19 March, 2024

Blog

Why The Gotabaya Rajapaksa Presidency Will Be A One-Term Wonder 

By Dayan Jayatilleka 

Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka

Back in June, GR insider, author of the inaccurately titled Gota’s War (2012) and Sri Lanka’s new ambassador/PR to the UN-Geneva, dedicated his regular Sunday Politics sermon to a ferocious full-page assertion of why Trump will win and a rousing endorsement of that prospect. His article dated June 19th 2020 and entitled ‘Trump and Civil Unrest in America’ argued assuredly that polarization around the ‘law and order’ vs. ‘anarchy’ issue guaranteed a white majoritarian tsunami for Trump.

In a fascinating coincidence, this was the core of the successful GR game-plan of 2019. Expect it to be remixed and recycled. 

However, in its first year the Gotabaya Rajapaksa presidency has made avoidable strategic blunders, tracing a trajectory which when extrapolated, indicate that it will wind up a one-term wonder, like the otherwise widely disparate administrations of the Trump Presidency (2016-2020), Yahapalanaya (2015-2019), and the Samagi Peramuna (1970-1977). 

On the occasions of the first and second anniversaries of the Sirisena presidency, public seminars of evaluation were organized at which I was a speaker. On both occasions President Sirisena was in the audience and sat through the proceedings. Dr. Suren Raghavan and Prof Rohan Samarajiva as fellow panelists at the first, and Ambassador Palihakkara, Dr Manikkalangam and Prof Uyangoda among the panelists at the second. At both these seminars (which are on YouTube) I made the same point: the government is heading rapidly in the wrong direction, which will prove unsustainable, result in unfavorable polarization, and crash and burn unless there’s a drastic course-correction back to the moderate center. 

The political adherents of sticking dogmatically to the 2015 mandate or rather, their neoliberal-reformist spin on it, have ended up exiled from Parliament or reduced to a single-digit splinter, while Sirisena’s SLFP which tried belatedly to hit the brakes, has at least a double-digit presence in Parliament.

On the first anniversary of the Gotabaya Presidency, my diagnosis is the same: this won’t end well, but it will end sooner rather than later. 

The Ranil Wickremesinghe-led, UNP-dominated Yahapalana government was doomed to a one-term existence by its adherence to an ideological model rather than to Realism. That government felt it more important to drive through a set of reforms which stemmed from its obsolescent ideological model of the neoliberal glory days of the 1980s and 1990s. The UNP leader, Ministers and civil society ideologues were blissfully unaware that in the 21st century a social backlash had overthrown the model in favor of statist-nationalism in Russia and populist religio-nationalism in Eastern Europe. Even when the rebellion reached the West with Brexit, followed by the Trump victory of 2016, the UNP didn’t change course. 

These global trends apart, the reality of Sri Lankan society—made transparently clear at the Feb 2018 local authorities election–made the Ranilist UNP model utterly untenable.

The UNP sought to turn us into a neoliberal neo-colony of the West. The GR model is designed to turn us into a military-occupied territory ‘liberated’ from liberal-democracy and inhabited by a regimented, controlled, drone-monitored citizenry. 

The Yahapalanaya and Gotabaya administrations share the assumption that their electoral victories were some kind of ‘revolution’ and a mandate for total transformation in accordance with their respective ideologies. 

Obviously, the Gotabaya administration hasn’t (yet) had a Bond scam type scandal on its watch, but the factor underlying that scandal is something that the GR Presidency has been greatly susceptible to: not appointing officials on the basis of the highest merit, of excellence. Ranil Wickremesinghe’s choice for the Central Bank chairpersonship was based on cronyism, not on his being the best available for the post. A correct choice was made far too late in the day at the insistence of President Sirisena and despite the obstructionism by Prime Minister Wickremesinghe.

In President Gotabaya’s first year, the abandonment of meritocracy has become a rule rather than an exception. Does anyone believe, can anyone believe, that the finest available Sri Lankan talent, the best available brains, the human resources of the highest quality and achievement in the fields relevant to the Covid-19 virus, have been mobilized and are actually driving the national/state effort to rescue us from the pandemic? 

Nothing is more symbolic and symptomatic of the first year of the Gotabaya Rajapaksa presidency than the complete absence in any capacity whatsoever, of the country’s senior-most virologist (and a party leader of the ruling coalition) Prof Tissa Vitharana, from the anti-Corona Task Force or any governmental structure devoted to fighting Covid-19–and the complete lack of outreach to him. (The story spills out in Chamuditha Samarawickrema’s excellent CNB News Brief video-interview.) 

The President’s appointments to/within the military have been fine, but the appointment of the serving and retired military to posts in which they have registered no expertise or experience, still less excellence, will prove at least as systemically damaging as the more obvious Bond scam. 

