Courtesy: Lakbima News
(October 25, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) One of the most prominent figures in the media world is now mute --- afraid to say anything about the media. A fighter for the people’s right to information, Poddala Jayantha is now a forgotten man.“I’m not speaking to you today as I would have done before, for security reasons”, he said as we sat down to an interview, among other things, he recalled what he had gone through a few months ago. On the 1st of June Poddala Jayantha, secretary of the Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA) was abducted and brutally assaulted. The assault has left him in a dire anxiety for the security of his family, while he has himself been in crutches ever since.
Steel plates
“I was in hospital for 29 days. I maybe able to keep my feet properly on the ground in a month or two but doctors say that I would be limping for the rest of my life”, he continued, pointing at the steel plates that were inserted into his foot.
“The media in our country is such that they soon forget, but I do not blame them. People will come forward and help you but you cannot expect them to do so all the time”, he explained. However, he remembers his friends and colleagues who constantly visit him and do whatever they can to help him. The editors, other reporters and the Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI) have helped him through difficult times.
Poddala remembers the days that he had fought alongside other scribes. “We never fought for anything personal, everything we did was for the people’s right to information”, he said. As a journalist he was a busy man, always on the move and mingling with the people, but today after he was attacked, he doesn’t go out except when it is absolutely necessary and then only for medical purposes.
These days, the President of the SLWJA, Poddala is extremely thankful to his friends and family who have been by his side at his time of need. “My friends call me now and then, to find out what I need, and I’m extremely thankful to Lake House for giving me my salary throughout these months; otherwise I would have faced extreme difficulties”, he said, adding that they had also paid his medical bills when he was in hospital.
Depends on his wife
“My child is in Grade 7, and she did her homework every evening at the hospital while I was there”, he explained. Since he is still using crutches he has to depend on his wife for the slightest thing. “I need my wife’s help to get over even the smallest hump when I walk”.
It had all started at Lasantha’s funeral. “When Sanath Balasuriya and I were leaving the funeral parlour we both got threatening calls, after which we both left the country. But I returned three weeks later, for some work. Then, this incident happened”.
“No government has caught culprits, who have assaulted journalists. This is a means of instilling fear in journalists. Keith Noyhar and I are the only journalists who have survived after being assaulted and come home from hospital; all others have left the country”, he revealed, as he is convinced that assaulting journalists has become the preferred modus operandi to scare journalists.
“I am under a lot of mental strain as I don’t know what to do when I return to work. I want myself and my family to be safe but, I find it hard to give up the life I am used to”. Poddala, as a leading investigative journalist has exposed corruption in the government, at work. “99% of my articles have been on corruption, and I have won an award for integrity for exposing corruption in government while working in a government paper”.
As the secretary of the SLWJA he had visited all journalists in Colombo and elsewhere when they have been assaulted or threatened, to ensure that they are not alone and to boost them mentally, and to tell them that there are others behind them when they expose corruption.
“I live in fear”, he said worrying aloud constantly about his family. “My wife was against this interview, but I convinced her”, he remarked smilingly. “Since my house is half finished, there are many ways to enter. We had a metal gate installed inside the house, so that when my wife and child are not at home I can stay in my room and keep the door locked”.
“I could have lived peacefully if I was the last journalist who had been assaulted, but this is not the case; many journalists after me have been assaulted. I can’t watch what is going on. I just hope that many others don’t fall victim, then we will be facing a more serious problem”, he said. -Sri Lanka Guardian
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