Rajiva Wijesinha

“ At the time there would have been those who would have resented this as unwarranted interference rather than a disinterested suggestion at a time of national crisis.
Now however the crisis is patent, and I believe young Ranil could do with a great deal of advice from outside the inner circle to which he has restricted himself for the last eighteen months. He will not of course take it because he has always known best, and observing evidence to the contrary has never come naturally to him. ”

“ But the claims of the Tigers, both the factual claims of incompetence which he has to accept, and the theoretical claims of quasi-sovereignty which he must reject, may induce even that narrowest of minds to expand ever so slightly. ”

“ I am not sure that Tissaranee is entirely right in assuming that Ranil is psychologically incapable of the type of flexibility necessary for this type of arrangement. After all he has come on a long way since the gung ho days of the eighties when he followed J R blindly. And even though, as Tissaranee suggests, he learnt little from Premadasa about people centred development, he has at least shown himself far more liberal in his approach to the media and the judiciary than one would have expected from his J R days. ”