Chandrika Kumaratunga's Aspirations for A UNESCO Post on The Rocks!

By Darmitha-Kotte

Chandrika Kumaratunga was in New York to attend Clinton Global Initiative 2nd Annual Meeting on the invitation of former US President Bill Clinton. According to a Daily Mirror report dated 20th September 2006, " The Clinton Global Initiative invites a selected group of distinguished and dedicated world leaders, including current and former heads of state, business executives, intellectuals and academics, to exchange ideas with a view of identifying solutions to selected global issues, Ms. Kumaratunga's office said yesterday. She will be in New York till Friday Ms. Kumaratunga has been invited by President Clinton to participate as a panelist for a working group on "Mitigating Religious and Ethnic Conflict at the annual meeting……………….." How can she mitigate when she was part of it?

Mr. Bill Clinton has obviously made the biggest mistake when selecting " former heads of state" when he invited Chandrika Kumaratunga to participate at the 2nd Annual Meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative! Why select a former Head of State who has made absolutely no contribution towards the development or unity of Sri Lanka? The people of this country are the true judges of whether a leader is good or bad and Chandrika Kumaratunga has certainly not earned that respect from Sri Lanka! By inviting her together with other dignitaries, Mr. Bill Clinton has actually insulted the other invitees as well. Other than to " add fuel to the religious and ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka", she has not done anything positive or constructive to any problem in this country. Her tenure of office was abundant only in negative things like intrigue, manipulations for personal gains, vindictiveness, high-handedness and utter disrespect even for the Constitution of the country. Her contributions only bring about ignominy and if those are the qualifications Mr. Bill Clinton wants within his organization- he is more than welcome to take her in. But, please ensure that her work must be outside Sri Lanka because we the citizens of Sri Lanka are fully aware of her incompetence!

The more important agenda on her trip to New York, was to try and use "her charm" on the Head of UNESCO Ms. Ann Veneman and get a commitment for her to gain entry into the UN organization not just " as a roving ambassador" because that is too insignificant a role for Chandrika Kumaratunga who does not know her own limitations! According to news reports in the Sunday Times of 1st October titled "CBK meets UNICEF head in NY", and Ceylon Daily News of 3rd October, 2006 titled "Ex-President seeks UN role " we understand that she made a courtesy call on the head of UNICEF and had said " she will do her bit to increase the UN children's agency's profile in Asia." Quite rightly as reported, "Ms Veneman had thanked Ms. Kumaratunga for her grand gesture towards UNICEF but made no offer of a part-time or full-time job for the former Sri Lankan President." It is further stated in the article that "UNICEF officials dismissed previous speculative reports that Ms. Kumaratunga had been offered the post of South Asian director general of UNICEF saying that there was no such post in the agency."

Even if there was such a post, Chandrika Kumaratunga should not be offered any post related to Asia, as she has absolutely no idea of the indigenous problems of this region. We have no idea whether or not she understands the problems of other regions but she could just bluff her way through without messing around in Asia! Any human being with an aorta of education must know his or her own limitations and try to work within those limitations. She should look back at the 11 years during which she was the Executive President of this country and analyze sincerely and honestly, the grand opportunity she lost to serve her Motherland by acting in a high-handed manner, not taking advise given to her, misleading the citizens including the Buddhist Clergy of this country, manipulating her Cabinet of Ministers into granting her undue privileges which no previous Executive President has enjoyed, and worst of all by amassing wealth through commissions obtained through government deals which were handled by "her selected agents" to the detriment of the good name of the country and the citizens of this country. These are heinous crimes committed against the State and cannot ever be condoned! Due to this "service to the nation" she is now facing many legal battles for "misappropriations" which truly prove her devious nature!

Having had the good fortune of being a daughter of parents who were both Prime Ministers of this country (and who brought dignity and respect to Sri Lanka), it is very sad for us to see that Chandrika Kumaratunga has never inculcated any of the good qualities of her late parents. We Sri Lankans are ashamed at having tolerated a leader like her in this country. Our fervent hope was that she would have "followed in the footsteps of her late parents" but we were fooled. We do not wish to see organizations like the United Nations or even Bill Clinton Initiative being fooled in the way, we the citizens of Sri Lanka have been manipulated.

Respected world bodies like the United Nations and its affiliated organizations should protect their reputation and credibility and refrain from offering any post to people like Chandrika Kumaratunga who have proved that they have no sincerity either towards their Motherland or towards humanity at large let alone children of the world! Her absolute incompetence was amply witnessed by all, during the aftermath of the Tsunami of December 2004. Her major concern was how to divert the incoming funds to enable her to manipulate. If anyone were to believe that she has experience in "Disaster Management"- they are only being duped by her "charm" -that is THE GREATEST DISASTER!