In 2009 Mahinda really wanted to win the western provincial council election big, specifically he wanted to win Colombo district big. This was at the very late stages of the war, a strong election win was needed for him to show the world that people approve the war. A big win in UNP stronghold Colombo would have created good news, and also made good grounds for the upcoming parliamentary elections (Presidential elections were probably not planned then).
The previous election results for Colombo wasn’t that good. The win was marginal; and that too at a weak period of UNP with people starting to reject the cease fire agreement. worst of all, there weren’t any strong candidates for UPFA in Colombo.
2004 Provincial Council Elections, Colombo District | Votes
| POLITICAL PARTY | VOTES | % | SEATS |
| UNITED PEOPLE'S FREEDOM ALLIANCE | 322,653 | 49.11 | 25 |
| UNITED NATIONAL PARTY | 276,759 | 42.12 | 15 |
2004 Provincial Council Elections, Colombo District | Top candidates of UPFA
| Candidate | Preferential votes |
| Aruna Hemapala | 36,029 |
| Andarage Don Gamini Thilakasiri | 34,992 |
| H. Kanchana Peiris | 34,658 |
So, Mahinda did what he does the best, bought a couple of candidates from the UNP, not with money, but with power! Duminda Silva and Thilanga Sumathipala. These two had enough money of their own for them to be bought with money, what they lacked while in opposition is power, and that’s what Mahinda had to offer them. The deal probably was win me Colombo and I’ll give you parliamentary tickets and organizer posts.
Results were quite clear, win they did. They literally bought votes for themselves spending insane amounts of money.
2009 Provincial Council Elections, Colombo District | Votes
| POLITICAL PARTY | VOTES | % | SEATS |
| UNITED PEOPLE'S FREEDOM ALLIANCE | 530,370 | 57.78 | 25 |
| UNITED NATIONAL PARTY | 327,571 | 35.69 | 15 |
2009 Provincial Council Elections, Colombo District | Top candidates of UPFA
| Candidate | Preferential votes |
| Arumadura Lorence Romelo Duminda Silva | 165,128 |
| Uduwatuwage Janathpriya Thilanga Sumathipala | 159,603 |
| Udaya Prabhath Gammanpila | 116,144 |
So, Duminda and Thilanga got their parliamentary election tickets and organizer posts as promised. But, unfortunately, that meant someone else lost their organizer post and possibly election tickets. To compensate for this, Mahinda offered Bharatha some other posts including the presidential advisor post.
For Duminda, the electoral seat doesn’t matter. He buys votes – literally. So he could go in to any area, throw some cash around, muscle out any resistance and get voted. But for someone like Bharatha, getting voted depends a lot on relationship building and small scale spending's over a lifetime. And giving his electoral seat to Duminda meant the end of his active political career; presidential advisor post didn’t really compensated for that. Thus started the battle between Duminda and Bharatha.
Where did Duminda get his money from? I don’t know. His brother owns few radio stations and they probably have other businesses. Some say it’s drugs. Can’t rule that out, but it’s highly unlikely that Rajapaksha’s would get a drug dealer in to the defense secretariat. Most claim drugs because they don’t know people could actually make an insane amount of money with legit businesses. And all they could think of is drugs.
There are no black or white characters, they are all shades of grey. Duminda had lot of thugs surrounding him, and I wouldn’t believe if someone said Bharatha didn’t. And most of all, I don’t think either of these two had got into a fight of this nature where the other party responded in the same way. They are probably so used to going in with brute force and shooting away the opponents.
So, when the first to get out of the vehicles – be it Duminda or Bharatha – started waving the guns around, probably didn’t expect the other party to do the same. And they didn’t know what to do next. They either had to pack-up and leave, or shoot. Alcohol probably stopped them from making the wise move and shoot they did. The ones with most guns, made the most kills. But I don’t think Bharatha’s group didn’t shoot back, or Duminda didn’t get shot, as some bloggers claim. With three bullets in the head, I’d be really surprised if he’s not vegetable now.
So, is this Mahinda’s fault for bringing in a thug from UNP to muscle out – and kill in this instance - the old SLFPers who helped him vin the elections? It’s obviously a consequence of a series of incidents, but I don’t think it could be directly attributed to bringing Duminda and Thilanga in to SLFP. Mahinda is just another grey character, with good and bad, making decisions which he thinks is right for him, his family, his friends and after some more items in that list, the country (hopefully).
Related: http://indi.ca/2011/10/hearsay-about-duminda-silva/
Agree to segment upto following.
ReplyDelete"I don’t know. His brother owns few radio stations and they probably have other businesses. Some say it’s drugs."
and segment starting with following.
"So, is this Mahinda’s fault for bringing in a thug from UNP to muscle out "
Rest, in between is your imagination, which is just one out of 101 logical possibilities. If I go by simple scientific demarcation, yours go out of my window as it has lots of "Idon't know"s and many other unexplained facts.
The biggest unexplained mystery is when their two good pals fought why the most powerful brothers unanimously support one. Just because that one won a bloody prov election? That shows taht relationship is not purely retro-respective. What deals they have now... I leave it for you.
Regarding wounds, I am unable to say anything. It can be from the scale of major wounds to none. Hospital board was fired just at this juncture, and taht leaves me with more doubt. There is no factual evidence to the scale of wounds at all. If you tell me to trust TWO doctors for that I'd like to remind the three who served in North during war.
This is too much drama for any sort of a staging act. Give the brothers some credit will you?
ReplyDeleteIf either the brothers or Duminda wanted to kill Bharatha for real, is this the ideal way or timing? Of cause not - it could have been a heart attack or some accident on a perfectly normal day. Even a shot in the head by an accomplice but a public shoot out on the elections day? nop.
So, it was not pre-planned. And lets say, Duminda didn't get hit, clean. Where would he go? Jayawardenapura hospital? I'd say gota's home, or Mahinda's home.
What if he got shot but not in the head? Japura? I'd say Army hospital, no issues in security, information or physical. You think Gota didn't know before he got admitted to the hospital? Of cause he knew, then, isn't he wise enough to direct them to the much closer Army hospital than the Jayawardenapura? I think not. If he went in to the Army hospital, it's much easier to air lift him in to katunayake and get him out of the country, if they wanted; why a public hospital?
Even after he got in to Jayawardenapura, if his condition was not serious, they would have gone with a transfer to the army hospital, given the extent of security efforts, and the latest director board change - if that's related to this.
BTW; don't you think the director board change is too much of a drama? Do you think they would have done it if something wasn't hanging by threads out of their control? I think that's Duminda's life, rather than a "secret of Duminda being okay" because; protecting that really doesn't require such dramatic moves.
So; I don't buy that Duminda is not hit in the head.
What deal does Brother have with him... ah.. interesting. Probably the sort of deal that they have with Mervyn.
But, there's a difference in the way how Gota treats the two.. gives an indication that it is the same sort, but different.
Who made the allegation about ministers and drugs? It was DM Jayaratne, who said it in parliament.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.elakiri.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1158604
When serious allegations like this are made, the government responds as follows:
http://www.thesundayleader.lk/2011/07/03/cid-questions-ravi-on-duminda/
What conclusions would you draw?
Conclusion: I was obviously not well informed! :)
ReplyDelete