Madness of politics here and there
Turning one’s head constantly to the left and right to simultaneously watch scenes of bedlam in the Sri Lanka parliament and confusion in the British House of Commons is educative. Except that it gives you a pain in the neck.
At the time of writing, the Supreme Court has extended its ‘ stay’ order on President Sirisena’s proclamation dissolving parliament and announcing a date for parliamentary elections.
So it seems we must wait for a few more days to hear its decision on the constitutionality of the presidential action.
Here in London, we need to wait a few more days for the British parliament to vote on Prime Minister Theresa May’s plan for the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union, perhaps the most crucial political issue confronting a badly divided nation.
One does not know at this point of time what the Supreme Court’s verdict will be on the constitutional issue and the Court of Appeal’s ruling on another legal matter before it. Nor would one wish to speculate on the outcome of such weighty matters which are better left to our black-coated fraternity who have got their teeth into it, not to mention anything else that could snugly into their pockets.
Here in London, we do not need to speculate. It seems that later this week we know that Theresa May’s agreement for the British pullout will be axed by a divided House and she will lose the vote. One does not have to issue a proclamation to know that unless May has several trumps in her pocket as President Sirisena said he had.
Some of her Conservative Party MPs are daggers drawn and only waiting to plunge them in when the time comes this week. Prime Minister May, despite her arduous efforts and on- going talks with her party MPs, is bound to face a Julius Caesar situation. Maybe she has already rehearsing those unforgiveable last words of a fatally wounded Caesar-- ET TU BRUTE!
But back to the comedy-- or more correctly the farce--enacted at Diyawanne. Not that watching and hearing those in the Diyawanna abode do not give a pain in the neck at most times. Why some of those who pass off as patriotic politicians sitting in parliament to serve the nation are not put to some use by producers of those “B” grade, generally unwatchable, teledramas one never knows.
But at least they will have to work for their living unlike MPs-- particularly those defeated ones who have crept through the backdoor also known as the national list-- drawing large salaries and a myriad perks for doing precious little for the benefit of man or beast.
Surely sections of the public in Sri Lanka must ask themselves why public funds are wasted to keep some of the MPs alive and kicking, not to mention punching. Somebody recently asked a valid question: If MPs elected to represent different groups of voters are staying away from attending parliamentary sittings, should they be paid for not doing their job? In other vocations such recalcitrance would earn a salary deduction. But then parliamentarians are a privileged lot!
I remember in the old days--as they are often called--one of Sri Lanka’s best known film stars telling me that in the early days of Sinhala cinema, producers would bring with them copies of Indian films and ask the actors and actresses to act just like the Indian stars. If the Indians looked to the left 10 times, then the local stars had to do the same-that is if they wanted to be in the film.
Moreover the Sinhala ‘version’ should have so many songs and so many fist fights to make the film a money-earning commodity. Thank all the deities that the current crop of politicians has only learned to engage in punchups and throwing chairs, not to mention the constitution they are squabbling over and a copy of the Holy Bible, just to show no religious ill-feeling.
Just imagine if they also decide to take to song how calamitous it would be with raucous sounds penetrating not only the ear drums but the lobes as well.
Contrast the conduct of the denizens of Diyawanna with the behavior of the people’s representatives in the Commons. Last week, Theresa May lost three separate votes in parliament, a sign perhaps of what awaited her this week.
One was an interesting issue initiated by the opposition. The government read out a summary of the advice given by the Attorney General on the May plan for exiting the EU. The opposition wanted to know the entire opinion and not just the summary.
When the Government refused to divulge it ( on grounds of national interest), the opposition called for a vote on a motion relating to a “contempt of parliament” charge against the ministers most closely associated with the government’s refusal.
It was the first time in modern history that parliament had asserted itself in this manner. The government’s defeat was not greeted by hurling books or microphones at their opposite numbers or berating the Speaker John Bercow. Now a house com- mittee will decide how to deal with the ministers concerned. Will it be just a rap on the knuckles or a punishment more serious?
Some Sri Lankan MP has voiced an opinion that an inquiry should be held into the proceedings and conduct of parliament during those vital days from November 14. If it is to be an inquiry into the actions of the Speaker why should such an inquiry not be conducted into the behaviour of the elected members and the entire caboodle of that disgraceful and dismal episode by some MPs during the same time on which visual evidence is available.
But nothing produced more guffaws in recent months than President Sirisena’s address to the SLFP convention last week. There were moments when he sounded like a raving King Lear and one wondered whether the organisers had not arranged for packets of tissue to be readily for the audience to wipe away the tears.
There was the leader of the SLFP and the country’s president standing before the multitude ( and what a multitude at that) cursing his recent prime minister for leading him astray, hurting the nation’s leader an ardent nationalist unlike Ranil Wickremesinghe.
I would have expected-- and surely, so would have SLFP members and supporters who turned up at Sugathadasa stadium-- to hear the Pericles of Polonnaruwa extol the bygone leaders of the SLFP and party’s great achievements on behalf of the people in 70 years or so.
Instead, what I heard was the crucifixion of Ranil Wickremesinghe and the heart rendering lamentation of a man more sinned against than sinning. If I did not reach out for the tissues, like surely his family would have done, it is because I have known politicians in Sri Lanka and several other countries long enough to sift the genuine from the rhetorical.
I remember seeing some pictures in news websites and main- stream media on the day Ranil Wickremesinghe celebrated 40 years of parliamentary life. I remember seeing President Sirisena, both of them having been MPs for several decades.
So when Sirisena spent half the time or more of his speech attacking Wickremesinghe personally I wondered what long standing members of the SLFP and others would have thought of the leader’s performance on such an important day for the party.
This surely must be the first time that an SLFP convention had devoted so much to the leader of an opposing side as it did to those who built up the SLFP from scratch. And much of the criticism of Wickremesinghe concerned his personal beliefs and his lack of understanding of Sri Lankan culture, traditions and its value system etc.
Is it not strange that for two persons who had been in politics for several decades that Sirisena did not understand what the UNP and Wickremesinghe stood for, if Sirisena’s psychoanalysis is correct?
It seems that Sirisena had no qualms about enlisting the support of Wickremesinghe and his party to elevate himself to the presidency. Maybe Sirisena had no knowledge of Wickremesinghe until he joined the government. Rather difficult to believe wouldn’t you say when he had all opportunity to seek the advice of Chandrika Bandaranaike?
The other day Mano Ganeshan claimed that Sirisena had said to a group of UNF leaders that if he is pushed to the wall he would resign and go to Polonnaruwa and take to farming.
The danger is that some might take him serious and try to move China’s Great Wall closer to the president’s official residence or ask the new US ambassador to have that incorrigible Trump build a wall down Buller’s Road near the president’s house.
Then of course there are others who could well believe that the president’s threat of resignation might not be a bad idea after all.
But nothing produced more guffaws in recent months than President Sirisena’s address to the SLFP convention last week. There were moments when he sounded like a raving King Lear and one wondered whether the organisers had not arranged for packets of tissue to be readily for the audience to wipe away the tears.