Can the committee and the PSC carry out investigations with an open mind after having so many theories on the crime having been spread and deeply rooted
President Ranil Wickremesinghe has announced that he would appoint a committee headed by a retired Supreme Court Judge to investigate the claims made by Britain’s Channel 4 on the ‘Mastermind’ of the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks of 2019 and a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to look into the statement made by former Attorney General Dappula de Livera on the ‘Conspiracy’ behind the same attacks.
According to NewsFirst, Mr Livera speaking during an interview conducted in May 2019 had said that there was a grand conspiracy concerning the 2019 April Attacks.
What would be the difference between these two Committees?
The Presidential committee would summon all possible witnesses who are apparent to be linked to the stories that were told in the British TV documentary Sri Lanka’s Easter Bombings – Dispatches and those related to the other theories, before presenting its report. The PSC might also summon the same persons to prepare its report.
The PSC would not be able to ignore the Channel 4 documentary, as those so-called ‘Whistleblowers’ in it were also attempting to prove that there was a ‘conspiracy’ behind the terrorist attacks that were perpetrated on April 21, 2019.
Similarly, the proposed committee might consider the former attorney General’s statement as well. Ultimately both investigations are aimed at uncovering the mastermind of the suicide bombings that killed 269 people on an Easter Sunday four years ago.
The simple question that arises with the claim made by the former Attorney General is whether he meant a political conspiracy, as he did not elaborate on what he stated. One might pose the question if the months-long or years-long planning by the National Thawheed Jama’ath (NTJ) and its leader Zahran Hashim for the attacks did not amount to a conspiracy.
According to the NewsFirst, Livera had told in the interview “The conspirators are at a different level. People like Zahran Hashim would have been involved in the conspiracy though he decided to explode himself”
However, he states how he came to the conclusion that there had been a conspiracy. The information by the State Intelligence Service with times, targets, places, methods of attacks and other information is clear there was a grand conspiracy, he had explained.
In the same breath, he had also said “We cannot say the investigations on the Grand Conspiracy has been concluded,”
The President has decided to appoint a Presidential committee and a PSC despite a Presidential committee, a Presidential commission and a PSC having presented their reports. PSC report was presented to the Speaker soon after its investigation was concluded and the reports of the committee and the commission were presented later in Parliament. Despite the reports of these three probes having been in the public domain the question about the mastermind of the macabre crime that was perpetrated against the Christian community on their holiest day is still raised by many including politicians and the victim community. This is an indication of the general disapproval of the conclusions of those probes.
The government led by the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) seems to be of the view that the Easter Sunday carnage was a closed issue. It seems to be of the view that it was an extremist Muslim terrorist group that was obsessed with the hope of attaining paradise had carried out the suicide attacks and no other conspiracy or mastermind was behind it.
Former Public Security Minister Sarath Weerasekara told Parliament on April 6, 2021, that the government had decided that Naufer Moulavi was the mastermind of the Easter Sunday Attacks.
That was the stance that the authorities of the Yahapalana Government during whose tenure the attack was carried out held, until they were ousted from power in November 2021.
However, the SLPP leaders then were promising to expose all those behind the crime. Then, all of a sudden, in about mid-2020 rumours started to do their rounds that the SLPP leadership, particularly Gotabaya Rajapaksa was behind the carnage.
It started not with any new finding by any investigative arm or any suspicion among the public that could be justifiable. It was based purely on a recently found theory “one who carries the prey is the hunter.”
This was not a new theory in Sri Lankan politics. The late President Ranasinghe Premadasa also used this when Gamini Dissanayake, one of his two most difficult adversaries became the uncontested leader of the Democratic United National Front (DUNF) after the other; Lalith Athulathmudali was assassinated by the LTTE in 1993.
Now this theory in respect of the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks has been successfully sold to a considerable segment of the Sri Lankan society. And Channel 4 documentary is just the icing on the cake. It did not present a single substantiated new evidence to vindicate the theory that has already been floated.
Since unanswered questions remain among the facts that have been already revealed by various circles including the investigating authorities such as the one about an intelligence officer having met a suicide bomber just before he killed himself at the Tropical Inn in Dehiwala, one has to come to the conclusion that anything would have happened, - even one who carried the prey might have been the hunter. Besides, greed for power is capable of doing crimes of any magnitude in Sri Lanka.
Can the proposed Presidential committee and the PSC carry out their investigations with an open mind after having so many theories on the crime that have been spread and deeply rooted in the minds of the people is a valid question. Also, since the possibility of SLPP dominating the proposed PSC as the tradition has it that the majority of members of any PSC will be drawn from the ruling party; the possibility of its findings becoming controversial is high. Hence, the proposed committee and the PSC have to draw lessons from the already concluded investigations carried out on the matter.
It must be recalled that the investigations by the past Committees, Commissions and the PSC had been carried away by the outcries provoked by political rivalries and communal enmities in the country.
From the beginning almost many people attempted to implicate their adversaries – political or otherwise – without sound evidence which made headlines though, influencing the investigators in turn.
This led to some people being repeatedly arrested after being released. The PSC spent considerable time on Qiazi courts, Madrasas or the Islamic religious schools which have been in the country for nearly a century, face veils, the date palms and Arabic sign boards in Kattankudi and former provincial Governor Hizbullah’s proposed university, while none of them seemed to have anything to do with the terrorist attacks.
All of them were later forgotten. Hizbullah, former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen and former Governor Azath Salley, who were at the centre of controversies were also forgotten later. These are some of the lessons for future probes.
