Liquor Permit List Released Without Key Details
SJB Continues to Harbor Alleged Conspirators
Ravi K Outsmarts RW in Strategic Maneuvers
Academic backed Govt. Now Criticizes Inexperience
The South Disturbed by the North
It has been 15 years since the LTTE was defeated militarily in 2009. Although the North has been celebrating its war dead for the past 15 years, this year’s commemoration ceremonies have become very controversial. This time, the people of the North were allowed to celebrate their dead relatives freely. Although in the past, security forces have obstructed the celebration of these war dead, this time there was no interference from the security forces.
Despite the situation in the North, a completely different situation was seen in the South. Especially in the South, photos of the way the heroes are being celebrated in the North were continuously published on social media networks. Videos were published. With the huge publicity received on social media, the security forces, who were monitoring the matter, took steps to inform the President. In particular, while providing a special report to the President, the security forces had stated that a propaganda project has been launched on certain social media networks to provoke the people of the South and that some were even advertising the heroes’ celebrations of previous years and even the heroes’ celebrations held in foreign countries as the heroes’ celebrations taking place this time.
Although the President did not pay much attention to this matter at first, at one point the security forces informed the President that certain groups were organizing and displaying fake photos in a manner that incited racism and that it was a very sensitive issue and that immediately action should be taken against it. Accordingly, the decision was made to strictly enforce the law against those who are spreading false propaganda that incites racism and to take action under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which can be easily implemented. Accordingly, four people were arrested by the security forces and a court case was filed against social media activist Kelum Jayasumana, who was presented to court under the Prevention of Terrorism Act.
Nirmal’s protest
The next crisis in the South arose with the arrests under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. This is because the previous governments had raised a huge voice against it when they suppressed opponents under the Prevention of Terrorism Act and launched a massive propaganda campaign demanding the abolishment of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which was led by the JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake. Accordingly, the opposition raised a strong protest within the society, saying that the government had started behaving in an anti-democratic manner, recalling the relevant incidents.
This protest in the South has gone so far that even Colombo University Professor Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri, who is known as a Compass supporter, took the initiative to post a special post on his Facebook page regarding it. Nirmal, who had once expressed anti-JVP views, was someone who did a great job in helping the ‘Compass’ ideology win in the last presidential election as well as the general election. Accordingly, when there was a huge protest on social media against the use of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, Nirmal Ranjith while posting a special post on his Facebook page, said, ‘If a government with such popularity is unable to face the spread of false information without suppression machinery, it is a huge political defeat…’
Regardless of the reaction outside, this serious political warning issued by someone of the calibre of Nirmal Ranjith, who was a great strength to the ‘compass’ to come out with some mature political ideas, was like a turning point. That is, the government realized that this opposition had even reached the compass itself. The result was that the government was pushed to the point of thinking twice about using the Prevention of Terrorism Act in making arrests. Also, when a suspect arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act was presented to the court, Judge Thilina Gamage granted him bail and made a special statement. That was, saying that the police did not have the power to make arrests based on the facts in their minds.
In addition, with the arrest of suspects under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, a great deal of international pressure was seen on the government, as the United States and the European Commission took steps to express their concerns to the government in this regard.
Against this backdrop, a serious round of discussions was held within the government on this issue. At that time, even the President was of the firm stand that strict action should be taken against all those who incite racism and religious fanaticism. However, it was also stated that there would be a problem with using the Prevention of Terrorism Act for this. Accordingly, sources say that orders have been issued to the relevant parties not to use the Prevention of Terrorism Act when taking action against those who incite racism but to act under other laws of the country.
Afterwards, a special exchange of views took place on how to control racism. Some parties said that some groups were behind the incitement of racism this time and had also incited racism in the past. It was also said that Parliament should be given more weight in dealing with racism and also said that since almost all the opposition party leaders, except for two or three, are against racism and religious fanaticism, and that they should first discuss this issue with them. Furthermore it also said that it could be decided whether to bring new laws against it, implement existing laws, or appoint a special select committee to discuss it.
A special party leaders’ meeting was held in Parliament on Thursday (05) evening to discuss this issue. Accordingly, during the inaugural session of Parliament held last Tuesday, Prime Minister Harini Amarasuriya, Justice Minister Harshana Nanayakkara, and Leader of the House Bimal Ratnayake made several special statements against racism. The Justice Minister made a special request in his speech and also invited the opposition to join in working against racism and religious bigotry.
Allegation of inexperience
However, the leaders of the ‘Compass’ felt that in addition to the Prevention of Terrorism Act, the next serious issue noted in the Facebook post by Nirmal Ranjith was that there was a lack of experience within the government. Even before Nirmal Ranjith said this, this lack of experience in the government had been a topic of discussion in some places within the country for the past few weeks.
