In the Shadow of a PEOPLE’S PRESIDENT
by Evans Gunalal Cooray
Published by Vijitha Yapa Publications
Printed by Tharanjee Prints, Sri Lanka

The story is more about he who cast the shadow than he who was in the shadow. Evans Gunalal Cooray writes about his "master and guru", Ranasinghe Premadasa, President of Sri Lanka, brutally assassinated by Tamil Tiger terrorists fifteen years ago. Into the narrative of the life and times of the President, the author weaves an outline of his own life, linking the two men’s outlook on issues common to both, albeit at two different levels – issues such as work ethics, politics, power, friends, and enemies. The intermingling of the two life stories dramatizes the general narrative.

The prose is mundane in the manner of news reporting which is the author’s training. Sometimes it takes the style of a diarist rather than the engaging flow of a story. Cooray is at a loss as to how to structure his story, like a roving reporter inundated with news from different sources. He seems to wobble under the weight of accumulated minutiae. Particularly weak in presenting historical perspectives, the author is too focused on his hero’s outer appeal, losing the general view. He fails to exhume the inner intelligence of the President’s mind which had serious consequences for the future of the country. This is a pity because Cooray had access to Premadasa’s mind over a long period of association. Chapter One is tantalizingly set up but the following chapters are frustratingly tentative and fail to draw the larger conclusions on Premadasa’s impact on national history. But for the most part, the story commands attention and draws the reader into a cultural dialogue.  I find it difficult to categorize the book in a particular genre and am tempted to call it a hybrid.

Evans Cooray paints his patron as a patriot among the people – the resort of all politicians, patrician and proletarian alike. He confirms that Ranasinghe Premadasa was an ambitious man of unsophisticated background who clawed his way to the pinnacle of power through the force of determination but lacked the finesse to manage power without overtly, even crudely, imposing his authority. The picture that emerges is of a politician who brooked no dissent and viewed opposition with an inferiority complex vis-a-vis those whom he considered upper class, uppity upstarts, conspiring to usurp his hard won position. In the author’s eye Premadasa was a paradox — an authoritarian, yet insecure man who sought to downplay his small beginnings even to the extent of disowning his elementary schools to adopt a college he hardly saw the inside of. He was a top-down autocrat, not a bottom-up democrat.

In the process of upholding his hero as a champion of the powerless and voiceless, the author feeds on the crumbs of privilege that are thrown to little bureaucrats.  Undoubtedly a clever Press Officer, Evans Cooray sadly mistook the role of a public servant to mean that of a private servant of a politician, designing election posters, running errands and even baby sitting. He says "when serving a minister you cannot detach yourself from politics" to justify his sacrifice of integrity and the time honoured public service code of impartiality. Yet, he takes umbrage at his being sent on compulsory leave after a change of government, calling it "sheer political victimization". He misses the central point that a public servant’s business is to serve the public, not to pamper individual politicians.

I had the pleasure of getting to know Evans Cooray when both of us were recruited as Press Officers in the decade of the sixties, identified by Minister Sarath Amunugama, as the "golden era of the Department of Information".  He was a warm, friendly, pleasant and amiable person who quickly established himself as an efficient worker.  I was assigned to the Ministry of Agriculture under Minister M. D. Banda and my principal task was to publicize the "Food Drive" spearheaded by Prime Minister Dudley Senanayake. The public servants in the Ministry, including me, never sought to serve the Minister personally, only the Ministry officially.  We did our jobs with loyalty to the task at hand, not to the Minister at the helm.

Sometime later, I was sent on compulsory leave without a stated cause, notice being served by the Information Ministry Secretary, Anandatissa de Alwis, over a grave at the Colombo cemetery where I was at a funeral! In fact, the media had the story before I learned my fate and I was told of it by Manik De Silva, then a brilliant reporter at the Observer, who used to meet me regularly at the Agriculture Ministry. No one was willing to tell me the cause but I gathered that the Prime Minister, Dudley Senanayake waved a piece of paper at a Cabinet meeting and bellowed "How can we have people like this in our government?"

Apparently he was riled by a secret report alleging that a "Ratnapala" was at Socialist meetings chaired by a former Minister, T. B. Illangaratne. This was a total falsehood as I never attended such meetings and was never a member of any political Party, though I had friends across the political spectrum. Many years later, I have reason to believe that the secret report had confused me with a journalist, Ratnapala Vithane. I paid dearly over the years for that wrong report without ever knowing why. Cooray offers a paean to Dudley Senanayake as a democrat, a "gentleman politician", "free of political bickering". This episode exposes Dudley was none of what Cooray claims and even if that false report were true, his actions reveal an anti-democratic Dudley, intolerant of different political views, given to political bickering.

Premadasa’s legacy is that of a stern disciplinarian, a hard task master and a micro-manager. Cooray handles this aspect of the President’s career well. Several anecdotes are carefully scripted as if Cooray feared that his patron’s ghost was looking over his shoulder. However, the serious student of politics of that era will remember Premadasa for his courage in standing up to J. R. Jayewardene who sought to crush political opponents. The greatest service that Premadasa rendered his country was in evicting the Indian occupying forces that had been foist upon the island by an unequal treaty, force fed to an intimidated JRJ. Premadasa freed Sri Lanka from the ignominy of becoming a client state of the acerbic Indira’s faux Gandhian India. Cooray’s reporting of Premadasa’s rationale for ousting the Indians is not rigorously researched and misses what might have been the greatest tribute to his master. At that time a leading member of Nepal’s Royal family looked me in the eye with great admiration and said "Sri Lanka has done what Nepal has been trying to do for years. Once the Indians get a foot hold, they never leave". Whatever Premadasa’s faults and frailties, Sri Lanka should indeed, gratefully instal him in the pantheon of national heroes. In Shakespeare’s words "How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is / To have a thankless child !" (King Lear, 1605)

Evans Cooray moans having made enemies during his years of service with Premadasa, as indeed Premadasa himself was despised during his tenure as President. Evans has found solace in exile in London. He can be proud of having produced this salute to his idol – warts and all, for "Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others" (Cicero, "Pro Plancio", 54 B.C.) This book adds value to the political bibliography of the country and should find a place in every library.  The themes are profound but emotional; intriguing and insinuating; brilliant at times and tragic at other times. Overall, Evans Cooray has crafted a story that is fascinating. He has liberated himself from the past and deserves admiration for a public confession.