POLICE APATHY AT GALLE FACE GREEN

by MERRIL GUNARATNE

SNR DIG POLICE (RETIRED)

The indifference and reluctance of the police to act decisively against groups of political supporters which committed violent acts outside Temple Trees and on Galle Face green on May 9. 2022, caused a vicious backlash in many parts of the country. These omissions also contributed to a serious diminution of the prestige and reputation of the government.

An analysis of police failures will shed light about characteristic features or ingredients which are associated with instances where political goons take the law into their own hands, watched by a passive police. Such phenomena have a long history, going back to late 1970s. Almost all political parties and governments in power, with the exception of the Maithripala Sirisena- Ranil Wickramasinghe government from 2015 to 2019, had exploited this iniquitous practice to hopefully acquire narrow political ends. Passivity amidst such aggression has now become a malignancy in the police.

The fundamental role of the police from a citizen’s standpoint is to protect law abiding and peace loving citizen from those who breach the law. Police at all times perform a host of functions to assure that citizen are protected from lawbreakers. If this be so, how can the police be merely present as passive onlookers when mobs engage in violence and brutality against hapless citizens before their very eyes? This is the kind of syndrome that has been evident since late 1970s’ and the police refrain from performing their fundamental role of coming to grips with offenders.

Even an ordinary citizen can exercise the right of private defence if he is a witness to a crime. If this be so, how can the police passively watch a third force perpetrate violence on hapless protesters? Such an omission by a service empowered to protect society, would constitute a grave contravention of the laws of the land, apart from being a serious dereliction of duty. Police would then not become mere witnesses to occurrence of crime and violence, but would be accountable in a court of law for failing to fulfil their paramount role.

Perhaps the best way to identity where the police went wrong on May 9, 2022 would be to examine what they should have done when they received information that groups of political supporters were planning to converge on Temple Trees in solidarity with the former prime minister. Such information was abundantly available to the police, for the print, electronic and social media had provided ample publicity for them.

Colombo police should then have realised that such groups with goals at cross purposes with those of protesters outside Temple Trees and at Galle Face Green, should be kept distant from those engaged in peaceful protests. Police also had time and space to mobilise intelligence sleuths to find out whether violence was being planned. Anticipating tension and the inevitability of violent clashes, they should also have considered it prudent to speak to the leaders of such groups and admonish them that police would deal with them firmly if they transgressed the law. Apart from these glaring omissions, the police, observing the lawlessness perpetrated outside Temple Trees on May 9, should have anticipated that they would proceed and indulge in acts of violence at the Galle Face green as well.

It may not be difficult to understand why police performed as amateurs or novices. None of the required preparatory work and planning appear to have been done. The irrefutable conclusion that could be drawn from the total absence of planning and foresight is that the police preferred to allow a third force to take the law into their hands. A feeble pretence at an endeavour to restore law and order was “on show”, but not convincing enough to the observer. The police, given the unusually large numbers they had deployed on the fateful morning, could have been a thorn in the flesh of the invaders if they had chosen to act firmly.

When we look at the history of this syndrome over four decades commencing from 1977, it may not be wrong to draw the conclusion that police presence at such scenes of violence had often served as an impetus or encouragement for mobs to swing into action. The police presence helps to assure the mob that they have some degree of protection in case the hapless victims get the better of them. To put it differently, the mobs, before they advance on victims, become conscious that the police are present to be of assistance to them, or to boost their confidence.

POSSIBLE POLICE COLLUSION WITH POLITICAL ELEMENTS.

I would support these conclusions by drawing lessons from my experiences in 1977 when I served as Senior Superintendent of Police, Kelaniya.

Around the early part of 1978, Minister Cyril Mathew, a heavy weight of the UNP government and the leader of the UNP trade union body, required the presence of police from Peliyagoda police station at the Dasa Industries factory at Dalugama, ostensibly to protect workers streaming out of work. Since the request was made to me, I chose to lead the police party visiting the environs of the factory. I observed the minister present, with an unusually large number of his followers.

