President Sirisena’s address: What it takes to deliver
Wednesday, 29 April 2015 01:15
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Dear Mr. President,
I listened to your address to the nation on Thursday 23 April. I am sure many thousands did. We are starved for news of what’s going on in the Yahapalanaya Government that we, the citizens of this country, installed 100 days ago.
Instead, all we see and hear is the circus of clowns who are performing a death-dance on behalf of the robber-baron whom we replaced by bringing you in. But we hear very little from you, the one man in whom the vast majority of us placed our faith in that day when we turned up in record numbers to vote in what we knew was a do-or-die moment in time for our beloved motherland.
As I said, I listened to you last night. A few minutes into your address, it seemed to me that you were speaking to a class of pre-school kids. Your manner, your delivery and your body language were ideal for that age group but was a huge disappointment to me, expecting as I naturally was, to see a full-blooded, statesman-like, adrenalin-pumping address from the President to his countrymen, telling them with vigour and candour and with rich doses of promise, what he will do to fulfill the country’s huge expectations of him, of which he can be in no doubt at all.
The content of your speech was passable – just so – but the negative impression it created was the last thing you need, when the morale of the masses is the need of the hour even as your detractors are baying at your heels, having smelt blood.
Mr. President, you even acknowledged that there was a perception of weakness and a lack of leadership skills in you. So you realise that it’s all about perception. The fact that you tried to explain it away by harking to the abolition of slavery in the US, with consequently some slaves preferring slavery to freedom, and likening it to the transition that this country experienced a 100 days ago, with some people preferring what was to what is, did nothing to redeem yourself in the perception of the people as not exhibiting strength and leadership.
It’s all about perception, Mr. President. You succeeded a person who cut a figure wherever he went, was his own man, was authoritative, decisive, and without a shadow of a doubt, a leader, even if he was taking us all, like the Pied Piper of Hamelin, down the precipice.
‘Stand out and be counted’
If I ever admired him even momentarily, it was for his ability to always stand out and be counted, whether here or abroad, through his posture, attire, grooming and above all his body language, which communicated loud and clear, even if his communication skills were weak, that here was a man who could and would hold his own, anywhere, whether it was in the West with its thinly-veiled snobbery and hypocrisy, the East where he was more at home or right in the Middle. There was a certain air about him which commanded respect. I admired that vital leadership trait in him.
It’s vital that you cultivate leadership traits Mr. President. Like the slaves of the US whom you referred to, the people of this country had got used to seeing and hearing, day in and day out, the face and voice of one who was a leader and utterly ruthless. Overnight, we cannot accept that instead, we have someone who on the very rare occasions that we see and hear him, is so benevolent and soft-spoken that he seems to be addressing us like pre-school kids.
It’s an accepted principle of leadership skills that the herd responds to a leader; they very often blindly follow one, as we all know. In you we need to see a leader who outshines the one whom we shooed-out, in you we need to see a leader who shows us clearly that he is in command (19th Amendment or not), a leader who is authoritative, assertive with a stiff upper lip, who commands respect and not someone who says he will address his Prime Minister as ‘sir’, (you will never live that one down), or appears apologetic and suppliant, even if you are not.
Right now you are Numero Uno; you must act the part. In your speech you said that you are conducting yourself in a manner as one which befits someone who is getting ready to pass power to the people. Nice but inappropriate timing to behave as if you are about to get into a loin cloth and walk humbly with a walking stick.
Mr. President, we, the majority of the voting public of this country, brought you into power on our shoulders, with immense faith in you as a person, for specific reasons. We need to see you delivering, left right and centre; not giving us reasons why this is not happening and that is delayed.
In order of priority, we expected you to restore law and order with no one being above the law, infuse racial harmony with the unstinted support that is available, close the gap between the haves (who are sinking in it) and the have-nots (who are sinking without it) and overriding and underlying it all, to make Sri Lanka the proud nation that it has all the potential to be on the world stage.
Negative features
Admittedly, much has been accomplished and, naturally, much more awaits the required timing. It is heartening beyond measure to witness the independence of the Judiciary, to experience the freedom of speech and simply to know that those who bled us to death are no longer calling the shots.
There are also the totally unacceptable negative features which may seem to even outweigh the positive ones: certain appointments to high office of persons for whom the public have no respect (with some even having legal suits against them), the CB bond fiasco (with today’s papers saying that the Governor - whose passport has been impounded according to the papers a few days ago – is back in his seat without any explanation to the public by any of you), the inordinate delay in penalising those who have robbed this country dry, as bellowed by all of you from election platforms, the inability to control illegal demonstrations by those who know what it’s like to be in the dustbin of history, the decision to host in the Merchants Ward of the National Hospital, a former high-flyer who is accused of robbing billions when a thief who robs a few thousands will be thrown into a prison cell and above all the inexcusable inability of the Yahapalanaya Government to hold the imagination of the people, and thereby its morale and high hopes, by delivering on their expectations of commanding, respectful leadership.
It’s debatable whether leaders are born or made. Irrespective of their origins, it is a fact that leaders who are committed to their cause do get trained in leadership skills. It is said that Margaret Thatcher underwent years of voice training after becoming PM to be able to deliver speeches in a more welcome tone of voice which then naturally attracted more positive responses.
To sum it all up Mr. President, your Government can come out far more strongly and assuage the people’s concerns to a much greater extent (and also control the clowns from the dustbin), if you, the man who is Numero Uno, lives up to what is expected of you. Fists of iron in velvet gloves, a ramrod straight backbone of steel, squared shoulders above the padding, a voice which is controlled and rich with power, and more than anything else testosterone in those two pouches.
Mahendra Fernando
Sri Lanka