The Gotabaya presidency’s model is not only the exact opposite of meritocracy, the principle in China, Vietnam and Russia– and the liberal democratic Asia-Pacific societies such as New Zealand and South Korea that the GR administration has clearly turned its back on. It is also the exact opposite of professionalism. Merely because you are a good professional in one profession, it is utterly illogical and irrational to assume that you are similarly proficient in any and all other professions for which you have not been trained and have no experience—let alone track record of success– in. 

If Sarath Fonseka and Gotabaya Rajapaksa had not picked the most able officers with the best track record in the military—with the approval of President Mahinda Rajapaksa — and put them in the right places at the right time, we would have continued to lose the Long War instead of winning it in a fairly short time span. The underlying principle or criterion is of universal validity, most certainly in combatting Covid-19.

On many occasions since January, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has gone on public record, including to two international audiences—the SAARC leaders virtual summit and the UN 75th anniversary world leaders summit—respectively downplaying the danger and claiming success in containing Corona (in self-congratulatory detail). If the anti-coronavirus campaign had been fought by an elite Task Force of the finest trained and credentialed professionals in the field, the President would not have made such statements because he would have been far better briefed and advised. Instead he has set up an echo chamber. Sadly, he is imitating the practices not of the victorious last war—the nation’s and his elder brother Mahinda’s finest hour, and his own finest contribution– but of presidential predecessors who chaired the unsuccessful war effort for decades.

The next major crisis we shall face is the economic. This time too, it won’t matter to the suffering citizenry that there was a global pandemic, any more than it mattered to the voters who threw the Sirimavo Bandaranaike government overboard in 1977 that the OPEC oil shock of 1973 affected a great many countries. The people just want to get out from under. 

What helps is if you have assembled the nation’s finest minds in the relevant domain—in this case, economic policy– to counteract the effects of the crisis and to chart a path forward. As in the case of combatting Covid-19, this is not what the Gotabaya administration has done. Pushing Dr. Dushni Weerakoon, Executive Director of the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) out of the Monetary Board is hardly a sign which inspires confidence. Having obtained her PhD at age 27, she has risen to be perhaps our top professional economist, with a reputation for non-partisan, independent policy diagnosis and lucid prescription. 

For the moment the biggest political advantage that President Gotabaya enjoys is the fog of intellectual and psychological confusion in the democratic resistance space. In the USA, the democratic intelligentsia (most indelibly Noam Chomsky), the media and the politicians (most notably Barack Obama) sounded the clarion call that the main existential danger was a second term for President Trump—Chomsky called it a threat to humanity– and that the indubitably overriding objective must be to prevent it. In the midst of the primaries, the Democratic field suddenly cleared for the candidate who had the best chance of winning back the blue-collar white voters and breaking through to the American heartland. The left, progressives, women, and the Black community rallied around him, submerged differences to attain the objective of stopping a second Trump term, perceived as the portal to Fascism of some variety and form. 

By contrast, the Lankan democratic intelligentsia remains ‘The Gang That Couldn’t Think Straight’. Recently, an emeritus political science academic urged the democratic Opposition to model itself on that led by Sirimavo Bandaranaike–who it must be noted, never proceeded to lead her country after she lost the general election in 1977 and was beaten to the Presidency by populist Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1988. 

Scorning Prime Minister Modi’s reiteration of the implementation of the 13th amendment as essential, Team GR hopes to constrict the Sri Lankan Tamils into something smaller and tighter, although the ‘global Tamil brand’ has got a turbo-boost and every ethnic Tamil everywhere has experienced a quantum leap in self-esteem, political optimism and emotional energy with the victory of Kamala Harris (and by extension, her ‘wingwoman’, Rohini Kosoglu nee Ravindran). 

With a Biden Presidency and the coming global re-set, it is the worst time for Sri Lanka to be less rather than more liberal-democratic, and more rather than less supremacist-autocratic; the worst moment to pivot from this island’s 90-year-old ‘Western’ democratic political tradition to a ‘Chinese’ centralist governance model. 

The ongoing transformation of our system from a fairly level democratic playing field to a centralized Party-State model of ‘governance’; the de-facto military junta in command of the state apparatuses and their public functions; de-facto Martial Law over the citizenry’s everyday life; the resort to tighter pre-emptive repression than Trump was constitutionally capable of, including capacity for real-time overview of disgruntled or protesting citizenry (as the Israelis have of the Palestinians); the Jojo Rabbit nationalist ‘jugend’ training programs; and the spin by the local Fox News outlets which cannot succeed where Mrs. Bandaranaike’s quasi-monopoly of the mass media failed, offer no solution. They dig the hole deeper. 

The first anniversary of the Gotabaya presidency coincides with the victory of Joe Biden. 

GR and his fellow (Sinhala) long-time supporters of the California Republican Right must absorb the lessons of the two-thirds vote that the Democratic ticket obtained in California (possibly due to Kamala Harris). 

