By Sarath de Alwis –
Sarath De Alwis
“Do you know, Prime Minister? The city is a funny place. If you spill the beans you open up a whole can of worms. I mean, how can you let sleeping dogs lie if you let the cat out of the bag?” ~ Yes Minister – BBC comedy.
I am travelling. Deprived of my PC, I write this missive cloistered in a booth in an Internet Café in a rather sleepy place called Petaling Jaya near Kuala lampur on Thursday 5th January.
Not familiar with what are called hand held devices that require graceful swiping and gentle taps I am tapping away on an aged Acer PC.
A personable Malay youth who calls me uncle helps me to get by with this contraption whose coy mechanism sneers at me with a pronounced enthusiasm.
I listened to the Presidential Statement on the Bond Scam the day after it was made. The sudden demise of a cherished friend had driven me in to a state of gloom.
A day later I called a friend in Colombo and made a perfectly reasonable statement. “I feel sorry for Ranil. The way it had to end. Who is tipped to be PM?,” I asked.
“Yako Umbata Payinthyanda? Anna eya kiyanawa Eyalu Isellma AG ta kiwee,” he responded. (Are you mad, you dimwit, Now he says that he reported the matter to the AG before the President did.)
Nearly an year ago, this writer described the predicament of the Prime minister in the Bond Scam as that of a person stranded up the creek with no paddle and worse, in a state of undress. It now seems that Ranil Wickeremesinghe does not mind his political nudity one wee bit.
Our nation is really in peril. For the first time in our post interdependence history we have an administration headed by a Prime Minter who has lost all credibility. He is marooned in an island of obstinate detachment from reality.
At this distance, this writer does not wish to dissect the observations of the Bond Commission. It is reported that the Bond Commission report has stated that the Prime Minister has observed procedural propriety in appointing Arjuna Mahendran as the governor.
It is unlikely that the Commissioners have commended the Prime Minister for his astute choice of governor from amongst others who were equally competent and qualified.
It is equally unlikely that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe will accept responsibility for making Arjuna Mahendran the Governor.
The 19th Amendment has made the President a hostage of the UNP majority that is held in a leash by the UNP leader.
The most practical measure that would force the UNP to dump its leader is to ensure the UNP defeat at the Colombo Municipal Elections on 10th February.
Azath Salley must be made the mayor of Colombo.
This stratagem has been foreseen by clever Ranil. He has a new defender in Faizer Mustapha who obviously wants to depoliticize the bond commission report. That too is understandable. When the SLMC last entered in to a coalition agreement with the UNP to form a government in 2001, the principal condition the SLMC insisted on was to make his father Faiz Mustapha our high commissioner to the court of St.James. Aha! Time for paybacks!
Mr. Faizer Mustapha PC and Cabinet Minister as reported in the Daily Mirror the “Bond Commission had clearly said that there was no involvement whatsoever by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in the bond controversy.”
He asked journalists at the SLFP weekly news briefing held at the party office whether a school principal would be removed when a student did something wrong simply because the principal admitted the boy to the school?
No. The School Principal will not be removed “when a student did something wrong simply because the principal admitted the boy to the school.”
But in this instance the School Principal has done several things which Faizer Musthapha PC has decided to bypass, disregard or just plain ignore.
The School Principal Ranil decided that he will be the master tutor in Book Keeping with Mr. Paskeralingam assisting him. He also decided to conduct additional classes in Economics with Mr. Charitha Ratwatte getting down tutorials from the Millennium Development Corporation in Washington.
He got down a special tutor from Singapore to teach us Monetary Theory and most importantly on Pareto desirability – the monumental contribution to Economics by the Italian Economist Wilfredo Pareto.
Pareto-desirability does not decide between good and bad. It evaluates the world based on the state of the world at a given time. It observes no moral code. Goodness is defined according to a person’s particular preferences, that is to say, when an individual is better off when achieving more of his or her preferences.
Pareto-desirability ignores the world that pursues common good of the most number of people. Instead it opts for those alternatives in which your own preferences receive preeminence. Now, the Pareto system is relied on by Economists to analyze theoretical options but not in the real world economics where hunger is appeased, illnesses cured and the young are schooled.
