cat’S eye :

Things are a-happening!

On Thursday, June 18 night this cat went to sleep purring so loud she could easily have woken her neighbours. Yes, she purred because she was happy. And what made her happy? A mouse running right into her and allowing her to bully it? A piece of cheese or a saucer of cream? No silly! Nothing so trivial as that. Kumari listened to MTV News First at Nine and had a wonderful lot of good things said, meaning positive steps to be taken in the near future.

Of course there were pronouncements broadcast by the most recent of the several speakers who have adopted the Abeyarama Temple as their pulpit or Hyde Park corner soapbox. It was Prof G.L. Peiris pontificating. (The less quoting him, the better). T.B. Ekanayake shared the pulpit with him, with Dullas A, Vasudeva N, Gammanpila, Dinesh G and Wimal W having temporarily vacated their pontificating pedestal in the temple premises. (For shame to use holy ground thus!) Menika had been parched for something to write about this Sunday of the monsoon rains. She was sick to death of the SLFPers and or the UPFA’s intransigence over support of the Twentieth A and the haggling over the number of seats in Parliament of the future. Though they had lodged two censure motions in Parliament against Ravi K and Ranil W, neither was taken up for debate.

Then she had shouted herself hoarse at the desecration of a particular Buddhist temple and the habit of some (discarded by the public in favour of the metta one) of making political speeches with strong undertones of the three vices identified by the Buddha namely – greed, ignorance and hate with a fourth attendant vice – simmering desire for revenge. So, parched for news she sat bolt upright as she listened to News at Nine on Thursday, June 18.

Drug eradication

There was her hero, the Maithri One, proclaiming that the drug menace among the youth of the country, aka schoolboys and schoolgirls, would be addressed forthwith and reduced, if not eradicated for good. And if the Maithri One says something, he means it, and it will be done. Amen! He crusades for the right causes and here he was very serious about wiping out the availability of drugs to schoolgoers. That is absolutely laudable; three cheers and all that! Immediately pictures came to this feline’s mind: Wele Sudha languishing in jail; containers of ethanol and other stuff imported with letters issued from no less an office than the previous Prime Minister’s. And that elder politician is now a presidential advisor. Not done at all in Menika’s opinion that the Ex PM and a long ago PM, both geriatrical, are now advisors to the Prez.

Wheels within wheels and political expediency of the absolutely needed kind, we presume, propelled the President’s signing wrist to so honour these two. The sources that import drugs and alcohol and sell them should be nabbed and punished with iron fists. Drug addiction among the young is stark and widespread. Hence those responsible for its import and manufacture and distribution deserve the most dire punishment. You cannot tell an addict to stop his addiction. The source of his addiction has to be removed for good. So catch those suspected of drug import and distribution.

Clean up of the future Parliament

This feline lapped up deliciously Ranjan Ramanayake’s pronouncements on elections and whom to give nomination to. Many UNPers have been voicing the concern of rabble being members of the August House by the Diyawanne. Hence the need to cut down to a minimum the manape vote. Ven Maduluwawe Sobitha Thera has repeatedly said that Parliament should be cleared of drug barons, rapists, murderers and all those dregs of society, which seem to abound in present-day Sri Lankan politics. On Thursday, June 18 Menika heard a cannon-to-right-of-them, cannon-to-left-of-them type of fiery speech from that hamson hunk of film fame and now speaking loud and clear on matters of grave political importance.

He said that when he gets up to address Parliament he is disconcerted having a murderer to the right of him; a rapist to the left of him; a necklace snatcher in front of him and a thug behind him. No truer words were uttered and to this cat’s jaundiced eye, its blue she sees garbing these dregs of society who are in Parliament. We have heard that a person from down South who is a vociferous parliamentarian and was a Minister of State or Deputy in the previous Cabinet, earned the sobriquet ‘raththaran’ for an obvious reason. In some of his speeches delivered in stentorian voice, he has painted himself whiter than the driven snow – the saintliest moral man with concern only for the suffering poor!

Paffrel has drawn guidelines on who is to be allowed to seek nomination, and made it public. That is a move in the right direction and will be favoured by our President, Prime Minister and so many others. Again Menika sees the colour green here. Red too since those firebrands of the JVP oppose the riff-raff that now populate Parliament.

No to MR

And so Menika comes to another pronouncement that gladdened her heart. There has been much mental and emotional see-sawing of late with the ex-President causing the waves. (Mixed metaphor, that!) Like Humperdink who sings of his band of guitar playing men, this ex-leader of the nation too has a band of faithfuls who strum their gut strings to breaking point with severe assault on our eardrums. What they demand is that Mahinda Rajapaksa should be handed over the premiership of the country on a golden platter. Others politely say he should retire to his now huge abode in Medamulane, (not Carlton House in Matara), and keep away from politics. Of course the infamous Four and many others will fall by the wayside off his satakaya like lice shaken off if he is no longer in politics.

Those are the exigencies of this game of politics, now highly sullied in this land of ours. So those singing his praises from the Abeyarama and other holy sites to save their political skins and continue in power as only the ex Prez can assure them of this, should expect failure in the next election. By the way, where is MP Weerawansa. Off in Disney land with his Shashi Girl of indeterminate age to whom he has shown much loyalty in the recent past, especially in the grounds of the Bribery Commission.

Well, the pronouncement that gladdened this feline’s mind and heart was Minister (Dr) Rajitha Senaratne pronouncing categorically that Mahinda Rajapaksa will not be nominated from the blue party (split or otherwise) as prime ministerial candidate (another recent creation by the Blues). He then pronounced as coming from the President that Mahinda Rajapaksa will not be on the list of the SLFP/UPFA nominees to Parliament, meaning he, MR, will not be a nominated MP. (I shudder at the anger that these statements will cause!) And then Dr. Senaratne sent cold shivers down the spine of this listener-to-news. He said if the above two concessions are granted then it will be the mere cost of a bullet that will put an end to the present incumbent of the position of President of the country and lay the position vacant for the PM to clamber back into. God forbid is Menika’s fervent prayer. We had enough of Family Rule with ticks clinging on in the periphery for 10 long years. Let yahapalanaya thrive and with it, we the people of this nation.