Our Strategy For The Future Is To Make Sure That There Is A Future 

By Lacille de Silva -AUGUST 6, 2018

Lacille de Silva

What should we expect from a different type of leadership in a country totally devastated by corrupt politicos? We now need to elect a group of people, who honour principles of public sector governance such as transparency, accountability, integrity, efficiency, effectiveness etc., which had been conspicuously overlooked by successive governments to-date. Nelson Mandela, Noble Laureate and former President of South Africa had said – “A political leader must be honest to himself” to run governance. Politicians who have ruled this country for the last several decades did not “walk the talk”.  

During the first half of the twentieth century, Europe had been the most turbulent region in the whole world.  It was then trembled by war, economic crisis, and social and political conflict. What changed? Social democrats were people who have changed all that having chosen ballots over the bullets. They had realized that appeals to the “people”, the “community” and the common good were much superior. It was however only in Scandinavia, and in Sweden in particular, that a new party had embraced the newest approach wholeheartedly, at the very outset.

Swedish Socialist Democratic Party (SDP) had immediately initiated developing comprehensive economic programmes to harness the powers of the Swedish polity. During the 1932 election campaign, they had declared, I quote – “Humanity carries its destiny in its own hands….Where the bourgeoisie preach laxity and submission to ..fate, we appeal to people’s desire for creativity…. conscious that we both can and will succeed in shaping a social system in which the fruits of labour will go to the benefit of those who are willing to… participate in the common task”.  

The late Mr. Per Albin Hansson, the then Leader of SDP in Sweden, had popularized his theme “folkhemmet” or “people’s home”. He had prophesized and declared the theory – “the basis of the home is community and togetherness” and had also stressed that social democracy strove to “break down the barriers that ….separate citizens”. SDP had been a community of people who  have come together to ensure freedom and justice, to preserve them and live up to them. These policies had subsequently helped Swedish people to reap excellent political rewards from the unprecedented economic recovery that had eventually occurred. 

Our core belief too is that power democratically acquired should be directed to strengthen economic forces in the service of the collective good. We are committed to establish a political culture which is empathetic, clean, unstrained, and people-friendly. Nobel Prize-winning Economist Amartya Sen, whose work greatly influenced the conceptualization of human development, argues that development goals need to improve people’s ‘capabilities’ – their ability to act and reach their full human potential.  Human development therefore requires attention to both development processes and outcomes, towards the overall aim of human well-being.

The men who founded the United States of America, namely, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton were also considered to be the best educated, most considerate and thoughtful people at the time. They had justified their intent to take up arms and had added that they could never have effectively defended their rights and established a democracy with institutions that uphold the rule of law and shared values, unless they had fought the war.

People in this country have always been fooled by the rulers. Mostly, youth too had felt frustrated due to limited opportunities to advance economically, lack of employment prospects and to participate in political and social spheres. The rulers have thereby committed dreadful mistakes having paved the way for chaos and a total waste of public funds. Graft in public offices is therefore rife even after a massive anti-corruption campaign launched by the Yahapalana regime, which no doubt was largely rhetorical. 

Sri Lanka therefore is in a pitiful state in regard to all affairs. They have closed down nearly 1500 schools in numerous villages all over the Island. Ministry of Education, has divided all schools in to five categories based on their level of difficulty in terms of facilities and accessibility. According to this categorization, it is sad 49 percent of the schools fall in to the category of difficult or very difficult categories in the Island.  

Read More