We are with the Leader of the Nation

In the year 1970, the young Mahinda Rajapaksa left the library of the Vidyodaya University and proceeded to the Beliatte Electorate election campaign with a retinue of friends from the Vidyodaya University who were with him at that time. The Vidyodaya friends who strengthened the political foundation laid by being elected the Peoples’ Representative for Beliatta is strengthening your hands today, as the objective of endowing the nation with a valiant Statesman has borne fruit by today.

Nature of politicians

Politicians of all colour and stripe could join you. And, they can also, leave you. That is the nature of politicians. But we, the Vidudaya - J’pura Scholars are always with you, not only because of the friendship and the confidence we had with you from the past, but also because of your service to the poor and downtrodden people of Sri Lanka, your unshakable leadership in developing the country, your dedication to defend the democracy of Sri Lanka from the machinations of Imperialist and Capitalist plotters and your actions to obtain honour to Sri Lanka within the International Community in the past for decades.

As it can be seen that various reactionary plotters, in the national and the international level, are building fortresses to disrupt your successful journey, the strength and the encouragement endowed to you in your efforts to the building of the country by nearly 100,000 Vidudaya Scholars representing various fields, has to be fortified.

You have a political vision created by you yourself and eminently suitable to this country. That vision is being successfully operated through ‘Mahinda Chinthana’ for the past four years.

As a result of this vision, a massive development program is operative throughout the Island, launching the country on a victorious journey economically. You got the ability to overcome the cruel atrocities of the LTTE that hindered the economic development of the country for 30 years and bring the whole of Sri Lanka under one flag because of your long term political experience.

The ‘Uthuru Wasanthaya’ program and the ‘Nagenahira Nawodaya’ program you have invited to the North and the East as a leader who is always seeking solutions to the National Question, has succeeded in invigorating the hearts and the minds living in those provinces and they are playing a major role in building accord among the nations and peace in the country.

Your ability in commanding and managing the war as the Commander-in-Chief was the direct result of your extensive political experience and today, you are facing the challenge of rescuing the country you have brought under one flag from Western influenced political plotters, nefarious dealers and those who depend on foreign currency notes. The Fascists, disguised as protectors of democracy, have launched the horrendous scheme of creating a military dictatorship using nationalistic slogans.

International Community

You have reached the level of a matured politician and a Statesman par excellence though your political activities during the past 40 years and you used the power the people bestowed upon you to render Sri Lanka a country with good reputation within the International Community. The ideas and impressions of the cruel terrorism that had swallowed the entire world you, as a person with a long history of putting your life on the line for fundamental rights and human rights, elaborated at various international fora representing Sri Lanka, have been much lauded by the world leaders and the world community.

When obtaining aid from the other countries of the world, to strengthen the development of your country, you exercised your statesmanship to the full, to obtain the said aid without any conditions affecting the territorial integrity of the country and understanding well that a poor country cannot be developed without foreign investment, provided facilities to foreign investment within the country, on very beneficial conditions to the country, because of your extensive political experience.

The economic relationships Sri Lanka built up with rich, small countries rather than capitalistic, developed countries were strengthened during the past four years keeping the goodwill of such developed, capitalist countries. The inborn ability you have to manage the agreements made with the world’s small countries with a socialist economic policy and the developed countries with capitalistic countries with a liberal economic policy is not to be seen in any other Statesman.

Through the “Gama Neguma” project included in the “Mahinda Chinthana” manifesto launched to develop the country at the national level, a massive re-awakening of the development of the villages can be clearly seen today and a great revolution in the road development of the country has been vested in the people through the “Maga Neguma” project.

Even though the benefits of the mega projects now under construction such as the Weeravila Air Port, the Hambantota Harbour, the Norochcholai Power Station and the Moragahakanda Reservoir have not yet reached the people, they know that they will be the beneficiaries of such mega projects in the near future. As the people of this country are having a correct political insight, in selecting a President for their country, they always decide on the pioneer of this development.

Unemployment

If you did not come to power, through the “Reawakening Sri Lanka” program launched by the former Government, matters such as handing over the country’s resources to foreigners, making the State sector idle and letting unemployment escalate within the country, presenting State-owned banks and insurance organizations to private individuals who were having shady dealings with the Government of the day, activating processes to let even the rich forests that protected the environment of the country come under the ownership of foreign interests, the programs that were being carried out to degrade the dignity on world heritage sites such as Sigiriya and the time table activated to make the country a drug users’ paradise, would have pushed the country to the abyss of destruction.

Your concept, “Country first”, has today become the concept of the people who love this country. The opposition has come forward against you, the leader who came from the village and who thinks from the angle of the country patriotically, joining with shady businessmen, political lackeys and betrayers, who are the agents of the capitalists of the world.

Your 40 year long political experience, acquired by being a Member of Parliament, Minister, Leader of the Opposition and Prime Minister and during the cruel years of being in the losing side, had caused to create a successful leader of the people and the political duel you are faced with today being one between an old hand and a novice to politics, has made it easier for the people to come to a decision about the leader they need.

The people have realized, even though it is oblivious to these political tyros, that your political acumen and Statesmanlike ability are not acquired by walking on a bed of roses, but by conquering harsh experiences and serving the people and it will take a new comer to politics at least half a century to acquire your political maturity.

We are with you and the people are protecting you, because, whenever the reactionary forces grabbed power in Sri Lanka, the development processes of the country and the people are shelved and the country gets turned into a place for the well-being of Capitalists and their agents.

Presidential Election

The coming Presidential Election and the composition of one party who had come forward to contest in the election is all the more terrifying because instead of the peaceful democracy that prevailed in the country up to now, the background is being prepared to establish a brutal military dictatorship hiding under a thin veil of so-called ‘democracy’. The only right the people living under a Capitalistic military dictatorship is the right to exist as slaves.

The militarists must remember that the people of this country enjoying peaceful democratic freedom for a long time are not prepared to let any one to establish a military regime in Sri Lanka, a form of Government long abhorred by the people of the world.

We are dedicating ourselves to protecting our President, who has dedicated his whole life to protecting the democratic freedom that has operated in this country up to now overcoming all the difficulties that stood in its way, because we remember the injustices meted out to the people of the world by military dictators such as ‘General” Idi Amin of Uganda, a cancer on the civilized world.

Dear President, instead of becoming a dictator or a sycophant, you became a real leader, because of the tempering you received during the time you spent in the shade of Vidyodaya Campus. During the last four years, you administrated the country taking the side of the poor and the down trodden, becoming an example to the other rulers in the world.

That fact, made you the champion of the poor and the down trodden of this country. We, the poor, intelligent children of the victory of 1956, are dedicated to ensuring your triumph, as there in not even a sign of another leader that can be entrusted with the country being born for thousands of coming years.

We, close to one hundred thousand Vidudaya - J’pura Scholars, dedicate ourselves to your victory, remaining like your shadow.

Nalin Mervin Fernando Vidyodaya J’-Pura Scholars’ Association