Loketa parakase, Gedarata maragathe?

by Dr Upul Wijayawardhana

The actions of Ranil Wickremesinghe remind me of the Sinhala saying, loketa parakase, Gedarata maragathe, which can be roughly rendered into Englis as “glory to the world but misery at home”. He is all out to set up a climate change university in Sri Lanka but his government is unable to provide an uninterrupted electricity supply for the benefit of the students sitting the GCE A/L examination! Instead of devoting his efforts to ensure that all citizens have at least one square meal a day, he has prioritised ethnic reconciliation and promised he would solve the problem before we celebrate the 75th anniversary of Independence. A cynic may comment that we would have been better off had we continued to be under the British than our local rulers, but that is another story. Celebrations costing Rs 200 million will show our glory to the world whilst many starve and students faint in schools due to hunger!

In a way, it is a surprise that no government politico has said, “Why can’t the AL students, study with kerosene oil lamps as we did”. Most of them are old enough to say that! I too did all my studies using kerosine oil lamps as our house in Godagama, Matara received an electricity connection long after I became a doctor. But the difference is that in our time there was no shortage of kerosene oil and six or seven decades later, people have to queue up for days to get kerosine oil! However, there will be no shortage of the aircraft performing flypasts for the dignitaries assembled to celebrate our independence with the President, who cannot afford to miss this chance.

The miserable position we are in due to the economic collapse brought about by the actions of our politicians is being capitalised by the remnants of the Tigers and politicians who hailed them as the sole representative. Therefore, Ranil has now changed the tune and says he will use his presidential powers to implement 13A fully. Just imagine! The man who fought for the abolition of the executive presidency is now threatening to use the powers of the executive presidency to implement 13A, rather than attempting to bring about a consensus among the parties represented in Parliament!

One wonders whether Ranil had the bright idea of a climate change university to justify his attendance at the climate change summit in Egypt without due consideration whether we need it and can afford it. Even if we can obtain foreign funding, there would be some local costs which we can ill-afford.

Let us remind ourselves how China and India responded when the West tried to impose reductions of greenhouse gases on them. They said they should be given the opportunity develop to the extent the West did emitting greenhouse gases before limits were imposed. Don’t we have more urgent problems that need attention before setting up climate change universities?

Ranil appointed Erik Solheim as the International Advisor on Climate Change. Do we need such a person? Even if we do, is Solheim the right person? I do not have to go into his shady activities during the so-called peace process as Shamindra Ferdinando has exposed in great detail in a number of excellent articles. Even if we disregard these, what about Solheim’s environment credentials? This news item printed in the British newspaper The Guardian on 20 November 2018, under the heading “UN environment chief resigns after frequent flying revelations” says it all:

“The UN’s environment chief, Erik Solheim, has resigned following severe criticism of his global travels and internal rule-breaking which led some nations to withhold their funding. The Guardian understands Solheim was asked to resign by the UN secretary general, António Guterres. Sources at the UN Environment Programme said that countries unhappy with Solheim’s conduct were holding back tens of millions of dollars, threatening a financial crisis at the body.

“A draft internal UN audit leaked to The Guardian in September found Solheim had spent almost $500,000 (£390,000) on air travel and hotels in just 22 months, and was away 80% of the time. The audit said this was a “reputation risk” for an organisation dedicated to fighting climate change. A UN staff union leader called some of the revelations “mind-blowing” and a prominent climate scientist accused Solheim of “obscene CO2 hypocrisy”.

The audit said Solheim had “no regard for abiding by the set regulations and rules” and had failed to account properly for some of his travel. He also unofficially allowed chosen staff to work from Europe rather than at UNEP headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya. Solheim told The Guardian he had already paid back money for instances of oversight and made changes where other rules had been broken.”

Do we need such a hypocrite as our international advisor? Is Ranil unaware of these facts or is he trying to bring him in for other reasons cloaked in an undeserving title?

The next was the arrival of David Cameron, the former British PM whom Britain has chosen to forget. He would have earned the title of the worst British PM of modern times had it not been for the antics of Liz Truss! We have not forgotten how badly he behaved when he attended the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting held in Colombo in November 2013. He insulted the Head of the Commonwealth, the Queen by not attending the opening ceremony, where Prince Charles was delivering her message. It was reported that he was holidaying in Sri Lanka. He met Ranil during the visit and what was the sinister motive behind?

To cap it all, comes the news that former UNSG Ban Ki-moon is coming soon to meet Ranil. The less said about this disgraceful international diplomat the better. He permanently damaged Sri Lanka’s reputation with his report wherein he denied Sri Lanka natural justice. No self-respecting country would entertain such a person and Ranil seems to have lost any sense of shame!

Why are all these shady characters coming to meet Ranil? Expect the worst for there is nothing to hope for the best!