With or without Democrat control of the Senate, President Rajapaksa can surely figure out the implications of a Democratic administration. Space could open for generalized, permanent ‘lawfare’ under ‘universal jurisdiction’, which could go global. 

President GR must learn the correct lessons of the defeat of President Trump, whose proudest boast of not being a ‘politician’ but a success in other fields, was the source of his biggest blunders, since as a political amateur he had no respect for the values, norms and ethos of democratic politics and governance. 

Having a drone-camera overview of your citizens helps little when far bigger military constellations have you under a microscope. 

Even the Tyrannosaurus Rex could not survive once its conditions of existence had changed with the cosmic event of an impacting meteor.

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Latest comments

  • 42
    4

    Yes, the way things are going, Gotabhaya may very well end up as a one-hit wonder. But the Rajapaksa horde’s morbid grip on the political process is not going to go away anytime soon – unless people grow out of their tribal mentality.

    • 5
      33

      Mr. Ajay,
      .
      This is funny.
      .
      Same people who tried to paint GR as a dictator and his government as a authoritative regime now telling us “Gotabaya Rajapaksa Presidency Will Be A One-Term Wonder”.
      .
      So you all are accepting the fact that he is a democratically elected President who can be removed in next election.
      .
      And….
      .
      You all are accepting the fact that there will be on time election under GR presidency. (After all this is not Yahapalana government)
      .
      So……
      All of you including Civil Society Pundits tried to deceive general public when you tried to paint GR as a dictator………..?

      • 5
        4

        SCP
        “So you all are accepting the fact that he is a democratically elected President who can be removed in next election.”
        *
        I am unsure if that will be the mechanism of removal; and about the aftermath of the removal in any form.
        Only a grave crisis will lead to his removal, and departure may not be a fraction as peaceful as arrival.
        Whatever that assumes power cannot solve the crisis and hence prove to be as repressive if not more.

        • 1
          0

          SJ,
          .
          Don’t jump in to the “Kidding yourself” pool

    • 12
      3

      Due to frustration, Gotler could go amok in the days to come. 😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎Ramifications would be more than what people experienced under his brother until 2015. Anything and everything can happen because silence is deep. With increasing heavy loads of debts and numerous other problems but not being politically knowledgeable how to face it, not an inch of progress can be achieved. That he has proved today.🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔
      His abilities are not it’s all cracked up to be. Media mafia and lack of law and order in srilanken legal system made Gota a candidate. Time passes by nothing seems to be achieving. Now looking back polonnaruwa donkey is not the most incapable man, I would say. As hoped no meritocracy is given the chance thr same kind of of political games seem to his tricks. All investigations filed against his men are taken away day by day as if he is elected to that job first before addressing growing alarming problems of the 40% population who are under poverty as of today. Covid is also not contained as self proclamations made the public perception . 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔

      • 2
        17

        Mr. eLM (eternal Loose Motion)
        .
        splendid spiffy rural lyrical tigh trigid room yprofusesplendidrigidclassygruesomewholesalesmellylivelybrie fround crazy dry tiny

        • 6
          1

          SCP,
          please grow up..TODAY is no too late and come with constructive argument to oppose what we have been adding to this and other pages. Then only the next generations would stop getting misled by you the kind of imbecile srilankens.

        • 1
          0

          “On both occasions President Sirisena was in the audience and sat through the proceedings”
          It is doubtful that he actually understood anything. Still, is this the reason Dr.DJ says nothing about Mary Sira’s role in demolishing Yahapalanaya?
          “Having a drone-camera overview of your citizens helps little when far bigger military constellations have you under a microscope.” True enough. Like the paranoid one in South Block.
          Gota is obsessed with technology and security, as befits a former IT person and less-than-illustrious soldier. But all the drones in China are not going to rescue him from a mis-step vis-a-vis Delhi. JR learned that the hard way.
          I suppose the above is part of DJ’s “realism” .

    • 4
      1

      Ajay,
      .
      rumours say, that the bugger cant face his then buddies today ? THose numerous YOUTUBERs show him posterior today. Some of them are SEPAL Amarasinghe and SUDA TV. They are both fearless to stand against Rajapakshe criminals today than any times in the past.
      .
      Honesty is defined, when talking to someone, to see in eyes of the listener…. that has become twisted with the Rajaakshes today.
      :
      Sooner, the next tragody for CADAVA eaters would be the COLLAPSE of MAFIA BOSS. Karma has warned him several times, the record breaking criminal would not have much to to be pro active. The bugger will fall in the deepest layer of the hell … I see the light at the end of the tunnel regarding Rajapakshe MAFIA s real end.

  • 19
    2

    It didn’t require much of a brain to predict that the Sirisena Presidency would not get to a second term. But, to forecast that a GR Presidency would not be any different is a bold statement. The power hungry Sirisena deserted MR to grasp a Presidency that’d have never been his, but for his sheer opportunism. In the case of Gota, MR used his appeal to reserve the Presidency for Namal, by inducing GR as a stop gap. GR has come to like the power he is enjoying. MR would find it troublesome to snatch it back. Racism, that is so ripe today, stands in good stead for GR, leaving MR gasping and NR empty.

