The games they play

A lot remains unsaid about IGP Chandana Wickramaratne’s two three-month extensions of office since he retired on March 26 this year upon attaining the age of 60-years. Appointing a successor was problematic for very good reasons. The three most senior contenders for the job, Senior DIG Nilantha Jayawardena, Senior DIG Lalith Pathinayake and Senior DIG Deshabandu Tennakoon have been found culpable of negligence of their duties by the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCOI) that investigated the 2019 Easter Sunday attacks. In their final report, the PCOI recommended that the Attorney General should consider prosecuting Jayawardena, who served as Director of State Intelligence Services at the time of the Easter carnage, under suitable provisions of the Penal Code. A disciplinary inquiry against Tennakoon, who had other problems relating to the attack on aragalaya protestors on Galle Face green on his plate, has also been recommended by the Commission.

No wonder then that the government resorted to the convenience of extending Wickramaratne, a decision endorsed by the Constitutional Council, as a time buying exercise. This also offered a window to the various prospective IGPs to sort out their legal problems. It is widely perceived in police circles that Tennakoon enjoys the confidence of Public Security Minister Tiran Alles who is in charge of the police and is pushing for this appointment which the president is resisting. In fact it has been reported that Wickramaratne and Alles had a meeting a few days ago before the second three-month extension, subject to Constitutional Council (CC) approval, was made.

Whether such approval will be forthcoming must await the next meeting of the 10-member Council comprising of both politicians and civil society representatives. Although the extension recommendation has been sent to the CC and acknowledged, no date has yet been set for a meeting. As it is, the CC is under pressure not to rubber stamp the president’s executive decision with former External Affairs Minister GL Peiris publicly demanding this last week. Matters are getting “curiouser and curiouser” as Alice had it in Wonderland.

Added to all this is the lacuna between the end of Wickramaratne’s first extension on June 26 and the second on July 9. For this fortnight’s period the country had no Inspector General of Police and no acting appointment was made. So does that mean that Wickramaratne’s second extension is a new appointment? The answer to this very valid question remains hanging in the air.

In this context it is worth remembering that there are two precedents on the police appointing IGPs from outside the service. The first was the appointment of Sir. (then Mr.) Richard Aluwihare to succeed Sir. Herbert Dowbiggin who was the British colonial IGP of then Ceylon from 1913 to 1937 – the longest serving police chief this country ever had.

Aluwihare, was a member of the then coveted Ceylon Civil Service to which he was appointed in consideration of his service to the British empire during World War 1. This appointment, at a time there was no suitable Ceylonese for the job was made because of his military and administrative experience. Several years later, Prime Minister SWRD Bandaranaike appointed Mr. MWF Abeykoon, a senior administrator, as IGP as he wanted a Buddhist holding that position. None of the then serving four (not dozens as at present) Deputy Inspectors General of Police (DIGs) qualified on that score. Bandaranaike reportedly told the then most senior serving DIG CC ‘Jungle’ Dissanayake: “Oh, Jungle, if only you were a Buddhist.” Abeykoon was IGP at the time of the abortive coup d’etat of 1962.

Apart from issues pertaining to the various contenders for the top job in the police, the Archbishop of Colombo, His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith and the country’s entire Catholic community hold the strongest views that nobody even in the slightest way tainted with negligence over the Easter massacre be appointed to head the police force.

Not only Catholics but also other Lankans of all faiths horrified by what happened that fateful Sunday, and acutely aware that available intelligence on the impending terror was ignored at the highest levels of the government and the police, are of that view. Any government ignoring such pervasive public opinion does so at its peril. Although we are supposedly notorious for having short memories, nobody is likely to forget what happened that day.

Added to the unfolding comedy of appointing a new IGP, another matter that has grabbed public attention is the ongoing attempt by the government, or a section of it, to have defunct local bodies reconvened without elections. This would mean that the former councilors will return to office empowered to serve as storm troops at any future election. This sordid attempt is by way of a Private Member’s Motion was presented to Parliament by an SLPP backbencher, Jayantha Ketagoda, widely believed to be a loyalist of Basil Rajapaksa.

It was reported last week that the Attorney General is of the view that the proposal involves a matter concerning the franchise of the people and would need a referendum in addition to passage in parliament by a two thirds majority. Already this has been taken to court. Yet we must not forget that when former President Mahinda Rajapaksa sought to abolish the two term limit on the presidency, this was permitted without a referendum by the then Chief Justice who argued that the measure enhanced, rather than diminished, the franchise.

What happened to MR who sought a third term in 2015 is now history.