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Speech given by Minister for Economic Reform, Science and Technolgy; Deputy Minister for Policy Development and Implementation, Milinda Moragoda for the 126th birth anniversary of Mohammad Ali Jinnah.

Pakistan was born as a nation some fifty six years ago. One man was crucial both in bringing about the new State and in building the nation. His name was, of course, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Today we honour his 126th birth anniversary with this event. Throughout his life Mohammad Ali Jinnah fought for what he believed in. First he played a crucial role as a lawyer, becoming one of Bombay's most prominent legal representatives; then as a politician, a Muslim leader, and statesman.

architect of the state

Most lastingly he was the architect of the state of Pakistan, the builder of a new nation. He brought to this new State the many skills learnt over a lifetime of constitutional expertise and legal understanding. We have many lessons we can take from him in nation building and it is with this in mind that I would like to address you today. Although Sri Lanka is, in comparison an old nation reborn in 1948, we are today, after 54 years of independence rebuilding our nation once more, under the leadership of our Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe,

I think that Mohammad Ali Jinnah would understand and share my concerns about the subject that I have chosen to talk to you about today, the need for law and order. I decided to raise this topic at this forum because of the continuing plague of brutal and violent crimes that have occurred in recent days , even in my own electorate. Some of these incidents occurred as I sat in a room in Thailand seeking to progress the talks for peace in our country.

debilitating conflict

Mohammad Ali Jinnah started life working in the legal profession. He understood better than most the importance to any nation of having a stable and well adjusted society. He would recognise that law and order is critical to any orderly transition into a new nation.

Today in our own society we see such a breakdown caused partly by the debilitating conflict of twenty years, as well as the fractious and confrontational system and culture and also by the rise in drugs related and other organised crime.

I think it is worth analysing some of the causes for crime wave we are experiencing today. The twenty years of war has undoubtedly been a major contributor to crime. Our Police have had to undergo a difficult period where their primary task of crime prevention was subjugated by the need to maintain internal security.

Meanwhile war encourages the spread of firearms. With tens of thousands of deserters from our armed forces over the past two decades many weapons have found themselves being used illegally against ordinary citizens. Many of these weapons remain out there in the hands of people who have rejected the norms of a civilised society and who now use them for malicious and wicked purposes.

Hand in hand with the spread of weapons has come the spectre of organised crime, bands of criminals working in unison and sometimes, as the gangland principle has taken over, in open warfare against each other. Regrettably this process has been helped by an unholy nexus between crime and politics. Meanwhile the Police have had to maintain a system where the use of weapons has spread and where the legal system has struggled to cope with the rise in litigation.

Go to virtually any area of Sri Lanka today and you will see the despair of many of our young people. Without jobs or any hope for the future in too many cases they have turned to drugs and illicit alcohol in which to seek relief from the horrors of daily life. And there are plenty of criminals ready to take what little money they have and sell them these destructive materials.

great problem

The problem has become so great that despite a large Police force we have not been able to control this tidal wave. No doubt there are many in our society, those who are comfortably protected from such matters who would criticise me for raising this spectre in such stark terms. But even they are beginning to realise that crime affects everyone and that things have to change.

Over the past fifty plus years we as a society have failed to accept the damage done to our law enforcement system particularly as a result of the war as well as of the acrimonious and confrontational political system and culture which has developed in recent decades. Take the situation with the Police force. Ask any policeman or woman and they will tell you that elections are tense and apprehensive times for them. In the past all too often they have been used to do the bidding of the incumbent Government. There are those who will tell you that they have been unable to defend polling stations or have had political pressure placed upon them to turn a 'blind eye'.

There are others who will tell you that if they tried to do their job without fear or favour they were threatened with a move to the North and the East as though that was some punishment for being disobedient. Look at the transfers that follow an election. The favoured end up in Colombo whilst those out of favour end up in operational areas in the North and East.

We have not given due consideration to what this has done both to the morale of the Police or the damage it has done to law enforcement around the island.

Consider this. Every time a policeman is transferred he loses contact with his own community and is sent to an area of which he knows little, where the local people do not know him and may not even speak his language.

The latter is especially true in the North and the East. How on earth is a policeman supposed to gain the respect of local people if he is seen as an outsider and can't even speak the language?

How is he expected to do his job when he needs to talk to a suspected criminal only to find that he needs an interpreter? How can he get fast and reliable information from witnesses to crimes or from informants when he doesn't know the community he is talking to nor does he understand their language? And how can he gain the respect of local people if they don't understand the work he has to do? Such problems polarise the policeman away from the community rather than allowing him to become a respected and important part of that community.

