Giving people ideas?

Friday 8th July, 2022

The JVP has complained of a vicious propaganda campaign against it ahead of a protest to be held soon. Its leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake has said a video doing the rounds on social media shows someone described as a JVP instructor giving a lesson on how to make Molotov cocktails, which those who are to take part in the scheduled protest are urged to strap to their bodies and explode to topple the government so that the JVP could capture power. Dissanayake says the video is part of a sinister government attempt to justify a crackdown on its political opponents who are conducting street protests.

As for the mastermind behind the video, we do not want to hazard a guess, but it is a very childish propaganda move, which will not dupe the JVP watchers into believing that the outfit is hatching a plot to use violence to overthrow the government. That, however, does not mean the JVP is not capable of violence, given its ugly past, and it will have a hard time trying to convince the discerning public who are au fait with its tactics that it had no hand in the spate of violence unleashed by the so-called Helmet Brigade in the aftermath of the 09 May SLPP goon attacks on the Galle Face protesters. But by no stretch of the imagination could it be thought that the JVP is so naive as to coach its cadres in producing petrol bombs. There are two reasons for this assumption. The JVP failed to capture state power even with the help of assault rifles, grenades and landmines in the late 1980s, when it deployed countless sparrow groups that roamed the country like the Oprichniki of Ivan the Terrible, and therefore it is not possible that the it will try to achieve the same end by using improvised explosive devices during a protest. The second reason is that there is absolutely no need for anyone to teach the JVP cadres how to make petrol bombs. You don’t have to teach your grandmother to suck eggs, do you?

The above-mentioned video which is obviously intended to demonise the JVP could prove counterproductive; it might give the resentful public ideas.

Kerosene racket

The Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB) and the private bus operators are clashing over diesel. The former insists that the owners of some private buses refuelled at its depots, sell diesel on the black market. The private operators have denied this claim, but an investigation is called for. It is not difficult to figure out what is going on. The private bus owners make a daily announcement of the number of their vehicles in operation and this could be checked against the SLTB statistics to find out whether there is any discrepancy.

There is another serious allegation against the private bus operators; many of their buses run on heavily subsidised kerosene instead of diesel. The main problem with all subsidies in this country is poor targeting. It defies comprehension why an across-the-board kerosene subsidy is given. Kerosene costs only Rs. 87 a litre whereas a litre of regular diesel sells at Rs. 460. Thus, private buses are making a killing at the expense of the public who bears the cost of the kerosene subsidy and pays extremely high bus fares.

Private bus owners stand accused of making unconscionable profits while claiming to be in dire financial straits. They had bus fares increased at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, when restrictions had to be imposed on the number of passengers travelling in buses. Today, there are no such restrictions, and, in fact, thanks to the prevailing fuel shortage, buses carry as many passengers as possible. Atop all this, the private bus operators have secured another fare hike. They are said to have got much more than they really deserve, as President of the Lanka Private Bus Owners’ Association, Gemunu Wijeratne, has admitted. This is something the associations championing the rights of commuters should take up with the Transport Ministry. The special fare hike given in view of the pandemic should be scrapped forthwith.

Kerosene should be realistically priced to prevent racketeers from thriving at the expense of the public, and coupons issued to the needy so that only they could obtain kerosene at subsidised rates. Above all, the manner in which fuel prices are determined is not convincing, and the pricing formula must be examined by COPE (Committee on Public Enterprises) to ascertain whether the crisis-stricken people are being fleeced by the CPC.