Sri Lanka is for Sri Lankans Make America Great Again” was the  slogan used by Donald Trump in his 2016 presidential campaign in the US. Our politicians need not have a similar slogan. For Sri Lanka is a great nation with a documented history of over 2500 years. The politicians busted up this country which was considered as the [...]

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Sri Lanka is for Sri Lankans

Make America Great Again” was the  slogan used by Donald Trump in his 2016 presidential campaign in the US. Our politicians need not have a similar slogan. For Sri Lanka is a great nation with a documented history of over 2500 years. The politicians busted up this country which was considered as the ‘Best bet in Asia’ at the time of independence in 1948.

I now appeal to all the politicians contesting elections over the next six months to have a common slogan. The slogan should be ‘Sri Lanka is for Sri Lankans’. In other words, they should work for all Sri Lankans, irrespective of race, religion, caste or creed once they are elected.They should work for the benefit of all citizens, not only for their supporters.  They should come out with plans to make a prosperous modern country to keep pace with global development.

This does not mean that we emulate some of our neighbours and develop nuclear weapons or send a man to the moon. Certainly not. What our people require is three meals a day, decent housing, good primary, secondary and university and/or professional education for their children to face the challenges of the modern world, comfortable public transport facilities at a reasonable cost, 24 x 7 security to live and move about without fear and the opportunities to earn a living to fulfil these aspirations without any discrimination on the basis of race, religion, caste or political affiliations.

People see how the politicians move about in their super luxury vehicles with so many people to guard them causing traffic jams. They tolerated this during the war. But no more. They see how some of the new rich emulating politicians (probably because they finance the politicos) move about in luxury vehicles threatening the other users of public roads. They see how uneducated ruffians get into local government institutions, then to provincial councils and finally to Parliament. They see political cronies get into sports bodies and rob and ruin them frustrating the sportsman and woman, also sports lovers. The list is too long.

Today, even children say that all 225 Members of Parliament should go. The social media cartoons and video clips demonstrated the frustration of the people developed over the years against politicians in the aftermath of the recent bombings. If a referendum of no faith is held to find out whether people have faith in current politicians, 99% will vote “no faith”.

No one but the politicians themselves are to be blamed for this state of affairs. There are many decent politicians among them and they should pressurise their party leaders to correct this situation. Party leaders must ensure that honest, educated, knowledgeable, decent men and women are attracted to the party and given nomination. The preferential voting system is a bane and has resulted in in-fighting among candidates of the same party (intra-party rivalry) leading to election violence. It should be scrapped, and the party should devise a mechanism to motivate all in the list to work hard to obtain votes for the party.

Take a cue from the JVP. There is no struggle among the JVP nominees to get “manape”, but they all work for the party.Spending by a nominee should be restricted and curtailed to a predetermined rate per voter of his or her electorate (district). Such a rate should be fixed by the Election Commission in consultation with the party leaders.

There is a cost involved in maintaining a vibrant democracy. Elections are costly. Maintaining a political party is also costly. People should contribute to maintain the democracy. Therefore government should provide an allocation based on votes received by each party during the previous election. The votes received should be reviewed after the election and a further grant should be given to the party that won. The political party that got less than the votes received at the previous election should reimburse the excess amount they were given by the authorities. Any contribution made by well-wishers should be credited to the party fund and the party fund should be audited and the annual financial statement filed with the Election Commission. This proposal will help ensure corruption among the politicians and election violence is reduced. Like in Australia a penalty should be imposed if a citizen does not vote at an election without a valid reason.

In spite of all political problems such as youth uprisings, terrorism etc,  Sri Lanka continues to be a democracy, which is the most valuable gift given to us by the British. We should continue and protect democracy as there is no any other alternative to this system of “Rule by the People”.

Rohan Abeygunawardena   Nugegoda


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