President Rajapaksa’s ‘Wish List’
Sans the pomp and pageantry, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa appeared in a business suit lest someone objected to a “Stranger in the House”, and delivered a business-like address to open the new Parliament elected on August 5 by the sovereign people.
He began by outlining his vision and mission with what have been his twin platforms -- emphasis on Buddhist values and national security. Then followed a gamut of other areas he will focus upon; tackling the underworld, introducing a new political culture through a new Constitution etc. He went on to explain why he was paying special attention to the rural economy, rural hospitals, rural schools -- the rural heartland that gave him and his party an unprecedented majority earlier this month.
Last week, we referred to the need to rewire, or reboot Government -- the need, the urgency and the difficulty in sorting out a public service that is not the efficient engine it is meant to be. President Rajapaksa seems to have identified the need for this. He has served as secretary of a Ministry and knows how the public service works -- or doesn’t work. In an address that was largely economy-centric, he referred to thinking “out of the box” to meet the challenges ahead.
He spoke of a new Constitution and how much "out of the box" thinking will go into that can be disconcerting. There was some reassurance at the first post-Cabinet news conference when the Government spokesmen said the Independent Commissions, the Right to Information law and such democratic gains of the recent past would not be tampered with.
The opening of Parliament address, whether it was the Throne Speech of yesteryear or the Statement of State Policy now referred to as a Policy Statement is always a ‘wish list’ of every Government. At the end of their term many things on that list remain unfulfilled.
That Thursday’s address was made in the backdrop of a lengthy countrywide power cut underlined the challenges the new Government faces. While an inquiry is pending, speculation is rife that it was an act triggered by the ‘energy mafia’ some of whom are part and parcel of this very Government. Special Police units have been now placed at the Electricity Board when the integrity of the very Police is in question. There would be a limit to calling out the forces every time the public service plays truant.
Likewise, the President said that no foreign fishing vessels will be permitted to poach in Sri Lanka’s territorial waters. The proof of the pudding, so to say, is if he can stop the armada of South Indian fishing vessels brazenly crossing thrice-weekly into the Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar and stealing the marine resources that belong to Sri Lanka.
Successive Governments have been unable to challenge Indian prevarication on stopping this theft. Such are the challenges the President and his Government will have even with a two-thirds majority.