Darshanie Ratnawalli
So, have you read Ranil’s Al Jazeera interview?
Has anyone who is expressing an opinion on Ranil’s performance at his interview with Al Jazeera’s Mehdi Hasan ingested the full content of this media circus? Even people like Himal Kotelawala (sympathetic to RW), Lakshan Wickrema (derisive of RW) and Crystal Koelmeyer (sympathetic to RW), whom I have so far read on this subject had not.
There is an advice I’d like to give people who are serious about analyzing video interviews – transcribe them using a speech to text software or manually. Then run your eyes through the transcript several times, then, only then, can you get an idea of which way the wind is blowing, what ignorances are the interviewer and interviewee prey to and which of them have good faith.
Crystal Koelmeyer and Himal Kotelawala, while sympathetic to the beleaguered interviewee, had said Ranil was unsuccessful in facing this interview. I did not see (upon reading the transcript) any such lack of success. I believe people are more influenced by stage effects and Ranil’s style of delivery, which is in typical old school Sri Lankan English register (which does not sound very suave to modern audiences brought up with international media English. For example, Ranil says at one point; “If I go to answer, you will shout on me”. This is an evocative glimpse of the Sri Lankan English register spoken by SL’s privileged Old Guard, which can appear ungrammatical and uncouth to a modern listener unfamiliar with that milieu).
I attach a video clip from the interview which I have transcribed manually.
Mehedi Hasan – SL’s brutal civil war lasted 26 years. It claimed the lives of estimated 100,000 people or more. You yourself tried to broker a ceasefire with the LTTE, also known as the Tamil Tigers, in 2002. Last year when you were president, the UN said; to date, the government has rarely even acknowledged the serious violations that occurred in the conflict or provided victims with adequate redress.
In the 16 years since the end of the war, you’ve been the prime minister four times and the president once. Can you tell our audience today how you believe justice’s been served on your watch to the victims of the civil war?
Ranil W – No contest. UN has said that. I am not contesting. Next question please
MH – That was not my question. My question is how’s justice been served on your watch to the victims?
RW – I said no contest.
MH – I don’t know what that means.
RW – I mean if I go to answer you’ll shout on me. So I said guilty as charged. No contest, whatever it is. Get to the next question.
MH – So you believe the victims of the civil war have been given justice?
RW – No I don’t believe anything. You are not giving me a chance to speak. So I am not saying anything. I said no contest. So bring the next question please.
MH – Doesn’t it look a bit childish for a former president of a country to not be able to answer a question?”
&&& &&&
So Crystal, Lakshan, Himal and countless thousands who’ve commented on social media on this interview, do not tell me you didn’t spot this? If you had read a transcript you’d have spotted this parallel worldliness of Hasan. RW has been the PM four times since the end of war? Where, in which parallel world?
In this world RW became PM just twice after the end of war. The first time was in 2015. That was the only time he served as a head of government (sortta) for a full term since the end of the war. During this time, his government co-sponsored the accountability resolution passed in the UN against Sri Lanka. It was a massive show of commitment for accountability and justice by the Ranil led government, which also and agreed to allow foreign judges into the system to inquire into the allegations of war crimes.
That unusual commitment was held as one of the reasons by Prez Sirisena for firing RW and appointing the 52 days’ government and it was a major reason why the good governance coalition failed and made way for Gota’s election.
The populace was simply not ready for that kind of dedication to accountability and transitional Justice, seeing it as treason.
This so-called Oxford Educated journalist Hasan is so clueless in the asking of this question from RW and there is no redress, no satisfactory response to this type of ignorance. Except to say, no contest, guilty as charged.
If y’all would read the transcript of this interview, there are enough instances similar to this, where the glaring ignorance of the so-called Oxford alumnus and intolerance to truth are painfully obvious.
TAKE NOTE …. of these VIDEO CLIPS: … [to be added] …. Alas blocked by COMPUTER MALWARE.