The tutor imported from Singapore has leaked question papers to his son in law. Now the Principal has told the Bond Commission that he distinctly told the new tutor that the school was out of bounds for the son in law. Yet the errant student and the conniving tutor had continued regardless. Their impudence was such that the Teacher had leaked the papers of the following year as well and this time with transcripts as well.
When the scandal surfaced, this School Principal scoffed at those early protests and claimed that the matter was too complex, too theoretical and too academic for us the hoi polloi.
When the Director of Education wanted the tutor removed, the Principal protested and claimed that only he, the Singaporean tutor and Charitha could teach this subject of Pareto optimality. He insisted that if his chosen tutor was removed, Charitha his other chosen tutor be assigned the task.
Faizer Mustapha PC has every right to defend the school principal. He can do it as a mouth piece wearing his wig and cloak.
As a Cabinet Minister, when he tells the media not to politicize the Bond Commission report his hypocrisy insults us – ‘we the people.’
S.Modaya / January 5, 2018
Dead on Sarath! Ranil Wickramasinghe and his prating is an insult to the people of Lanka. Ranil loves to strut his stuff and mouth off about “Parliamentary Privileges’ “, to loot Lanka, flanked by the Highway robber Kiriella who should also be impeached with Ranil and Ravi K.
“Feeding pearls to Swine” is how Ranil dishes out lies, alternative facts, fake news and spin, on the Fake advice of his MCC groomed and payed for alternative fact experts for Economic diagnostics who wrote his Vision 2025 and Regaining Sri Lanka alternative fact based “Economic development policy for Sri Lanka, that miss-identified and miss diagnosed the Lankan malady. MCC pretendsthat Land, transport and labour shortages, rather than corruption is the reason for lack of FDI and real Economic growth in Lanka!
These same Fake international experts in alternative facts it appears trained Sujiva Senasinhe to write a book to justify the Bond Scam while he visitedat Harvard University. MCC’s alternative fact development theorists should be asked NOW to track down the funds looted from Sri Lanka to pay off the gigantic national debt run up by Bond Scam Ranil.
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nimal fernando / January 6, 2018
Sarath and the rest,
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Most of you guys will rant and holler but in fairness to the guy, I have to say this in his defence ……………Whatever Ranil’s faults and utter stupidity, there is one distinction between him and the others. He has not stolen a red cent to enrich himself.
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His fault is blind loyalty to his circle of crooks; paradoxically that includes the Rajapakses too, and Weerawansa and many others of the previous regime ……….. all of whom he is protecting.
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The bond scams is a long running affair – it didn’t start in Feb 2015 – the Arjuna Aloysisus (or whatever his name is ) guy was a well experienced participant, who had years of experience playing the game with many others. The scam was one of many over several years (let’s be honest here, if we can.)
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Contrast Ranil with the Rajapakses ………. who didn’t have even a house in Colombo and were living in rental accommodation or state supplied housing (according to his youngest son’s interview on TV) ……..and where are they now? Where did they get the money? And look at all his other accusers …..where did they get the money?
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Ranil is a lightning-rod for attracting criticism and ridicule because of his naiveté and monumental stupidity about the Lankan-man’s ways ……… he too, tries to deceive, alright ……..but he is not a patch on Mahinda and some others ………
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Ranil is no leader; doesn’t have a single quality of a leader, most of all courage …………but I still believe, he is the only man we have right now to lead the country in to the “modern-world” …………or at least something that resembles the modern-world in a sorta/typical Lankan way – without standing still for another 20 years or going backward.
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If not Ranil, who? Any names? Just say the name of a single person. ………..who has even an inkling, where we should be heading in the 20th century ………and how to get there.
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Don Stanley / January 13, 2018
Ranil is desperate for power and to be President of Sri Lanka. He believes and knows that he need lots of money in order to pay bribes to corrupt politicians to become president because he will never win the people’s vote.
This is why Ranil is desperate for money because he lives by Money-politics and has cultivated a culture of immunity and immunity for Financial Crime for corrupt politicians.
Ranil must be impeached in order to clean up Sri Lanka, or else he will block all investigations by AG, BC and CID. Ranil is a disaster for Sri Lanka. IN his blind greed for POWER, he is bankrupting the country and dancing to the tunes and working for the Strategic interests of the Deep State of the Superpower and in order to enrich the Global 1 percent.
