-By Virgil
(Lanka-e-News -31.July.2024, 9.35 pm) “If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.” ~Lao Tzu
It is dull in the wee hours of the morning. The delight of the morning rays penetrating the foggy landscape presents a picturesque backdrop, enchanting the early risers to an unspoiled ecstasy; the dew under the roughened feet sends tremors creating faint shivers to the shoulders. Unlike in the parched arid zones, this hill country village is surrounded by hillocks and mountains that stand like sentries jealously guarding the secrets and inherently idiosyncratic lives of the inhabitants.
Previous night's cold was not kind; its all-encompassing shades of keeping the members of the family, the parents and the two children of school going ages together, huddled up in one corner of the room's solitary bed had a unifying effect; their scrimpy dinner that comprised of a roti, a round flatbread made from a mixture of wheat flour and coconut with chili chutney was, in fact, a feast for a third meal for the family. Famine yet unbeknownst to the humble pedigree of men and women in this ramshackle house does seem to be making its unannounced visit. And it is not a welcome one in any time of one's life.
Life's problems, in general, do not offer any quick fixes. Those who seek such quick fixes invariably find themselves lost half way; their false hopes would come crashing down; their children's education is in danger of being halted long before they reach eighth standard. That would be an unspeakable misfortune; its dimensions would have to be measured in lives lost of members of the same family. Sri Lanka has not yet reached that horrible plateau of indifference and drab apathy to neighbors' emaciated bodies on display at street corners for lack of food, but given the direction we're heading, we might be fast approaching that unkind spectacle.
In such a cruel circumstance, when the entire nation is being engulfed by ridiculous mud-slinging on the part of the political leaders, where can the defenseless masses look to; where could they go? Hope and change as a mere slogan throws out a plethora of imaginative possibilities. But that enchanted circle of dreaming has to come to an end, not tomorrow, not the day after, it has to stop today, now. It is rather painless and uncomplicated to lash out a given set of slogans which have been the design and architecture of advertising companies. Those designers are paid to create such magical stanzas. But elections are run on ground by men and women of flesh and blood. They live and breathe every second the same air which is the common property of a collective community.
The National People's Power (NPP) has been clamoring for the last couple of years, asking the people to get ready for a change of system. They have been pleading with them that only a total system change can produce a new, fresh and clean and crisp system; a system that could withstand the soiled winds and gushing dirty waters. Whether the people in turn would oblige is yet to be seen.
What the NPP must realize is not only that the people may have been hesitant at the beginning of the asking process, but has it dawned upon them that the change they have been promulgating about must first visit them; a change that they expect the masses to embrace must not be alien to the hardcore of their party; what is preached must be as amenable to them as it could be for the masses. 'Healer heal thyself' theory should apply to the NPP, its leadership and its rank and file. When the masses begin to see the original signs of such change is more than welcome by the party leadership, the people in turn would reaffirm their faith in the party and its leadership. They cannot leave any room for speculation and doubt.
Change that the NPP is asking the people to vote for must be an integral part of them. They must embrace that change that they're asking the people to do so. They must not take it for granted that the people at large would automatically vote for them just because their message and messaging sound thoughtful and right. The doubters who question the NPP/JVP's past must be addressed and a tangible change has taken place not only in their rhetoric and platform pontification, but a fundamental change as from the violence-oriented past which reminds the people of the '71 insurrection and '87-'89 killings.
Can the NPP do that? Can it afford to risk the unpleasantness of the old JVP and state that they are deeply sorry for their past? If not, albeit the current conditions in the country might give them a legitimate chance, but ensuring the conversion from other parties to the NPP is rather a difficult thing to do.
It is a tall order. Winning an election is a tall order. The opposition to the NPP is not emerging from only one source. Multiple founts are operating simultaneously to bury the NPP. But that collective opposition has not yet found a clear and an undiluted central message. Nor has it found a credible messenger. While bragging about vast experience in running the affairs of the country with vastly experienced man and women, there isn't a single man or woman at leadership level to counter Anura Kumara Dissanayake, neither in parliament nor on the public platform.
Change and its awesome promise are challenging the whole country. If any man or woman would try to minimize the magnitude of the coming change, they would be found lacking in sound judgment for it's advent is inevitable. Instead of blaming the NPP and AKD for provoking such a monumental phenomenon like an NPP-led Presidency and rise of a Thambuththegama Central School old boy to the ultimate seat of power in the country is indeed a badge of honor for all citizenry of Sri Lanka. Unlike some other political leader who tried to rewrite his own history because he felt ashamed of his beginnings, AKD has laid out in the open his past, present and the future that he is promising the countrymen. To abort the old and create a totally new societal development could be achieved only by those who challenge what is staring in his face. AKD knows that. Such men are rare.
The writer can be contacted at [email protected]
Virgil's Collection
https://www.lankaenews.com/category/21
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by (2024-07-31 16:06:43)
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