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| Saturday, 13 November 2004 |
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On my watch It's time to smash the Private Bus Mafia In a timely observation on the eve of completing ten years in office, President Chandrika Kumaratunga said a proper crime prevention strategy required a free and fair judiciary, as well as a clean police service that can command public cooperation. She was addressing a special session of the National Advisory Council on Crime Prevention. There can be little disagreement that these twin areas of law enforcement need to be completely clean, above board and worthy of the people's trust in a good democracy. The President went into a detailed analysis of what seemed to ail the police service, citing instances of gross corruption and also the virtual breakdown of the police system due to politicization. She dealt with what may seem to some as the minutiae of police corruption in referring to the police becoming so depraved as to demand bribes from lorries transporting cattle to abattoirs. In most of these instances it is unauthorized and therefore illegal transport of cattle to unlicensed and illegal abattoirs, where both the transport and the killing is done in the most cruel and inhumane manner. While the President's concern about the alarming rate of increase in crime, and the well known connivance of the police in many such crimes, there is another criminal element that is causing grave hardship and concern to the public. I refer to what is clearly the Private Bus Owners' Mafia, now operating in the open, threatening the Government at every turn with no qualms about holding passengers to ransom for the slightest and most cussed reason. A little investigation will show that part of the clout of this Mafia in public transport is also due to the involvement of members of the police, at higher levels, in its operation. The situation is now so threatening to the Government that according to a recent statement by bus owners they will even go on strike unless the Minister of Transport is changed. What they seek is a minister ready to work to their bidding and not in the interest of the people. Knowing very well the dependence of the vast majority of our people on public transport, these bus operators are now ready to make the most outrageous demands, knowing the Government would ultimately give into them to ease the harassment caused to the public by their sudden strikes. This must come to an end. Public transport must be cleansed of this self-serving, politically motivated Mafia with its strong tentacles to the underworld and corrupt elements in the Police. Forty-six years later It is now 46 years since the father of today's President, the late Prime Minister S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, nationalized the public bus transport service in the country, when most private operators could not provide a reasonable service to the people. In one of the smoothest acts of ownership transfer from private to public hands, the then Government established the Ceylon Transport Board (CTB) to carry on the operation of nationalized bus transport. The CTB functioned under good leadership, always having the welfare of the passenger in mind. It expanded the network of routes, introduced new and more convenient routes and at one stage was one of the largest single bus operators in the world, with more than 4,000 buses. In later years the CTB did lose its focus on passenger welfare, due to politicization, whereby government MPs used the CTB to ease the growing problem of unemployment. It reached a time when the CTB had more than four crewmembers to a bus. There were rackets in tenders and the building of bus bodies. These were all ills that could have been corrected by the Government. Instead, the UNP Government elected in 1977, without taking the necessary corrective measures, decided to dismember of the CTB, by the re-introduction of private bus operators. The theory as usual was that competition would give a better service, but in reality the UNP government only created a merry-go-round of exploitation of the public by private bus operators. This led to the collapse of the CTB, with the cluster services that remain being a mere rump of a great institution that served the people. The time for action With the concern expressed by the President about the need to combat crime, it is time now for the Government to seriously address the issue of combating the criminal behaviour of the Private Bus Mafia. They have become a law unto themselves. I have seen private bus drivers deliberately obstruct and use harsh language on CTB drivers for picking up passengers ahead of them. The public must be saved from the reckless driving of untrained and unlicensed persons. The issue of tickets must be ensured and above all, the practice of lightning or wildcat strikes that so badly affect the public must come to an end. It is necessary to do this before an enraged public decides to take the law into their own hands in the face of the criminal and anti-people acts of these marauders on the roads. The method of smashing this dangerously strengthening Mafia is to go back to 1958 and once again nationalize all public transport by bus. There is no need to worry about Sri Lanka's image among foreign investors as a result, because in most countries where genuine investors come from, public transport is not a wholly private business. The UK has already learnt the adverse lessons of privatized rail transport, and is reverting to state control. Until the private sector in Sri Lanka demonstrates its responsibility to social welfare and not only the worship of profit combined with political motives, the public can never benefit from the private sector controlling bus transport. The re-nationalizing of passenger bus transport would be much appreciated by a people, long suffering under the criminal harassment of private bus operators and their rowdy crews. It is a matter the President should give the highest priority to as she marks the tenth anniversary of her election to office. In fact it is a worthy tenth anniversary gift to the people. |
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