  • 6
    4

    old codger

    How are you?
    Is there anything interesting to share with us?

    • 5
      14

      Mr. Native Kudda,
      .
      This is a public forum. Please use SMS/WhatsApp/Messenger or something like that for your coupling rituals.

      • 11
        3

        S. C. Passqual

        “This is a public forum. “

        I know it is.
        Did you get my point?
        If you didn’t there is no point in explaining it to you.

    • 3
      0

      Native,
      I am enjoying the clueless gyrations like crabs in hot water, of paid provocateurs like SCP, even though I am not normally a sadist. I really didn’t expect this so soon.

      • 2
        1

        OC, /Sinhala Man
        .
        where had you both been ?

        I thought you were abducted by a whitevanner. There are speculations there, that JUNTA II would go beyond the levels of Duterte’s in coming months. Please take good care of you. Shani Abeysekara will be the next to Makandure Madhush, as my own sources revealed me yesterday.

        And that bitch s son DERANA TV Channel owner deliberately spreads blatant lies about PCR tests. His ulterior motives are nothing but to mislead the thanakola eating majority and achieve his gains. What happened to GOTAs one law for all ?

        • 1
          0

          Dear LM,
          .
          I know that I’ve been quiet for some time: don’t know what to be saying as things worsen here.
          .
          I voted for JR. J in 1977, but I’m a bit concerned that GATAM and you are now so full of him, and of Ranil. The vulgarity of the Rajapaksas may stand in stark to their suavity, but that doesn’t mean that they were morally superior to them. I don’t want to start another argument on that.
          .
          Limiting the damage being done by the current rulers has to be a priority, but I don’t know how we should go about it. I never get on to TV entertainment, but that must be going on, with the cricket that is now being played – hardly the time for it – and these are things on which lots of money has to be spent. Plus spending on the military and road construction. The priorities all wrong.

          • 1
            4

            Mr. Panini Edirisinghe,.
            .
            Can’t see you are demanding ID numbers from eLM (leelagemalli – eternal Loose Motion).
            And…..
            Can’t see your “repeat requests” “to reveal their identities”…….
            .
            Or……
            Is it ok to any anti Sinhala, anti Buddhist, Anti GR, Anti Democratic idiots to bullshit everywhere…???

  • 15
    6

    True. Gota will be a one time president. Rajapaksas will go extinct from politics in 2024.

    However, they know this and now trying to tweak the constitution to turn them into a local Kim dynasty. This must be defeated. Opposition must have a noisy nationalist to destroy the remaining Rajapaksa frontier.

    Gota Failed!

  • 7
    1

    This comment was removed by a moderator because it didn’t abide by our Comment policy.

    For more detail see our Comment policy https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/comments-policy-2

    • 8
      3

      Thanks very much for making it shorter 😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎

    • 5
      1

      a14455 / November 26, 2020

      We advised you to become normal by talking to your Brother who is said to be a MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL in SL.
      .
      If he is no biased to GMOA (General Murderous Officers Association), he would have free mind to get back to your sense. It will be a family matter actually THOUGH you sitting in Trumpachchi s land, your behaviour is similar to that of Ms SCP who is the most known stupid person on CT/but an old royalist ha ha

  • 14
    8

    If the USA can produce one term clown president, the shithouse beggar colony has also blindly produced a nincompoop of a kallathoni war-criminal who’s clueless in every aspect foolish dumbo as it’s 8th president.?
    2.
    Ever since the ill-fated day of 16th November 2016, the recovering country thanks to the valiant efforts of the UNP led yahapalayana government who had anointed a clueless village clown as the head of the kingdom of the muttala [ fools ]
    3.
    The kallathoni of a war criminal uncouth unsavoury, not even a night school student who was able to creep in to the racist not even worth two cents incompetent puff army.
    All this was due to his late father was a card-carrying member of the blue-shirted racist SLFP who is the one’s responsible for the destruction of a prosperous rice exporter.
    4.
    At one time the shithouse government was having many an erection whrtr they shamelessly crowing themselves as they were the 2nd best on the globe to fight the rampaging coronavirus.

    • 11
      9

      5.
      A year has passed by in a hurried aimless jet-speed the island is at a point of breaking up.
      No jobs for the masses, they have no paiza to purchase their daily food needs, no clothing to hide their nakedness, no schools are allowed to be open and in a nutshell, it has now become a NO shit paradise where only the likes of the hora boru rajapuka’s can survive.
      6.
      The Lord Buddha has waved his magic wand and has gifted the pleasure-giving coronavirus-19 to the shittiest of them all and now the hapless hungry peasants are dropping dead in every imaginable nook and corner.
      7.
      When and if will the island ever become prosperous is the million-dollar query on everybody’s lips.
      8.
      Sad to state that as long as the crooked randy bandy clueless rajapuka’s are around ruling the roost filling their shop-soiled amudes with ill-gotten wealth they will always be one-term president, prime minister and government like what occurred with the rowdy abortion king the one and only pipeless Donald Trumpet who was nothing but a bully of a fraudster.
      9.
      Down, down with the rajapuka’s should become the national wail of the shittiest of them all, a proud rajapuka creation.
      10.
      Alleluia.