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nimal fernando / January 6, 2018
Continued……..
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If one is impartial, one has to accept that the culprit that is responsible for us to sell the harbour and the airport to China and India and become a vassal state of them is none other than Mahinda Rajapakse for building the useless crap with high-interest loans………….. but who ends up getting all the blame? Who else …….. the inarticulate babbling moron, the lighting-rod who goes ahhh …….ahh
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The simple truth – if you can face it – is that Ranil is monumentally unlikable (that’s his make-up) …………while Mahinda is a very likeable guy ………… beyond that nothing. That’s all.
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Will the country be any better without Ranil? At least in his ham-fisted bumbling bungling way he keeps the country relatively honest and corruption free!
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To hell with Ranil and his stupidity ………..if you want the answer ……….all a honest impartial person has to do is compare now with Mahinda’s rule………..only a lunatic or a raving masochist will want the Rajapakses back ………well unless one has a personal benefit to gain……………
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We are victims of our own version of “democracy” …………unlike in Medicine where quacks are trained for long-years and put through stringent examinations to ensure at least some competence (in SL, well, I hope:)) to treat us as individuals ………but collectively we vote for people to treat/run our country as a whole ………….. as we have found out, if people vote for witchdoctors, voodoo is what you end up with.
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In this time and place in history, this is as good as it’s going to get …………….well, that’s if one is an ultra-realist ……………. Then again one can always hope………. count me out………..
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Native Vedda / January 6, 2018
Sarath de Alwis
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Please note you got to be careful when you venture out to send an article or comment to CT as you know the Malaysian Intelligence Agency closely work with Gota’s boys. The agency could either charge you or deport you back to this island. You could be suspected of being a LTTE money launderer or an LTTE entrepreneur.
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Perriamama / January 5, 2018
Ranil has never like a man (or a woman) with a backbone accepted the many defeats he has led the party to…..the situation is so bad that under him the “grand old party” has been unable to even field a candidate at the presidential polls in both 2010 and 2015.
How sad………do you think a worm with no backbone will now grow one after 40 years in politics?
NO!
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Douglas / January 5, 2018
Dear Sarath: You, many more others, including myself have been quick to place the blame and make the PM “Responsible” and “Accountable” on this “Bond Robbery”. That is our “Common Sense” judgement. Yet, all of us would certainly like to know what the Three Members of the Commission “SAID” and “DETERMINED” over the matter of “Responsibility” and “Accountability” of the “LINE MINISTER” in whose purview the SLCB fell. There were “TERMS OF REFERENCE” to the Commission. What were their ANSWERS to those. Now that the ex Minister of Finance (RAVIK) also says: “I am at a loss to understand how I am responsible and accountable to be accused, when I am not the Line Minster”; it would be interesting to know what and how the Commissioners dealt with that issue. Let us first find that out. Is it true that the main “ACCUSED” scooted off to his adopted country Singapore and never to return to answer the charges? Has that aspect too been taken care of and made any recommendations by the Commission? I suppose the Commission should have looked into that aspect, in stating that “PM is correct in making that appointment”. Well…well… more questions than answers.
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Jim softy / January 5, 2018
Douglas: RAVI THE LIar IS CORRECT BECAUSE THEY CHANGED THE Foreign Exchange Control act. So, his money laundering is OK now. He did it twice. He got postponed his first case since the previous govt until the 100 day govt comes. How shrewed he is that the Judge also retired soon after the case. That is why the EX – Finance Minister who is a LIAR, Money Launderer, one who got bribes is saying I am at a loss. SO, if the money control act is legal now, both MY3 and Ranil are responsible for that Financial fraud in which they change laws to escape law.
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K.Pillai / January 5, 2018
Sarath de Alwis
How about some horizontal thinking?
Is the language/religion-divide past the ‘Use by….’ date?
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Percy / January 6, 2018
Pillai
Enna horizontal thinking adey?
Poda Pillai inteligence illay?
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CraigNelson / January 5, 2018
Difference is the Horas in the UNP are sophisticated, very well attired Royalists, English speaking cunning thieves who know to use a fork and knife, and like fine champagne, unlike those crude and sarong wearing johnnies from Medamulane who eat rice and kurakkan with their fingers.
