Monday 3 April 2023

 

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02 April 2023

Gajalakshmi Paramasivam

 



 

 

SRI LANKA’S HUMAN RIGHTS DAMAGED BY LAWYERS

The wise say ‘Live in the present’. What does that mean to me? Living in the present reality, to my mind, means – to live in truth in its the form of my current environment.

The above picture in the Sri Lankan Human Rights Commission’ – published on 06 April 2019. It is a picture that appears on the front page of the website, under ‘current activities.  The note goes as follows:

The delegation of the UN Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture (SPT) visited the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka on 04 April 2019. The delegation comprised of Mr Victor Zaharia, (Head of Delegation), Mr. Staybhooshun Gupt Domah, Mr. Petros Michaelides, and Ms. June Lopez. The SPT Delegation met with Dr. Deepika Udagama, Chairperson and Commissioners Ms. Ramani Muttetuwegama and Ms. Ambika Satkunanathan and discussed issues of mutual concern and interest.

 I met Dr Deepika Udagama, then the Chairperson, through, Sri Lanka Reconciliation Forum, Sydney. As per my current knowledge, the lady resigned from her ‘position  of the head of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka’ in August 2020.

Hence, to my mind, the Human Rights .Commission of Sri Lanka, is misleading the people by showing the past as present.

The most basic human right is the right to live as per one’s own truth and nothing but the truth. The right to as per the law is NOT  a human right. It is a requirement of the State towards following in common pathway.

In Sri Lanka, there are big gaps between the written law and belief of law-makers the laws they make. The controversial ‘Prevention of Terrorism Act’ (PTA) is a good example of this. Alleged Human  Rights groups who do not define  their own truth / belief but use UN policies, would damage  the investments made by those who are true to themselves but have been punished by courts, using the law written by corrupt politicians. The stronger the desire for money, the shorter the gap between cause and effect.

Last week’s ‘Face the Nation’ program under the title ‘Debt restructuring & reforms: What must Sri Lanka do?’ was about restructuring State Owned Enterprises.  Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) were mentioned. In my response to the Auditor General on this, in 2003, I emphasized that KPI’s were for owners and not for auditors. Ref Appendix.

The Face the Nation group discussed also the need to separate Government from interfering with Management of these organisations. The two policies contradict each other.  KPIs are internal indicators of Belief. They are driven by feelings and NOT proof. One who requires proof is an outsider. Hence the Doctrine of Separation of Powers is applied between the Judiciary and the Executive Government. The latter is the maker and the former is the outsider who measures the performance for external purposes. Courts need evidence but owners are driven by indicators.

 

When these State owned enterprises showed Economic losses they indicated losses in government also. One who feels ownership in both would have picked up the early warning signs of the National level collapse that followed.  As per Wikipedia - News First or News 1st,  is a Sri Lankan news organization owned by the Capital Maharaja Organization Ltd.

To the extent they are economically successful their Energies would influence Privately owned Airlines. State owned Enterprises need to be managed by those who feel ownership in Sri Lanka as well as the Service being provided. In the case of the National Carrier the Service has to be of global standards in every aspect.  If this is unrealistic, then we need to stop importing global policies as if we are of global standards.

 Lawyers who are clever often kill the rights of the simple believer at grassroots level and thus damage Human Rights of the believer. The Prescription Ordinance 1872 of Sri Lanka is all about belief being superior to money. All Sri Lankan lawyers need to be guided by this.

 

Appendix

Mr. Sendt  - the NSW Auditor General, wrote on 20 November 2003 in response to my Public demand for him to pay his Dues as a Professional Accountant::

Ms Param, I fully understand that auditors are not to participate in the management of the entities they audit. That is basic. What I said in my report is that external financial reports only give a partial view of the performance of many public entities. Such entities are not established to earn a profit or a return on assets, but to provide services to the public. So to give a true and fair view of how well they are providing services, they also produce non-financial performance indicators. If financial reports are required to be audited – to give the public confidence in their accuracy – then so too should the performance indicators. I fail to see how you can state that this is participating in the management of the entity.

Bob Sendt

NSW Auditor General

My response to the above indicates the deep wisdom I have in Audit and Compliance, largely based on my Sri Lankan training:

Thank you Mr. Sendt for  the prompt response. Most progressive organizations produce both – Financial and Non-Financial Performance Indicators. They  are both for MANAGEMENT purposes and reflect the THINKING and WORK_IN_PROGRESS. If you use Performance Indicators – then you are thinking with them. This is like the Executive Government participating in the Judicial process. Your Non-Financial Reports are based on the Legal records that these organizations are required to maintain – such as the Recruitment and Employee Assessment records. Where there is a big gap between Law and Practice – it requires YOUR staff to do the additional work. Taking the Performance Indicators distracts you away from this work. It is in breach of the Doctrine of Separation of  Powers. These organizations must be allowed to confidentially do the cooking and it’s up to your staff to do the spy work from the finished product to the LAW and not to their dreams and goals. You are seeking the short path because your staff are not trained to find out from the client staff what is going on. Staff often ‘hide’ information from you because you are third party. So they should. That way your staff would improve their skills. Using client-staff’s work-in-progress deters your staff from thinking through their own specialty = AUDIT on the basis of existing LAW. Then we would become a uniform society instead of a diverse society challenging each other – you within the existing law and the operational staff towards tomorrow’s laws. Challenging leads to creativity – as you can see from me. Gandhi also said that the night he was thrown out of the first class compartment of the South African RAILWAYS was his most creative experience.

You need to get the client organization to publish their non-financial reports that are mandatorily maintained. Public service organizations primarily make goodwill. This can also be positive or negative – profits or losses. They are collected together and are balanced with the total costs through Common Funds. It will be useful for you to develop a standard dollar value for these legal requirements so the People can SEE and know the Truth. Your role is not to help them make a profit but to report whether they are and how much. How about doing one on UNSW? Or State Rail?

Thank you again for responding. It has helped deeply.

Regards,

Gaja ( effectively in custody)

 

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