AKD and the NPP were given the switch to power by the people on three basic premises: 1) eradication of corruption (accountability), 2) a more competent management of a failed economy with clear knowledge and 3) transparency of government thought and action (deliverables).
AKD was elected President on September 21, 2024. The new Cabinet of the National People’s Power (NPP) government was sworn in on November 18 before President Anura Kumara Dissanayake at the Presidential Secretariat. The Cabinet comprised of 21 Ministers, Dr. Harini Amarasuriya as Prime Minister and President Dissanayake assuming responsibility for the portfolios of Defense, Finance, Planning and Digital Economy.
So far so good, it sounds. One hundred and ninety four (194) days, more than six full moons have risen and set since the new government has taken charge of a failed economy, a corrupt sociopolitical culture and a wailing nation whose little children in the rural areas, which is more than seventy percent (70%) of the country, are still going to sleep with a half-empty stomach; and the parents’ grief-stricken sighs are showering down their frail and sunken cheeks as drops of tears.
Yet when one visits Colombo, the capital city, dotted with high-rise towers with coruscant lights and houseful restaurants in which price for each dish exceeds an average wage earner’s monthly income, one wonders whether this is the same country that was declared bankrupt a couple of years ago. Acutely willed men and women in our administration are trying to navigate this nasty topography. Where is the disconnect? What can we do to shrink this ever-widening gulf between the haves and have-nots?
Nevertheless, one does not see the government politicians wining and dining with their henchmen’s money at these restaurants. That alone is somewhat a cause for psychological relief for the Appuhamys and Natarajahs. But that is hardly sufficient for a people, from the parched up-North to the Deep South, whose hopes and expectations were sky-high. At the same time, one questions: can the issues and problems that have been eating into our sociopolitical fabric be resolved in a period of mere six months? A more pertinent question should be, are we heading towards a better tomorrow in the context of our social and economical journey? Is the direction clear or still too blurry and foggy? Do we have sufficiently qualified and more committed men and women in the bureaucracy to navigate the ship of state when the seas get rougher?
AKD and the government have not advanced any answers to these questions, at least not as yet. Six months is more than enough for such a grueling exercise of power and pure administration. No half-baked answers and unclear explanations would suffice. Patience always has a limit’ sometimes too short and sometimes too long ultimately leading to apathy and forgetfulness.
The country, its economy; its sociocultural composition, its social fabric and its political ambitions as a collective psychological element are all integral part and parcel of the nation we most patriotically be screaming about from atop the platforms. In the same vain, all those elements that make up the notion of ‘nation’ are one and the same with those who comprise the ‘nation’. One cannot separate one from the other. There is no nation without the people and leaders who constitute the nation.
For all narrow political purposes, leaders, more often than not, attempt to differentiate one from the other., nation from the people and their leaders. The people at large would not realize the difference or lack thereof between society and themselves. It is real and at the same time, nuanced and more profound. Yet they would not wait for their leaders to define such deep social nuances and deceive them at the polls. Their main, and sometimes, only concern, constitutes in food on the table, children’s schooling, monthly saving for a rainy day and their elders’ health conditions and the availability of medicines at affordable prices. In others words, their economy, their day-to-day existence without exceedingly exotic entertainment constituents. AKD and his government must be totally and exclusively focused on making the majority feel relief; they must be singularly dedicated to the uplift of the economic premise of the poor.
Eradication of corruption, its aggressive spread amongst the most vulnerable segments of society, its alluring appeal to those who are charged with the allocation, management and monitoring of national assets, must be addressed and resolved with utter ruthlessness. But it must be executed within the existing laws and constitutional confines. But swiftness with which that exercise is undertaken and desired results delivered is as significant as its very substance.
Rhetorical explanations are aplenty; debate and arguments and counters are many; a populist appeal is still holding, yet the deliverable results are nowhere to be seen. Playing with the public’s patience is a gamble and many governments before the current one have paid a very steep price for such hypocrisy, futile political vacillation and double-standards. Now the people are openly asking whether the NPP administration is as accountable and transparent as their predecessors were not.
The current status is much more complex than one would admit. Its very birth and its evolution within a period of six short months which have been awaited by hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of our population is already in the past. Is the current government up to it? It certainly is qualified, but Is it competent and versatile in their administrative and management skills to steer on such angry and raging political waters to achieve their desired goals?
Political discourses cannot get you there. Many celebrated orators have dominated our political landscape but in terms of deliverable results they all have failed miserably. SWRD Bandaranaike is one glaring example. R Premadasa too had a gifted gab which protected some of his cruel deeds. Oratory alone would not get one to the designated goal. At the same time, history shows us that some eminent men and women whose leadership skills resided not in their respective speechifying talents but in the actual attainment of tangible societal aims and goals.
People respond to leaders in tangible fashion and palpable styles. Their aims and goals are very mundane and immediate. Making ends meet is no big purpose for each voter/citizen, but it is a must if he has to sustain his faith in the same leader. AKD’s chief challenge is that. If he has to change his Cabinet of Ministers, if the only way in which he could advance the national agenda to suit the national ambition, he has to do the reshuffling of the portfolios; maybe ha has to bring in fresh faces and fresher ideas and ideals. He is the Executive President. He may be subjected to the whims and fancies of the JVP’s ultra-left tendencies. But if he wants to implement fresh programs and fresh strategies in order to advance and accelerate the process of the transformation of governance, he can do it. The people are waiting for that.
AKD, we never told you that it was going to be easy and effortless. On the contrary, we may have realized the difficulty long before you came to that conclusion. We’re ready to wait a longer than we already have; but we must see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Up to the present time, that light seems to be receding before our very eyes.
Accountability, knowledge of the situation and the will and the skill to bring forth the deliverables. AKD, your very initials are the basic representation of your fundamental pledge to the country. Each day you wake to go to work for the service our men and women and children, remember your initials by which your followers so fondly refer to you as. A vast expanse of rural landscape parched most of the time by a heartless sun and drenched in others by torrential rain, the flat plains that await the diverted waters of the mammoth Mahaweli and other tertiary canals, the breathtaking hills in the central land and picturesque valleys that have become cushion-like beds for various cash crops, and the seemingly unending shores beyond which are shoals of fish ready to be baited by a fisherman’s unfriendly hook are all in the midst of our resources. Harness them to the service of man. If you succeed even fifty percent (50%) in your efforts, the men and women who voted will be happy and contended. Their natural and easy slumber shall bring your busy and tiring day to the same comfort of slumber from which you wake the following morning for another unforgiving day’s efforts.
*The writer can be reached at vishwamithra1984@gmail.com
