{"id":233870,"date":"2023-09-08T16:48:22","date_gmt":"2023-09-08T11:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=233870"},"modified":"2023-09-21T19:21:52","modified_gmt":"2023-09-21T13:51:52","slug":"unthinkable-unspeakable-can-happen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/unthinkable-unspeakable-can-happen\/","title":{"rendered":"Unthinkable, Unspeakable Can Happen"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Sarath de Alwis<\/a> –<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

Sarath de Alwis<\/p><\/div>\n

The French novelist Emile Zola who captioned his last novel as \u2018Verite\u2019 [Truth] wrote these immortal words. \u201cWhen truth is buried underground it grows, it chokes, it gathers such an explosive force that on the day it bursts out, it blows up everything with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his Philosophy of History, Hegel remarked that people and governments have never learned anything from history. The observation is crucially relevant to the times we live in.<\/p>\n

The Channel 4 video has succeeded in its purpose. It has provoked a fresh inquiry into the Easter Sunday Carnage<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n

The Archbishop of Colombo Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith<\/a><\/span> has called for an impartial investigation with international assistance into revelations made by the Channel 4 documentary on the 2019 Easter Sunday carnage.
\nThe seventh executive president Gotabaya Rajapakse has captioned his response with argumentative finesse. He calls it \u201cThe latest Channel 4 film on Sri Lanka.\u201d<\/p>\n

His response ignores the yet unresolved broad day light killing of \u2018Lasantha Wickrematunge whose brutal assassination is shrewdly woven into the preamble of the Channel 4\u2019s Easter Sunday story.
\nHis Press Release seeks to dismisses Channel 4 allegations as \u2018fabrications\u2019 and \u2018plain nonsense.\u2019 He explains the deplorable and humiliating transfer of the CID\u2019s top investigator as an imperative dictated by his sense of governance propriety.<\/p>\n

As per the media release no one called someone a \u2018dog\u2019.<\/p>\n

A \u2019Viyathmaga<\/a><\/em><\/span>\u2019 stalwart in a passionate defense of the former President said on TV that the idea of a few Islamic fundamentalists blowing themselves up to make someone else win the presidency was simply and ridiculously inconceivable.<\/p>\n

That indeed is a valid point. But this is where Hegel\u2019s remark of our incapacity to learn from history comes in to play.
\nWho could have imagined that Velupillai Prabhakaran would impose a boycott of the 2005 Presidential election paving way for a Mahinda Rajapakse presidency.<\/p>\n

So, if history is of any help, the unthinkable and unspeakable indeed can happen.<\/p>\n

One may agree or disagree about its motives and timing. That said, the simple truth is obvious. Channel 4 video is cinematography mocking at the Rajapakse dynasty\u2019s brazen attempt to weaponize \u2018pride\u2019 and \u2018patriotism\u2019.
\nFor too long we have quietly acquiesced or helplessly watched the subversion of universally held norms of justice.
\nThe military defeat of violent separatism has been used to stigmatize minorities. In post war Rajapakse family rule the mainstream media has been coerced in to meek or calibrated dissent. There are plenty of timeservers\u2019 clerical and lay to offer apologies when injustice is perpetrated by the ruling class.<\/p>\n

Justice is dispensed by humans. Humans are fallible. US Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson\u00a0famously quipped, \u201cWe are not final because we are infallible, but we are infallible only because we are final.\u201d<\/p>\n

I undertake this essay despite a serious eye problem due to age, weakening my eyelids resulting in eyes flooding with tears. I consulted several Eye surgeons, and it took some time to find out what\u2019s wrong.
\nThese are thoughts that come to mind at random. If Doctors can make mistakes so can judges, jurors and investigators.<\/p>\n

But the Channel 4 story is not about error but deliberate directional determination to arrive at error, distortion, or both.
\nAs E.C, Hughes remarks in his classic commentary in sociology \u2018Men and their work\u2019 no human effort is wholly immune from error.<\/p>\n

The myth of ending a thirty-year war made Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/a><\/span> incapable of wrongdoing. He was the \u2018Appachchi\u2019 of the nation. The \u2018Appachchi\u2019 decided that henceforth there were no minorities. All are patriots.<\/p>\n

Soon after the end of the war Professor Neera Wickremesinghe wrote an essay \u201cProducing the Present: History as Heritage in Post-War Patriotic Sri Lanka”. I invite readers to revisit her brilliant and prophetic reading of our steady dissent into a cult of tribal savagery under the guise of a return to heritage.<\/p>\n

A defective investigation will not give us effective justice. We are in the process of restructuring our sovereign debt, domestic and foreign. At the behest of the IMF, we have undertaken a governance audit.<\/p>\n

His eminence the Cardinal wants a fresh audit of the investigative process of the Easter Sunday massacre.<\/p>\n

Decision-makers vested with authority in a democracy must be able to explain how they reached important decisions on behalf of all in society. As a Society we must never relinquish our right to question officialdom.<\/p>\n

Protestors on the streets shape the future. That is the lesson of history. Behind the barricades are those who fear the future. They refuse to learn from history.<\/p>\n

Emile Zola ended his famous tract \u2018J Accuse \u2018in which he accused 19th century France\u2019s officialdom of a grand cover up of a gross injustice with these words.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have only one passion, that of light, in the name of humanity which has suffered so much, and which has the right to happiness. My fiery protest is only the cry of my soul. So, dare you put me on trial and let the investigation take place! I wait.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pillayan and Moulana are silhouettes dancing in the dark world they were nurtured in by a Surveillance state.<\/p>\n

Though broken, and bankrupt, we still retain some sanity. We demand light!<\/p>\n

Meanwhile in a parallel universe mischief is afoot.<\/p>\n

Wee Willie Winkie runs through the town,\u2028Upstairs and down stairs in his night-gown,\u2028Tapping at the window, crying at the lock,\u2028Are the children in their bed, I\u2019m looting your EPF !<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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