Tuesday, 17 December 2013 00:01
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POLITICAL scandals make for great reading but they are produced usually from underlying abuse and corruption within the political system itself. The current heroin drama regarding the Prime Minister is another example of how the “crony system” results in shady deals and infests governance.
The key actors in the drama have each come out with a version of events that best match their interests. The key figure at the epicentre of the drama, Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne, has insisted that the letter was issued by his Coordinating Secretary Keerthi Weerasinghe without his knowledge and therefore cannot be held culpable for any connection with the 131 kilograms of heroin found in the container.
Moreover, since Weerasinghe has resigned, the premier believes there is no need for his name to be further connected with this incident. Opposition parties disagree and interestingly a United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) ally the Jathika Hela Urumaya was one of the first to call for his resignation suggesting that deeper issues may be afoot.
Since parliamentarians with much graver offences ranging from tying public officials to trees to being accused of rape and murder inhabit the house it would be expecting too much from Sri Lanka’s legal system to see the Prime Minister’s removal. But it is imperative that the Government comes clean on the deal as it came into power promising to wipe out the “kudu mafia”.
Weerasinghe, on his part has issued statements and given interviews, saying the letter was issued as a request made by Gampola Town Council member Taranga Vittachchi who is in turn a close associate of the unnamed businessmen who in fact wanted to clear the container, which officially contained bathroom fittings. Since the container had not been cleared in the specified time period customs duty was imposed and the letter was a ‘get free’ document releasing the container from all such payments.
While it is not clear how far along this chain of events the police have travelled, what is clear is that the tradition of political cronyism is a massive problem in Sri Lanka.
The Government depends on revenue from customs and taxes to provide much needed public expenditure such as education, healthcare and housing. Yet, mired corruption based largely on a “you scratch my back and I will scratch yours” policy leeches off this already low revenue for the benefit of the already wealthy.
Few people have questioned the legitimacy of the Prime Minister’s secretary writing a letter exempting a legal payment of tax in the first place. What authority does Weerasinghe or even Jayaratne for that matter have to authorise waiving of tax imposed under the law of the country? Since tax, like the law, should be imposed universally, the fact that it is not done so is a serious problem.
During the last two years the Government lost an estimated Rs. 60 billion from vehicle imports, which is another deeply corrupt practice. From waiving entertainment taxes on night races under the Western Province Chief Minister’s directive resulting in millions of losses to the Colombo Municipal Council, to the Committee of Public Enterprises (COPE) itself calling for the overhaul of Customs and the Inland Revenue Department it is clear that corrupt tax collection has a serious impact on the economy.
The deeply embedded crony system also aids the drug problem among many others in Sri Lanka and without stamping that out, these scandals will be repeated.
