“Green Card-holders married to foreign women who have lived for a long time away from Sri Lanka, after they went abroad as students should not be appointed as ambassadors, for the USA or any other country. We just had a case like that recently. The maintenance of embassies is a costly affair. This is why some countries join together in renting one building and share office space.”_________________________________
by C. Wijeyawickrema
by C. Wijeyawickrema
(March 07, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) In the sad saga of the destruction of Ceylon/Sri Lanka by partisan politics, the foreign ministry has evaded notice for a long time—until the non-traditional approaches of Rajiv Wijesinghe and Dayan Jayatileka. The late professors W.S. Karunaratne and Ediriweera Sarachchandra were ambassadors but the foreign service establishment did not and could not openly engage in bad-mouthing them.
In the past, a president spoke of the foreign ministry as a place full of mistresses and friends. It remained a place for the remnants of the Colombo upper class because without English one cannot go beyond the janitorial service in that building. The ambassadors and other officers selected on merit or connections generally did a lousy job for the salaries and perks they received. It helped some in giving a foreign education to their children.
What Dayan Jayatileka is facing today is no different from what the late Wilmot A. Perera faced when he was sent as the first ambassador from Ceylon to China. The establishment of diplomatic relations with China was a historic achievement by SWRD even though the Rubber-Rice Agreement had been concluded before 1956. Wilmot P quit his post finally after losing a long "battle" to get a public relations officer of his choice appointed. He had obstacle after obstacle placed in his way by the Colombo office. That was the power of the foreign ministry establishment!
During 1961-63 the late Prof. Gunapala Piyasena Malalasekera was the UN ambassador and Charlie Mahendran was the Third Secretary. When GP was contesting for the president’s job of UNO, somebody in his UNO office sent the wrong canvassing letters to the wrong countries! If a letter that was supposed to go to China was sent to Russia one can understand, but if it was sent to UK or USA it was a disaster. And disaster happened and his candidacy became a joke. Yet nobody was fired.
My next recollection was a disgrace. It was Gorbachev’s visit to the U.S. Congress on May 15, 1992. An Asian-looking man in a three-piece suit tried to enter the barricade and the policeman prevented him. Then the man tried to force his way through. The policeman took him by the collar and threw him out. Rather than going home the man came back to the policeman and declared "I am the ambassador from Sri Lanka. What is your name?" Dan Rather who showed the whole incident on CBS national television asked the policeman, "Why did you not allow him in? He said he is the ambassador from Sri Lanka." The policeman said, "He was two hours late and we were told not to allow anybody in after the time allowed." To date I do not know who this ambassador was and what punishment he was given by the then Foreign Minister.
A friend of mine who went to a trade show in USA about ten years ago told me how the trade representatives who came from Sri Lanka could not speak English and avoided customers who had questions about Sri Lankan products. Some minister sent some of his catchers at the expense of the country’s reputation and gain. While intelligence and English has no connection, for a trade show in an English-speaking country, to send people who cannot speak English or broken English at the very least, was a crime.
Green Card-holders married to foreign women who have lived for a long time away from Sri Lanka, after they went abroad as students should not be appointed as ambassadors, for the USA or any other country. We just had a case like that recently. The maintenance of embassies is a costly affair. This is why some countries join together in renting one building and share office space. If in London a rent of 8000 pounds a month is paid when it could be reasonably done with 2000, it is a crime and a sin to waste the money sent to Sri Lanka by village women who clean toilets in Arab houses .
The Mahinda Rajapakse administration has begun initiating real changes in the foreign ministry and this must be continued despite resistance from those in the foreign service who got their jobs by proper or improper means - because after some mixing, both groups become one in protecting their common goal of safeguarding their perks. (Via Email)
- Sri Lanka Guardian
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