So because they are Royalists and are PM’s best friends the Elite Colombo Club and Cinnamon Grand crowd do not treat them unkindly. People tried to defend RK even though he had a long history from Hayleys days.
So in SL it is “Apey Hora and Ungey Hora” battle that goes on no? Our thieves shit don’t stink only the others do.
RW by insisting on keeping Arjuna Mahendran, lost credibility. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to figure out their scheming. Only crude sarong wearing kurakkan eaters are horas for the Colombo Haamu radala circles who are more comfortable reading Shakespeare than WA DeSilva or Martin Wickremesinghe. These are sophisticated tie-coat wearing English speaking gentleman who just stole from the poor from EPF! Sirisena better take action fast.
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CraigNelson / January 5, 2018
They all the same. RW, RK, Malik, Hashim are all crooked from top down. So is the Semesinghe Trinitian who wrote a book. All HORAS. AMU PATTA PAL HORAS. Damned rank thieves and liars. And to call Ranil a “man” is wrong. We all know how he bats. He has not batted straight in his entire political life metaphorically speaking. Biggest rape of Ceylon and you guys are still making pathetic excuses? You sound like the Australian citizen in love with RW and UNP now.
Yes procedure was followed in putting Charlie’s son Charliegey putha a Singaporean Oxford Royalist Banker as Head. He fled to Singapore. Perhaps he can do us a favor by becoming CB Governor of Singapore, steal their money and send it back to compensate for his foulplay? You guys blame Buddhists, these are Tamils and Tamil Christians but CT will censor that because CT loves to attack Sinhala Buddhists for all Sri Lanka’s woes. RW’s uncle was a top bishop too. He like CBK are token buddhists for elections. PATTA PAL HORAS of Royal College. Liars and thieves. China still executes people for economic crimes.
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CraigNelson / January 5, 2018
Royalists are sophisticated. They steal in English. The Rajapakses were simple Gamayas who did not go to Royal or Oxford.
But you people here like Shyamon and pathetic Vishwamithra of Gamini Dissanayake whose name we all know but CT hides, are all apologetic for RW, Hashim and Malik etc. But all of them including the idiot Sinhala only expats who attacked them are silent or making god-damned excuses for this set of Cinnamon Grand thieves.
11 Billion is ElevenThousand million rupees. that is a lot of money even in dollars. Aloysius etc were CHRISTIAN Tamils yet you people with CT’s abetting always attack Sinhala Buddhists. Why? Aloysius and Mahendran are Demala people of high class. Mahendran is a Royalist but Aloysius is a playboy from CIS where there was a lot of teen pregnancies and herpes and HIV type of promiscuous new rich unrefined crude people.
We are sad that you people are quick to make excuses for the UNP(they did not do a damned thing; at least the Medamulanes built the instrastructure and stole; your UNPers stole and stole and stole without nothing to show for it except a hurriedly erected Flyover; which by the way used the same Access Engineering without open bid becaquse they are the only ones with the wherewithal. But all the Semeys, oneshot cheap shot f**s, Erans, Harshas attacked Access Engineering when lots of flyovers were erected under MR and CBK).
Munta hena gahanna oni. Curse these sophisticated thieves. Remember China executes people for massive economic crimes and gets the family to pay for the bullet. Time to vote for JVP. Shyamon and Vishwamithra will twist this too in excellent English too.
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CraigNelson / January 5, 2018
Sarath, you too are still making excuses for RW; RW insisted on retaining AM even after the President wanted him gone. AM fled to Singapore. WHY? like Jaliya the black beauty cousin of MR who fled to Atlanta? If you have nothing to hide, why flee? STOP STOP STOP making excuses. Hashim, Malik all are complicit. The difference is you people believed every accusation against MR and BR(no doubt a crook) but you never said “give them benefit of the doubt”. **g Wedding Sam accused him of gold theft, gold horses and Ferraris. Why the FCUK are those then? Stop being so fucking one sided in defending Radalayas because they are from Colombo 7. If you pathetic UNPer penis vacummers have any decency, you will then attack this UNP with the same venom and gusto as you tried and convicted MR and co here on CT. Stop insulting the intelligence of the peasant please Vishwa and Shyamon and now Sarath too.
