Turning the Square into a Circle – Modus Operandi
Gunadasa Amarasekara.
Ranjith Soysa asked ‘Can the Prime Minister square a circle’ (6/5/Island).
My friend Ranjith should have no illusions about the capabilities of our Prime Minister. He may not be a statesmen or a visionary, but he is certainly the cleverest politician amongst us. He is Machiavelli incarnate. (Remember how he burnt Chandrika’s package which was close to his heart.) He has already launched his modus operandi to achieve his goal.
The square – 11 member committee views – that diabolical report was presented by him not with the intention of implementing it. He is no naive fool to do such a thing. It is for a specific purpose that he did it. It is to create the necessary background; to create a terrific fear psychosis in the minds of the Sinhala people which is a must- the modus operandi badly needed. He knows too well how the nationalists would go at it and tear it to pieces, how the Sangha will take to the streets, how the legal luminaries will rack their brains to demolish those fraudulent arguments. He also knows that greater the opposition, greater the rabble rousing, greater would be the fear gripping the minds of the people. This is the background that he needs.
It is in such a ‘fear psychosis’ background that he can present the proposal which he actually wants to implement. And that proposal is the implementation of the thirteenth amendment fully and nothing more. He knows too well how the fear stricken people will embrace it with a sigh of relief, how even those who have misgivings about the full implementation of the thirteenth amendment will accept it as a lesser evil. The full implementation of the thirteenth amendment with police and land powers is all that the enemy yearns for. The Western powers who are out to divide the country will welcome it. India will fully endorse it. TNA and the Elamists Vigneshwaran and Sambandan, will accept it with a display of bogus protests. This is the stepping stone they all need in the pursuit of their journey towards Elaam. Once the stepping stone is provided they will look after the rest.
This proposal will be presented to the Parliament in the coming months by the PM with the blessings of everybody. The SLFP members within the government would have no qualms in accepting it. I would not be surprised if some members of the JO too do the same. Dew Gunesekera has already shown his stance.
How this strategy – this modus operandi has succeeded could be seen from the reaction of the Sangha; the leaders of both Malwatta and Asgiriya when they met President Sirisena had agreed to endorse to implementation of the thirteenth amendment. All they wanted was the strengthening of the centre!
It is also most likely that this proposal of the Prime Minister would be presented not as one initiated solely by this government but as one initiated by the previous government which failed to see the light of the day.
I believe when the Prime Minister converted the entire Parliament into a constitutional assembly, this would have been one of his Machiavellian intentions. The bait was swallowed by the JO, hook line and sinker in spite of our warning them.
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