“Beware of
invisible forces” said the headline of the Sunday Observer and it
continued “the President pointed out that albeit the armed enemies have
been well identified as lethal and should be wiped out by our gallant
armed forces. But some unscrupulous elements may act in diverse and
subtle ways. They could be even disguised in the garb of human rights
activists.
These parties
too, should be recognised and dealt with accordingly. As otherwise, he
said, these enemies may ultimately have a greater impact 
and cause more harm
and destruction to our motherland.” While Mahinda is making such
statements there was chaos in the streets and anarchy has raised its
dirty head. This was in addition to the murderous war in the North that
consumes hundreds every day.
We have
witnessed queues and chaotic situations in the past but in almost all
such occasions the cause was a strike, mob violence or terror attack.
In this case it was created by a court decision to reduce prices of
petrol as an answer to a fundamental rights violation appeal. Clearly
the president was referring to this judicial intervention when he
referred to a conspiracy by some unscrupulous elements.
However in the
same paper there was a news item claiming that “parliament supreme in
taxation” and went on to say that “effecting changes or fiddling with
taxes designed and imposed in the recently passed budget in parliament
by a comfortable majority would badly affect the fiscal year 2009,
economists and academics warned yesterday. They pointed out that all
financial powers of the state and the executive were wrested with
parliament. Even the annual budgetary allocation for the vote on the
president too had to be approved by parliament. “Therefore, a budget
passed for implementation should not and cannot be changed without
approval from parliament as it badly affects fiscal year 2009,” they
claimed. Meanwhile, Trade and Consumer Services Minister Bandula
Gunawardena yesterday stressed that the constitution defined parliament
as the country’s legislative organ entrusted with powers on state
financial matters...” Why are they making such noises instead of
showing us the supremacy of parliament? Why don’t they bring 
the whole matter to
the parliament and take decisions to be implemented by the ever so
powerful executive president?
Biggest conspirator
The answer is
very simple. It is Mahinda himself who took steps to undermine the
authority of the parliament. He must go before a mirror to identify the
biggest conspirator against the legislature. He bribed MPs to cross
over, made over one hundred ministers to form an inbuilt block vote,
and finally disregarded parliamentary voices. He then carefully
conspired to sabotage the implementation of the 17th Amendment passed
by parliament. By keeping UNP MPs bonded with letters of resignation,
President J R Jayewardene made the parliament a virtual doormat. What
Mahinda did is no better. There is only one step more for him to reach
the same level as Hitler: make enough noise and set fire to parliament
and put the blame on the opposition! He is running out of funds with
this never ending war in the North. Hundreds are dying every day with
several thousands filling the congested hospitals in the country. The
country and the people are literally bleeding.
The court decision to cut the illegitimate income of the Mahinda regime obtained from plundering the petrol consumer has made him come out with the above vicious statement. Beware judiciary and complainant! This man has no sense of the thousands and thousands of poor three-wheeler and motorbike travellers dependent on petrol.
It is clear
that this monstrous war cannot be continued with democratic strapping.
In any case brutal capitalism with plunder and corruption is anathema
to democracy.
Already Mahinda’s friend Wimal Weerawansa is advocating dictatorial powers to face the enemies of the self defined Sinhala Buddhist state. Mahinda has put the signal, but the journey is very difficult.