So that saintly MP has thrown a spanner in government’s works again. The pious member lashed out against a battery of citizens from journalists and lawyers to members of his own estate. Last week, much of his grievance was about the silence of the media and the judicial-legal fraternity on the harassment of a bastion – no pun intended – of the free media.
There is a background to this story and I would thank you to research it on the jungle telegraph, as mainstream media has gone commentary-dark. Or at least watch the video of the honourable gentleman speak his mind in the august (ahem, I don’t think so!) assembly last week…
On behalf of my fellows in the Fourth Estate, I suppose one must be grateful to the sterling MP in question for stalwartly pointing out the error of our ways. At least, unlike those among his learnèd (I use the term loosely) friends across the aisle, he did it with strong words; not with flung chairs or House-made chilli cocktails.
He was at pains to point out the unconscionable silence of journalists at a time when one of their number – as well as the former head of her erstwhile media establishment – were the subject of a witch-hunt by the incumbent administration. Of course, this begs the question of how that regime came to be in power to the extent it is today and who, by design or by default, helped them to get there in style.
Prologue
For those who came in late, or have lived in a fantasy-land where there are two principled parties with opposing ideological platforms thrashing out matters in the national interest, let me interest you strangely otherwise.
The older king grown arrogant and his monstrous regime were ousted by an unlikely alliance of unalike allies. But far from being the white knights they purported to be, those motley usurpers fell out with each other soon enough. And not before another brace of criminal heists had been carried out in the name of Good Governance (well, there was a little of that, too). Now the old rogues want to hamstring the old ones… and vice versa.
The sad thing is that those who genuinely believed in them, as well as others who championed their cause, fell victim to the chicanery of the deep state or a chummy brotherhood that unites the ruling classes of every hue.
Bar 19A – and there’s some doubt over that, isn’t there – and RTI, little good came out of GG. And those who threw in their lot with the Good Guys came a-cropper in the end for their pains in supporting a principle –unafraid. Because it seems the ‘capo di capo tutti’ are in cahoots with each other – we see it every time they meet and greet like long-lost pals, rather than political opponents.
Clear? As mud, which is the lifeblood of the political culture we live in.
That is it in a nutshell. Today the boot – or jackboot – is on the other foot. However much they may promise media freedom or the unfettered expression of ideas, these two political camps brook no variation from the theme.
On the one hand, the lesser of the two evils in terms of governing coalitions would employ their partisan friends (or should I say party hacks or media-based ideologues) to press the case in print against their political opponents. The less said about the other camp the better; pushing you up against the wall as they are wont to.
Which is a large part of Eran Wickramaratne MP’s grouse against the media. That it is silent about the political persecution of a former Observer editor and her boss, as well as an ex-CID bigwig to boot. For the love of God, he can’t understand why these innocents are being hounded.