Abductions, killings and robbery have become regular incidents in Sri Lanka. The telltale symptoms of a broken down rule of law and a system that has failed to address it. The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has issued several statements in the past expressing its concern over the widening gap between the fact and fiction in Sri Lanka.
The fact is that there is no semblance of rule of law in Sri Lanka whereas the fiction of governance is projected. Rule of law has broken down to such a state that people look at their law enforcement agencies with suspicion. The fear of suspicion has crept into every facets of human life. No body is certain of anything. This is reflective in the day-to-day human conduct. A capital city that gets deserted by early in the evening is nothing but a visible symptom of enormous fear that has engrossed the society.
The recent abduction of the Sri Lankan Red Cross workers and the recovery of their bodies with gun shot wounds is the latest in the series of incidents that has fortified peoples’ fear. The very fact that often the law enforcement agencies itself are being blamed or suspected for such gruesome incidents shows the extent to which the system has broken down. As of today, even police officers are not immune from fear of abduction and insecurity.
A policing system that is corrupt to the core and a judiciary which has made a mockery of justice alienated the people from their administrators. What Sri Lanka is witnessing today is the collapse of the centre, a wilt within the core. Justice institutions within the country have become non-functional as far as an ordinary person is concerned. Even professional communities like the lawyers have succumbed to this fall.
A government that cannot address these problems do not have a right to claim that they are in power. What was reflected time and again from various sources within the government in the past few years is the utter unwillingness and helplessness of the government to deal with the breakdown of rule of law in the country. Every imaginable pivot of administration and governance was let to be manipulated for personal and short-term gains and the imbalance within the system has reached a level that it cannot be set straight anymore.
In circumstances of complete chaos arising out of the absence of rule of law often the people look to the centre – government – to reinstate law and order. The life in the capital city is what the people in such circumstances look up to witness the presence of relative safety. However, in Sri Lanka life in the capital itself has become dangerous. Abductions in Colombo have become so regular that people have started referring to abductions in casual conversations as a hazard that they have to live with like their police.
Abduction is a crime that requires meticulous planning and execution. It often requires the involvement of more than one person and plans to meet contingencies. This is because crimes of such nature are hard to be kept hidden and is difficult to avoid prosecution. The ease with which such crimes of serious nature is committed in Sri Lanka indicates the there is nothing much to be concerned about for the perpetrators and that crimes of such nature does not anymore require any planning.
Indeed what is reflected in Sri Lanka today is the result of the absence of sensible planning and execution of ways and means to address the downfall of a justice system. What was done instead was trying to cover holes of imperfection and ineptitude with darkens of lies and deception of varying nature. Lies and deceptions practiced at the highest order to satisfy the greed of a few persons. This is not however what the people in Sri Lankan deserve. They deserve an honest administration that is willing to bring back sanity to the day-to-day affairs of life that is now challenging their existence as a civilised society.
There is no place within the country that could provide these though, neither are there any capsule solutions. The possible recourse is through the intervention of the international community that has recently expressed its interest in addressing these issues in Sri Lanka. This could be possible by facilitating a process by which an interim administration could be put in place in Sri Lanka to address immediate concerns of the country, particularly concerning issues of law and order.
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| Relatives of those missing after being abducted mourn at a recent protest in Colombo. Photo TamilNet |
The recent abduction of the Sri Lankan Red Cross workers and the recovery of their bodies with gun shot wounds is the latest in the series of incidents that has fortified peoples’ fear. The very fact that often the law enforcement agencies itself are being blamed or suspected for such gruesome incidents shows the extent to which the system has broken down. As of today, even police officers are not immune from fear of abduction and insecurity.
A policing system that is corrupt to the core and a judiciary which has made a mockery of justice alienated the people from their administrators. What Sri Lanka is witnessing today is the collapse of the centre, a wilt within the core. Justice institutions within the country have become non-functional as far as an ordinary person is concerned. Even professional communities like the lawyers have succumbed to this fall.
A government that cannot address these problems do not have a right to claim that they are in power. What was reflected time and again from various sources within the government in the past few years is the utter unwillingness and helplessness of the government to deal with the breakdown of rule of law in the country. Every imaginable pivot of administration and governance was let to be manipulated for personal and short-term gains and the imbalance within the system has reached a level that it cannot be set straight anymore.
In circumstances of complete chaos arising out of the absence of rule of law often the people look to the centre – government – to reinstate law and order. The life in the capital city is what the people in such circumstances look up to witness the presence of relative safety. However, in Sri Lanka life in the capital itself has become dangerous. Abductions in Colombo have become so regular that people have started referring to abductions in casual conversations as a hazard that they have to live with like their police.
Abduction is a crime that requires meticulous planning and execution. It often requires the involvement of more than one person and plans to meet contingencies. This is because crimes of such nature are hard to be kept hidden and is difficult to avoid prosecution. The ease with which such crimes of serious nature is committed in Sri Lanka indicates the there is nothing much to be concerned about for the perpetrators and that crimes of such nature does not anymore require any planning.
Indeed what is reflected in Sri Lanka today is the result of the absence of sensible planning and execution of ways and means to address the downfall of a justice system. What was done instead was trying to cover holes of imperfection and ineptitude with darkens of lies and deception of varying nature. Lies and deceptions practiced at the highest order to satisfy the greed of a few persons. This is not however what the people in Sri Lankan deserve. They deserve an honest administration that is willing to bring back sanity to the day-to-day affairs of life that is now challenging their existence as a civilised society.
There is no place within the country that could provide these though, neither are there any capsule solutions. The possible recourse is through the intervention of the international community that has recently expressed its interest in addressing these issues in Sri Lanka. This could be possible by facilitating a process by which an interim administration could be put in place in Sri Lanka to address immediate concerns of the country, particularly concerning issues of law and order.
