One of the most die-hard critics of current Sri Lankan government, Lasantha Wickramatunga was shot dead last week. He was the chief editor of Sunday Leader, a weekly newspaper in English. I must say that I have not read the Leader for a very long time and not a fan of Lasantha by any mean, but still I was deeply shocked at his demise. Although I have many a reservations about his never ending conspiracy stories , without a doubt he was the only main stream journalist in South who criticized the highly glorified war currently run by the SL government. Although the country is going steeply downward in terms of democracy almost the entire majority Sinhalese is glued to the war heroics like we are glued to a game of cricket won by the Sri Lankan cricket team.
The author of the attached EDITORIAL is ‘Dead Lasantha’ not the living one which makes its points send a more chilling wave through my spine than ever. The writing lists 4 very important assets of good governance.
1. Transparent
2. Secular
3. Liberal
4. Democratic
Please get away from the Wins in war fields for a second and give it a thought. Does your educated mind allow you to do that you?
and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me
German Theologian,
Martin Niemöller
@ the time of the Great Holocaust
Posts
2 comments:
Although I agree with you about your thoughts on democracy and war, it’s high time that we need to have a microscopic view of the behavior of those who called “journalist”. What we see here today that journalist are behaving like “Gods”. It’s true that democratic country needs to have the freedom of speech, but some of the prominent journalist and media organizations run their own cult, promoting their masters and sponsors and calling themselves 100% unbiased and totally free. Majority are blinded by this double game as they are to the govt war propaganda.
Unfortunately late Mr. Lasantha also falls into this category. The real issue is not that he’s strong government critic and sees only the negatives of the government. Anybody can have their own political believes and do whatever dirty work to achieve those. Then we call them politicians. Not journalists. When politician-turned-journalist Mr. Lasantha could not move away from his politician thinking of doing whatever possible to get power. I feel if someone tries to govern the country by the pen or camera is same as try to do that by gun.
Mark, I completely agree with your comments. I suppose my blog was too short and incomplete view of the big picture. In-fact I'm more at odds against the so called fake journalism and media for making majority of Sri Lankans a set of ignorant idiots.
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