(June 12, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Extreme police brutality as manifested recently during the protests by the Katunayake Free Trade Zone (FTZ) workers is nothing that one should be astonished at. This is but a logical culmination of the militarization of the Sri Lanka Police which has been steadily progressing apace during the past years. This process had, of course, accelerated with astonishing speed during the past three years.
Politicians should be at the receiving end of public fury
It would be natural, for example, for police officers of present day times to be far more familiar with provisions of the emergency law rather than with the sections of the ordinary criminal procedure code. From the most junior police officer to the mostsenior, it would also be very hard to deny that the doctrine of command authority has not been undermined by political pressure to the extent that a senior police officer’s actions may be countermanded as a matter of course by a subordinate who acts under political cover. So while the police are the natural scapegoats in almost every instance when the public cannot take it longer and exhibit their fury, it is the politician who should also be at the receiving end of such public fury.
This militarization of the police force, (for which politicians, political administrators and their sycophants in the Police Department are almost wholly to blame), is evidenced best of all in the comparatively recent phenomenon of the shooting of alleged criminals. These shootings have been explained on the ludicrous basis that the criminals (despite being unarmed) had been shot while trying to escape, in the course of which they had attacked their custodial officers.
Excuses, in any event, are thinly given and it is more common to admit quite unabashedly that, in fact, this method of arbitrary and extrajudicial execution is useful for the summary disposing of ‘criminals.’ In 2006, the then Inspector General of Police defended the summary disposing of such ‘criminals’ in radio interviews, going on to describe an alleged criminal who had a previous conviction and who had continued to engage in further crimes. The rationale was that these people do not deserve any mercy and should be dealt with as expeditiously as possible.
Inability of the police to act as a civil investigative service
The UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions, in his 2006 Mission Report, documented that the police shot at least 22 criminal suspects after taking them into custody during the period, November 2004-October 2005 (CN.4/2006/53/ Add.5, 27 March 2006, at paragraph 53.) The Government justified its actions to the Special Rapportuer as follows ‘It is alleged that the use of force became necessary when, after having been arrested, presumably searched and (in most cases) handcuffed by the police, the suspects attempted either to escape or to attack the officers. In all cases, the shooting was fatal and in none was a police officer injured. The Government confirmed that in none of these cases had an internal police inquiry been opened. The reason proffered was that no complaints had been received.”
Unsurprisingly, the Special Rapporteur was not convinced by this peculiar logic and observed that “The pattern of summary executions that emerges, demands a systematic official response that brings those responsible to justice and discourages future violations.” This most salutary recommendation was however (predictably) blithely ignored.
But the fact of the matter was that the police simply were not performing their function of proper investigations. Instead, individuals were being caught for complicity in crimes regardless of whether those individuals were guilty or not. In Gerald Perera’s Case, for example, Gerald who was a decent hard working employee was arrested on the basis of mistaken identity when the police believed he was a known criminal in the area, who also went by the name of ‘Gerald.’
Tortured to the extent of undergoing renal failure, he thereafter went to the Supreme Court which ruled that the information that “a Gerald had committed murder” was not sufficient to justify the arrest of any person believed to be “that Gerald,” particularly where the suspect’s statement had not been recorded promptly (Sanjeewa v. Suraweera [2003] 1 Sri LR 317). The Court pointed out that even when taken subjectively, there was no basis to believe that the person arrested had committed murder, which showed that the police were simply hoping that something would turn up.
What has been the effective disciplinary action taken?
This was the same story in many other similar cases. The question is as to what action the Department of the Police had taken in regard to disciplining the police officers in the instances where they so clearly act outside the law? When a National Police Commission was established under the 17th Amendment and individuals of integrity who served on that Commission attempted to bring back some decency and order to the functioning of the police, what happened? Politicians seeing their power taken away from across the political divide conspired to cripple this Commission. Later, a lame duck Commission was established with its members being appointed by the President without the nomination of the Constitutional Council.
For the past one and a half years, we have not had a Police Commission at all. For some who prefer to ignore the deterioration in the police service and its almost complete subordination to politicians, the absence of a credible Police Commission may be cause for applause but it certainly does not bode well for the good of the country.
And as frequently pointed out in these column spaces, laws have not proved to be effective in addressing this problem. The Convention Against Torture & other Cruel and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, Act No 22 of 1994 is a case in point. Its deterrent effect has been minimal. No prosecutions have taken place of officers-in-charge of police stations who consent and acquiesce in the torture of suspects in their custody though an innovatively argued interpretation of the Act makes out a case for indictment on this basis.
Looking after our own
Laws and practices notwithstanding, it is public will that matters. We saw public will demonstrated in full strength by the FTZ workers. And it was inevitable perhaps that trade unionists are now demonized in much the same way as other critics of government policies. So now we hear calls that those spearheading the FTZ protests were working to the agendas of ‘foreign interests’ and that they need to be brought to heel.
We need to return to sanity where criticism of our systems is not automatically seen as unpatriotic. True enough, there is a skilled LTTE propaganda machine that is well versed in twisting the facts to suit a particular argument. True enough, there may be regional powers and superpowers who act according to their own agendas and in the interests (naturally enough) of their own countries. But the best way to defeat such holy or unholy machinations as the case may be is to look after our own.
This can be done not by lofty Presidential pronouncements, by building luxury hotels or initiating development projects out of which a huge proportion goes into the private pockets of government figures but by actual and concrete improvements which indicate that we live in a democracy and not a dictatorship.
Merely protesting (as the Minister of Justice has done recently) that the independence of the judiciary is, in fact, secured and that problems if any, in the past, should be attributed solely to the actions of former Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva, is to be grandly farcical. We have seen this farce for far too long now.
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