COLOMBO: Senior medical professionals in Sri Lanka have called for urgent action to solve the shortages of food, fuel, medicine and proposed several measures that should be taken by the government of President Ranil Wickremesinghe in order to meet the aspirations of the people who have expressed their desire for a system change.
A statement issued by more than 150 medical professionals in Sri Lanka, said it vehemently condemned the “politics as usual attitude” displayed by the rulers so far, and that they would present in due course the medium term and long term measures to be implemented to achieve good governance and hence a prosperous, peaceful society where all citizens can thrive in harmony.
“We, the Senior Medical Professionals entrusted with the task of looking after the health of the nation, are closely watching the actions of the government of the new president. While it may be too early to assess the performance so far, certain issues are worrying us. We wish to bring to the notice of the government the urgent measures to be taken to ease the discontent of the masses who expressed in the recent past their displeasure and their desire for a system change”.
- Fully withdraw or restrict the use of emergency regulations. At a time of relative peace as at present these regulations give a feeling of insecurity to the people as these laws are prone to be abused by the authorities, as has happened often in the past.
- Arbitrary arrest of suspected activists often on made up charges should stop forthwith. Those already arrested should have access to due process with legal representation. Peaceful expression of ideas seen during recent protests should not be considered as unlawful or criminal activity.
- Findings of investigations into any violence on and after the 9th of May 2022 and action taken thereon should be published. Transparency should be strictly maintained in all this activity.
- Fully investigate the mysterious deaths of many young men whose bodies have washed ashore or found dumped elsewhere. No postmortem findings as to the cause of death are made available. There is a serious suspicion among the people whether we are seeing the repetition of alleged state sponsored killing of youth a few decades ago.
- There has been a spate of deaths by gunshot injuries in public places often in broad daylight. The police have been trying to justify them by suggesting that the victims are criminals involved in drug trafficking or are accused in various cases in courts of law. The way the culprits go about with their gruesome acts, and the apparent failure or reluctance of the police to investigate them, makes one suspect that they are backed by politically powerful elements or even the law enforcement authorities. Urgent action is demanded to stop this carnage.
- The armed forces personnel should be removed from duties normally performed by the police. The interaction between the public and the armed forces not trained to deal with civilians should be avoided wherever possible to prevent unnecessary conflicts.
- Emergency measures to solve the shortages of food, fuel, medicine etc should be taken as a matter of extreme urgency.
- An interim government with a cabinet of up to 20 ministers capable of solving the burning issues of the people should be formed. It should not be guided by the need to accommodate veteran party seniors, who often happen to be proven failures. As such the term “all party government” could be misleading.
- Nineteenth amendment (19A), with improvements to increase the proportion of non parliamentary representation in the Constitutional Council and hence truly independent commissions should be passed without any delay. The provision for the president to hold any other portfolio should be confined to the defence ministry only. As such we note that provisions in 22 A already approved by the cabinet do not meet our expectations fully.
- Uninterrupted education of school children and undergraduates should be ensured.
- There have been many appointments of friends and cronies, of questionable suitability as heads of departments, statutory bodies and corporations in the past few days. Heads of foreign missions should be career diplomats. Meritocracy, one of the main features of system change demanded by the millions of protesters recently, has been totally ignored. This has to stop immediately if the people are to have faith in the ability of the new rulers to establish good governance.
