Govt. learning from UNHRC

Wednesday 3rd March, 2021

There is obviously no love lost between the incumbent Sri Lankan government and the UNHRC, but the former seems to have taken a leaf out of the latter’s book. It has adopted the practice of using reports to scare and tame its political opponents.

In what looks a counterattack on the political front, the Rajapaksa government has decided to release the report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) that probed allegations of corruption and irregularities under the yahapalana government from 14 Jan. 2015 to 31 Dec. 2018. The then President Maithripala Sirisena appointed this commission to settle political scores with the UNP. He sought to take moral high ground and show his political enemies, especially the then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, in a bad light. The final report of the Easter Sunday PCoI, which Sirisena appointed to deflect criticism and pin the blame for failing to prevent the carnage on others, has boomeranged. The SJB is using it against not only Sirisena but also the present government, of which he is a member. The government seems to think the release of the PCoI report on corruption under the yahapalana government will help it silence the SJB, whose grandees were Cabinet ministers in the previous administration accused of being involved in various corrupt deals. One may recall that allegations of corruption were also levelled against several SLFP notables in the yahapalana Cabinet, and they are now in the present administration. Will the SLPP open up another can of worms by releasing the PCoI report at issue?

Most of the Opposition politicians who pretend to be paragons of virtue have a lot to answer for as regards frauds and corruption under the previous dispensation if the testimonies of high-profile witnesses who appeared before the PCoI on corruption are anything to go by. These politicians are now in overdrive, bashing the government for its failure to reveal the masterminds of the Easter Sunday attacks. It will be interesting to see their reaction to the government decision to release the PCoI report on corruption. Will they dare the SLPP to do so expeditiously and call for a parliamentary debate thereon? They should be able to do so if they are as confident as they claim to be that they were above board while they were in power.

If the government thinks it can mitigate the fallout of the flawed PCoI report on the Easter Sunday carnage by using the PCoI report on corruption to silence the political Opposition, then it is mistaken because not all its critics are its political rivals. Some SJB and UNP politicians attacking the SLPP may chicken out lest they should be prosecuted for corruption, etc., on the basis of the PCoI report, but there is no way the government can allay the fears of the public and counter protests by the Catholics who bore the brunt of the Easter Sunday terror. The Catholic Church has declared a Black Sunday protest (07 March), and its agitation campaign is likely to continue. Its consternation is understandable. Nobody is safe until the masterminds of the carnage are identified and dealt with, for they can carry out more attacks.

There was absolutely no need for a presidential probe to identify those whose lapses had led to the Easter Sunday tragedy. Their identities were already known and legal action could have been taken against them, but such a course of action will not help ensure that there will be no terror attacks. The need for a presidential probe arose as nobody knew who had actually masterminded the carnage and they had to be identified and neutralised.

The yahapalana leaders and their lackeys in the military and the police are no longer a problem because they are not in charge of national security. But the masterminds of the terror strikes are still at large. There’s the rub. The government ought to fulfil its election pledge to probe the carnage thoroughly, identify the masterminds thereof instead of trying to silence its critics politically.