Hypocrisy Of Political & Religious Leaders
By P. Soma Palan –January 20, 2018
I refer to two front page headlined reports in the Daily Mirror of 17th January:b) “ Gazette withdrawn to respect Culture”, a statement by the Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe regarding opening and closing times for Liquor Shops, and another earlier report,
The statements by the Minister at (a) above in support of women working in liquor Bars and the extension of the closing time of liquor bars to 10 p.m. are nullified by the withdrawal of the Gazette notification ,by the Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe. The statements of the two Ministers contradict each other. I will confine myself to this issue only, although there are several issues where the Government had made resolute decisions and then revoked them.
Aren’t these Policy decisions and actions to be taken are discussed and approved by the Cabinet of Minister, in the first instance, prior to notification by the Gazette. It is only later it is discovered that such decisions/actions are not in accord with our culture and values. Isn’t this belated invocation of national culture and values, political hypocrisy to show the people their concerned commitment to national culture and values?
This ubiquitous verbal chant of our national culture and values, both by the Politicians and the Religious fraternity, sounds hollow, if our politicians and religious leaders take a walk in our streets ,to see at first hand the low level of our culture and values paraded, not only by the common man but even by those who are supposed to be educated and cultured. I would dare to say that 90% of them are uncultured and uncivilized. The conduct and behavior of the motley crowd of pedestrians, all kinds of motorists, reflect the poor standard of our national culture and values. As a daily walker of the streets, I can say this with certainty and conviction. The day culture, values, civility are established on our streets and other public places, we can proudly proclaim of our national culture and values. Until then, it is nothing but sheer hypocrisy of our politicians and religious monks.
The statement of Minister Sarath Fonseka that “if men can work and manage bars, so can women” is absolutely correct. Isn’t prohibiting women to work in liquor bars discriminatory and a violation of a Fundamental democratic right? This is against our national culture and values, the politicians and our religious leaders say. But they have no qualms about our women working as House Maids in Middle East countries in menial positions, including the washing and cleaning of the toilets of the Sheiks. Only God knows whether they are strictly House maids doing household work or otherwise. Here money counts more than our national culture and values. Without the inflow of their Dollar remittances, our economy will collapse. Isn’t this utter hypocrisy of our Political and Religious leaders parroting about our national culture and values with an air of superiority, as if the cultures and values of other countries are degrading.