Accordingly, special attention was paid to this topic of inexperience in a discussion held within the government. There, the ‘Compass’ leaders discussed how to prevent this allegation from targeting the government and how to deal with it. Especially if the allegation of lack of experience goes to the village level, the grassroots level, it will face a serious crisis in maintaining the government, so everyone thought that it should be broken first. During the lengthy exchange of views, one of the main points they identified was that the main place to answer this accusation of lack of experience was Parliament.
On the other hand, the Compass leaders had received information that the SJB was planning to embarrass the government by asking questions on the very day the parliament was opened, to show the country that the government was immature. Special attention was also paid to this during this discussion. Accordingly, the Compass leaders prepared a plan to deal with this situation from the beginning of the parliament until the end of the day.
Bimal, Nalinda and Handunnetti, who have parliamentary experience, were given a heavy responsibility. There, they specifically discussed how to answer and intervene in the questions that were deliberately asked in parliament to cause embarrassment. For example, if the opposition asked questions peacefully, they planned to answer them peacefully, and if the opposition asked questions impulsively, they planned to give impulsive answers. It was also advised that if the opposition tries to return Parliament to its old state, it should remember the mandate given by the people and take steps to resolve the situation, saying that the people have sent a message not to turn Parliament into a shambles.
Ranil plays a different game
While the government was making plans to confront the opposition in this way, the opposition did not see any such planned program being launched. The opposition was quite depressed due to the defeats in the presidential and general elections. However, with the defeat, one of the things that was said by both the SJB and the UNP was that in order to win the elections, these two parties should unite. Several SJB stalwarts took steps to bring this view within the party and discuss it.
They also discussed it with UNP leaders in Colombo temples. During those discussions, not only Ranil but also Ranil’s fraction issued statements to the media saying that Ranil would not return to parliament. That he would not contest the elections. It was also said that Ranil was ready to step down from the party leadership.
But this time, for the first time, through the ‘Inside politics’ column, we are ready to reveal an extraordinary secret that no one knows about this. Ranil never wanted to unite the UNP and the SJB. Ranil’s only desire is to defeat Sajith and destroy the SJB by any means possible. Ranil has been involved in that conspiracy since then. Even if a situation arose at a certain point in the 2019 presidential election that Sajith could win, Ranil took steps to defeat Sajith through Ranil’s statement that he would be the Prime Minister of that government if Sajith won.
Ranil contested this presidential election knowing full well that he would be defeated by preventing the UNP votes that would go to Sajith and defeat Sajith. But the sad thing is that a few small-minded political puppets who do not understand Ranil’s conspiracy to destroy the SJB are still in the SJB and are seen running after Ranil. This time, the people voted for the SJB not to run after Ranil, but to force the SJB to form a party that can stand up and form a government. Many believe that until that political compulsion is understood, the SJB will have no political path beyond this point.
On the other hand, same political cronies pulled Sajith out of the UNP by saying no to Ranil and moving forward without Ranil. It turned out to be a more correct decision because the UNP led by Ranil was unable to win even a single seat in the 2020 general election. Although the cylinder won 3 seats in this general election, none of those who won were UNP members, but MPs from other parties. Despite this, some of the others in the SJB are still trying to take the SJB and put it in the UNP’s lap.
However, this time, what we are preparing to reveal through the ‘inside politics’ column is a conspiracy that targeted the UNP General Conference held in Sugathadasa when Ranil was the President. Palitha Range Bandara was the UNP General Secretary at that time. But because he knew a lot about Ranil’s conspiracies, Range had struck a political dispute with Ranil. Under such a background, Ranil could not amend the constitution as he wanted at the UNP general convention, so Ranil removed Range from the party’s work. Instead of giving the organization of the party convention to General Secretary Range, Ranil removed it from Range and handed it over to Harin Fernando.
Since Harin generally does not have much knowledge about party work, Ranil secretly included two extremely dangerous clauses in the UNP constitution for approval at the party convention. The first clause is the proposal that Ranil Wickremesinghe should be given the leadership of the UNP for another 6 years. That is, the proposal was to give Ranil the leadership of the UNP until 2030. Ranil is currently 76 years old, and by 2030 he will be 82 years old.
Article Two
The second proposal stated that all positions other than the party leadership would be abolished by December 31. The proposal also stated that Ranil had been given the power to appoint new members to those positions. Accordingly, Ranil is currently preparing to appoint his closest friends to the top positions in the party after the 31st and even deprive several of the current ones of their positions.