      • 14
        1

        rj1952
        6. ………gifted the pleasure-giving coronavirus-19 to the shittiest of them all ……….
        Are you referring to the US and Italy : US with In God we Trust (approved by President Dwight Eisenhower on July 30, 1956, requires that “In God We Trust” appear on American currency) and Italy with a resident Pope, both countries which bore the brunt of Covid.

        • 4
          4

          The Vatican City State is the Holy See’s independent city state, an enclave within Italy BUT NOT PART OF ITALY.

          • 4
            0

            Dear SJ
            The Vatican City is completely surrounded by Italy’s capital city, and is an enclave. So it is an enclave in the centre of Italy as it were. Surely the divine power should radiate to the outside world through Italy before any other country.
            And so that is close enough relationship with Italy for divine intervention with a Resident Pope..

            • 6
              0

              PS.
              I forgot to add that it is a common phrase to refer to the Vatican/Pope as “Rome”, as the Pope is the bishop of Rome.

              • 3
                0

                F,
                The Pope’s powers have declined since the time he owned a good part of Italy and claimed infallibility on even planetary mechanics.
                You have to forgive the present Pope, who appears to be a thoroughly nice guy. Maybe his spiritual influence with the Almighty is less than that of some of his more nefarious predecessors.

            • 1
              0

              An enclave is still not part of the country that surrounds it.
              There are other enclaves:
              San Marino, enclaved by Italy, and Lesotho, enclaved by South Africa, are completely enclaved sovereign states.
              *
              My comment concerned the clause “Italy with a resident Pope”which is inaccurate.
              If you insist that Italy has a resident Pope, do have your way.

              • 3
                0

                As I said, the Pope is the Bishop of Rome.
                “If you insist that Italy has a resident Pope, do have your way.”
                Thank you for your concession, even after splitting hairs.

          • 1
            1

            SJ,
            .
            correct… to be precise – very tiny state within ROME.
            .
            I have been to the place few times but never had the time to join the long ques and spend more time there.

            • 3
              0

              Dear LM
              You missed a treat. I have been to the Vatican and spent five hours or so as it is so vast. Of course the highlight was seeing the Sistine Chapel and the hallowed paintings. It was a pleasure to see the changing of the Swiss Guards as well.
              Oh. With these irrelevancies, we are digressing and moving away from DJ and and “One time Wonder”. I am sorry indeed.

      • 1
        2

        rj1952
        Your earlier generation used to fondly call Sri Lanka shithouse.
        When they were in their motherland their only ambition was to find a job of shit bucket carrier in our country.
        You are still using the words coming down in the family.
        You used to go behind your uncle pushing the shit bucket cart sniffing the smell and you are unable to forget that great smell even when you sit down to write a comment for CT.

        Soma

        • 3
          1

          soman

          “Your earlier generation used to fondly call Sri Lanka shithouse.”

          So the country hasn’t changed that much.

          “When they were in their motherland their only ambition was to find a job of shit bucket carrier in our country.”

          Did you have special schools/universities/technical colleges to teach them their trade? That profession was abolished in this island by late 1960s. Is that why they switched their profession to being SLPP, UNP, …… politicians, …… ?

          • 1
            0

            NV
            Yes, that profession was abolished in 1960.
            Family of this rj1952 became unemployed and unemployable as dealing with ‘shit’ was the only job they knew. He is still living wth that unforgettable smell.
            .
            “So the country hasn’t changed that much.”
            That is why +50 of them wouldn’t budge out of ‘shit’ areas.
            They love the smell.
            I never suspected you are a relative of rj1952.

            Soma

            • 1
              1

              soman

              How come you never mention your living relatives Rodies or Rodiyas?
              Poor people.

              When is Gota going to mount an armed occupation of Southern Hindia over their Bottom Trawling of our waters?

              • 1
                1

                NV
                “How come you never mention your living relatives Rodies or Rodiyas?
                Poor people.”
                .
                I am one of them.
                rj1952’s relatives carried our shit buckets.

