If we return to the subject of Milinda Moragoda it is only because, like a pugilist who refuses to be counted out, he simply keeps asking for more. Last Sunday he figured on the front page of this newspaper. It was not the profundity of his words that attracted attention; it was the servility contained therein.

Appearing, unexpectedly, at the relaunch of the US-based International Executive Services Corps, Minister Moragoda offered an explanation for his presence. He was there because the US ambassador had asked him to come.

"But when the US ambassador asks you to come, you don't ask why. You just come", confessed Mr Moragoda unashamedly.

Such candour, if not downright naivete, is the stuff of comedy and opens up a phantasmagoria of possibilities for practitioners of the art, be they cartoonists or comic writers, satirists or plain humourists. They would rue the day that Moragoda and his ilk entered into a vow of eternal silence. So in keeping with the occasion and our vocation we produce below a scenario of what might have been. This is, of course, plain and simple imagination and we confess to not being able to produce the real thing, truth being even stranger than fiction.

And so it came to pass that on this day in the year of our lord only knows when, silence prevailed in the Moragoda Mansions. Inside, the minister poured over an important Cabinet paper on fast track tendering for contracts he was to present later in the morning as minister for economic reform.

Suddenly in the cavernous interior a bell tinkled. It had a distinctive ring like no other telephone in the grand manor. For a moment the minister froze, caught in a pose that resembled Rodin's Thinker, though it would be unfair by Rodin- not to mention the Thinker- to press the similarity any further.

Quickly the minister made his way to the alcove that contained the telephone with a handset that was a picture of George Bush- Bush junior that is.

"Hello, good morning," said the minister, words turning into honey in his mouth.

"Top of the morning to you too Milinda, my boy. I hope you are tendering to affairs of state of this happy isle".

"Oh yes, Your Excellency. I was just going over the Cabinet paper I'm presenting this morning".

"I'm afraid that's out Milly boy, I need you here".

"But Sir there is the Cabinet meeting and my paper on hastening privatisation by accelerated tender procedure is on top of the agenda"

"Don't be silly Milly. You can do it next time. Tell the Cabinet you're with me. Be here in 15 minutes".

"Yes Your Excellency, I'll be there".

Elsewhere in the capital of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, to give the country its full titular panoply, our political power was gathered in one room. The Cabinet was waiting for the arrival of the President. But she, bless her dear heart, had only two days previously dashed off an epistle to the Prime Minister with a series of questions on VoT (Voice of Tigers) and other matters. Among them, she asked, what was VoT, where was VoT, what was VoT really doing, what if it did not do what VoT promised to do etc, etc etc. Exhausted by this exercise in intellectual inquiry and piqued at having had to play a minor role on independence day, the President decided to keep away from Cabinet. But where was the man of the moment, Minister Moragoda?

Suddenly a door opened, a lackey appeared and whispered close to the prime ministerial ear. The Prime Minister, always conscious of time and punctuality, turned distinctly red. Not carmine red but the hue that our dear departed parlour Bolsheviks used to display at their revolutionary best.

"Milinda is with the American ambassador," intoned the Prime Minister. " Let's meet tomorrow".

And so ended that day's Cabinet meeting much to the chagrin of the two interlopers who switched off their communications equipment in another part of the country which some call Eelam, some want to call Eelam but most others are refusing to have anything to do with it- well except some southern politicians, businessmen, privatisation pundits, NGOs, and several foreign diplomats who see a killing there, economically speaking.

"VSAT a waste of money," said Bala. "We could have built two schools with that money, no aiyyar".

"Don't you worry Siva. The way these ministers drop bricks we can build enough schools. Anyway we didn't pay for this equipment, we got it all free. But those silly fellows in the Sinhala government were so busy meeting our every demand they failed to notice it".

"So what to do today, aahhhhh?"

"I'll tell you what. You know all those tapes the CIA sent us? Right now collect all the great sayings of Moragoda."

"But annai, what about those other two ministers who were on that TV programme. One was a dentist and the other had something to do with Samurdhi or something. Ha, ha, ha.You know what the dentist minister said. He spoke about our Aiyyar and IRA.

Those IRA fellows must be laughing no. There is nothing called New IRA. It is Real IRA. Silly fellow".

"So what do you expect. Just because ministers and MPs travel to England and Ireland, they know everything? Now get the tapes done and send them to RAW."

At the same time in a government-owned house in Colombo, several ministers, deputy ministers, ministers with portfolios, ministers without jobs and other sundry wielders of political power were gathered.

"So what do you want me to do," asked the foreign minister.

"To begin at the beginning (which you will agree is a good way for a politician to start) why is the American Ambassador snapping his fingers only at Milinda. This is thoroughly unfair and makes us less important than Milinda. Moreover to embarrass us he mentions this publicly".

"That is not all," butted in an academic type, " He tells the world he does not even reason why but responds immediately to the summons from the super power ambassador. That makes people believe that the rest of us think before we answer a call. That is unfair by all of us. We don't think either".

" We must have equal responsibility and importance," added a legal type.

"I suggest that we be assigned an ambassador each and they be told that if they want us to jump they must be prepared to snap their fingers."

"The American Ambassador's must be worn out like hell," cracked a wag that showed that ministers are not entirely humourless.

"But there aren't enough ambassadors here to cover the entire Cabinet and other ministers," protested the foreign minister.

"That is simple, open more embassies," said a practical type.

"How will that help," asked the foreign minister not quite quick on the uptake.

" Why, then those countries will reciprocate and open missions here."

The foreign minister suddenly saw the wisdom of the whole scheme, especially opening more Sri Lankan missions abroad. So it came to pass that on an appointed day in the year of our lord only knows when, a weighty policy speech was to be made in that august assembly where affairs of state- not to mention affairs of other kinds- are discussed, dissected and debated. The intellectual weight exerted on the floor of the chamber by the combined efforts of the professori, Moragoda and company was too much for the house that Bawa designed and the whole complex came crashing down and even blocked the Diyawanna Oya.

Then it came to pass that at the beginning of a new millennium like this, a couple of intellectual scavengers, sometimes known as archaeologists, were digging around Diyawanna Oya when they discovered whatever remained of that talking shop. Among the artefacts was an undelivered speech by one Moragoda, George W. Bushesque in style and substance.

Having examined the document with microscopic care, epigraphists and other experts came to the conclusion that the name of its author was not Moragoda but more likely to be Molagoda, given its brainy contents. Archaeologists working on sites round Kilinochchi also discovered some tapes marked "Important Thoughts of Moragoda". No copies of it were ever found elsewhere (of course they didn't try the Library of Congress).

This inevitably led those in the North, still in search of their Eelam, to claim this was adequate proof that Sri Lanka was ruled from Kilinochchi. As further proof they produced contemporary newspaper reports of the destruction at Diyawanna.

National mourning, they said, was virtually absent. Where there were desultory expressions of regret, it was purely at the millions wasted in the original construction of an opulent structure.

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