{"id":155597,"date":"2016-01-09T23:59:23","date_gmt":"2016-01-09T18:29:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=155597"},"modified":"2016-01-15T03:51:18","modified_gmt":"2016-01-14T22:21:18","slug":"some-wonders-of-asia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/some-wonders-of-asia\/","title":{"rendered":"Some \u201cWonders Of Asia\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Emil van der Poorten<\/span><\/a> \u2013 <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Emil<\/a>

Emil van der Poorten<\/p><\/div>\n

I have, from time to time, referred to the camp followers of the Rajapaksa Regime (MR1) who fattened their wallets and visited destruction and death upon those who were seen as enemies of their patrons. Those references have, generally, been \u201cin passing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also, given a grossly over-burdened judicial system in this country, it is understandable if the primary effort was to net the big sharks first and deal (or not deal) with the acolyte remoras that survived (very well!) on that body politic. However, what has clearly emerged in the past year has been that it has been an infinitesimally small number of even those sucker-fish who have been prosecuted while their host monsters continue to swim free.<\/p>\n

One that fits into the category I describe was taken into custody for signing cheques worth hundreds of millions for the building of houses in Tsunami-ravaged parts of the country, houses that, up to now \u2013 more than ten years after that calamity \u2013 have not seen the light of day. After a period in custody- spent mostly in rather comfortable \u201cdigs,\u201d at state expense, in one of those places referred to as a \u201cprivate ward\u201d in Sri Lanka\u2019s premier public hospital, he was not only set free as the proverbial bird but employed, presumably at a salary \u201cbefitting his status,\u201d by the very government that had taken him into custody in the first place! As to what happened to the very serious charges that would, in similar instances, have been laid for the alleged crime, suffice it to say that your guess is as good as mine. The indications, though, are that they have disappeared much as humans dragged into white vans did, not so long ago. The exhortation to \u201cPut up or shut up\u201d is surely deserving of modification to \u201cProsecute or exonerate,\u201d in this context.<\/p>\n

Incidentally, this individual\u2019s defence at the time of his initial apprehension was something to the effect of, \u201cI only signed the cheques. I didn\u2019t know anything else about the whole business.\u201d If this came from the office peon it might have been credible. However, emanating from a top-rung functionary with the kind of financial authority he obviously possessed, it seemed, at the least, a bit bizarre.<\/p>\n

But \u201cthe powers-that-be\u201d obviously bought his response because he has been re-employed by the very government \u2013 Maithripala-Ranil (MR2) \u2013 that took him into custody in the first place! \u201cOnly in Sri Lanka you say?\u201d Well, we are \u201cthe wonder of Asia\u201d after all, aren\u2019t we? And this government might well have felt obliged to indulge in practices even more weird and wonderful than their predecessors in order to maintain that status!<\/p>\n

The benefits reaped by sycophants in uniform are epitomized by one of the high-flying brand who, after his retirement from the wide blue yonder was appointed (and re-appointed) to head the Sri Lanka Rugby Football Union as, in point of fact, some sort of \u201csecurity\u201d to the Presidential progeny while those delightful young men, all three of them, sought to treat the rugby field as some kind of Sri Lankan sports slaughterhouse. Before he reached this position that carried a plethora of perks, this gentleman (I use the term with generosity) reportedly built himself a holiday home on land that had been designated as part of a World Heritage Site in the Knuckles mountain range, using the resources of the service he headed to do so. Then, even the genuflectory local media ran a few \u201cminor scandal\u201d stories on the subject and the kerfuffle, such as it was, ended there. Before it did, it was evident that all the relevant authorities were aware of this brazenly illegal act but have not seen fit to do anything about it. Then or since.<\/p>\n

The other instance I wish to refer to has far more sinister underpinnings.<\/p>\n

It is of an individual who was an integral part of the well-organized campaign of total obstruction of information and deliberate obfuscation that was a feature of government policy during the final – \u201cNanthikadal\u201d – phase of the conflict between the Sri Lankan security forces and what was left of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), obscenely titled \u201cThe Humanitarian Operation\u201d by the man who only recently departed his Empire. The services provided by this man to the Emperor were of the most obsequious kind at all times but, nevertheless, distinguished by their ruthlessness, when required.<\/p>\n

