POLITICS-SRI LANKA: Media Takes Government To Task

By Feizal Samath Reprint | | Print |

Feizal Samath

COLOMBO, Nov 19 1997 (IPS) - Check out Sri Lanka’s independent dailies, TV and radio stations, and things couldn’t appear worse for the government.

Dominating the news is the mounting death toll in the unending civil war and the snails pace at which efforts to negotiate peace by the ruling People’s Alliance (PA) government are progressing.

The media thinks President Chandrika Kumaratunga might be in more trouble than she realises as her government completes three years in power later this month.

Political analysts are optimistic though. An expert at a Colombo-based think tank pointed out that the government was far ahead in popularity ratings of the opposition United National Party (UNP) which has done nothing to mend its image since the drubbing in the 1994 polls which ended its 17 year rule.

“As long as the UNP remains weak and leaderless, the PA will remain the only option left for the people,” the expert says.

President Chandrika Kumaratunga would like the media to highlight her government’s achievements. But only the island’s state-run press plays up the “good news”, like the air force’s sinking a rebel arms ship and the big trade fair, ‘Expo 97’ in the capital, that is attracting thousands of foreign visitors.

A peeved president even read out a report filed by a leading international news agency as an example of how the press is “biased and one-sided” in its coverage of the war, at a recent press conference.

Kumaratunga wondered if the media had “too much freedom” under her government when compared to the often heavy-handed ways of the previous regime which controlled information, sometimes by terrorising journalists.

Sri Lanka’s independent press are agitated by the manner in which the government is handling sensitive issues like internal security. Among them there is little disagreement that the government would last if it were to build up public confidence.

The public mood has been shaky since last month’s massive explosion in Colombo. Tamil rebels infiltrated the business centre and set off an explosives-laden truck, killing people.

The media has been critical of the manner in which the investigations into the bombing were conducted. One cynical editor said security officers again rushed to launch “the usual top-level security report to find out what went wrong … and its recommendations end in the WPB (waste-paper basket)”.

A few heads rolled, that of some low-ranking police officers, and the Trade Centre probe apparently ended there, though Kumaratunga was quick to say that the government’s emergency services responded fast to the attack.

Government ministers and officials have gone on record saying that rebel attacks were inevitable, and that there were much more attacks in the city under the previous government.

This, analysts point out, is the problem with politicians. “What the government does not realise is that the people need security. The public is not interested in excuses and what happened before the government was in power,” an analyst said. Last Friday, the Tigers struck again, exploding a few bombs at a key power station just outside the city.

The Defence Ministry in its first statement on the early- morning incident spoke of an accidental fire at the power station, but said that vehicles entering the city were being searched and some roads were sealed off.

By that time news agencies and local radio and television stations were running stories of a rebel attack. It was only by evening and 10 hours after the incident, that the ministry referred to a “small band of terrorists” setting off bombs adding that the damage to the plant was minimal.

The independent ‘Sunday Times’ newspaper said their investigations revealed that the sentries were sleeping at the Kelanitissa power station, the country’s main thermal power station, when the intruders struck and had they come with bigger bombs, the consequences would have been catastrophic.

“As usual a committee would probably be appointed and we are now familiar with what happens to such reports. We will be told how many kilos the explosives were, from where they came and how they came. But we will not be told who is accountable for the security lapse,” the newspaper commented.

“It is accountability that forms the core of the country’s conscience and we may be fearfully close to losing ours,” the Sunday Times said in a hard-hitting editorial.

But President Kumaratunga is preoccupied with efforts to push through her government’s constitutional reforms package, which could be a major step forward in ending the 14 year war in the island’s north and east.

The government hopes the promised greater autonomy to the regions, including the north-east which are claimed by the Tamil militants as a separate homeland, would help resolve the ethnic conflict that has divided Sri Lanka.

The opposition could block the package in Parliament. But government ministers have said they would take the package to the people in a referendum.

Half-way into her six year term, President Kumaratunga is still on top. But she is shaky there, say the independent media.