Making our child minds work
Seeing what is happening around us, I cannot but refrain from quoting
from a book I wrote and released just the day before the Presidential
election of 2005. It was a collection of regular weekly columns I wrote
in a Sunday journal over the previous year, intending them to be a
socio-political commentary of our times.
The chapter I am quoting from is titled; “Time to make our child
minds work” and it read “Remember when we were children. We fought. We
made up. We forgot. We forgave. We got up each morning to a new day. We
carried no baggage from the past. The child mind is amazing.
It is non-dogmatic, is caring, is immensely creative, is innocent and
most important of all, devoid of lasting hate and is full of love and
the capacity to love. When all else fails, what we need in times of
crisis ....is may be to appeal to our leaders to put their child minds
to work. Never mind the complex processes, strategies, plans and schemes
to outdo each other. What they now seem to need is a full dose of
innocent silent meditation to look inwards. Focus on the back to basics
of why they are there, to do what for whom”.
Sowing seeds of disunity
Seeing the Sunday newspapers and reflecting on the musing about a
‘common candidate’, driving deeper divisions between people who
contributed actively to end the reign of the brutal terrorists that were
the LTTE, in my mind, will only drive this nation towards more disunity
and further division.
It will certainly not help uplift the quality of life of our people,
bring the various races together to think as Sri Lankans or help regain
the lost glory of the nation, before it entered the dark age of conflict
and mistrust.
Although these are the stated objectives of most of those who claim
to serve us, their actions certainly do not heed what they have
preached, or have stated in their policy manifesto. This consistent
veering away from the promises will only bring us all more misery, undo
any good that has been done and further push the nation towards
disharmony and even chaos.
What we need now is to focus not on ‘what is good for me or for my
party, but on what is good for our country and her people’. Like it did
in 2004, when I wrote my column “Random Thoughts”, it pains me as
another caring citizen of this country, who does not have any political
party alliance, to observe that there is still no end to the pettiness
among and around us.
We are yet to see genuine concern from most of our leadership. What
we see, in my mind, are mostly opportunistic political manoeuvres by
politicians claiming to be leaders, craving to regain lost ground by
forming strange and uncharacteristic alliances or attempts at taking on
‘below the belt’ punches without having much credence to support them.
Never mind who did it first, but it is time to turn a new leaf.
Reason prevailed
It is true that we have a history of intrigue and betrayals dotting
our nation’s history and one can argue that it is unrealistic and
idealistic to expect it to be any other way.
But then, there are examples even in recent world history where the
tide has changed, to make rationality and good sense the victor.
I believe that a good majority of the American people chose to put
their child minds to work when they elected President Obama, to hold the
highest office in the land, defying all odds.
At this time in our history, when we ignore and disregard the
teachings of Gauthama the Buddha, Jesus Christ, Prophet Mohamed and
social activists the likes of Mahatma Ghandi or Nelson Mandela at our
own peril, this recent feat stands out to offer some hope for us and the
world at large.
Assert our will
What we need now to do as a nation is to put our own child minds to
work. We must dust off any cobwebs we have and take off the many colour
tinted glasses we wear and look at our own future with clear vision. We
must assert our own will and judge our ‘leadership’ on what they say,
have done and are doing for the good of the nation and sieve away those
who work with petty personal and partisan agenda.
The real issues we need to focus on are many. Upon the ending of the
reign of terror of nearly 30 years, there are the issues left of
re-establishing the rule of law, rebuilding trust among the different
racial communities seeking true unity within our diversity, ending
corruption, raising the living standards of the poor, ensuring an
equitable redistribution of development and regaining the nation’s lost
prestige and honour as being primary among these.
Hold accountable
The President as the head of state has made several significant
statements and provided policy guidance directed towards achieving most
of them, since taking office.
Undoubtedly, an excellent job was done on the war against the LTTE
with a singular focus on the objective of defeating terrorism,
maintaining a strong momentum in the allocation of resources to the
defence forces, delegation of authority in the management of operations
and maintaining morale through harnessing of popular support for the
effort.
Now that it is behind us, we need to believe that the other war on
rebuilding the nation as a unified entity, where all can live with
dignity and honour is being taken on with equal efficacy.
Our role as concerned and caring citizens should, I believe, is to
support and contribute to these efforts to the best of our ability, hold
those responsible for giving it leadership accountable at all stages of
the process, provide constructive and substantiated criticism and ensure
that the end objectives are achieved as intended.
This I believe, is a responsibility each of us have, to ensure that
our country moved ahead towards prosperity, no matter where we stood in
the system of our political alliances and/or creed based loyalties.
Rule of Law
Very rightly, several of our civil society leaders are making strong
and loud calls for the re-establishment of the Rule of Law, having a
true sensitivity towards the plight of other races in this country and
ending exploitation of the weak and corruption of all forms.
No one has the right to take the life of another or to take the law
unto their hands without due process being adhered to.
The recent gruesome incident on the shores of Bambalapitiya, where a
mentally deranged person was forced to drown and the reaction of most
among us, raises some very basic questions on where our nation’s
collective psyche is placed.
No looking the other way
It is time now for us, not to look the other way. As Mahatma Gandhi
once said “You must be the change you seek to see in the world”.
It is time for us all now perhaps, to put our child minds to work and
demand the same, from those who claim to be our leaders.
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