Changes to 13-A vital - Minister Keheliya Rambukwella

By Uditha Kumarasinghe

Simple and easy-going, Mass Media and Information Minister Keheliya Rambukwella is a friend of the media fraternity. His authoritative but soothing voice won the hearts of journalists at the weekly Cabinet press briefing. The Minister in an interview with the Sunday Observer said that the total strength of the country’s media personnel may be around 5000. But we can’t let 20 million people in the country suffer because of them. They should have recourse to redress if the media has done something wrong. There are media personnel who are acting in a responsible manner. At the same time there are irresponsible media reporting as well. The Government has only 10 percent of media institutions. Ninety percent of the media institutions are owned by the private sector. Nobody is talking about the conduct of these private media institutions.

He said media personnel are not super-powers or super-humans. If they make mistakes, that may be alright. Sometimes certain media deliberately tarnish the image of not only politicians and Government officials but also the people at large. So we need to safeguard their rights. Sometimes, it depends on the ownership of that media institution. We must always maintain a give and take policy.

Minister Rambukwella said there is no decision whatsoever to abolish the 13th Amendment, but there could be some amendments to it. Such amendments are for the betterment of the country. What was suitable 30 years ago may not be so today. Obviously these things will be done in consultation with all the parties concerned. We are not going to bulldoze things authoritatively. It is up to the relevant authorities to get the things done. That is why the Government has appointed a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) in good faith.

Excerpts of the Interview:

Q: Following the visit of Thai Premier Yingluck Shinawatra, the concept of regional cooperation has become more evident. Cannot we seek fresh markets for our exports and also investments from the region?

A: It is not only the Prime Minister of Thailand, there has been a number of state visits by President Mahinda Rajapaksa to many countries and some foreign Leaders too have visited our country. I think the international relations in meeting state Leaders, getting assistance and regional cooperation have become very important. During the past three or four years, our President had been invited by many world Leaders to visit their countries. The President had also invited several world Leaders to visit Sri Lanka. We see our international relations are being further strengthened through such state visits.

Q: Despite seminars, circulars, high level meetings, report-writing Dengue is reported to be on the rise. What has gone wrong is the lack of coordination among the stakeholders. How do you view this scenario?

A: It is the responsibility of the Government, Health Ministry and Local Government Ministry to deal with this issue. I must also underline the fact that it is also the responsibility on the part of the people themselves. Dengue has reached the epidemic level. A student of the Law Faculty of Colombo University fell victim to Dengue recently. I don’t think I am qualified to comment on it as much as I would like to. I think we all have to take a very serious note of eradicating this menace. There may be some constraints, but there are countries which have eradicated the Dengue epidemic. So we need to seek advice from them and work on that basis.

Q: The UNP has produced a constitutional draft probably filling the gaps and discarding the excess of their 1978 Constitution. Would you like to express your views?

A: I think they have not published this document as yet. I saw in some newspapers that the UNP had been talking about it. There can be many proposals coming up. It is always good to have many proposals. Hopefully they will invite the President and the ruling party to have a look at it.

Q: Following President Rajapaksa’s visit, the Chinese Government has pledged billions worth of aid to Sri Lanka for key infrastructure projects. The mutual relations have been described as “ strategic cooperation partnership”. How far the Chinese aid has helped Sri Lanka consolidate economically?

A: Immensely. There is no doubt about the assistance. In fact, we have a very cordial relationship with China throughout. Every time when there is a left-oriented Government, Chinese have come out very strongly. Now China is moving towards free market and open economy. Our mutual ties are persisting. If we look at the BMICH and the recently opened Nelum Pokuna, both are gifts by China. I can name many other projects initiated with Chinese assistance. I suppose that this can be considered a golden era. In the past when China helped us, they were struggling for economic consolidation and yet they helped us. Today they are an economic super-power. Now they are much more lavish, as they could afford to do so but they have never forgotten their old partners. Perhaps, they are trying to increase their assistance not by two-fold but hundred-fold. We are very happy about it.

Q: You have moved regulations in Parliament under the Sri Lanka Press Council Law. What are its basic objectives?

A: It was to increase the registration and renewal fees. In fact,

the Press Council is only a stopover because we need to look at it more seriously. We had the Consultative Committee on Wednesdays and there were very good proposals from the Opposition. We need to look at it. I had a chat with UNP MP Ruwan Wijewardene and told him that their newspaper has been acting in a responsible manner. There are also media personnel acting in a responsible manner. At the same time, one has to accept the fact that there is the irresponsible media reporting as well.

So we need to do something about it. If we look at the media fraternity, all together there could be around 5000 media personnel. But we can’t let 20 million people in the country suffer because of them. They should also have recourse to redress if the media is wrong.

