True national leader

Karunaratna Divulgane, North Central Province Governor

A tiny island with an unbroken history of two thousand five hundred years, which according to the celebrated Soviet writer, Chinhees Eithmathavil, looked like a drop of milk falling from the udder of India, came under total subjugation of a foreign power on March 2, 1815. The crown of Independence which Mother Lanka jealously guarded amidst a myriad of struggles finally fell off her head.

President Rajapaksa always had time for children and elders

Therefore, the motherland’s prime concern was nothing, but Independence. Some landmark struggles launched to regain this lost independence, among others were the famous rebellions of 1818 and 1848.

The Independence she gained on February 4, 1948 was the outcome of these struggles. The Independence we thus gained was a far cry from the broad Independence we aspired to win.

What the country yearned for was a true leadership conscious of the roots that had penetrated deep into the soil of Mother Lanka for 2500 years and loved them and wanted to strengthen them and plan the forward march to the future accordingly; a broad concept of a political, economical and cultural independence uniting all the forces available.

At the time when President Mahinda Rajapaksa assumed leadership, the aforesaid ‘drop of milk’ had unfortunately become the ‘drop of tear’ of Asia; the country had been pushed to the bottom of the list as one of the most unsuccessful countries in the world.

All and sundry who had a medium of patriotism in their hearts had been agitating for a leadership capable of liberating the country that had been devastated by terrorists; in short, when the people wanted a ‘king’ for them. The expectation of Ven Degaldoruwe Thera, when the country’s sorry state had reached its nadir, was also the same.

Oh! Ants
You have a king
We do not have
That is our Karma
If we get a king
We would eat Kavum and Kiribath
We would organize a perahera
And make great noises of Sadhu.

From this, what we really had expected was not to be content with making somebody a sheer feudal ruler.

What was expected was the advent of a genuine national leader. The happiness emerged once it was fulfilled was a sound of Sadhu. If any leader commands such a measure of happiness and contentment among the people, he is none other than President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The terrorism which brought untold hardships to all the people, Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim, across the country for thirty long years was, with the blessings of some local sections and foreign powers in a position of great strength and some elements asserted that they were militarily invincible.

Carried away with such support and comments they most inhumanely closed the Mavil Aru sluice letting a paddy cultivation of a tender age spanning over 36000 acres to die.

There was no racial distinction to tears that flowed following this brutal act of the terrorists. Probably they may have thought that the best way to spite the President Mahinda Rajapaksa was to deliver a blow on farmers for whom the President was very sensitive.