Strange case of Payenda

In your above-titled editorial, you speak of former Afghan Finance Minister in exile, Khalid Payenda who is now a cab driver in the US. Whether this is a ploy of his to show that he had not siphoned money to the US when he was Afghan Finance Minister is a matter for conjecture. But I strongly object to the last sentence of the editorial ‘No wonder journalists’ queries about the educational qualifications of the current MPs have met with stonewall after stonewall’.

You could be excused as this is the general wish of voters to send educated, honest men to Parliament to fulfil their aspirations. In fact, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, during the General Election campaign, supporting the SLPP, cried hoarse to send such men and his brother Mahinda Rajapaksa, leader of the SLPP, nominated a mixture of educated men along with uneducated and also crooks with criminal records.

Keep apart the performance of others but speak of the performance of those educated, Professors, Doctors, Lawyers. They have been dismal failures. One incident to mention is their voting on the 20^th Amendment. Any national-minded person, educated or not, would have voted against.

One could easily conclude that once elected and taken to politics, these so-called educated, professional men, pocket or sell their educational qualifications and honesty any, play crooked dirty politics.

As against these so-called educated men, take the case of an uneducated politician whose only qualification, as reported, was that he was married to a girl from the Medamulana area, appointed Piththala State Minister, representing an electorate adjoining the metropolis, sacred as it is said Buddha visited to settle a dispute. His first action was to summon prominent handicraft experts to brief him. Correct step seeking the help of knowledgeable men to deliver the goods, as expected.

G. A. D. Sirimal

BORALESGAMUWA