The real problem with political dregs, especially the government types, is that they make a grand show of their bovine upbringing in public, oftentimes in a violent manner. Hardly a day passes without one of them running berserk and creating a scene somewhere much to the consternation of the public who bear the cost of maintaining them.

On Tuesday, Deputy Minister of Livestock Development Abdul Baiz on his way back home abused a policeman near Parliament for the crime of not going out of his way to remove a roadblock. The policeman, as we reported on Wednesday, politely told Baiz that he could not defy orders from on high. Piqued, Baiz ordered his guards to clear his path and vented his spleen on the poor policeman to his heart's content. Worse, he promised to remove, of all things, the policeman's trousers. We stop short of attempting a Freudian analysis of the deputy minister's predilection for removing another man's pants. Suffice it to say that we consider the livestock, whose development Baiz is in charge of, better behaved than most politicians, including ministers and their deputies.

If a parliamentarian cannot restrain himself without going on the rampage at a roadblock put up for the protection of politicians, how can the whole caboodle of ministers and MPs expect the public to keep their cool vis-à-vis road closures and all kinds of checks in the name of VIP security? The Parliament road remains closed for half an hour each in the morning and in the evening aggravating congestion in the city, when Parliament is in session. Tens of thousands of road users are affected by this harebrained scheme. In a previous comment we pointed out that while the security forces were waging war in the Vanni to open roads for the benefit of the northerners, roads in the city were being closed much to the inconvenience of the southerners.

People, we are sure, have no major issues with special traffic arrangements aimed at ensuring the safety of political and military leaders whom terrorists are zeroing in on. Their safety is a prerequisite for national security and therefore they must be protected at any cost. But, why on earth should each and every political clown be protected as if he or she were a national asset? We bet our bottom dollar (or rupee) that Prabhakaran will not expend bullets or human bombs on most politicians as they are an asset to the LTTE in that so long as the country is burdened with them it has no chance of recovery. Instead of sending assassins for them, Prabhakaran may consider making a payment to some of them in appreciation of their campaign to scuttle the country's anti-terror drive.

The police claim to have initiated an investigation into Tuesday's incident. A statement has been recorded from the policeman concerned, we are told. The poor man, we suppose, is faced with a double whammy. Having been insulted in public, he must now be under pressure from his superiors to desist from saying anything against Baiz so that they could save their skin without ruffling political feathers.

A few months ago we saw how the government silenced the Rupavahini workers, some of whom had come under goon attacks. President Mahinda Rajapaksa brought the victims and Minister Mervin Silva, who was accused of having a hand in the attacks, together at a meeting and settled the matter. Nothing has come of the police probes into those incidents! Is it that meetings between alleged perpetrators of violence and their victims at the behest of the powers that be have come to be deemed substitutes for police investigations and legal action?

The poor policeman concerned is without anyone to rise in his defence and therefore the servile police top brass licking political boots will find it easy to sweep the incident under the carpet at his expense.

We usually have nothing kind to say about the police. If Baiz had threatened to remove the trousers of the IGP or at least a senior DIG, we would not have cared to pen this comment; instead we would have gladly looked forward to the threat being carried out! We the public deserve some entertainment once in a way, don't we? But, since the person who happened to be at the receiving end of Baiz's menacing hubris was a hapless policeman, we cannot but condemn the incident and urge the champions of human rights to take up the victim's cause.

Even criminals in this country have their rights better protected than the ordinary police personnel. If a policeman threatens a criminal, scores of human rights activists descend on him and haul him up before Court. But, when a policeman is threatened by a politician or political thugs, there is no one to protect his interests. That is the predicament of the guardians of the law. No wonder that the police are highly demoralised.

This country has a history of betraying and sacrificing police and military personnel. In 1990, about 600 policemen were ordered to surrender to the LTTE which surrounded the police stations in the East, as the then government was desperate to salvage a crumbling truce. All of them were taken into the jungle and mowed down. The police pretend that massacre never occurred. They have never ever held a special commemoration for those victims. A memorial has been put up for the IPKF troops who died in action here and they deserve to be remembered. But, strangely, there has been no cenotaph for those policemen who were sacrificed on the altar of 'peace'.

It is reported that a witch-hunt is being planned against the policeman who refused to give in to Baiz. The bludgeon of parliamentary privileges is likely to be used against him. Should any such attempt be ever made, it would be imperative that the media, civil organisations and the right thinking politicians, if any, stand up for the policeman. If the police bigwigs commit the shameless act of letting down their man, they will have no need for their trousers in the future.

Finally, it behoves the unruly political nitwits who are all mouth and no trousers to remember that their trousers will be removed by the irate public undergoing untold hardships, given half a chance.