They are not super -powers or super-humans. If they make mistakes, that may be alright. Sometimes certain media personnel deliberately tarnish the image of not only politicians and Government officials but also the people at large. We need to safeguard their rights. Sometimes it also depends on the ownership of that media institution. For example, the one time owner of a recently started newspaper was very close to Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Today Wickremesinghe is the most criticised person by that newspaper. The owner of this newspaper does not like Ranil Wickremesinghe.

This is a classic example which was cited in Parliament on Wednesday. How do we deal with this? We need to have a certain standard.

They are blaming the Government. But the Government has only 10 percent of media institutions. Ninety percent of the media institutions are owned by the private sector.

But nobody is talking about these private media institutions. They are always talking about the state media. The argument is that the Government institutions are run with public funds which is true. In any democracy, there are public funds which are controlled by the Government.

What I am trying to say is that this cannot be looked at in a partisan manner or at party level. All Media personnel must get together.

I think 225 members in Parliament are not the people who are deciding for the 20 million people in the country.

There could be around 5000 media personnel in the island. Can they also dictate terms and tarnish the image of innocent people? We must maintain a give and take policy.

Q: What made you to introduce a code of ethics to media personnel particularly at this juncture when there is no apparent abuse of media freedom?

A: The idea came in the absence of any kind of teeth or mechanism to look at the criminal defamation. There is enough and more freedom for the media. But the media should use the freedom in a manner to gain reputation to the media institutions itself. You find it not happening today. I am not generalizing it.

There are so many media organisations which act responsibly. There are some media institutions which are absolutely irresponsible. So how do you draw the line in between and how do you handle this? I don’t personally agree on this. But as the Minister in charge we try to introduce a code of ethics and draw up a draft which we did. We got the inputs of all parties. Finally we put it before the Consultative Committee of Parliament where different political parties are represented. So it will look at it and give its inputs. We shall try to get into kind of a MoU situation along with the parties concerned.

The Ministry has already drafted the new code of ethics and its a copied document. We have given its copies to all members of the Consultative Committee.

I suppose the people have got confused that we are going to bring a Code of Ethics Bill. This is not a Bill.

Its a piece of paper where we have laid down certain terms and conditions to be adhered to on concensual basis - not forcefully. There is no legality in it. It’s like Press Council. If a journalist writes some thing wrong or defamatory of a person or whatever, he will be issued a letter of warning.

But there is nothing that anybody can be charged. Actually I don’t know whether it is right or wrong. The media has to decide on one side while the whole community has to decide on the other.

Q: Apart from abolishing the 13th Amendment, repealing Police and land powers is timely from the standpoint of national integrity after the prolonged struggle against LTTE terrorism. Your comments?

A: There is no decision whatsoever to abolish the 13th Amendment. There can be some amendments for the betterment of the country.

What was suitable 30 years ago may not be so today. Obviously these will be done in consultation with the parties concerned.

We are not going to bulldoze things authoritatively. It is up to the relevant authorities to get things done.

That is why the Government has appointed a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) in good faith. But we can’t go on indefinitely. The TNA changes its position from time to time. Actually they are adopting the tactic of delaying this process. We can’t further delay this. We gave them more than a year to make their representations. In the absence of the TNA’s participation in the PSC, somebody has to do it. We as the Government have put forward some proposals.

Q: The Western bloc openly supports human rights in preference to sovereignty of independent countries. In a way this is licence to violate territorial integrity as it happen in Libya and Afghanistan. How do you explain this new development?

A: They are using human rights as a tool to interfere in the internal affairs of independent countries. You see it happening. But one thing is that we are also equally strong in our small way and we will take the bull by the horn.

We know exactly what they are doing and we are also taking counter measures. So far we are in the struggle and taking up this challenge.

Q: It is a new development in the country that the people organise themselves against the authorities for their failure to attend to public needs such as repairs to roads, renovating village tanks or provide water for cultivation. Is this democracy or waking up lethargic public officials?

A: It is both. Waking up lethargic officials is permitted because there is democracy in the country. So it has to go hand in hand. If there is no democracy, you can have lethargy.

But then they will not dare to come up. Today we have opened up vistas so that the people can agitate, conduct demonstrations and express their views.

That is good in a way. If we were to control, we would have done so. But at times, we had done so, in the national interest and security.

There have been killings reported. It was also told in Parliament that nine people had been killed. During the past few years thousands of people had been killed by LTTE terrorists. It’s a different scenario.

Q:There is controversy over the set up of the second coal-fired power plant. When will this project get off the ground in view of the acute energy crisis in the country?

A:The fact of the matter is that we need energy supply. We are looking at providing electricity for the entire Sri Lanka by 2016. We have already gone much farther than any other Government.

We need to finalise a few more areas and we will do it. If the coal-fired power plant in ‘X’ country or ‘Y’ country has some problem, we will go to another country for assistance.

It is a priority on our agenda and the development of power generation cannot be compromised.