Paid advertisements and public demonstrations - Editorial

The country’s sovereignty is not the personal property of anyone; nor does it solely belong to the government. The regime, though appointed by an overwhelming majority, is a mere guardian of the people’s power and certainly not the owner, the interpreter and the violator of it.

When the controversial Divineguma Bill with amendments was passed in Parliament on Tuesday with a majority of 107 votes, people could see that the government had been all of the above.  One hundred and sixty members voted for the Bill while 53 MPs from the UNP, JVP and TNA voted against it.

Be it the most people-friendly Bill or otherwise, the dangerous imbalance of power in the legislature hints of the faltering democratic ideals in the incumbent governance whose political omnipotence seems capable of performing even the task pronounced impossible by the creator of the present constitution.

It is through this greasy channel of power that the demonic 18th Amendment became a law overnight and the vital Right to Information Bill reached the bins.

What was more disturbing however was the wave of demonstrations held in the Capital by people who were supporting Bills they knew little of. In the recent history, the only protest that could be called authentically public was the one that was staged by the Free Trade Zone employees against the Private Sector Pensions Scheme Bill. Its conclusion that came at the expense of an employee’s life shouts aloud the Government’s attitude towards anything that is genuinely public.

Everything else that parades Colombo’s streets, displaying national flags and placards hailing the government is a paid advertisement.

It may be true that the government was largely instrumental in bringing peace to the country, thanks to which the public can get onto the streets without fear of getting blown up in another LTTE massacre. However, the government at any rate should not misuse this factor in order to decide the reasons and time for the people to protest. Bringing peace does not give the authorities the undue privilege of making decisions on behalf of the people, who exercise their freedom of association in this manner.

Ideally, without suppressing the dissent, the government needs to look into the grievances of the people and remedy them promptly in order to avoid recurrence of such incidents. It should not be eliminating those who raise their voices against the government, but the reasons as to why they take to the streets, demanding justice.
Under no circumstance, should a politically mature government make the voice of the masses their trumpets nor should it convert mass protests into public stunts. After all it is the citizenry of the country that decides what is right and what is wrong and the government is only an institution that operates according to the common will of the people.

In that matter, the government of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka cannot be an exception.