On Air..........

One of my friends happened to come to SL from Scotland. He planned to come by an Emirates flight as usual. Emirates stopped flying here but then again agreed. Now this flight was suppose to land here at night time. But according to new rules, Katunayaka air port is closed after 6PM I guess. So Emirates have informed them that they will have a 16 hour transit at Dubai.

When I first heard I told him, so you can do shopping there. Then he asked me "How can I do shopping for 16 hours?"

To see, even though they have to go through quite a long hours of transit, air line is not providing them hotel facilities. Because closing down air port is not the fault of the Air Line. They only obtain VISA for travelers to go inside Dubai. But they will have to find places to stay by them selves.

Hm. I thought. ............................ What to do. Where the fault?

What’s my share?

Recently I involved in some consultancy project with a government department. If you served in any private sector company who have dealings with government departments or places like harbour its a known fact that there's a special fund, allocated to give commission, or in local language bribes to officers.

If the commission was not given, it’s better to give up hopes on that particular project or task to be done. In these dealings, you have to gift the ground level workers starting from ministers. Commission goes to different officers depends on their power & ability to get the work done. If it’s a very big project, most of the share goes to minister or his family or electoral. These are most of the times indirect as well as direct.

Very surprisingly in my recent project I met an officer who never gives any hint on bribes. Not only he didn't ask for commission, he was a very talented officer. When he started his duties in the last year, that department had funds only enough to pay the salaries. As a person who closely worked with that organization I saw how they developed. In terms of profits as well as in terms of scale. They started some major projects, some with foreign investors. He expanded their work in to larger category.

Last week I suddenly got to know that he was dismissed from his job. I couldn't hide my curiosity I called one of the directors of that Bureau who is a friend of mine. I asked him,

"That chairman has showed incomparable results during his time & I heard he was fired?"

His reply was,

"Yes he is superb. But what's the use for us? What's our share from that profit? Nothing. What did minister get? Nothing. There are enough people who supported us in the elections & there are more elections to do. When he was requested to give some jobs to minister's carders he refused saying there are enough & more people in that office. So I don't see why we keep him any more"

Even though this was quite a normal news for us, I felt I should write it here as a respect to that gentleman who did his duties. What do you think people? This is the system we have. Is there anything we can do to change this? Most people enter this system becomes a part of it. Otherwise they will be a victim of it like the hero in my case.

What do you think? Can we change it?

Missing in action

If you are watching “News 1st", abductions may not be such an alien topic for you. I feel many things when I watch these sad news every day. Different people say different things. I would like to share your views as to how would you feel about this.

Some people say these people who are abducted & killed are LTTE intelligent officers or some sort of terrorist attached with them. Therefore people think SL army is using a " Mozard" system to disappear them. There was a belief that when you disappear the supply for the problem, problem will get disappear with time. One of my friends in the SL army claimed that these people are not innocent & involved in killing so much of innocent citizens. Therefore it’s not a sin to kill them. He claimed that people should support the government for this as the same way American people supported the war against terrorism. His point was after Bush started so called "War against terrorism" there wasn't a single terrorist attack in America. Therefore it proves the success of it.

Another set of people think these are done by organized gangs in Colombo. People think they are abducted to take huge ransoms. One of the guys who stand for this argument told me that they abduct people who earn so much black money. Because then, when they get released they could not go to police & complain about the real amount they paid. Then they will have to answer the questions of income tax officers who will be at their door step next day morning. So some category of people thinks its fine to charge them since anyway its unlawful money. But as we all know, not only rich people get abducted.

But in my opinion I cannot agree with any of these. I do not know what happened to these people. I do not know whether abductions are for real like "News 1st" says or those are fake like president says. I do not know who do these things. (But I am sure that is some group with a very high power & political backup). All sorts of people belong to all levels & all religions get their victims. In the beginning it was only Tamils. But recently I saw they have abducted some Sinhalese lady & her little daughter at the Battaramulla check point. Whether its Sinhala or Tamil it’s human. It’s our people after all. Every person has a right to live. My friend still argues these people are terrorist & therefore should get punished. I agree. But there is a way. There is a law. You should give them a chance to prove their innocence before the court.

This shows that our society is not developed much. It’s true that even in developed countries these things happened. If you have watch “Prison break" you may have see how the intelligent service disappear the people. When these things happened in a country, after some time there are so many criminals that gradually develop. People uses the chances for their personal users & who are with power will always win.

Is it fair?

Did anyone think what will it be like if this happens to any of our family members? How sad it will be? Their families also must be feelings the same way. My friend here argues that people who get killed by them & their families also have fundamental rights. I know. I know. But still I feel very sad about this. What do you think?