However, it can be seen that a large opinion is currently being formed within the UNP that Ranil should step down from the party leadership, hand over the UNP to Sajith and merge both parties. Mr. Akila Viraj Kariyawasam, who is a close friend of Ranil and the UNP Deputy Leader, is also currently in the same position. Mr. Ashu Marasinghe, who was a senior advisor to Ranil, is also of the same opinion.
Recently, former Governor Naveen Dissanayake also met the Malwathu and Asgiri Mahanayakes and informed them that these two parties should unite. However, Ranil has no interest in uniting the UNP and the SJB. With the power to fill UNP positions after the upcoming 31st, Ranil is preparing to give top positions in the party to his close friend Sagala Ratnayake and his cousin Ruwan Wijewardene. Ranil thinks that even if there are only three in the UNP, Sagala and Ruwan, it is enough.
Ravi is the gamer
However, even though many people called Ranil a ‘gamer’ based on such issues, Ranil was defeated by the game of UNP Deputy Leader Ravi Karunanayake this time. By now, Ravi is considered the only man who turned his party symbol ‘Hansaya’ into a ‘cylinder’ entered parliament from the national list and played a game with Ranil. Here, Ranil initially thought of appointing Sagala and Ruwan to the two national lists belonging to the cylinder. However, with Ravi showing Ranil the hook and entering parliament from the national list, Ranil is now preparing to enter parliament from the national list himself, regardless of Sagala and Ruwan. This was confirmed by the fact that by last week, various groups had started pressuring the seniors of the cylinder to give him a national list position.
SJB Contract
However, we have previously pointed out on several occasions in the ‘inside politics’ column that Harsha, Kabir and Iran inside SJB had launched a major operation to somehow bring SJB closer to Ranil. Also, Kabir and Harsha had taken steps to praise Ranil, saying that Ranil’s economic policy was good. The two of them are dealing very closely with Ranil. In particular, we once revealed that Harsha was acting as the Chairman of the Finance Committee during the previous government and was following a policy friendly to Ranil. We also said that Harsha had invited Ranil, who had never served as the Finance Minister, to the initial discussion of the Finance Committee, breaking tradition. We also pointed out how Harsha had once tried to silence Sajith when he came to the Finance Committee as the Leader of the Opposition.
Our report said there that Kabir worked closely with Ranil in this way with the aim of acquiring 10 acres of land in Hanthan. Ranil also tried to get Kabir into the government by showing him the land, but when Kabir finally refused to join the government, Ranil got representatives from the compass to leak the relevant letter to the media and humiliate SJB. Accordingly, by now, the SJB representatives have serious doubts as to whether Harsha and Kabir are preparing to revolt within the SJB once again according to Ranil’s wishes.
This was most confirmed based on two special events that occurred last week. One of these events was the publication on the website of Ranil’s uncle’s newspaper, Lankadeepa, of news that the cylinder was preparing to propose Harsha to be appointed as the chairman of the Finance Committee again. The SJB is ready to give the chairmanship of the Finance Committee to Harsha. However, Ranil published a story like this on his uncle’s website deliberately to create a conflict within the SJB.
The second news was that the party had decided to appoint Anuradha Jayaratne as the leader of the Cylinder party. However, Ranil does not have any power within the Cylinder party to make such an appointment. The power lies with Ravi Karunanayake, who is the leader of the Cylinder. Parliament has already accepted Ravi Karunanayake as the leader of the Cylinder Party. This is further confirmed by the fact that Ravi has been invited to the party leaders’ meeting in Parliament as a representative of the Cylinder.
The main opposition, the SJB, has also accepted Ravi as the leader of the Cylinder party. Accordingly, with the publication of the relevant news on Ranil’s uncle’s website, the Cylinder party issued a special statement, which stated that the party had not taken any decision to appoint Anuradha Jayaratne as the leader of the Cylinder and the party was not prepared to submit any proposal to nominate Harsha as the chairman of the Finance Committee.
With the release of this announcement from the Cylinder side, sources have said that people like Harsha de Silva in the SJB have received a message to create problems by opposing the acceptance of Ravi as the Cylinder group leader. It is also said that these people have received a contract from Ranil’s side to launch a serious attack against the SJB’s proposal to appoint Ravi to parliamentary committees.
Sajith-Ravi now friends
However, a special event that was never seen before was witnessed during the last parliamentary week. That was at the Parliament Canteen. Although Sajith’s face was never seen in the Parliament Canteen before, last week Sajith was seen going to the Parliament Canteen for the first time and chatting amicably with the MPs representing the opposition. Also, the next special event that surprised everyone was seen there, when Ravi Karunanayake, who had openly fought with Sajith since his time in the UNP, was seen sitting at the table where Sajith was sitting and chatting amicably with him. Everyone could see Sajith smiling and chatting in a very friendly manner.