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Jim softy / January 5, 2018
Sarath De Alwis: I heard one used dealer from australia or New Zealand who came to head the EPF fund and Arjun Mahendran have all left the country. Govt was silent So, how arrogant they are to behave that way. Bond Scam Ranil and UNP should so sure to that kind of frauds. they know sri lanka LAw enforcement is simply non-existing. I heard one female school teacher who got a bribe of Rs 25,000 is in jail for eight years. thailand has jailed one pyramid scheme conman for some 13500 years for defrauding 144 people. All over the world, those who involved in corruptions, Most recently in Korea, had to step down. that is just one country. check the internet even in the USA, A simple mail frauds is enough the senator to be prosecuted.
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Jim softy / January 5, 2018
I forgot to write that Politicians should be given free male in order to meet their voters. Yet, Sri lanka increased their STAMP ALLOWANCE from Rs 175,00 to 350,000. that is how they steal. In Sri lanka parliamentarians does not do anything in his own. they vote the party.
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Jim softy / January 5, 2018
Faizer Musthapa is just another LIAR and a cheater. He just used wrong analogy to interpret it. their should have been an intelligent journalist to ask question instead of writing politicians crap. Politicians are simply lieing and journalists are publishing those lies. That is the press freedom and the media responsibility in sri lanka. That is why what the previous govt did was proper.
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douglas / January 6, 2018
CraigNelson: Fell good reading your comments. The previous ROUGES, LOOTERS & CRIMINALS clad in “Kurakkan Saatake” & “Redda & Banians” along with their companions of “Shirts & Pants” who called themselves “Professionals”; but more of “RUSTIC” types, have NOW been REPLACED by a more “SOPHISTICATED” and an “ELITE” class of “Royal Types” to ROB the wealth of this country. The “REDDA & BANIAN” of that “Gamarala Type” did desert that “RUSTIC TYPE” to bring in the “ELITE” and most “SOPHISTICATED” class ably rendering a SILENT SUPPORT by another class called “YAHAPALANAYA GROUP” hiding behind the cover sheet of “CIVIL SOCIETY” to ROB and still allowed to carry on regardless. This is my understanding in summary form of all your comments. So what do we DO NOW?
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Percy / January 6, 2018
Ranil sings in the bathroom
This is number one
And the fun has just begun
Roll me over,lay me down, and do it again
Roll me over, in the clover,
Roll me over lay me down and do it again
Sira joins Ranil and sings:
Then this is number two
You wanted me to do
Roll me over lay me down and do it again
The country is screwed
And we care two hoots
Our buthgottas are there to cheer is on.
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WalaGemba Raja / January 6, 2018
Mr. De Alwis,
Thank you for the hilarious quote from one of my favorite British comedies, “Yes Minister”. What we have here is more than a comedy. Our country is a sewer. Majority of the sludge in this sewer is the flow from meaningless, visionless, leaderless and immoral politics (also communal politics) since regaining our independence. No matter what “beans” you “spill” or what “cans” you “open”, what we have got from politics in this country is nothing but maggots and poop. No matter what “cats” we have let out of the bag or what “dogs” we have aroused, both our cats and dogs have been infested with ticks. The fault of our miserable plight also lies in our people who we consider erudite, educated and learned but are immoral, self serving and greedy because they willingly revere demagogues or accepts the status quo by prostituting themselves to our politicians and clergy that worse than tick infested animals. Our country Mr. De Alwis is DOOMED. We are a country that has been cursed without a moral leader to shepherd us to a promised land. I leave this quote from Mahatma Ghandi, and this quote highlights as to why we find ourselves in this mess;
“Wealth without work,
pleasure without conscience,
knowledge without character,
commerce without morality,
science without humanity,
worship without sacrifice,
politics without principles” – Mahatma Gahndi
….and if I may add, a country without leadership and leadership without ethics is what we have had all along. Doesn’t the above quote speak volumes as to our current plight?
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chiv / January 6, 2018
Country men it is you who elect these people to rule, The one percent theory is true in many countries where the rich become filthy richer at the expense of the rest, they are well supported and includes these politicians who keep the cash machines well oiled, And when it election time they connive and spin together to play there ace card which is religion/race/cast and not performance/expectations/vision, and as usual majority people are happy to be ignorant and play FOOLS, Who is to be blamed, just look at the past from the time of so called independence.
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