Rathana Thera comes forward to protect gold thief

Mar 05, 2017

Ven. Athuraliye Rathana Thera yesterday (04) expressed views before the media against the imprisonment of the Navy officer Mapa Bandara, who stands accused of having abducted a Tamil businessman, stolen 48 gold sovereigns and Rs. 600,000 in cash from his possession before making him to disappear. It is questionable as to how the Thera could describe, even in accordance with the Five Precepts, taking legal action against a thief by calling him a war hero.

The CID had delayed the arrest and producing the suspect before courts and he was taken into custody only due to the intervention of the Colombo magistrate. At the previous hearing, the magistrate severely reprimanded the CID and ordered its senior DIG to make an explanation to courts if the arrest was not made. It was only after that Lt. Commander Mapa Bandara was arrested. His arrest had until then been prevented by Navy chief Ravi Wijegunawardena and his predecessor Wasantha Karannagoda, the media has revealed.

 

The Navy is facing accusations of abduction, theft, extortion and enforced disappearance of persons in the past. All these crimes and criminals are hiding behind the veil ‘war hero.’ Those who seek to protect them too, put forward the popular explanation that the morale of the war heroes will be affected. Hidden behind that is nothing but racism. Rathana Thera tries to protect thieves and killers and to provoke racism.

 

We do not know if the doors are kept open at Rathana Thera’s temple for any uniformed thief to come and take away the caskets of relics. Even if he does that, a country cannot look the other way while military men commit robberies and murders. If all are equal before the law, military men cannot be an exception. It should be identified that Rathana Thera or any other power that raises a voice against corruption and fraud in parliament while come out in the open to protect thieves and killers serve the law of the jungle only.