A decade ago, many were the pundits who predicted a swift end to the newspaper business taking into account the rapidly emerging social media platforms, which 10 years later are still on an upward growth trajectory, and incidentally, so is the news business. Having prophesied the obvious, these pundits – at least in Sri Lanka – forgot to predict that news organisations need not sit around and be fossilised like their political counterparts and that they have the option of choosing to embrace change and re-invent themselves in adapting to the new order. It is only those who chose not to who found themselves at a dead end, while others simply shifted gear and continued to drive on.

Now, let’s pause for a minute and consider the impact of change – with emphasis on the media landscape – on the political establishment in Sri Lanka over the course of the last decade. In fact, we were reminded of this topic while observing the media circus currently being enacted with regard to the country’s debt restructuring effort, which for all intents and purposes has progressed at a snail’s pace over the course of the last two years. 

Incidentally, the recent ha-ho over reaching an agreement with bilateral creditors is only half the story, with discussions with commercial creditors that account for a significant chunk of the external debt stock yet ongoing. But in a land where mediocrity rules and lack of achievement is compensated by spin doctors, this administrative formality in the restructuring effort is being hailed as a major victory for the nation. Interestingly enough, no one is yet privy to the contents of the agreement and it will be up to the parliamentary Opposition to demand it when the matter is taken up in the House next week. Here again it is unfortunate that the spin wizards have been successful in eclipsing the lack of transparency with hype about ‘success,’ while the majority of the media have also seemingly fallen for the bait.

For starters, the whole concept of unsustainable debt is usually bad news. Bankruptcy is worse. Stagnating in that state for over two years can in no way be counted as positive either. Therefore, while any efforts to get out of that state must necessarily be welcomed, it hardly qualifies to be classified as worthy of celebration. But in a country where economic bankruptcy has exposed its political bankruptcy, which in turn is now leading the nation towards moral bankruptcy with even the last remaining pillar of the public conscience, the Judiciary, increasingly becoming fair game for uncouth politicians, the current status quo cannot by any yardstick be described as warranting celebration. Yet, crackers were lit and milk rice consumed for the cameras, while the leadership announced the long-anticipated bilateral creditor agreement in accordance with the ongoing International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout programme.

It has been obvious for some time now that Sri Lanka’s ageing politicians have run out of ideas and have been clutching at straws to portray themselves in a positive light especially post the people’s uprising that effectively stripped them of their perceived cloak of greatness and invincibility. The task of restoring some degree of credibility appears to have been outsourced to the regime’s chosen spin doctors who faithfully appear to be doing their job, oblivious to the fact that flogging a dead horse can only go on for so long. 

Nevertheless, while the spin doctors resort to their old tricks of leading the nation down the garden path, there are an increasing number of those who refuse to be taken for a ride post-uprising and are patiently watching from the wings to see how far the latest circus will go. By attempting to spin anything and everything to its advantage, the regime is only making a bad case worse, as evidenced from the toxic fallout of the latest attempt at glorifying what is essentially a sad story. For, the failed attempt has somewhat managed to realign media focus on the greater problem: that of what caused the bankruptcy and those responsible and why the current regime is not saying a word about either, despite a Supreme Court ruling.

To state that the entire effort backfired badly is quite an understatement and a misadventure the spin masters will likely regret sooner than later given the imminent electoral ramifications. Rather than attempt to make light of something as acutely negative in both nature and perception as a debt default by portraying a partial restructuring agreement as ‘coming out of bankruptcy,’ which process is yet very much in the making and thereby literally jumping the gun, the spin masters appear to have picked the wrong tree. 

Instead, it would have been eminently better if the current leadership had simply used the opportunity to turn the spotlight on the dark and yet undocumented road that brought the country to this juncture – an unmitigated crisis which the nation could well have avoided. While those in power can continue to act as if deaf and dumb to the collective public demand for accountability and hope that fairytales manufactured by spin doctors will make that demand go away, it is unlikely to be the case as the regime is bound to find out if it cares to put its ears to the ground and not be fooled by its own ‘circus’. At the end of the day, politics is not for the fainthearted, for decisions have consequences and even though that has not been the case thus far in this country, it is clear that change is now at hand, notwithstanding the collective resistance of the majority of the political class.

At the very minimum, any attempt at holistic debt restructuring aimed at future, long-term debt sustainability must necessarily involve a comprehensive audit of debt stock, the purposes for which the colossal mountain of funds was sourced and then used, as it is the ordinary people who are being called upon to pay it back and therefore have all the right to know how their hard-earned money is being utilised, especially since the declaration of bankruptcy.

People will be curious to find out how a nation that was declared bankrupt with a debt stock of $ 80 billion two years ago is now being portrayed as no longer bankrupt with the debt stock having ballooned to a colossal $ 100 billion in the intervening period where no repayments have been made other than multilateral debt servicing. Both Parliament and the people remain in the dark as to how and why this is so. Given this worrying state of affairs, the artificial euphoria over the bilateral debt restructuring agreement is the equivalent of an announcement being made on a match being won while the scores are kept hidden. Therefore, to expect people to accept whatever is told to them by a regime that not only lacks credibility but also a mandate while ignoring the fine print will likely prove to be costly.

Finally, a word about the IMF and its intentions in bailing out this nation for the 17th time. It is clear that the current regime, like the one before, does not have any alternative to the Bretton Woods twins’ economic plans and seems happy in outsourcing the country’s macroeconomic management to it. However, it is this same entity which in 2015 came out with the 16th programme when the current President was then Prime Minister and kept piling on International Sovereign Bonds at commercial rates to the equivalent of over $ 5 billion. 

Knowing well the unsustainability of the practice, the IMF simply chose to look the other way, much the same way as it is doing today. Therefore, questions are going to be raised as to whose interests it puts first. Although its recent actions tend to favour the latter, as long as the powers that be are provided a lifeline to office and the spin doctors are unleashed to divert attention, the circus will go on.