Will Cabraal’s epic tome clinch the Booker prize for best fiction?
A new book aspiring to be ‘the lifeblood of a master spirit to be embalmed and treasured life beyond life,’ was published last fortnight by the author himself. After its launch, its’ author, Nivard Cabraal said: “Now, I can sleep very well. I am the one who acted and saved the country from bankruptcy”.
Titled ‘Arthika Gathakayan Meda’ or ’Among Economic Killers’, it is written in Sinhala for the mass Sinhala market to educate them on the 1,2,3 of high finance by a maestro whose reputation precedes the book’s purchase.
As a formal introduction, suffice to say that Fortune smiled on Nivard Cabraal, who was a UNP member of the Western Provincial Council from 1999 to 2004 after he embraced Mahinda Rajapaksa no sooner he became President in 2005. So impressed was Rajapaksa with the 41-year-old accountant that, in the following year, he made Nivard Governor of the Central Bank for his entire two terms, from 2006 to 2015.
Gotabaya made Cabraal a national seat MP and State Minister of Finance with Basil as his Finance Minister following Mahinda’s exit from the post. He was made Central Bank Governor from 2021 September to 2022 April. The independent post came with cabinet rank, thus blurring the divide between politics and finance.
Being in the thick of the action and presiding, during Mahinda’s term, over the decline and, during Gotabaya’s tenure, over the fall of the Lankan economy, no doubt, he is eminently qualified to write this first-hand account of how Lanka went bust and name the guilty men responsible for the ruination of its people.
Being, as the book’s title suggests, ‘Among Economic Killers’, these confessional memoirs, writ with the accusing finger, perhaps, unwittingly pointed inward, must contain the author’s pain and anguish when the rain of milk and honey that had flowed nonstop, ceased to pour on him.
Now in the blazing glare of the remorseless sun, has Nivard written his De Profundis while out on bail for the alleged killing of the economy, alone or with others? Or a Christie-style ‘who dun it’, with the cover revealing the secret?
But the present hardships make access to a copy somewhat difficult. Its’ exorbitant paper-back price of Rs 2500 has put it beyond the reach of many. Though aimed at a mass readership, it seems it’s targeted at a small esoteric cult of Rajapaksa worshippers.
Perhaps, it’s only those that have drunk deep from the well of knowledge, who can truly fathom the depth and wisdom of Nivard Cabraal, who, incidentally, bears the rare honour of having been
conferred by the Ramannya Nikaya, the grandiose title, ‘Desha Keerthie Lanka Putra’ for ‘his outstanding services to the country’s economy’.
His book that relates his heady days of power with the Rajapaksa trio, Mahinda, Gota and Basil, with its cover showing four symbolic nooses strangling the island’s neck, also blames sinister foreign forces for Sri Lanka’s downfall, thus transforming the pedestrian pace of a drab economic tale into a racy international thriller, with subterfuge and deception thrown in for good measure.
In an era of surprises, who knows, the book might even win the Booker prize next year for best fiction.