- Sirisena and Fonseka clash over their track records as President, Army Commander
- Fonseka calls Sirisena ‘stupid’ over Easter Attacks
- Sirisena notes LTTE attack on Army HQ on Fonseka’s watch
A heated argument erupted yesterday (18) between former President and Defence Minister and incumbent Opposition MP Maithripala Sirisena and Samagi Jana Balawegaya Opposition MP and former Army Commander Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, based on the recent judgement delivered by the Supreme Court (SC) against Sirisena and several others regarding the Easter Sunday terror attacks of 2019, during which critical comments were made about the way issues related to national security were handled during the periods when each held the office of the President and the Army Commander, respectively.
Speaking in Parliament yesterday, Fonseka said: “The former President (Sirisena) was ordered to pay Rs. 100 million as compensation by the SC. Now, he says that he will sit beneath the Bo tree in Pettah and shake a tin to collect money. These kinds of issues arise when those who should remain panhandling in Pettah are appointed President. He also says that he did not think that the National Security Council (NSC) should be held regularly. He says that he was under the impression that the NSC should be held only when there was an emergency law in effect. If we continue to rule the country with such stupid leaders, our country will no doubt be destroyed. These people should think about the country and go home.”
In response to him, Sirisena said: “Fonseka made a statement aimed at me. I want to make it very clear that if someone gives me money by collecting such in Pettah, I will take it, as I do not have money. He has been saying over the past few days that I should be jailed. I request him to read this judgement. The SC has accepted that no one, no security or intelligence officer, informed me after receiving information about this terror attack. I was the one who acquitted you when you were in prison and appointed you Field Marshal. In that situation, it is very unfair for you to talk to me like this.”
Claiming that Fonseka has no right to accuse him over national security lapses, Sirisena recalled the incident of the Army Headquarters (HQ) falling prey to bomb attacks by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) when the former was serving as the Army Commander.
“The Army HQ was destroyed. You were injured. It was the doctors who saved you. How can you, who could not save the Army HQ and yourself, point the finger at me about national security? Also, former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga is saying everywhere that I should be arrested. She too lost an eye in a LTTE attack. She is not here, but she too has no right to talk about national security and say that I should be arrested.”
Speaking further, Sirisena said: “I ensured national security more than you did. In three weeks, I destroyed the entire organisation of one of the Easter Sunday attacks’ bombers, Mohamed Cassim Mohamed Zahran (Zahran Hashim). It is clear in the judgement that I had no awareness of the matter before that. You should read it. Seven Judges, including the Chief Justice, have accepted that no one had given me this information. I have been ordered to pay compensation under a new legal principle – that if the officials appointed by the President commit a mistake, the President should also be held responsible for it. You have helped me when I was running for the Presidential Election. I have never spoken bad about you. Accept what I say. You have no right to talk about national security.”
Fonseka, who stood up again to respond to Sirisena, said: “Now, he said that I was acquitted and appointed as Field Marshal. I got on his stage as a leader of a political party with 375,000 votes. I spoke at a hundred of your meetings. It was in the promises made by you where you stated that justice would be done by me and that the relevant positions will be given. It is not something that was done on a single opinion. It was fulfilled according to the promises of the Election campaign. You should also have mentioned what happened to my Ministerial position. You removed it very timidly, as I criticised you during the 52-day Government coup (the replacement of then-Prime Minister and incumbent President Ranil Wickremesinghe with then-Opposition Leader and incumbent Government MP Mahinda Rajapaksa by Sirisena in October 2018, and the subsequent events).
“Sirisena also said that the Army HQ was bombed. The problem there was that when I became the Army Commander, there were peace talks going on. During such talks, we don’t put up barriers and inspect civilians. Steps like checking people at places like the Army HQ and the Defence Ministry are reduced and terrorists enter such places among others. You don’t understand these things. So understand these things now – that is why such an accident happened. I will also read the SC judgement, but I wrote a 65-page report of my own when I was in the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) that investigated the Easter Sunday terror attacks. It is clearly stated in it that there were two SriLankan Airlines flights to Sri Lanka after the attacks, at 12 noon and 9 p.m. on the day (21 April 2019). Instead of returning in them, you chose a Singapore flight at 1 a.m. as it was the only one with first class seats. It reflects what attitude you had as the President,” he added.
Sirisena again responded to Fonseka, saying: “He says that he was given the rank of Field Marshal. There is a law in the world that this rank can be given only if there are one million members in the Army, but he kept coming after me to get that rank by force. There are only about 190,000 soldiers in our country. It is in such a situation that he was given the role. The language he uses is very bad. He does not know what words should be spoken in Parliament.”
Meanwhile, Opposition MP and General Secretary of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (of which Sirisena is Chairman) Dayasiri Jayasekara, who stood up at this point, said that Fonseka is angry with Sirisena because the former was not given the post of the Minister of Law and Order during the previous United National Front-led Government. When the said position was about to be given to Fonseka, he claimed that almost all senior Police officials had come and told Sirisena not to give it to Fonseka as he was a military person. Since then, he claimed, Fonseka has been holding a personal grudge against Sirisena. Speaking further about the PSC that investigated the terror attacks, he said that it consisted of MPs who were working against the President at that time, and that its report has been made into a political report.
Meanwhile, Sirisena has accepted a sum of Rs. 1,810 that was collected from people in the Pettah area by actor-cum-YouTuber Sudaththa Thilakasiri to be used in paying the compensation of Rs. 100 million.
“Sirisena is innocent and he is unable to pay the ordered sum of compensation as he does not have money. Therefore, I went to Pettah and collected money from the people. Then I handed over the sum of Rs. 1,810 that was collected to Sirisena, and he accepted it,” a post on Thilakasiri's Facebook profile read.
On 13 January, the SC, which held that Sirisena, then-Defence Ministry Secretary Hemasiri Fernando, then-Inspector General of Police Pujith Jayasundara, then-State Intelligence Service Director, Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police (SDIG) Nilantha Jayawardena, and then-Chief of National Intelligence DIG (Retd.) Sisira Mendis have violated fundamental human rights by not preventing the said terror attacks, ordered them to personally pay Rs. 310 million as compensation to the victims of the bombings, with Sirisena being ordered to pay the highest sum of compensation of Rs. 100 million. Following the judgement, Sirisena said that he has no personal capacity to pay the relevant sum of compensation, and that he will therefore pay it with his friends’ support.