Stench of rotten fish

Saturday 27th November, 2021

Members of Parliament consider themselves a special class, and jealously guard their privileges. Living off the public, they want first dibs on everything. But most of them do not even care to behave properly inside Parliament, much less debate matters of national importance or carry out other legislative duties and functions in a civilised manner; their conduct is so appalling that teachers are wary of taking schoolchildren to the parliament gallery when the House is in session. In what could be considered the latest incident that has brought the national legislature into disrepute, an SLPP MP—Tissa Kuttiarachchi— has insulted women including SJB MP Rohini Wijeratne, in a recent speech in Parliament. The Opposition has been calling for action against him. He however is not the only one who has affronted women in this shameful manner; there are many others of his ilk.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, former President Maithripala Sirisena, and other leaders of the ruling SLPP must be ashamed of accommodating a bunch of misogynists in their coalition government. Similarly, let the holier-than-thou male MPs of the Opposition be reminded of something MP Rohini Wijeratne told this newspaper in response to a query we made, a few months ago, about the verbal sexual harassment of female lawmakers; she said some sickos in the garb of MPs on both sides of the House insulted women. So, if the male Opposition MPs think they can dupe the public into believing they are true sisters under the skin by wearing ‘orange armbands’ and shouting slogans in support of women, in the House, they are mistaken.

It is not only in Parliament that female representatives undergo sexual harassment and other forms of abuse. We have pointed out, several times, quoting female members of local government institutions that their male counterparts do not allow them to speak during council sessions; jeers, catcalls and even sexist remarks greet them whenever they stand up to speak, they complain. The Women Parliamentarians’ Caucus (WPC) should have taken up cudgels for the rights of women in Provincial Councils and local government institutions as well.

It is women’s tears and sweat that fuel the national economy. Women slave away on estates, in garment factories and in West Asia to earn dollars for the country, but they are not even properly represented in Parliament or other political institutions although they account for more than one half of the country’s population. There must be at least 113 female MPs in the current Parliament, but sadly there are only 12 women in the House.

If the male MPs really feel for the Sri Lankan women, they must stop stealing and wasting public funds and make adequate budgetary allocations for women’s welfare, and bring in tough laws to safeguard the rights of female citizens who face harassment almost everywhere, especially at workplaces and in trains and buses. There has been an increase in incidents of domestic violence against women and girls during recent years. If women are not free from harassment in Parliament, how helpless they are elsewhere goes without saying. A fish, as we keep saying in this space, rots from the head down.

Leading the women’s right campaign from the front in Parliament is former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. He has recently lashed out at the government MPs who insult their female counterparts, and demanded that State Minister Dr. Sudharshani Fernandopulle, who chairs the WPC, be vested with powers to deal with woman-haters who make a nuisance of themselves in the House. One could not agree with him more on this score, but will he explain why he once had as his trusted lieutenant a convicted rapist—Gonawala Sunil—who was given a presidential pardon by the late President J. R. Jayewardene and made a Justice of the Peace? President Mahinda Rajapaksa pardoned a female murder convict serving the death sentence for killing a woman in the most barbaric manner. President Maithripala Sirisena gave a presidential pardon to a man sentenced to death for killing a girl in 2005. The TNA politicians had no qualms about supporting Prabhakaran and recognising him as the sole representative of the Tamils while he was abducting girls in the North and the East and turning them into cannon fodder and human bombs. Some of these politicians commemorate the dead LTTE leaders. So, the question is how wise it is to expect present-day male politicians to help protect the rights of women and girls.