruling the two provinces have now been demerged. President Jayewardene merged the two provinces under duress; having been pressurised by the Indian government. It was the first time in modern history that a Sri Lankan head of State gave in to threats and pressure by a foreign power J. R. Jayewardene was no ordinary poltroon!

Ranil is now visiting States, both big and small in the capacity of a self-appointed ambassador, the mission he has set himself being the vilification of his motherland. A large number of people, including supporters of his party, have expressed their chagrin of his anti-national action. Ignoring the constitution of his party he now acts like a law unto himself.