MY STORY by Lalith Gunarathana.
Only a few know about my last days in the Army, and I wish to put it on record so that many who knew only a part of it can also complete the picture.
I was the Military Coordinating Officer for the Monaragala District in 1988, conducting anti-insurgency (mostly hearts and minds) operations. I was given slightly less than 200 troops to cover the whole district. Fortunately, I had some terrific young Officers as my detachment commanders.
The Killing List
One day, Ranjan Wijeratne, President Premadasa’s blue-eyed boy and strongman, handed me a piece of paper with 64 names written on it, and said, “I say, these people should be eliminated by tomorrow evening”. I looked at it and told him point-blank that I would not do it. When he asked me why, I told him that I was a professional soldier and would not kill innocent people, to which he replied, “You better have it done when I call you tomorrow evening”.
The list comprised mostly of the Government’s political opponents, beginning with Sumedha Mudalali (the shadow SLFP MP of Monaragala), his brother, and his wife, Sumedha Jayasena (who later contested the Monaragala seat and won, and was appointed a Junior Minister in CBK’s Government.)
As stated to Ranjan Wijeratne earlier, I did nothing about the list other than getting my intelligence officer to find out who these people were. I found out that about 55 people in that list were political opponents, and the rest were friends of the 55.
The following evening, Ranjan Wijeratne called me and inquired whether I had completed the job. I answered in the negative and reminded him that I had also told him so the previous afternoon. Suddenly, he lost his temper and began berating me for not carrying out the President’s orders, implying that he was merely passing down his instructions. I laughed, and that ‘pissed’ him off.
” Kill Them or Get Out”
He then said,” I say, I am also a Lt Col and you know, I can do a better job than you buggers”, to which I replied, “You were trained in Vavuniya for 6 days by a Signals Officer and how can you even claim to be better than a new second lieutenant in military knowledge?’
Then came a barrage of slang and cuss words (filth) which were very abusive verbally. All this time, the dialogue was in English. So was the filth he uttered. Perhaps, the school he attended polished his garbage language skills. Being an Anandian, my trash language was not as good as his, and therefore I decided to give him back with the same treatment in Sinhala. By God, that sounded much better than the English version.
Saying, “I will get you kicked out of there,” and hung up.
The following day, even without notice, Col. SMA Jayawardena was helicoptered to Monaragala to bring me back to Colombo. I did not have any prior notice. I explained everything to Col. Jayawardena and refused to go with him, saying that I would come down to Colombo in three days. When asked why, I said that I wanted to go around the district and thank all those who helped us and the detachments in many ways, and introduce the new Coordinating Officer before I left. Col. Jayawardena spoke to the Army Commander and got my request approved.
I went to Colombo as promised, three days later. Drove into Army Headquarters and handed over my version of the whole incident, inclusive of the list given to me and a report of a previous verbal skirmish I had with Ranjan Wijeratne at the Pelawatte Sugar Corporation Headquarters at Pelawatte. All reports and signals that I had sent previously about experiencing political pressure, including one to General. Cyril Ranatunga and the list of 64 names were handed over to the Army Headquarters.
How the Army Treated Me – in short.
I had to report to the Army Headquarters (AHQ) daily.
The tension was so high that even my colleagues working there were reluctant to communicate with me. I spent most of my time in the Officers’ Mess expecting a call at any moment with the news of my new appointment.
It was the same routine for almost a month.
General. Wanasinghe had taken over as the new Army Commander, and perhaps he was busy with his work and kissing the Premadasa butt. He was a card-carrying member of the UNP and wasn’t afraid of showing his membership card, even when in uniform. Some officers will back me on this.
Almost a month passed, and I was still without an appointment. I then decided to retire from the Army.
When I put my papers up, political pressure and interference were stated as the reason. General Wanasinghe summoned me to his office and got me to change it to ‘Personal Reasons’. This I did.
It was only then that he realized that I had not addressed the request for retirement to the President, which is the correct protocol. He wanted me to change it, but I refused. I said, “I am retiring because of him and his thugs”.
He said that I might not be granted the authority to retire. “Let’s see how it goes, sir”, was my reply.
I got this extra courage because General Ranatunga had told me, “I think they are gunning for you,” and I knew my request would have been forwarded to the President’s Secretariat even if I had addressed it to a clerk at AHQ.
I never thought of retiring since I had already planned on being a lifer in the Army. I must get my home affairs in order, look for a new job, and carry out many more post-Army preparations. Most of all, to adjust myself to work out of uniform.
As I thought, my retirement request was approved within six days, which I assume was done in comparatively record time. So quick.
Only one senior officer had the decency to call me and inquire about what happened and wish me good luck. Even my Regiment that I served with utmost loyalty and with honor ill-treated me. When I went to the Regimental Headquarters to get my clearance, the Commanding Officer (CO) was brutalizing Kalutara, and the acting CO refused to give me clearance because I had to return a ‘Silva Compass’ even after I promised to find him one. Fortunately, a student of mine from another Regiment helped me out, and finally, I was cleared.
This is only a summary of my story, which I thought that at least my friends should know. The only ‘recorded’ case. I should also mention that a good friend slightly junior to me also faced a similar situation.
I was an average officer minding my own business, but the Government at that time and the Army wouldn’t let me be.