When the Tigers were finally vanquished on the battlefield and the surviving civilians \u201crescued,\u201d among those \u201crescued\u201d were the four doctors who had more than lived up to their Hippocratic oath under truly unimaginable conditions. Subsequent to a threat made against them when they were successful in getting their appeals for a cessation of incessant bombing attacks on supposed \u201cno fire zones\u201d out to the world, they were, on the record, threatened by the head of their service. While I don\u2019t recall the specific punishment threatened, there was no doubt about the gravity of its nature given the impunity with which this man\u2019s patrons were carrying out a variety of extra-judicial sentences.<\/p>\n

I distinctly remember the time that these four members of the medical profession were presented to the nation at a media conference. This was after they had been held in custody for several days and to describe their appearance as \u201cbedraggled\u201d at the time they were put before the TV cameras would be to overstate their well-being. I understand that one of these doctors who chose to follow the most important part of their Hippocratic oath – \u201cDo no harm\u201d \u2013 has since had a complete breakdown that prevents him continuing in the profession to which he was, very obviously, a credit.<\/p>\n

The upward progress of the medics\u2019 boss in the matter of very highly-paid employment continued unabated, however, a reward, not only for his stout defence of the MR1 regime in the final days of the war but, perhaps, also for his conduct relative to post-mortems in the Action Contre La Faim execution atrocity, something which also refuses to go away thanks to its very enormity.<\/p>\n

The first of these steps was into the office of an international agency located in one of Asia\u2019s major cities. Here he proceeded to draw a salary (and perks) befitting an international civil servant, traipsing the globe at no expense to himself or his spouse.<\/p>\n

However, like all good things, this phase of his upwardly-mobile career ended. The \u201cofficial\u201d reason advanced for his contract not being renewed was, I understand, that he was an \u201cunwitting player\u201d in some internal politics involving the government of his host country and Sri Lanka. However, that this man\u2019s past might have emerged in the continuing, unrelenting controversy over the suppression of information and the carnage relating to the end of \u201cthe war\u201d and associated events, his public pronouncements relative to them and the potential embarrassment that might have ensued if his contract was extended, are factors that could well have played a part in the parting of the ways.<\/p>\n

However, talk about falling in you-know-what and emerging smelling of roses! On his return to dear old Sri Lanka, the man lands a job with a multinational drug behemoth in his home country with a monthly salary that exceeded what most Sri Lankans probably earn in a lifetime.<\/p>\n

The man\u2019s continuing easy access to the halls of power along which Mahinda Rajapaksa then strode is not likely to have hurt his chances of securing the position he did! After all, Sri Lankan society is no exception to the old adage that \u201cit\u2019s whom you know and not what you know\u201d that matters and this man\u2019s \u201cconnections,\u201d very obviously, had commercial value, particularly in the most profitable of capitalist enterprises.<\/p>\n

This employment being in the private sector, the chances are that, now that MR1 is out of power, this man\u2019s bosses will find someone else that has similar entr\u00e9e into the MR2 halls of power, suggesting that the adage I quoted in the previous paragraph can sometimes have its down-side!<\/p>\n

Of course, this man, like the one I referred to earlier, may simply display his chameleonic skill and change his political colours and\/or be simply accommodated, as have so many other square pegs from the MR1 regime, who now occupy the round holes of the MR2 regime.<\/p>\n

As redundant as it might seem, I cannot resist the temptation of another old quote in closing: \u201cthe more things change, the more they remain the same.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":93580,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,46,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-constitutional-reforms","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nSome \u201cWonders Of Asia\u201d - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/some-wonders-of-asia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Some \u201cWonders Of Asia\u201d - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[…]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/some-wonders-of-asia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-01-09T18:29:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-01-14T22:21:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Emil.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"356\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"433\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/some-wonders-of-asia\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/some-wonders-of-asia\/\",\"name\":\"Some \u201cWonders Of Asia\u201d - 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