Will you please shut up!

Somebody once said that Sri Lankans have not only an open mind but an open mouth too. In these days of energy crises don't spend your mental energy on trying to find out who said it. For all I know, it might have been me.

Okay, I might be called unpatriotic and anti-national. But look at it dispassionately. Are we not a society that talks too much? Don't we approach most subjects, especially ones we know little about, with an open mouth?

One could expect that from politicians. If they are not born to speak on every conceivable subject, they certainly acquire the habit on the hoof, so to say.

Some leeway may be allowed then. After all they survive by their mouths, making the kind of promises that would make voters eat out of their hands.

Unique political survivalist

Remember just before the recent provincial council elections that unique political survivalist called Mervyn Silva said he would resign from his ministerial post if the UNP's Janaka Perera got even one more vote than a wounded soldier who was contesting from the other side. Such bravado!

Janaka Perera did get much more votes than the former soldier. So did Mervyn Silva resign? Oh no. His response to  the call for him to keep his word and resign was met by a strange argument that would have had the best logicians in a spin.

He would resign, said the aforementioned Labour Minister, only if President Rajapakse tells him to resign.

To break the word he held out so boastfully he was ready even to drag the name of the President, even though he might have realised the damage he was doing to the image of the party he joined, left and rejoined and to the President himself.

In the game of politics - and it is a game though some might try to raise it to the level of a dedicated service to the people - this sort of evasion, prevarication and sheer hypocrisy is to be expected.

Poor opinion of politicians

That is why the public has such a poor opinion of politicians though sometimes they are compelled to associate with them and even pay pooja to them because of the  need for the assistance of politicians in society that has become politicised from top to bottom.

Public services that were once admired even by foreign countries which sought to emulate the Ceylonese (now Sri Lankan) example of impartiality and fairness in treating the public have become so politicised and officials hankering after promotion and recognition so patently one-sided, that one begins to wonder what ever happened to the society that others applauded from afar.

Some of our friends at Paradise Club, this favourite watering hole down Duplication Road, say that the administration of this country has gone to the dogs. I, Pachoris would like to add one word to that. It might seem like a minor amendment to some. But to the more perceptible the meaning would be clear enough.

I think it has gone to the "running dogs,"  a phrase made popular by the Chinese communists in the heyday of Mao Zedong. I would not have got into this subject at all except that when I walked into Paradise Club after a break of two weeks or so brought on by an awful flu, two old friends and habitu‚s of the club were discussing the deterioration of our public services and the lickspittles that have ensconced themselves in various parts of the administration.

The changed public service

Kandiah (call me Ken) Vinasapathi, a former high ranking civil servant was telling the gathering of friends how the public service has essentially changed.

In days gone by administrators rarely if ever spoke on matters extraneous to their posts. They hardly uttered a word on a subject that was outside their mandate or on topics they knew little about.

Today everybody seems to speak on everything and love to see themselves quoted by the media or have their pictures on the box or in the newspapers.

Publicity-seeking public servants now want not only to be heard but seen. The result often enough is that they make asses of themselves.

"Hey Pachoris, you were not here when I mentioned the other day about that police spokesman, some chap called SSP Ranjit Gunasekera who gave us a great lesson in democracy and an interpretation of Article 14 of our constitution.

In an argument more contorted than a boy scout's reef knot, SSP Gunasekera appears to have come to the conclusion that the exercise of the right of protest and association by some media representatives was an infringement of the freedom of movement of others.

Unorthodox interpretation

Having said that, according to a media reply to Police Spokesman Gunasekera's rather unorthodox interpretation of rights and freedoms enshrined in our constitution, he goes on to say that such a protest indirectly obstructs the economic progress of the country.

If Gunasekera is so concerned about the economic progress of the country he might do well to start by catching the bribe givers and bribe takers, those involved in organised crime and in such despicable enterprises as the narcotics trade being carried on at times, it is said, with the help of politicians and the police as some recent cases have tended to indicate.

If that is not possible perhaps Gunasekera should apply for an opportunity to pursue doctoral studies where he could engage in an exegesis of his theories on fundamental rights and freedoms.

After such scholarship he would no doubt find a senior position in any university in Zimbabwe or Uzbekistan or a similar country known for its democratic excellence.

As our friends at Paradise Club were saying so clearly and with genuine concern such puerile comments can be expected from policemen who stray into areas of study and research better left to the more educated. Somehow they should be persuaded to keep their mouths tightly shut for the sake of what little sanity is left in our nation.

Lodged a protest

But it is not possible to stomach the blunders made by some of our diplomats who see themselves as seasoned campaigners in the business. It was Felix Katepittu, a former ambassador and a retired veteran diplomat who mentioned a recent statement made by our ambassador in Brussels.

He had lodged a protest with the head of the European Parliament about a critical report on Sri Lanka made by a European parliamentary delegation that visited Sri Lanka in July.

As Felix was saying there is nothing essentially wrong with Ambassador Ariyasinha protesting against some of the observations made against the Sri Lanka government which many thought unfair because they were based on twisted interpretations of events.

But to Katepittu, with several others concurring, Ambassador Ariyasinha went overboard by virtually accusing the leader of the delegation, Briton Robert Evans of being associated with the LTTE.

A diplomatic viewpoint

 Ariyasinha might well be correct. There have been newspaper reports about Robert Evans' presence at pro-LTTE meetings in London and about his lending his name to other such events.

The question from a diplomatic viewpoint is, should our ambassador have been making such allegations or should other than official means have been used to lay into Evans? Could the Ambassador back up his allegation with incontrovertible proof?

If the Ambassador and the government felt so strongly about Evans they could have used the media, (not the state media but the private media) to expose Evans and his pro-LTTE stance or some other avenue to do so.

But to accuse him officially of pro-LTTE tendencies is a step too far and shuts the door to any retreat.

However angry one might feel in such circumstances it is far better to eschew such diplomatic responses because they will not be helpful in the long term.