Fate of Dayan – An Athenian saga or local drama?

Editorial :The Daily Mirror

(July 20, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) ‘Hubris’ is a concept one often bumps into when studying Greek and Roman Literature. The word is used to describe ‘excessive pride in oneself’. According to Greek mythology hubris is a quality that is sure to lead one, to one’s downfall and Greek and Roman literature is full of kings, generals and other personalities who meet with tragic ends due to their excessive pride.

The rationale is that such behaviour earns the envy of Gods and when one is full of hubris, the powers in the universe get together to destroy the person. Achilles in Homer’s Iliad, King Oedipus in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King or Ikarus, the son of Daedalus and dozens of others paid the price for being haughty.

Many knew Dayan Jayatilleka as a person who took immense pride in his achievements. He was especially proud of the mammoth contributions he made to elevate Sri Lanka’s global standing since his appointment to Geneva. The stunning victory he recorded for his country at the UNHRC vote in May was a sure feather in his cap notwithstanding puerile attempts by a few ministers here to take credit for the majority vote Sri Lanka commanded at the debate.

Yet as to whether Dayan’s degree of pride came close to Athenian levels would have been something only known to the ones who interacted with him regularly.

Others including the writer are left with the task of putting the pieces of this jigsaw puzzle together to figure out what really went wrong for him.

It was no secret that Dayan earned the envy of many especially a few ministers in the government. After all here is a man who is far superior to them in many ways. Firstly he was endowed with oratorical skills that could be considered superior even by international standards. Secondly he had the best international contact network system. Even if one puts the links of the entire Cabinet together that would still not have matched the ties he enjoyed with the Arab nations, African Union and the Southern American states. It’s due to this fact that the UNHRC victory became a reality for Sri Lanka. Thirdly he was somebody who always knew what he was talking. Dayan could talk on almost anything on earth and the doctorate he earned a few years ago was just an added qualification. It was a different matter that the stand he took on a few issues was not palatable to some including the writer.

However these were enough to make many lesser qualified fellows back in Sri Lanka extremely insecure. There would definitely have been a regular line of intimidated tale carriers poisoning the head of State about how Dayan failed to help them with their baggage at the Geneva airport or how Dayan supported the 13th amendment through the articles he contributed to local papers in a personal capacity. Some would have kept clippings of the pro-13th amendment comments he made during the recent debate with his erudite friend and Harvard drop out Malinda Seneviratne. Knowing Malinda the last thing he would have wanted would have been to see an abrupt end to Dayan’s assignment in Geneva due to the debate he initiated.

So when a leading Sunday paper carried a front page story yesterday to the effect that a few in the government had taken up issue of some ambassadors writing to newspapers expressing their personal views on political matters, one knew what has happened.If Dayan was in the wrong, one may well have called for an explanation. It will certainly take some time for the authorities to realize the monumental mistake they have made by recalling him.

-Sri Lanka Guardian