Criminal defamation Vs. Media freedom
Media freedom is treated as an essential part of a democratic system, and by accepted standards Sri Lanka is among the countries with least of it. The media minister told his first press conference that the government had been brought to power mainly by the media.
ජනමාධ්ය නිදහසට එරෙහිව සාපරාධී අපහාස නීතිය
Although its first media minister Dharmasiri Senanayake called the People’s Alliance a government brought to power by journalists, it has reformed only parliamentary privilege law and, instead of repealing criminal defamation, filed twelve cases against editors, six of them against Ravaya. Sinha Ratnatunga and Lasantha Wickrematunge were convicted of defaming the President, who never testified. The editorial contrasts English practice and the Salman Rushdie episode, cites New York Times v. Sullivan, and notes that the 1996 recommendations of the R.K.W. Goonesekere committee were ignored.
කමල් අද්දරආරච්චි, රාවය හා කාන්තා ඉරණම
Ivan recounts Ravaya’s campaign after a magistrate who knew actor Kamal Addararachchi discharged him of raping a schoolgirl; the magistrate left for Australia and Kamal was indicted and sentenced by Shiranee Tilakawardane to ten years. The Court of Appeal has now acquitted him while calling his conduct ungentlemanly. Ivan argues that poor young women rarely get justice, citing a girl abused by a former police chief, a child-sex racket at a Beruwala children’s home that led to a defamation case against Ravaya, and Lenin Ratnayake, sent on paid leave.
Rehabilitating parliamentarians
A research officer is to be added to every MP’s staff. Adding one will not change the quality of what members do; what is needed is to make the staff already there work properly. What would change it is an institution the public can complain to.
පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්රීවරුන් පුනරුත්ථාපනය කිරීම
Ivan argues that adding a research officer to MPs’ staff will change nothing while members fill their secretary, stenographer and office-aide posts with relatives and treat the pay as family income; staff should come from a public-service pool. Sri Lanka alone gives MPs a duty-free luxury vehicle every five years, which most sell illegally, though customs confiscated vehicles used by Aravinda de Silva and his father. He notes the non-enforcement of the assets and liabilities law and proposes a British-style parliamentary body to hear public complaints against members.
Government in extremely delicate position
The PA government seems to be trying to cover up all its sins through peace talks. Meanwhile the conditions for a democratic political culture — an independent elections commission first among them — are being deferred until a new constitution that may never come.
ආණ්ඩුව ඉන්නේ අන්තෝ ජටා බහි ජටා තත්ත්වයකය
Ivan says the People’s Alliance is trying to hide its sins behind peace talks without preparing the ground. It rewarded poll offenders, its pledge to recall MPs’ liquor licences is a lie when some ministers hold seven, and the President ties the four commissions to her constitution. He recounts the farce of cabinet-making, from Anuruddha Ratwatte’s return as Deputy Defence Minister to the splitting of the deputy finance post between G.L. Peiris and S.B. Dissanayake. With a four-vote majority and a failing economy, he expects the Chief Justice’s impeachment to be the first shot.
The inherent limits of the Norwegian peace initiative
The Norwegian attempt to bring peace to Sri Lanka is being discussed from every point of view. What the column sets out is what a third-party facilitation can and cannot reach — and why India’s own intervention carried the limits it did.
සාම ප්රයත්නයේ අභියෝග
EPDP leader and minister Douglas Devananda told a Sinhala daily that he does not oppose talks with the LTTE but that a northern and eastern settlement is possible without it if the other Tamil parties agree. The piece likens this to the views of the JVP, the Sihala Urumaya and Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake, notes Dinesh Gunawardena’s silence, and argues that Devananda, who prospered under Premadasa and now the People’s Alliance, owes his armed guard and power to the war, casting doubt on the government’s sincerity.
වඩා භයානක මදුරුවා ද ? ත්රස්තවාදියා ද?
Ivan contrasts the billions spent on fighting terrorism with the neglect of mosquito control. About 60,000 died in the 1989–90 insurrection and fewer than 100,000 in 16 years of war, while the 1934–35 malaria epidemic alone killed about 100,000. He recounts how malaria relief carried the Sama Samaja movement to Sabaragamuwa, where N.M. Perera defeated Adeline Molamure in 1936 and became ‘Parippu Mahatthaya’, cites B.H. Farmer on malaria and the dry zone, and warns that since state control was abandoned in the 1980s the disease is returning.