The Lesser Banda fears for his life

R Chandrasoma

Anura Bandaranayaka is mightily peeved that his force of bodyguards has been reduced from a praetorian hundred or so to a mere brace of common cops. It appears that the Dying Monster of the North is out for his blood (supposedly 40th in a list potential victims) and he declares with vehemence that his untimely exit from this world (if that sad eventuality should come to pass) must be unequivocally attributed to the Police Boss or his underlings who ordered the reduction in the force protecting him.

Statistical calculations are not the forte of politicians, but Mr AB must be extraordinarily and fearfully naïve to suppose that he is in any real danger of extermination, The probability of a leading politician being killed by suicide bomber (we exclude Tamil politicians and men in uniform) is now triflingly small. Since he is 40th on a list of targets of diminishing importance, the likelihood of Mr AB being attacked is truly minuscule. Age, ponderosity and lifestyle must be factored in when assessing the force of mortality and it appears that these easily outweigh the risk from Prabhakaran’s explosives.

More importantly, why should Prabhakaran find Mr AB worthy of the powder and shot involved in blasting him into oblivion? He and his famous sister have unhesitatingly declared that the Elamist enterprise has its sources in the disaffection of the Tamils within an uncaring and hegemonist Sinhala State. They are convinced that military action against Prabhakaran is an error and a misconstrual of the true state of affairs in Sri Lanka. Last (but not least) Mr AB is a great friend of the greatest friend of Prabhakaran –Ranil Wickramasinghe. Surely, this friendship is a better guarantor of survival than a hundred additional cops.