                Soma

  • 9
    5

    Due to frustration, Gotler could go amok in the days to come. Ramifications would be more than what people experienced under his brother until 2015. 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔Anything and everything can happen because silence is deep. With increasing heavy loads of debts and numerous other problems but not being politically knowledgeable how to face it, not an inch of progress can be achieved. That he has proved today.
    His abilities are not it’s all cracked up to be. Media mafia and lack of law and order in srilanken legal system made Gota a candidate. Time passes by nothing seems to be achieving. Now looking back polonnaruwa donkey is not the most incapable man, I would say. As hoped no meritocracy is given the chance thr same kind of of political games seem to his tricks. All investigations filed against his men are taken away day by day as if he is elected to that job first before addressing growing alarming problems of the 40% population who are under poverty as of today. Covid is also not contained as self proclamations made the public perception . 😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎😎

    • 9
      3

      In 2015 he sent the army and stopped vote counting! MR told him to withdraw and walked out. Now he doesn’t have to listen to anyone. He will be a mad buffalo.

    • 4
      8

      Mr. eLM (eternal Loose Motion),
      .
      So….
      After all GR is not a dictator…..?
      And……
      Unlike your “yahapalana” regime there will be on time elections….??

      • 6
        2

        Yahapalanaya could do lot more if pissu sira was not raped by all time high criminal Rajapakshe. Today Sirisena suffers that much so ad mahinda Karma will teach them more in the days to come, Ms SCP , u should go back to your cage, bone sare waiting for u. Besides this forum is beyond ur levels. 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔

      • 1
        1

        Ms SCP,
        -We should forgive you for your repeats. That has nothing to do with you, but your genetics.
        .
        I think now almost everyone is clear you are born abnormal. We should not stand against abnormalities, but your irritating comments would nt help anyone, let alone falling Rajapakshes.
        :
        Criminal Rajaapkshes came to power twisting AND making use of the pot holes in srilanken legal system – this is a fact. By the time, Gotler became P Nominee, he was still a Dual Citizen to the US. But that MACO aka bed pan style mouth holder, did not care much about the regulations because of his closeness to RAJAPAKSHE goons. Myths that Rajaakshes liberated srilanka from LTTE rebells also misled him.
        :
        Let s come to the DEFINITION of DICTATATORSHIPs
        .-
        A dictatorship is a government or a social situation where one person makes all the rules and decisions without input from anyone else. Dictatorship implies absolute power — one person who takes control — of a political situation, a family, a classroom or even a camping expedition.

        What is happening today with then CRIME investigations, after 20A became valid, being passed by PUNNAKU eating ballige puthas in the parliament along with total indifference of SAFFRON clad so called monks?

      • 1
        1

        In the days ahead of us, people will realiize how kind the YAHAPALANAYA had been, even if your born imbeciles never noticed it.
        :
        Now with all high criminals becoming saints, what more could happened to our motherland.
        :
        Btw, today the number s

        Sri Lanka
        Coronavirus Cases:
        22,028
        Deaths:
        99
        Recovered:
        15,816


        No need to BECOME swollen by your SELF PROCLAIMATIONS … we are sure rate making up to ” recovered” would not help much that is almost with that of FAR poor countries. Now you the MEDAMULANA spokeswoman, utters not a single word about YOUR ACHIEVEMENTs ha ha ?

      • 2
        1

        S. C. Passqual

        “After all GR is not a dictator…..?”

        Probably, however he has already proved himself to be an effective war criminal with a few stupid b***s carriers.

        Why don’t you teach Shavendra how to count up to 100?

  • 7
    1

    You think so ??????? How NAIVE our political scientist is ????Buddy it may be one term for GR but it is life term for Rajapaksas. The family play of musical chairs, will ensure the power is within the family the SP and other die hard fans (like Trump) satisfied. All they need to is create an impression of change every there and now to satisfy SB, other die hard fans and racist. This will be supported by catchy words like splendor, prosperous, lawful, virtuous—(again like trump,s MAGA 1 , MARGA 2, lock her up ). The change will be between MR, BR, CR, GR, NR —-, just like how they interchanged President/PM post among them self. Dude remember Lankans have already said bye to their dear DEMOCRAZY. If you did not realize yet , “what we have now is called 20 A, and wait for the rest to come.

  • 6
    2

    This is what happens when you are away from dear Sri Lanka too long.. “You seems to have lost reality”. Return back and you will be fine within days.

    • 1
      1

      “This is what happens when you are away from dear Sri Lanka too long. Etc.”
      *
      Not that I agree, but I like that as a cap that fits many a head.

  • 14
    1

    The President is making another serious mistake. He claimed to be the “President of not only the people who voted for him but also president of the people who voted against him.”

    It turns out that what he meant by this was he would only serve the people who voted for him while he would simply lord it over and dictate to the people who voted against him.

    The minorities have innumerable grievances but he will not hold discussions with their representatives about these, or address their problems or solve any of the outstanding issues.

    He goes out to various places inhabited by the people who voted for him, listens to their troubles, and takes the necessary actions to remedy the situation. Has he ever visited the Northern Province or Eastern Province and spoken directly to the people in those areas who look to him for solutions? He even makes himself inaccessible to their political representatives.

