Much maligned ‘Regaining Sri Lanka’ to Mahinda’s rescue

By Wickramabahu Karunaratna

(May 10, Colombo, SRi Lanka Guardian) Mahinda clearly said that he has ordered the armed forces to withhold using heavy weapons. At first the reason he gave was that the war is over, hence there was no need of heavy weapons for further action which are basically clearing operations. But nobody believed him as he did not explain what happened to the LTTE leaders including Prabhakaran. It was clear that he was responding to the foreign ministers of the West who shed a lot of crocodile tears to fool the masses — which masses I do not know.

As Mahinda found their questioning discomforting, he came out with this statement to stop them from breathing down his neck. It may have temporarily satisfied the impatient foreign ministers, but it ‘ignited’ his own government. Within minutes the patriotic branch of the Mahinda regime was on the streets of Colombo demanding that the war be continued until the LTTE is no more - for that, the use of heavy weapons is a must. Of course Wimal was cautious enough to say that if the war is really in the final stages, then it may not be necessary to use heavy weapons as 2x2 rods would be sufficient to smash the leftovers. While these chauvinist gangs were adamant that the war should be fought to the end without any conditions on using heavy weapons, Mahinda changed the tune to say that heavy weapons are not practical in a scenario where civilians outnumber the armed LTTE population. Whatever the reasons given, it is clear that he gave the order not to use heavy weapons. But now the UN has come out with its own satellite pictures saying that the troops do not heed orders but keep on using heavy weapons that terribly affect civilians. The Mahinda regime has no answer to this except to claim that the LTTE has infiltrated the UN official satellite observation unit! APPARENTLY THE LTTE HAS HACKED INTO THE DEFENCE MINISTRY WEBSITE, SO WHY NOT THE UN OBSERVATION UNIT?

Rational past

While this entire muddle is creating enough trouble for the government, there came the gallant knight of the opposition leader, Sir Range Bandara to save Mahinda. He smashed the anti war opposition to demand that the government should use heavy weapons to crush the Tigers that hide behind civilians. Of course we know that the opposition leader is reluctant to stand firm as the leader who signed the peace agreement in the past and to defend that rational past. But we never expected the UNP to vulgarise itself by taking the tail end of the Champika-Wimal-Somawansa gang. What will happen to the Tamil voters who voted for the UNP expecting relief from the Sinhala chauvinist gang?

Bag of Champika

While such ridiculous but sad things are happening in the opposition front a new campaign has come out of the bag of Champika Ranawaka. He has started demanding compensation from British imperialists for the brutal murders carried out during the repression of the Kandyan rebellion of 1917. Tremendous! But there is a catch. Why is this leader of the Mahinda regime putting up posters in road corners instead of sending the relevant letter of demand to the British government? After all it is legitimate to make such demands even according to the UN charter. I believe there is consensus to pay compensation to all those who suffered from past imperialist wars.

When these buffoons campaigned for power they howled that as soon as they are elected they will be at the doorstep of 10 Downing Street with the letter of demand for compensation. Instead what we witnessed was crawling on all fours before these Western masters, asking for handouts on the basis of the document ‘Regaining Sri Lanka’ of Wickremesinghe. I believe they got $ 3.5 billion for all those mega projects which puts us under neo colonial bondage for a further period. Trotsky said that the bourgeoisie of developing countries, in this global capitalist era, cannot stand for even bourgeois democracy and freedom. How true!

-Sri Lanka Guardian