I then suspected that our presence was to provide some degree of confidence or protection to this group, and that the actual plan was to manhandle the factory workers when they left their premises after work. Our intelligence officers confirmed our assessment. Police were thereupon ordered to baton charge and arrest the miscreants, if they assaulted the ‘Dasa’ workers. The assaults took place as anticipated, and the police swung into action decisively and effectively. The minister left in his car hurriedly, and the goons, apart from some being arrested, took to their heels.

It was evident from this experience that the mob had some confidence that the police would not only watch passively, but also render assistance in some form or the other, if the victims turned tables on the offenders. When the unexpected occurred, they took to their heels. Some of these features were not alien to the events at Galle Face on May 9.

Two weeks after the ‘Dasa’ incident, occurred a far more serious incident. On a particular morning, the minister had assembled about 200 of his followers on the Colombo-Kandy road and invaded the Vidyalankara University in order to cripple left student unions. The Vice Chancellor and the HQI of Peliyagoda police station had apparently been advised to make themselves “unavailable”. The office of SSP Kelaniya being about 300 yds distant from the police station, I was in the dark about these sinister developments.

Perhaps after the experience at Dasa Industries, preparations for the assault had included plans to make me unaware of the planned trespass. Fortunately, a police constable who was an external student of the University, arrived at my office and bared the entire plot of the minister. I telephoned my DIG at police headquarters to keep him in the picture. He showed no surprise, and appeared to know what was taking place! Having briefed him, I visited the Campus premises with a strongly equipped police party.

I then gathered that the assembled mob was to make a second foray to wreak vengeance, for one of their ilk had been done to death by students in self defence. The minister, on seeing the police party, left the environs and summoned me to the police station. He requested that the police party be withdrawn, which I refused to do. He then withdrew his followers. The mob did not prefer a confrontation with the police.

These experiences offer proof that mobs with political designs are often reluctant to clash with a determined police which would uphold the law. Therefore if we relate these two experiences to the events of May 9, 2022, it may not be wrong to reach the following conclusions; the police probably knew the plans of the mob, and worked in collusion; they felt confident to unleash violence, with a passive police present; the goons did not consider the police a threat or obstruction to them; the police bid to restore order was belated and ineffective, leading to the conjecture that it was a pretence; And finally, if the police decided to deal with the miscreants firmly, there would not have been any resistance from them. Our experience in Kelaniya made it abundantly clear that mobs generally do not wish to clash with a police determined to uphold the law.

A PRESIDENTIAL COMMISSION MUST EXAMINE POLICE ROLE ON MAY 9

The apathy of the police in similar scenarios for over 40 years is proof that a malignancy has set in. I think juniors are not to blame for sins of seniors. Even with regard to serious omissions leading to the carnage of “Easter Sunday in 2019, juniors cannot be faulted. One of the reasons why a high powered Commission should be appointed to perform effective surgery of a chronic malignancy is to ensure that the police deviate from the abhorrent practice of allowing third forces to flout the law in their presence. This keeps occurring with monotonous frequency. Further, apart from prosecution in courts for criminal charges, penalties such as dismissal, denial of the right to enjoy “public office” again, and loss of civic rights could be invoked so as to serve as deterrents.

The fact that not one similar instance had been previously scrutinised and investigated to deal with errant officers, is a compelling reason for the appointment of a Commission; and the omissions of the police, apart from triggering a vicious backlash, has caused the government to lose considerable ground, from the standpoint of prestige. To my mind, the police could have acted firmly and justifiably when people surrounded the residence of the head of state at Mirihana and even torched public property. Their inertia became an impetus for what followed. And after unrest advanced from a trickle to a torrent, the question of using force did not emerge as a prudent option to consider. The police did far worse at Galle Face by allowing a third force to cause violence and mayhem.

THE DEFENCE ADVANCED BY SENIOR DIG TENNAKOON

According to news in the social media the Senior DIG is reported to have stated that he was first guided correctly by the president as to the correct course of action to be adopted, but thereafter misguided by two defence officials to desist from doing so. I would consider that this argument in defence is puerile and preposterous. When empowered by law to act against a mob which threatens peaceful protestors with death or injury, he had to be only guided by the law, not by those in power structures. He cannot shift responsibility for violence and carnage to outsiders, for he was in control of security at the green. He alone is therefore accountable in a court of law for his actions. The buck stops with him.