Features
Meeting in Court; COPE; poem read at Oscar Awards 76
Will he? Won’t he?
Will Rohitha A institute legal action against these two stalwarts of the JVP? Cassandra places a sure bet: he won’t. Our politicians usually threaten to go to courts but definitely fight shy of doing so. If they are as white as their kapati suits, they need not fear appearing in any court or public forum. But many have skeletons rattling in their cupboards. And they rattle loud and clear.
Some even keep hidden in their closets not one but several skeletons. Is Rohitha one of these? I suppose the main reason why he will fight shy of appearing in a court case is fear that the opposite side will refer to his nickname, or sobriquet. It has been shouted out in Parliament and the reason for it sticking on him like a strip of Band Aid plaster, exposed. Cassandra has her views on this, expressed before but not in print. Rohitha himself explained either in Parliament or elsewhere how he came to have the sobriquet bequeathed on him.
His aarchie, who loved him dearly, used the loving term on him. He was her Raththaran Munupura. So, the term stuck on him. Aney, suweet no? Very plausible story too. Then it was said he frequented railway stations, Galle particularly. So what? Boys were and are fascinated by moving vehicles, more so by locomotives, those days hissing and steaming, pulling railway carriages. Cass can bet her last 1000 rupee note that like most other boys, Rohitha A aspired to be a locomotive driver hooting and puffing his way along railway lines built by the British. How did he become a politician? Must have seen how the kapati suited politicos in his area very soon got bloated with riches and poundage acquired through posh living. Sure path for getting rich fast, with the added bonus of power. Hence MP and COPE Chairman – Rohitha Abeygunawardena Amathithuma – go to Courts and face those JVPers.
Latest on the issue of COPE is the resignation of COPE member Eran Wickremaratne, honourable MP that he is. He has been an effective member of this investigative body of Parliament for many terms. His reason as given in The Island of Tuesday March 19 goes thus: “COPE was established to ensure the observance of financial discipline in Public Corporations and other semi-governmental bodies in which the government has a financial stake. By appointing a ruling party member as its Chairman, the committee fails to meet its objectives of keeping a check on the executive arm of the government.” So clear, so precise with no side tracks of stupid surmises and mention of gossipy hearsay. There are MPS deserving of honour and admiration in a collection of under-educated, dishonest 225 legislators.
Subsequently six more COPE members resigned. Cass applauded but two friends were disapproving as they contend that disagreeing members need to stay on and steer proceedings with a disapproved of MP occupying the Chair.
Conspirators
Quoted from page 1 of The Island of Tuesday March 19 is this: “Gota accuses Church of having a role in his ouster” and he means the Roman Catholic Church. The article is long and quotes his accusation in his “explosive memoir” titled ‘The Conspiracy to Oust Me from the Presidency’”. It narrates how Cardinal Ranjith and the Rajapaksa brethren saw eye to eye and had good relations, which turned completely sour and bitter after the Easter Sunday 2019 suicide bombings of churches and hotels. The word used in The Island news item is most apt: ‘explosive’ because terms like ‘Sinhala Buddhist’, ‘Catholic action’ and ‘Sinhala Buddhist majority’ are used in the book. These terms are incendiary in this land of ours. Cass has not read the book, neither will she read it.
Cass presumes the term Sinhala Buddhist was a coinage of either the Rajapaksa’s or their old political party or newly-formed party – SLPP. We were just Buddhists and remain thus. There is no meaning to the term. Are there other groupings like Tamil Buddhists? The term Sinhala Buddhist is loaded with very dangerous, nay explosive connotations, which we right thinking Buddhists reject outright.
So coming back to the list of conspirators that ousted Prez Gotabaya R in addition to foreign and local groups – political and interfering – is the Catholic Church. How many more are named in the book? Will he fish out and present more to the public?
What Cass timidly proposes, nay advice Ex-Prez GR, is to look within himself and find the real cause; also, within the advisers who crowded round him – ViyathMaga and all that – and not outside for causes that made him escape from this country. He actually need not have run away. If he resigned from the presidency he would not have been further exhorted or harmed in the slightest. The real Aragalaya wanted a system change, not blood and mayhem. This is the truth. Of course terrorists who infiltrated and then crashed in were blood and revenge thirsty. One proof of bona fides of true Aragalayists (to coin a term) was their returning a wad of notes – millions – to the authorities without taking even one note to share among themselves, the finders?
Cass quotes two religious sayings to prove her point that the Ex Prez will find all the reasons for his ouster within himself, his brothers, his coterie of advisors.
“First cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.” The Holy Bible makes this command, not helpless Cassandra, so please no white van for her.
“In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you,” That is the Buddha’s wise saying. In this case we can substitute the word ‘served’ for ‘loved’ and ‘graciously’ you let go. So, fitting is the final bit of Buddha’s advice in the case under discussion. There are no two words about it: Gotabaya was a powerful commander during the civil war but a failure as the president of the country.
The saddest report on Gaza
Multitudinous are the reports, documentaries, speeches, poems on Gaza and the severity of the travails of its people. Palestinian children themselves have cried out vocally, in song and in writing. To Cass the most heart wrenching was the poem read out by journalist Chris Hedges to the glittering audience on Oscar night 2024 in Hollywood. “Why do they kill children?” he asked. “All that was familiar is gone” “Who will die next? You mother, your father?” “Are these your last moments on this earth?” and he speaks of injuries, blindness, amputations and starvation. He speaks as a journalist reporting the attacks of Israel on the Gaza strip and Rafah particularly. “We have children like you: precious, innocent, loved.” and that’s why we come over. He ends on a hopeful note of “I will be old” and you would travel the world in safe planes. With tears he ends: “We have failed you but we will film and report – not much help, but …”