A diplomat in the good old days used to be one who could lie abroad for his or her country. Today’s ambassadors are vastly more versatile, to go by recent media and social media reports. They cheat; they steal; they allegedly procure arms for rebels hell-bent on violently engaging their host country or modern empire. [...]

The Sunday Times Sri Lanka

There’s some corner of a foreign field that’s forever, er, s(t)inking

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A diplomat in the good old days used to be one who could lie abroad for his or her country. Today’s ambassadors are vastly more versatile, to go by recent media and social media reports. They cheat; they steal; they allegedly procure arms for rebels hell-bent on violently engaging their host country or modern empire. Why is it, then, that our head of state is suddenly so keen on good governance that he’s considering genteel ladies and lordly gentlemen for key overseas postings? My dear sir, ambition should be made of sterner stuff!

But seriously, folks! The need of the hour is evidently a professional and competent civil service. For too long have friends and family members of the ruling sub-class been dispatched to lie dormant or underwhelm their opposite numbers in some hideous embassy. See how some ugly corner of a foreign field is for ever-so-brief a time Sri Lanka to such little gain for the motherland. See how our socio-political reputation, image, prestige, have plunged progressively below the plimsoll line in the eyes of the watching world. See how the nation-state has suffered economically and materially at the hands of an often cruel and usually capricious international commonwealth when global changes and chances necessitate a few good men and women true to come to our rescue.

Which is why watchdogs and guard-dogs and even lapdogs are best trained, unlike diplomutts willy-nilly employed. Which is why cats are constantly groomed, the more they purr and are expected to perform – even if it is only to look pretty, or simply prim and proper. Which is why –oh, but you do get the point, don’t you, dears?

Thus to our point, ah. That be our foreign policy as it may at home, our ambassadors had better be longer and harder trained and groomed after schooling and selection than they are, at present. That also foreign policy is best made at home, by the way. This home-made resolution to cull, taper, streamline, present, exemplify, and persevere in excellence all round being the need of the hour now or never; not many or some moons hence.

“Rosy is my darling…”
But, I sense you, dear reader, making your argument: What if we already have a candidate who’s more than suitable for such a delicate posting? She’s proven her mettle in a land that’s “truly Asia”, shall we say! She’s well-groomed, well-intentioned, and well-spoken of. Well, she’s also a politician – and therefore partisan, even if not suspected of the usual petty vices that political appointees are suspect for. Besides, plum diplomatic postings shouldn’t be some sort of consolation prize for whenever your electorate fails to favour you at them polls. No matter what the constraints you faced were – just saying.

Conventional wisdom: Track record of one turn is good enough to get another shot at it.
Devil’s advocate: A lot of water had flowed under the bridge since then; not all of it potable.
Worst-case scenario: A clean, decent enough candidate who can hack it till the new pros emerge.
“Kumar is king of county and country…”

Be that as it may, do I hear you say, gentle peruser of this paper and this piece: What if we have another candidate who’s eminently qualified for such a demanding placement? He’s skippered a national side; scuppered the vilifying attacks of a bag of scum inimical to a national sport’s best interests; sidelined vested interests; seems to have no hidden agendas of his own; smiles all the while the smile of a smiler with a knife under his cloak. Won’t he fit the bill for King and Commonwealth? He might well do, but even a lesser man with a far lower sense of the dignity of the office being proffered would have the gravitas to politely decline the offer being made.

Conventional wisdom: O captain, my captain! Play up, play up, and play the game!
Devil’s advocate: There’s a breathless hush in the close tonight/ Ten to make and the last man in.
Worst-case scenario: The boy stood on the burning deck… whence all but he had fled…
In the bad old days, our diplomats used to be tyrants at home and democrats abroad. Today, flag-bearers for a watered-down republicanism, they might as well be hanged for sheep as be hanged for mutton. If we are opposed to friends, family, or any other type of aficionado of the powers that be (cronies, supporters, lackeys) being appointed to represent our best interests overseas, we might as well go the whole hog.

So, why not begin at the beginning, again. Cleanse the Augean stables of the administrative and civil services with a series of sackings and re-appointments. Seek, locate, recruit, and train a new generation of dedicated and competent career diplomats. Thus, Rosy is not my darling for all the good she may have done in Malaysia once upon a time and in other fairy tales. Nor is Kumar king of anything else but the ‘Commonwealth of Cricket’, for all his largesse and finesse and savoir faire. Laissez faire, laissez passer, let’s look to the next generation of new diplomacy now – not next year or in a month of Sundays.

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