වසන්ත සමයේ අවසානය
Because of the absolute power the presidency gives, leaders who reach it fall in love with the system as a matter of habit. But it was never properly made, and the oppression built into it works not only on the opposition and the public but on the president himself — and what a leader who reaches the office can see is only the sweetness of absolute power, never the poison hidden under it.
දූෂණය ගැන වැඩිදුරටත්
Answering replies from Shiral Lakthilaka in Ravaya and Wasantha Wijenayake in Lanka, Ivan denies ever certifying the Rajapaksa administration as clean. His argument was that J.R. Jayewardene’s political system was built to reward plunder, so every ruling party since 1977 has been corrupt by design — and the opposition attacks corruption only to reclaim the right to profit from it. He rejects the claim that corruption cannot be proved without rumour, citing Ravaya’s own documented exposures under previous governments. He then turns to the libel suit Gotabaya Rajapaksa brought against Lasantha Wickrematunge over the MiG procurement story, and states that Wickrematunge’s celebrated posthumous editorial was written after his death by another hand.
පුවත්පත් මණ්ඩල ක්රමය නැවත ඇති කිරීම
The Press Council was left dormant in 2002 so that the industry could regulate itself, and is now being revived. Ivan sets out what is wrong with the law — registration of every owner and editor, renewable yearly — and what is wrong with the self-regulation that replaced it, and concludes that the media organisations’ only course is to negotiate a single institution in which the government also has a share.
දුම්රිය ගමන හා වේගය
A commuter’s letter about the two and a half hours from Galle to Colombo sends Ivan through
the history of travelling speed, from the ox cart at eight miles an hour to trains that now
exceed three hundred. Sri Lanka had the best railway in colonial Asia and has since
shortened rather than extended it; nine hundred level crossings on a thousand kilometres of
track are what hold the trains back. He recalls Lalith Athulathmudali’s expressway joining
Hambantota to Jaffna, and finds the same instinct in the Yal Devi announcement.
Mangala’s Unfinished Revolution
Mangala Samaraweera’s revolt against President Rajapaksa has hurt the regime, but Ivan finds it neither consistent nor honest. He compares it with the 1991 impeachment move by Athulathmudali and Dissanayake, and reminds readers of the share Samaraweera took under Kumaratunga and of the waste in the institutions he controlled.
ඉතින් මැතිනියනි ඔබට ආයුබෝවන්
The worst story about Chandrika Kumaratunga’s honesty came from Le Monde’s Delhi correspondent, puzzled by the degrees listed in her official biography after 1994. Ivan then recalls the impeachment plan of 1991, in which all three main actors lived in dream worlds, and how the exposure of the Suriyakanda mass graves brought the rising Kumaratunga great fame.
රටට අමතක වී ඇති විධායක ජනාධිපති ක්රමය
The editorial notes that the once-powerful campaign to abolish or reform the executive presidency, begun by N.M. Perera and carried forward by Lalith Athulathmudali, Gamini Dissanayake, Chandrika Kumaratunga and the JVP, has fallen silent. With the President’s second term ending in 2005 and the Prime Minister hoping to succeed her, it argues that at minimum presidential immunity should be confined to official acts and removal for deliberate constitutional violations made easier.
ස්වයං විනාශයකට යෑම
Ivan asks why the LTTE demands an interim administration it knows the government cannot grant, and argues that it seeks recognition as an equal state, as it did when excluded from the Indo-Lanka Accord. He recalls that the Accord already conceded much the Sinhalese now resent, and that the JVP, which bombed Parliament in 1987, now backs the President’s resistance. Examining Sinhala Mahavamsa myths and the Tamil claim to the East, he warns that both leaderships are steering the country towards anarchy.
ජනාධිපති අගමැති ගැටුම කෙළවර කුමක් ද?
Tracing the Development Lottery Board dispute back to the 1978 Constitution, Ivan quotes N.M. Perera’s warning that split control of presidency and Parliament would paralyse the state and invite dictatorship. He recalls Athulathmudali and Gamini Dissanayake turning against the executive presidency, the PA’s 1994 pledge to abolish it, D.B. Wijetunga’s peaceful handover of domestic power, and Kumaratunga’s broken promise to the JVP. Wickremesinghe, a defender of the office he hopes to hold, failed to strike a deal at the height of his mandate and now faces a dilemma.
රනිල්ට වැරදුණේ කොතැන ද?
After the Supreme Court blocked the 19th Amendment strategy, Ivan assesses Ranil Wickremesinghe’s leadership. He compares the goals and power bases of J.R. Jayewardene, Ranasinghe Premadasa, Chandrika Kumaratunga and Wickremesinghe, and argues that the Prime Minister missed the chance, just after his election victory, to use his mandate to force the President into constitutional reform. He praises his resolve on peace but faults his reliance on personal friends rather than the cabinet and his failure to explain his goals.