    Can anyone mention even one or two complaints of the minorities that he has considered, addressed, and rectified over the past one year that he has been the president of the republic?

    • 1
      6

      Captain Morgan,
      COVID-19 is the main problem people faced after Gotabhaya Rajapakse became the President. Didn’t the Government look after the COVID-19 infected people belong to minorities in the same way they look after the Sinhalese? Didn’t the Government take measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in North and East in the same way they did in rest of the country?
      In news I saw Tamils and Muslims praising the Armed Forces for looking after them well during the time they were quarantined. Anti-Rajapakshe guys do not see those things.

      “Can anyone mention even one or two complaints of the minorities that he has considered, addressed, and rectified over the past one year that he has been the president of the republic?”

      • 3
        1

        Eagle,
        “Didn’t the Government look after the COVID-19 infected people belong to minorities in the same way they look after the Sinhalese?”
        Oh yes, he treated the Muslims the same way as the Sinhalayo, by cremating all.
        Now of course he will command that all Sinhalayo males too should cut off their you-know-whats in the interests of equality. If I were you, Eagle, I would think twice before coming back here . You don’t want to lose it, old and wrinkled though is, do you ?😁😁

        • 3
          0

          old codger.
          You should have no worry about eagle eye/ mahindapala coming back to SL.
          He is living off the Australian government with a good hand out, which he will never ever get in SL. Not only that his off springs( half Demalas) are turning lot of tricks on a daily basis.

      • 2
        0

        Eagle eye/mahindapala.
        you wrote “In news I saw Tamils and Muslims praising the Armed Forces for looking after them well during the time they were quarantined. Anti-Rajapakshe guys do not see those things.”
        It depends on the news site you are referring to. Government news outlet will publish such news and more. They have enough financial backing to buy a lot of Tamils and Muslims to say this and more.
        The fact remains non of the concerns of the Tamils have been addressed not only by Gota and also by the previous governments,
        To be fair to Gota he has a lot of things on his plate right now, we should give him time and see what he does or doesn’t do.
        I am sure he will do much better for the country if people like YOU (real racists) are eliminated from the earth.

  • 11
    0

    DJ.
    Hope your prognostications will come true.
    “Especially since as a political amateur he (Trump) had no respect for the values, norms and ethos of democratic politics and governance.”
    Exemplified here by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s statement that his verbal orders must be considered as circulars coming from the “Executive President” which would have adverse implications for the public sector and for governance.
    The top executive should have only policy papers on his table, while the systems set up in place down line of command, needs to carry that out.
    In fact I recall Samsonite brief cases had three sizes of brief cases when it first came out in early sixties exemplifying the lines of action. It was like :
    Thick – “Executive” for bulky papers
    Medium – “Manager” for few files
    Thin – “President” for just a few policy papers.
    It is insane for the President to go into every little detail of day to day governance.
    I still own the thickest – very hardy, but used hardly now !

    • 1
      0

      Sorry : …but hardly used now.

  • 12
    2

    Dear Dayan

    Many moons ago I remember seeing an article you wrote, after visiting the inaugural ‘Viyath Maga’ at Shangrila Hotel. You were very impressed and paid a glowing tribute to Gotabhaya and the organisation.
    Several months later, you turned against them and subsequently accepted an Ambassador post from President Sirisena.

    I have seen several write ups against GR after you returned from Russia.
    What made you change after writing about Viyath Maga in the first instance?
    Was it an opportunity in the first instance and sour grapes now?

    • 12
      1

      As human beings we are not infallible. Also over a lifetime, new experiences, new ideas, new people we meet, can all bring about changes in anyone’s journey through life.
      DJ has put out his current thoughts as a message. Let us look at that, not the messenger.

      • 3
        0

        F
        It is nothing personal, but can one dismiss his past utterances, until he asks us to.

        • 5
          0

          Dear SJ,
          Yes I think one can. Whether you dismiss or not is in your hands, no permissions necessary. Similar to any dismissals or disagreement on any idea expressed in the current article by the Author. Your life.
          But of course you can ask him, if you wish, why he has changed his stance, or just stick to the ideas currently expressed and give thought to them.

          • 3
            0

            F
            There is a question of credibility when one makes political prescriptions.
            When a person has been continuously prescribing on certain issues, it is hard not to ignore earlier prescriptions.
            *
            Many have challenged his change of stance on earlier occasions, I wonder if he has ever responded.

            • 1
              0

              Sorry
              When a person has been continuously prescribing on certain issues, it is hard to ignore earlier prescriptions.

            • 4
              0

              “But of course you can ask him, if you wish, why he has changed his stance”
              “Many have challenged his change of stance on earlier occasions.”
              Yes there is that.
              Hope he reads these comments and responds like Mr,Harsha Gunasena, in this forum itself.
              Cheers.

              • 3
                0

                F
                Thanks.
                He is no fool.
                He responds occasionally to what suit him to score a point.

