Cries for justice and smoke and mirrors

Wednesday 18th October, 2023

Three investigations into the Easter Sunday attacks have been completed so far, but the general consensus is that much more remains to be done to get at the truth and trace the masterminds behind the carnage. However, the need is not for another parliamentary probe.

The government’s hard-sell strategy to persuade those who are seeking justice for the victims of the Easter Sunday carnage to endorse the appointment of a parliamentary probe into Channel 4 allegations has come a cropper. The Opposition and the Catholic Church have rejected the proposed PSC out of hand—for good reason.

The public has lost faith in parliamentary and presidential investigations because they are widely seen as political instruments with which governments in power obfuscate hot-button issues or deflect blame or launch witch-hunts against their political rivals.

In the immediate aftermath of the Easter Sunday tragedy, the then President Maithripala Sirisena, who drew heavy flak for his lapses as the Minister of Defence, appointed a special probe committee headed by Judge Vijith Malalgoda, on 22 April 2019. The committee submitted its report to Sirisena on 10 June 2019, but it never saw the light of day. (Sri Lankan Presidents seem to have a remarkable ability to swallow committee or commission reports!)

A Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) was appointed on 22 May 2019 to probe the Easter Sunday terror attacks, and it was headed by the then Deputy Speaker Ananda Kumarasiri. Its report was presented to Parliament on 23 Oct., 2019, but no action was taken on the basis of its recommendations. Sirisena has refused to accept the PSC findings and recommendations; he claims the UNP members of the committee were prejudiced against him because he had broken ranks with the UNP by that time. His argument is not untenable.

While the UNP-dominated PSC was conducting its investigation, Sirisena appointed a Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI), on 22 Sept., 2019 to probe the terror strikes, and its report was presented to his successor, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, on 01 Feb., 2021. Only a few of the 88 volumes of the report were made public, and the Rajapaksa government was accused of a cover-up. The complete report has now been released, but doubts and suspicions linger. All PCoI recommendations save a few have remained unimplemented.

Channel 4 has not made any revelations as such. It has based its so-called exposé on an observation made by the aforesaid PSC, whose report says, inter alia, “The PSC also observes that further investigations will be needed to understand whether those with vested interests did not act on intelligence so as to create chaos and instil fear and uncertainty in the country in the lead up to the Presidential Election to be held later in the year. Such a situation would then lead to the call for a change of regime to contain such acts of terrorism. Coincidently or not so coincidentally, the security situation and fear would be unleashed months away from the Presidential Election.” Channel 4 has spiced it up with some claims made by a Sri Lankan asylum seeker and a number of unsubstantiated allegations thrown in for good measure.

It can therefore be argued that the proposed PSC investigation into Channel 4’s claims will be a waste of time, energy and resources. On the other hand, PSC probes in Sri Lanka are politically motivated, and most of the MPs appointed as their members are not equal to the task of carrying out impartial, thorough probes; they try to please their political masters, the PSC which probed Chief Justice Dr. Shirani Bandaranayake in 2012 being the best example. The less said about the PSC probing the causes of the country’s bankruptcy, the better!

There is no reason why the government cannot order a fresh probe into the Easter Sunday tragedy if it has nothing to hide. The proposed PSC probe is all just smoke and mirrors.