"The fundamental rule is that hands of rulers must be kept bound if citizens are to live safely. People no longer want monsters to rule over them."_______________
By Basil Fernando
(September 15, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The very essence and goal of democracy is to tighten the hands of governments. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Power, therefore, needs to be bound.
The wires that tie the rulers are called laws. That no one is above the law explicitly refers to the fact that that rulers are not above the law.
Charles I argued that no one had the right to judge him because he was the king. He relied on a rule that was well-established then. He failed to understand that the views of his the people of his country had changed. He lost his head. No British king or queen ever since has made the same argument.
Then power passed to elected rulers. But the problem still remained. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. New rulers also had to be bound. They also had to obey laws. They were not above the law.
Then there were some difficult problems. How, for example, to deal with a war? Your enemy obeys no law. Should you obey law? That even in war there are laws to be obeyed is a rule that evolved over a long period. Finally the Geneva conventions laid down some basic laws of war.
From time to time there are challenges to this principle. George W. Bush, for example, wanted some such laws to be ignored. One law was the international law against torture. Some of his countrymen agreed, at least for sometime. Then, faced with the actual experiences, many were horrified. The voting of the people showed the change in favour of the old rule against torture. Thus, in countries where laws relating to war are accepted, there is a renewed interest in the debates which crated these laws.
Charles the First still may have had some admirers. George W. Bush had some also during Bush era, and many got rich by being “Journalists”. By supporting rulers that abuse power, it is possible to get very rich. Today, a political stooge that calls himself a journalist can be assured that their buriani and arrack is served through the backdoor. Such journalist hacks say that the rulers can do whatever they like.
The fundamental rule is that hands of rulers must be kept bound if citizens are to live safely. People no longer want monsters to rule over them.
-Sri Lanka Guardian
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Absolutely right. Very timely article because we now clearly see little monsters emerging!
The writer is very eloquent in his analysis. Yes, the rulers should be kept locked up. Then how on earth you are going to face a criminal like Prbhakaran. All this big talk is for lies. Is he talking about the UNP state of Democracy by Day and Terrorism by night? The writer should be happy that he can write this kind of articles without fear and persecution. Within a few months most have forgotten how we lived for 30 years in real fear for life. The terrorists were all around us, and our leaders and people of writers standing were feeding the terrorists. Even now so many of these people including the former President of Sri Lanka bad mouthing the current government. She should take the responsibility along with Wickramasinghe and Jayawardana for making a mockery of democracy. They ruled the country under emergency regulations for years. No one then spoke against it except of course the LTTE proxy the TNA. Mr. Fernando, you must be grateful that we have a country now to call it is ours. Within another few years we will achieve the dream that we are all citizens of Sri Lanka first before talking of Sinhalese or Tamil.
Why does a country need a rulers in the first place?
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