Hansard – October 25, 1990
Starting from column 361
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Please tell. Who should speak now?
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Hon. State Minister Farook, please sit down. His time is over. Order please! What are you trying to do ? Are you presiding or am I presiding ? [interruptions]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please ! Please be silent and sit down. Please be silent. Sit down. Now speak.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Thank you Sir. Hon. Deputy Chairman of Committees, I think you witnessed today, here in this House, the extent democracy has been eroded in this country. It was proved. Freedom of speech is a democratic right in a democratic society. The right to express that you have is there for the opposition too.
Hon. U. L. M. Farook –
I was disturbed when I spoke. Disturbed in a vulgar manner, I was not listened to.
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Please sit down
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Hon. Deputy Chairman of Committees, don’t reduce expressing of ideas to praising a government or praising leaders. Democracy is – [disturbances] I wish to remind you that you should have the strength to listen to your opponents when they criticise or speak against you. [disturbances]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please!
Hon. Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Not only that. It is because democracy in this country was eroded that the north - east and the whole country is burning now. During your 13 year rule, remember, this situation arose as the faith in democracy was wholly devastated. [disturbances]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Please be silent. The Hon Minister of State has finished his speech
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
If today, to safeguard democracy, the members are not allowed the right to express themselves, if they are disturbed when speaking, [disturbances]
Hon. A.H. M. Azwer –
You disturbed [disturbances]
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Not only to speak in parliament, there must be freedom to express ideas What happened to me today ? As you spoke in this house today and said, to hoot and disturb Mr. Nanayakkara [disturbances]
Hon. Ms. Renuka Herath
Was he not disturbed?
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please. Silence please. This debate has to be continued. Sit down please [disturbances]
Hon. Reggie Ranatunga – [rose]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Please do not disturb. Hon. Member please continue and come back to the topic.
Hon. Mr. Mahi-nda Rajapakse –
Hon. Deputy Chairman of Committees, they are calling for a fight
Hon Hemaku-mara Nanayakkara – Swallowed drugs for lunacy
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
We know you all are people who fought. We know whom you all hit. There is no doubt on that. But that is not the question. Today, the right I have to present the problems of my people as a member has also been robbed. [disturbances]
Hon. Ms. Renuka Herath
Passers by would have seen who robbed.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Now don’t panic.
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Silent please. We won’t be able to continue this debate like this
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
That day we were accused that we are going to stop aid to this country. We were accused that we are helping the Tigers. [disturbances] I am telling you today, when this report is read, you have nothing to say. You have to sit like a cat that spoiled on a hard rock. [disturbances] It is now proved that we did not go in front of the Human Rights Committee to stop aid to this country. [disturbances] We asked that Human Rights be safeguarded in this country [disturbances]
An Hon. Member –
Didn’t the body guards kill?
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
If the World Bank can tell to close down corporations, sack people, invalidate rice ration books, hit the innocent people below the belt, increase the price of sugar, privatise the CTB and if this government is dancing to those tunes, we asked the donor countries, ‘why can’t you lay down conditions on human rights in this country while giving aid?’ That is what we asked for. That had been done now. [disturbances].
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please ! Hon. Minister, please sit down. Please do not disturb. We have to continue with this debate.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
I must tell one thing. It is our Hon. Minister who invited the Human Rights Committee. We have to honour a person when it is due. [disturbances] What ever it is, it was him who invited.
Hon. Ranjan Wijeratne –
Why didn’t you tell what you did in Beliatte also when you went to Geneva ?
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Please continue with your speech
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Let me tell that if this government is going to suppress human rights, not only to Geneva, we will go even to hell to work against this government. We are prepared to go to any place to save human rights from this government. Keep that in mind. [disturbances] Hon. Minister, we will not allow our rights to be suppressed. Remember that please.
Hon. A.H.M. Azwer –
Don’t go against the state. Don’t do unpatriotic work. [disturbances]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please. Please behave in this august house.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Members of this august house are stopped using the police. We members are stopped using murderous police. We are screened. We didn’t take gold bars.
An Hon Member –
Shame
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
We didn’t take gems. We didn’t carry imported underwear. We didn’t take undeclared money like the Menikdiwelas. We didn’t get humiliated by the police for taking undeclared money. Let me remind that we took with us the wailing of the mothers of this country. Is there no freedom for that? It is that wailing those 12 countries have heard. Although those 12 countries heard the wailing of those mothers, their protests, this government don’t hear the cry of the mothers. This government is like deaf elephants.
Today you all are stuck with problems. Caught in them. You all started a mobile service to go to the people. [disturbances] Wait. I will tell about this mobile service. In one mobile office there was a board that said ‘Depot Superintendent.’ So I thought I will go and speak to this Depot Superintendent about a bus. There was a conductor seated in this Depot Superintendent’s chair. Then a mother came running to me and said, ‘Oh my god, I escaped by a whisker.’
The Hon. Ranjan Wijeratne –
Do you say not to treat the small people? Is it wrong for a small man to become a superintendent?
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
No. no. Not a superintendent. It was a conductor.
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Silent please. Hon Member continue please. Order please! Listen, what is said.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
A mother with a child came to me. She said, she recognised the police officer who took her child away. [disturbance] No. Shut up. There is no talk with you. [disturbances]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please!
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Listen to this mother’s story. Since there was so much publicity about this mobile service, keeping trust on it, with the other younger brother, I sent the mother there,
An Hon Member –
What happened to the mother?
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
The mother went to that mobile service. To see, the same police officer who abducted her son was the officer taking complaints.
An Hon Member –
Shame ! Shame!
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
The judge and the prosecution are both the same! [disturbances]
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Mr. Rajapakse will produce them
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
The mother and the son came panting. She said, ‘Sir, I was spared by a split second. If I went to complain, I would have been over and this son would have been over too.’ I am not against the mobile service. But if you allow the same officer accused of wrong doing to conduct the inquiry, then it is like allowing the mother of the rogue to sit in judgment.
Hon. U. L. M. Farook –
It is surprising that all mothers come to you.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
There is no trust in you all. You all cannot do anything.
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Order please!
Hon. D. M. Jayaratne
No mother has any trust in you all.
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
Will you please sit down? The member will speak. Please sit down.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Told you all about disappearances. When Joe Sim like highway robbers come and give bundles of money saying ‘here take’ for supposed development of the government, all the hotels are just given on a whimper [disturbances] What?
Hon. Ranjan Wijeratne –
We know what was taken
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
What was taken ? We know the place these Joe Sims have been given. Robber barons have been given all the facilities to run casinos in five star hotels. That is your righteousness. That is the sermon delivered every morning. That is the puritanism. The new puritanism taught. To gamble with Joe Sim. Preach it every day. Then it would be fine.
Not only that [disturbances] We are accused of opposing you when you had talks with the LTTE in the Galadari Hotel. We know what is going to happen. We are not prepared to fool the Tamil people like the UNP. [disturbances] What did you all do? Brought them saying it was to discuss and – had given them arms. They had been given all the possible comfort and everything. [disturbances] Thai girls must have also been there – It was after having given all that...
Mr. Deputy Chairman of Committees
There’s one more minute for you. [disturbances] Silence please ! The Hon. Member has one more minute left to speak.
Hon. Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse –
Hon. Deputy Chairman of Committees, what did you say Sir ?
Deputy Chairman of Committees
The Hon. Member has only one minute more.
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http://www.thesundayleader.lk/20080608/spotlight.htmSometimes History is funnier than a joke.
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