The veteran gave the tip
During this discussion, Ravi requested Sajith to accept him as a party leader and appoint him as the opposition member to the parliamentary committees. Ravi had informed Sajith that he was ready to act as the chairman of the finance committee, especially since he had served as a former finance minister. However, Sajith informed Ravi that Ravi was also suitable for the position, but the party had already decided to nominate Harsha for it. However, Sajith had informed Ravi that he could consider proposing Ravi’s name as a member of the finance committee.
In this way, after the Sajith-Ravi discussion ended, Mujibur Rahman arrived there. After Mujibur Ravi had watched the two talk for a long time, he said to Sajith, ‘That’s the way the leader does politics. There is no point in the old grudges. We in the opposition must all come together and work to take this fight forward…’ he said.
However, the tip that Sajith and Ravi met and discussed in the parliament complex was immediately whispered to Ranil by a contractor inside the SJB. We are reporting it in the ‘inside politics’ column with great responsibility. Ranil, who became even more agitated after this economic ‘osthar’ gave this tip to Ranil, immediately turned to the economic ‘osthar’ and told him to grab several other MPs and build a big opposition against Ravi within the SJB. The economic ‘osthar’ was also instructed to build this opposition in such a way that Ravi could not participate in any committee of the opposition.
As per the instructions given by Ranil, it was seen that the Economic Osthar and several other MPs had started the process of sabotaging the opposition’s unity operation last week. Sajith had also received a tip-off from within the SJB regarding this. Accordingly, Sajith invited all the opposition party leaders, including Ravi, to come for a special discussion before Ranil’s game began. It was also noteworthy that all the opposition representatives, including Ravi, Namal, Hakeem, Digambaram, participated in it.
‘Mawrata’ wins bar permit battle
The ‘Mawrata’ newspaper was the first to reveal to the country that during the government of former President Ranil Wickremesinghe, opposition MPs were given large-scale concessions as bribes by the government. We said there that Ranil was once prepared to give ministerial posts to a large number of SJB MPs. Harin Fernando, Manusha Nanayakkara, and Vadivel Suresh fell for Ranil’s ministerial tricks and joined Ranil’s government. We then revealed that Ranil had taken steps to give liquor licenses to opposition MPs as bribes .
Ranil had taken steps to give two or three liquor licenses not only to opposition MPs but also to government MPs. We strongly emphasized that steps should be taken to immediately reveal to the country the list of names of the ruling party and opposition MPs who had obtained Ranil’s liquor licenses. After our revelation, the then Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa and the opposition MP Anura Kumara Dissanayake publicly stated that as soon as they came to power, they would reveal to the country the list of names of MPs who had obtained liquor licenses from Ranil. Not only that, they would also take steps to revoke those liquor licenses. In addition, we reported at the time in the ‘Inside Politics’ column that an opposition MP had gone to Nuwara Eliya with his family and met Ranil and even granted a special license to a businessman to manufacture liquor.
However, even after a month of Anura being elected as the President, the list of names of MPs who had obtained liquor licenses from Ranil has not been seen coming out. Accordingly, we took steps to report the news in the ‘Mawrata’ newspaper, reminding us of this from time to time. Accordingly, the battle we waged was won last week. That was when the government presented the list of names of those who had obtained liquor licenses from Ranil to Parliament. According to that list of names, Ranil had taken steps to issue 361 liquor licenses within the 330 days that had passed since January 1st of this year. However, the names of party and opposition politicians were not mentioned in that list of names, instead, only the names of the person or institution that had obtained the relevant license were given.
Where are the MPs?
Accordingly, last week, the opposition once again informed the government to immediately disclose the names of the individuals who applied for these liquor licenses and the list of politicians who submitted recommendation letters for them for the information of the people of the country. However, the government has not yet responded properly. Accordingly, we say that the government should also disclose the list of names of the MPs involved in this to the country for the people’s information.
In addition, Ranil carried out another program to win over opposition MPs to the government during Ranil’s government. That was by providing the government’s decentralized funds worth crores only to selected opposition MPs. At that time, we had emphasized that the list of MPs who received that money from Ranil should also be disclosed. However, it does not appear that the government is yet to disclose that list to the country. Accordingly, this time, we are saying through the ‘inside politics’ column that the government should reveal to the country, for the people of the country, the list of names of the MPs who were in the opposition at the time, who made deals with Ranil and received crores of rupees of government decentralized funds.
