Petrol price reduction the visible GONIBILLA

by Dr. Vickramabahua Karunaratna

(December 28, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) “Beware of invisible forces” said the headline of the Sunday Observer and it continued “the President pointed out that albeit the armed enemies have been well identified as lethal and should be wiped out by our gallant armed forces. But some unscrupulous elements may act in diverse and subtle ways. They could be even disguised in the garb of human rights activists. These parties too, should be recognised and dealt with accordingly. As otherwise, he said, these enemies may ultimately have a greater impact and cause more harm and destruction to our motherland.” While Mahinda is making such statements there was chaos in the streets and anarchy has raised its dirty head. This was in addition to the murderous war in the North that consumes hundreds every day. We have witnessed queues and chaotic situations in the past but in almost all such occasions the cause was a strike, mob violence or terror attack. In this case it was created by a court decision to reduce prices of petrol as an answer to a fundamental rights violation appeal.

Clearly the president was referring to this judicial intervention when he referred to a conspiracy by some unscrupulous elements. However in the same paper there was a news item claiming that “parliament supreme in taxation” and went on to say that “effecting changes or fiddling with taxes designed and imposed in the recently passed budget in parliament by a comfortable majority would badly affect the fiscal year 2009, economists and academics warned yesterday. They pointed out that all financial powers of the state and the executive were wrested with parliament. Even the annual budgetary allocation for the vote on the president too had to be approved by parliament. “Therefore, a budget passed for implementation should not and cannot be changed without approval from parliament as it badly affects fiscal year 2009,” they claimed. Meanwhile, Trade and Consumer Services Minister Bandula Gunawardena yesterday stressed that the constitution defined parliament as the country’s legislative organ entrusted with powers on state financial matters...” Why are they making such noises instead of showing us the supremacy of parliament? Why don’t they bring the whole matter to the parliament and take decisions to be implemented by the ever so powerful executive president?

Biggest conspirator

The answer is very simple. It is Mahinda himself who took steps to undermine the authority of the parliament. He must go before a mirror to identify the biggest conspirator against the legislature. He bribed MPs to cross over, made over one hundred ministers to form an inbuilt block vote, and finally disregarded parliamentary voices. He then carefully conspired to sabotage the implementation of the 17th Amendment passed by parliament. By keeping UNP MPs bonded with letters of resignation, President J R Jayewardene made the parliament a virtual doormat. What Mahinda did is no better. There is only one step more for him to reach the same level as Hitler: make enough noise and set fire to parliament and put the blame on the opposition! He is running out of funds with this never ending war in the North.

Hundreds are dying every day with several thousands filling the congested hospitals in the country. The country and the people are literally bleeding.

The court decision to cut the illegitimate income of the Mahinda regime obtained from plundering the petrol consumer has made him come out with the above vicious statement. Beware judiciary and complainant! This man has no sense of the thousands and thousands of poor three-wheeler and motorbike travellers dependent on petrol.

It is clear that this monstrous war cannot be continued with democratic strapping. In any case brutal capitalism with plunder and corruption is anathema to democracy.

Already Mahinda’s friend Wimal Weerawansa is advocating dictatorial powers to face the enemies of the self defined Sinhala Buddhist state. Mahinda has put the signal, but the journey is very difficult.- Sri Lanka Guardian