I heard this on the BBC a few nights ago.
It is by Lasantha Wickrematunge
“No other profession calls on its practitioners to lay down their lives for their art save the armed forces – and, in Sri Lanka, journalism. Electronic and print institutions have been burned, bombed, sealed and coerced. Countless journalists have been harassed, threatened and killed. It has been my honour to belong to all those categories, and now especially the last.
“It is well known that I was on two occasions brutally assaulted, while on another my house was sprayed with machine-gun fire. In all these cases, I have reason to believe the attacks were inspired by the government. When finally I am killed, it will be the government that kills me.
“The irony in this is that, unknown to most of the public, President Mahinda Rajapaksa and I have been friends for more than a quarter-century. A few remarks to him would therefore be in order here.
“In the wake of my death I know you will make all the usual sanctimonious noises and call upon the police to hold a swift and thorough inquiry. But like all the inquiries you have ordered in the past, nothing will come of this one, too.
“As for me, I have the satisfaction of knowing that I walked tall and bowed to no man. And I have not travelled this journey alone. Fellow journalists in other branches of the media walked with me: most are now dead, imprisoned without trial or exiled in far-off lands. You will never be allowed to forget that my death took place under your watch. As anguished as I know you will be, I also know that you will have no choice but to protect my killers: you will see to it that the guilty one is never convicted. You have no choice.
“As for the readers of the Sunday Leader, what can I say but thank you for supporting our mission. We have espoused unpopular causes; stood up for those too feeble to stand up for themselves; locked horns with the high-and-mighty so swollen with power that they have forgotten their roots; exposed corruption and the waste of your hard-earned tax rupees; and made sure that whatever the propaganda of the day, you were allowed to hear a contrary view.
“For this I — and my family — have paid the price that I had long known I would one day have to pay. I am, and have always been, ready for that. What am I among so many? It has long been written that my life would be taken, and by whom. All that remained to be written was when.
“That the Sunday Leader will continue fighting the good fight, too, is written. For I did not fight this fight alone. Many more of us have to be — and will be — killed before the Leader is laid to rest. I hope my assassination will be seen not as a defeat of freedom, but an inspiration for those who survive to step up their efforts. Indeed, I hope that it will help galvanise forces that will usher in a new era of human liberty in our beloved motherland. I also hope it will open the eyes of your president to the fact that however many are slaughtered in the name of patriotism, the human spirit will endure and flourish.”
