Harpoon ‘whales’

Editorial-May 8, 2015, 7:25 pm 

We thought Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera made a huge mistake when he, at a media briefing on Thursday, claimed that the Rajapaksas had stashed away in offshore accounts funds to the tune of USD 18 billion. We doubted his claim not because we believed that our rulers, both past and present, were paragons of virtue and would not line their pockets at the expense of the country; we thought the amount Samaraweera mentioned was too big to be true and it should be rupees and not dollars. But, he insisted that it was USD 18,000 million and converted it to Sri Lankan rupees to convince the media personnel.

Sri Lanka’s national income stands at about USD 75 bn and its external reserves amount to approximately USD 7 bn. All these decades it has borrowed, from various sources, funds to the tune of USD 24 bn. With the aforesaid USD 18 bn most of the country’s foreign debt could be paid back overnight.

The UNP-led UNF government (2001-2004) strove to obtain foreign loans to the tune of USD 4.5 billion from the so-called Tokyo Co-chairs of Sri Lanka’s peace process and even chose to appease the LTTE for that purpose at their behest. It never got the money and its appeasement policy as well as its controversial Regain Sri Lanka programme led to its downfall. The rest is history.

The government should be maniacally focused on tracing the stolen funds and bring those responsible for the grand robbery to justice without expending its time and energy on hunting for others who have committed lesser offences; fingerlings can be dealt with later. It is the corrupt whales flapping their tails freely in the ocean of black money that need to be harpooned and brought ashore first of all. In fact, that is one of the solemn promises the new government made to the people.

The Rajapaksas continue to trouble the current administration and some ruling party politicians have accused them of trying to scuttle the government’s pro-people programmes. Hardly a day passes without some ruling party bigwig taking a swipe at the ousted ruling family obviously in a bid to keep them at bay.

Yesterday’s pro-Mahinda rally in Kurunegala was a huge success with 54 UPFA MPs attending it in the wake of Sirisena-Mahinda parley which ended inconclusively. It is a worrisome proposition for the government with a general election on the horizon. All signs are that the SLFP will suffer a debilitating split down the middle with a breakaway group backing former President Rajapaksa.

All that the government has to do to take the Rajapaksas off its back and romp home at the next parliamentary polls is to trace the funds they are alleged to have deposited in foreign accounts. If that can be done, President Sirisena will be free from trouble for the rest of his tenure and the UNP can rest assured that it will be able to rule this country as long as it likes, undisturbed. For, besides legal action against its bêtes noires for amassing ill-gotten wealth the government will be able to enhance Samurdhi, Mahapola benefits manifold, develop free education and free health care as never before and subsidise essential commodities without worrying about foreign aid.

The government says it has the US, the EU and India on its side and together they should be able to help find the stolen funds in foreign banks.

So, the government must drop everything and go at full tilt to trace and recover USD 18 bn. Let no excuses be trotted out. All hands on dock!