Michael Burton in his book 'The Policeman in the Community' explained it like this, "The more a policeman is hindered from participating in the community, the less he will understand public sentiment, the less he will exercise his discretion, therefore the more are people likely to be irritated by his behaviour, the more they will treat him differently in social contacts, the more isolated the police will become. As their sympathy for the members of the public declines further, hostility towards them increases, they become further isolated, and so on."

difficulty of people

Added to this the problem for the past twenty years of having to mix the duties of peacetime policeman and crime prevention, with the task of maintaining internal security. In my visits to the North and the East, many people have commented that it is often difficult to tell a policeman apart from the armed forces. Their roles have become confused and their duties overlap. As one person stated, "the Police have been trained to fight not to mediate or arbitrate".

As another person put it, in such circumstances the Police do "their best under difficult circumstances". This is especially true when in some areas of our country an entire generation has grown up without any sense of normal contact with the police or a proper upbringing in the rules of a peaceful society. But the problem isn't just confined to the North and the East. In the South and the West too many people talk of the police as being 'invisible'. Never there when you need them but often seen driving around in squad cars or group patrols.

heavily stretched

The Police understand this, and I do not criticise them when I say this. I say it because they too understand how heavily stretched they are in attempting to carry out their normal duties. Many years ago we used to have a Cadet Corps in many of our schools but these have become things of the past. And all too often the time we have given our young new recruits into the police to learn their job and become wise to the law has been pitifully short.

The policy in times of crisis seems to have been to put someone out there in a uniform without considering if they have the skills and knowledge to do the job effectively. Again, I quote from one person who said to me "the police cannot automatically expect respect, they have to earn it". And we all know that respect only comes from being highly professional and impartial.

political interference

During the general election campaign I highlighted the problems faced by the Police in carrying out their duties; In particular the problem of political interference. If a criminal or an offender is apprehended by the Police but is known to a local politician then all too often the Police have come under extreme pressure to 'turn a blind eye' or worse still to release them without charge.

With little training in prosecution skills policemen have had to go into courts to give testimony without the skills required. They have been faced by extremely skilful lawyers who make their job difficult in the pursuit of winning their clients case. It is with these problems in mind that criminals get away with their crimes and the legal system becomes swamped with appeals and cases that linger on for far too long because of lack of a proper prosecution.

I praise the police for the difficult job that they do, but as with any institution there are those who seek to use their position wrongfully. A few give the majority a bad name. And here I talk about the corruption which exists within the service. Some people have suggested that this is linked to police salaries, but why then is it that so many policemen do their duty without resorting to such methods.

The fixed penalty law has allowed an unscrupulous few to demand money in place of paying the fine. In recent times there have been accusations of some police officers being involved in organised crime. Some people have intimated that at some checkpoints in the North and the East money changed hands in order to allow people to pass as they go about their legitimate business. I do not believe that this is a widespread issue. But it has become the subject of hearsay which has divided the Police from the people and created an impression of a corrupt service not to be trusted.

part of the community

But within these frameworks how can those who seek to maintain law and order properly go about their duties? Any police force in the modern world needs to be part of the community. They need to know what is going on in that community and they need to be leaders. Our Interior Minister, John Amaratunga is working hard to correct many of these problems.

The police play a central role in society. In future they will have to play a lead role in creating a new society where the rights of the citizen are respected and upheld.

The police have a duty to ensure that the criminal is identified, to prevent crime wherever it may be spawned and to see that criminals are brought to justice within the framework of a workable criminal justice system. But they can only do that if they are supported and respected both by the politicians and the ordinary law abiding citizen.

So far I have looked at some of the problems we face today. A police force ill-equipped to carry out its duties effectively. Rising crime caused partly by the war of the past twenty years and partly by a breakdown in the societal structures that should be the norm in a democratic society.

It is now time that we look again at our values, social responsibility and civic duty. However we should not assume that this is just a job for the Police or the Government. We all have a responsibility in building a fair, just and law abiding society. Perhaps the time has come for us to seek the right to a 'citizen's arrest', where when any of us who see a crime being committed are empowered to prevent that crime from happening.

crime itself increased

Meanwhile the type of crime itself has increased in all areas. Everyday we read of murders, rapes and violent theft. Drugs related crimes are on the increase and in recent days we have read in our newspapers of crimes related to pornography, in this case involving young children.

As responsible citizens we should also seek to see the laws we already have are properly enforced. For example we have the death penalty but it is never used. How can we hope to enforce law and order if we do not put crime properly in its place. If you commit a certain crime you should be prepared to pay the appropriate penalty. If that means the death penalty then it should be carried out without fear or favour.

Equally we should seek to ensure that the penalties applied to a life of crime are harsh and unambiguous. There should be no hiding place for the criminal and he should understand that he will pay dearly for his misdemeanours. I know a debate is currently under way about such matters and I am clear in my view that harsh deterrents are necessary.

Are we really a sick society where our basic values have been subjugated by self interest or self indulgence?

As a society I believe that we all have a fundamental duty to bring back values into our daily lives. In my view that can only be done through a disciplined society. While we tackle the evil within our country we have to solve these basic issues.

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