The claims recently by disgruntled opposition politicoes that they
have attained rajayoga status make even lizards laugh.
The only person who has reached the rajayoga summit is President
Rajapaksa who was elected Head of State by the free votes of the people.
It must be remembered that the person who drafted the present
Constitution, J. R. Jayewardene as the Executive President once declared
that he has the powers of a king.
Just having rajayoga in one’s horoscope is not a challenge to the
king, the present incumbent Head of Government.
Hamilton Senanayake
Panadura
I just cannot understand how one could increase the spending power of
tourists! To say the least it is bit of a joke in any economic terms!
(Reference DN May 03) What you must do is to make Sri Lanka an
attractive tourist destination to increase the flow of tourists.
The increase in the inflow will increase the tourism dollars coming
into the country. For this to happen, it is of paramount important to
invest in attracting the tourists to the country.
Part of such investments should also go into research on tourism.
A larger proportion should be invested in the improvement of the
general infrastructure, including good roads, parking facilities,
traffic management, clean toilets, enforcement of hygenic considerations
and also in area of civil law and order.
In other words you need a clean and safe ‘house’ before you could
invite paying guests! It is simple as that.
I also cannot understand why some of the high ranking officials talk
in terms of 600 million dollars as the objective! It must be in the
billions of dollars, so that they will have a real challenge to work
harder to achieve that kind of objective.
Given the endowments Sri Lanka has, actually the tourism potential in
the country should be 10 billion or more for an year. What I can see is
lots of people are talking about lots of things, but very little or
nothing is done at the end of the day.
No doubt they will ‘miss the bus’ if they are so incapable of putting
down a strategic development plan for this fascinating industry where
Sri Lanka has a tremendous potential compared to lots of other
countries.
SIRI GAMLATH
via email
According to press reports, I understand that the Sri Lanka Cricket
Secretary Kangadaran Mathivanan will be raising the matter of Adam
Gilchrist’s use of a squash ball, as a batting aid in the World Cup
final. (Reference DN May 08).
In my opinion ‘Law 42’ does not in any manner permit or refer to a
squash ball as a permitted item.
I understand that the law specifically prohibits a player from using
equipment or materials other than the permitted.
In the past, Ricky Ponting’s graphite coated bat and Dennis Lillee’s
aluminium bat were ruled to be illegal. Even in the World Cup 2007, New
Zealander Scott Styris was requested to remove the bandage from his
injured right hand prior to commence balling.
These were all acts which fostered fair-play and equality among the
various teams.
In my opinion, the hidden squash ball was totally illegal in terms of
Law 42, apart from being unethical. I very earnestly look forward to the
ruling by the ICC on this matter. Sri Lanka was not only handicapped by
the inclement weather, but also by the unfortunate application of the
Duckworth Lewis formula and also by the use of a non-permissible item
under Law 42.
ANTHONY RODRIGO
via email
It was reported in the Hansard in UK that an All-Party Parliamentary
Group for Tamils has been formed by a few LTTE terrorists sucking Labour
MPs including Keith Vaz, Simon Hughes (He had been a supporter for the
last 25 years), Paul Burstow, Angus Robertson, Andrew Pelling to name a
few to find a solution to the ethnic conflict (For their information,
this is not an ethnic conflict but a terrorist issue) by arranging a
summit in London between GoSL, the LTTE and Norway.
I totally refuse to call these MPs Hon. and none of them deserve to
be called honourable as they are backing a terrorist outfit that had
brought immense mayhem to their own people as well as to the Sri Lankan
people at large.
This plan for a summit in London just like the CFA by the Norwegians
is another subtle trap by the LTTE and their UK paid English
sympathizers to stop the current battering by the Armed Forces against
the LTTE and looking time for them to re-arm, re-group and consolidate
their position in the North again.
We cannot forget the facts that it was Britain who plundered our
natural wealth for centuries and valuable artifacts, divided the nation,
introduced slavery by getting South Indians to work in the tea estates
creating another problem, spreading their missionary by force and
through other devious means, creating a Tamil elite class during their
rule leaving the majority Sinhalese discriminated, to name a few
terrorist activities (in terms of the bygone era) by the British Empire
on this small tiny beautiful island called Sri Lanka.
I remember seeing a placard a couple of years back by an Indian
migrant who was protesting against British migrant policies and it said
that “We are not here if you were not there?” This placard nicely summed
up who the British’s are.
However, we have not found the British Conservative Party overtly or
covertly supporting the LTTE terrorists in the recent past.
It is the Labour party members (excepting few MPs like Kim Howells
who is somewhat balanced minded), MPs, Ministers, Lords and Shire
Councillors who are openly conniving with the LTTE terrorists, activists
in UK by attending their fund raisers, making supportive statements in
the Parliament etc. UK became a safe haven for all the LTTE terrorists
including late Balasingham.
The recent attempt to get involved in the terrorist conflict through
a LTTE supportive Tamil Group headed by Keith Vaz and Simon Hughes (may
be they are in the LTTE’s bonus payroll) is a gross interference with
our sovereignty.
The Sri Lankan Government and all patriotoic parties should totally
reject their proposed plan of a Summit between GoSL/LTTE and Norway and
tell the British Labour Government categorically to keep their ‘Hands
off our internal matters’.
We have already made the biggest mistake by inviting Norway and it is
now a Tiger Tail which cannot let it go and are we going to do the same
mistake again by inviting Britain who made the LTTE terrorists, their
ideologists a safe haven on their own soil not second to the Norwegians.
One pertinent question to those British English MPs who are in this
Parliamentary Group supporting the proscribed LTTE is, why not start
negotiating with the Iraqi insurgents for a peaceful settlement among
the rival groups?
The labour Government is partly responsible for creating this mess in
Iraq and they have a bounden duty to solve it.
Why not negotiate with the Islamic fundamentalists on your soil
instead of arresting and charging them on flimsy matters like possessing
terrorist literature or being a devoted Muslim for the safety of your
own people. The English Government should put their house in order
before poking into others!
Sri Lanka does not need expertise to solve the LTTE terrorist problem
we are facing as long as the international community keeps away from it
and stop arming them and allowing them to raise funds for the war chests
on their soil.
The Sri Lanka Government should categorically tell the English
Government not to interfere with this terrorist problem as long as they
don’t treat the LTTE as terrorists.
The July terrorist attack by some Islamic Fundamentalists on
Londoners, we all condemned and sympathize with the Government and the
victims.
But unfortunately, especially the Labour politicians are behind the
LTTE (as in Australia) molly coddling (their survival lies on their
votes) the most brutal terrorist group in the world who had killed
thousands of innocent civilians with their suicide bombers.
I don’t think the majority Sri Lankans will ever condone or
sympathize with the British people, if another attack like the July
attack happened again mainly due to DUPLICITY ON TERRORISM by the
English Governments.
British politicians whilst mollycoddling the LTTE terrorist
activists, they are hounding every Muslim who has some remote connection
with Osama Bin Laden or some Islamic terrorist group.
The new leader to be of the Labour Party Gorden Brown should take
cognizance of the fact that the Labour party is swamped with the LTTE
terrorist activists and supporters and needs a thorough cleansing.
British HC- Please cascade this to the British papers.
MALIN ABEYATUNGE
Australia
via email |