    • 3
      1

      snanayakkara,

      Thero standing next to Hakeem and Rishard in accepting or begging for position in both UNP & SLFP factions. He worked for Siri Ma – O , Varathar, Vaalatithodam Sr., Old King, Yahapalanaya and now waiting for place in Royal government. He has been struggling to compete with party acolytes to get Diplomat post. It has ended up as he have to even compete with Rapist Army – Rapist Navy war criminals. He recommended Communist Dinesh for Foreign Affairs minister during the coup, from Russia. But that Secretary is Rapist Army man. What to do? The clouds are not just in East, but in all directions -N-E-W- S- the news is bad for Thero because the entire day seems to ended up gloomy for him, in the Kingdom of the Royals.
      In the mean time, he may have to run to Biden-Kamala’s America for refuge, a possible distant light.

  • 4
    1

    Square Pegs in round holes would be recycled as Round pegs in square holes.
    This is the policy of Rewiring in the Presidency of Gotabaya Rajapakse.

    DJ IS DOUBTFUL OF DYNASTY PLANS!

  • 9
    1

    You mean to say Rajapaksas planning for years, spending a fortune and GR giving up US citizenship, just for a term. Get real.

    • 2
      3

      “You mean to say Rajapaksas planning for years, spending a fortune and GR giving up US citizenship “

      Chiv,
      Things may not go that simple. Jalia could not return to Lankawe by President installing him as diplomat in Washington Embassy. Diplomatic immunity to him is not accepted by America. It wants to investigate. Of cause I know there is an ambiguity surrendered in King’s dual Citizenship. That is because America took a hasty decision fearing Old King was scheming the get King arrested in California in Ahimsa case. America didn’t like anything go out of its hand completely and fall into Old King’s hand. To see the rest, you have to wait for the screen to move.

  • 7
    3

    would it be a
    one term wonder?
    or
    one term disaster?

    • 0
      4

      Rajash,
      It will certainly be a term of disaster for terrorists, extremists and their sympathizers, separatists, drug dealers and under world mafia.

      “one term disaster?”

      • 3
        1

        Eagle Eye – Karuna and Pillayan are there to resurrect terrorism as and when & where the Rajapakses need

        • 1
          0

          R
          K & P (like KP) have served the family well and are receiving remuneration for services rendered.
          In fairness, the latter has a popular base in the East; and the family makes political mileage out of it.
          *
          The two cannot resurrect anything significant; nor can the left overs of the LTTE.

          • 2
            1

            SJ “The two cannot resurrect anything significant; nor can the left overs of the LTTE.”

            may be you misunderstood me or its my choice of the word resurrect.

            I didn’t mean they will resurrect LTTE.

            they are there to organise a bomb here & there at request of the Rajapakses….

            and then the Rajapasas to scream I told you so …LTTE is still alive…

  • 9
    3

    Since Gota became President we have not seen him delivering what he promised, rather delivering benefits and positions to his family members, friends – especially from the armed forces and to Derana and Hiru owners who did the dirty work of promoting him and the Rajapakse brand.
    A simple thing that he promised to the most vulnerable sector of the population – the estate workers
    Rs 1,000- a day wage has not been delivered, but he has given additional security detail to his brother Mahinda who runs around in a convoy longer than Donald Trump’s. Gota has repeatedly said in his speeches that he is for those who voted for him and not for all Sri Lankans.
    On the backs of the Buddhist Monks and Vyath Maga he started his political campaign. Today Vyath Maga has been left on the Maha Maga by Gota. Although the Buddhist Monks who supported him are today shouting against him, I am not sure if its a genuine protest or a strategic setup by the Rajapakse family to show that the Monks are against but at the end they fall at the feet of Rajapakses.

    • 3
      1

      xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
      Can we ever expect pigs to fly ?

      Never right.?

      Likewise, even if SRILANKEN media mafia made GR a presidential candidate, does he have the knowledge to do the little change in this country ?
      :
      He himself visited RMV, srilanken airport, Mahabaenkuwa and several other offices but what has he achieved sofar ?
      :
      RMV – remains as had been before
      SRILANKEN BIA – remains as had been before or even worst today than was before
      :
      What has been changing is – ONLY LORDS OF INVESTIGATIONS filed against GR, MR, NR, BR, YM,, Wimal Buruwanse, Johnsten Thakkadiya and and and…
      .
      Next week or so, KUDU Dhmindha the convicted high crimal will be released.
      :
      What happened to the promises made to the VOTERs ?
      My Dear B1,
      .


      xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  • 4
    2

    May be one term as president ! Who knows there after? As most important positions that were usually held by Senior administrative officers and other Professional heads of Departments are now being replaced, by either retired Servicemen of Army, Navy or by his kinsmen ,the public service would automatically be dismantiled. This phenomenon could end up in a dictatorship similar to

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