Sri Lanka needs one visionary and hundreds of missionaries

“Where there is no vision, people perish.” This is the belief and the conviction of the one of the most dynamic and greatly successful kings who ever lived in Israel, King Solomon. He was able to reign for over four decades and build the nation of Israel at that time into one of the most prosperous and most feared nations. 

Vacancy for a full-time visionary for ‘Sri Lanka Inc’

A visionary is a one who can envision the future, one who can imagine pragmatically progressive ideas for advancement of his people socially and economically. Though the country boasts of a heritage of achievement in its 2,500 years of history, yet we have failed to see a dynamic visionary leader with courage of his convictions surfacing from the political landscape of the country in the last 50 years. 

The only two leaders in the recent past who had little opportunity live up to that were President J.R. Jayawardene and President Mahinda Rajapaksa, but both were tainted with so much bad initiatives and too much of political manoeuvring and self-centred agendas, it resulted in a lost opportunity for both of them to blossom into a quality of a leader the country demanded and needed. 

In comparison, two of the great visionaries from our own Asian neighbourhood: one is former Singapore founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, and the other is architect of the modern China, Deng Xiaoping, who are continuously admired globally for what they achieved for their countries. 

Visionary leader Lee Kuan Yew

The vision Lee Kuan Yew had and the transformation he triggered are unprecedented in the modern world in all frontiers. Just 50 years ago Singapore was a battered British port on a small island off the southern tip of Malaysia. It had a rapidly-growing poor, uneducated population mostly living in slums and houseboats. 

The change began to take shape in the year 1965 when Singapore became an independent nation with Lee Kuan Yew as the Prime Minister in firm control. In the next two decades under the visionary leadership of Lee, Singapore’s economy grew eightfold. Average income per capita rose more than fourfold and the percentage of families living in poverty dropped to 0.4%. 

Singapore’s average life expectancy is now 71 years. Today in Singapore, no one is homeless, virtually everyone has a job. The country today runs like a well-oiled machine 24 hours, seven days, 365 days, and has become the key hub in Asia for social, economic and technological engagement for the world.

Visionary leader Deng Xiaoping 

When one thinks of the world power China, the architect who envisioned and laid the foundation for modern China, the dynamic leader and the visionary Deng Xiaoping, come to everyone’s mind. 

Thirty-five years ago, Deng Xiaoping set out an economic vision to achieve a near impossibility, to transform China from a 70-year planed policy into an advanced economy. Deng’s vision of ‘One Country, Two Systems’ transformed China into a communist country with a capitalist economy.

He encouraged peasants to cultivate individual plots, allowed small businesses to operate for profits, rejuvenated the education system, and even promoted study abroad. Doors to the West opened and even sought foreign investments. Individual initiatives and entrepreneurial spirit were encouraged. These were taboo in the under the planned economy that existed before. 

China abandoned the planned economy policy, created a social market economy, and adopted more and more of the institutions of market economy. The results were unprecedented, 8.5% a year increase in DGP per capita for over next three decades and lifted 630 million people out of the internationally-defined poverty line. This is one of the single greatest social upliftments and human welfare by any country in the last 50 years.

Missionaries to achieve the missions possible and impossible 

The bottom line in the case of these two dynamically charismatic leaders is the vision they had for their respective people and their respective countries. Both were able see the big picture, where they need to take their people and their countries towards in the short, mid and long term, socially, economically and technologically. 

In order to fulfil and realise the respective visions these two leaders identified likeminded missionaries who need not only to take ownership of these two great leaders’ respective visions but also their ability to see eye-to-eye in achieving the missions impossible in short, mid and long term. 

The whole world have seen the significant milestones these two countries, one a small Singapore, the other the Great China, have achieved. It was mainly due to, without any argument, the passionate visionary status of these two leaders and equally focused hundreds and thousands of missionaries who shared the visions of their respective leaders and with the courage of their convictions and relentless determination accomplished the missions that matched the vision of their leader.

Ideology of divisive agendas vs progressive visioning and missioning 

The people of Sri Lanka have been battered in the last 50 years enough by divisive politics. In my recent article on moving away from north-south social brand to east-west economic brand, I have argued the need to move into a new dynamism of economic transformation of this already-divided country by ethnicity, culture religion and politics, while recognising the process of democracy has to survive and exist. Currently existing egocentric politics and selfish political manoeuvring is most unhealthy for the country.

The country needs a visionary of the calibre of Lee Kuan Yew and Deng Xiaoping who can see the potential this country can reach in the next 10 years and a leader benevolent enough to lift the people above ethnicity, party politics and individual agendas towards more socially impactful economic programs that can enrich the people economically. 

The country also needs thousands of strong-minded, pragmatically-focused missionaries tasked with supporting the visionary leader to achieve the missions possible and impossible. 

There are numerous mission fields to put the country on a progressive path. Among them some that stand out are areas such as the need to move the bloated Government bureaucracy to a dynamic ecosystem with economically manageable social benefits and make them accessible and affordable to people through inclusivity, timely reforms that are essential for transparent governance at all levels, and a system of regulation and framework that facilitates innovation and entrepreneurships at micro, small, medium and corporate levels, to name a few.

Where there is no vision, people perish 

Our leaders are slogan-focused and short-term oriented; they fail to see the big picture. They fail to see the potential of the country and its people. Unfortunately, our democratic process in the last few decades has only thrown up bad leaders, not surfaced good leaders. The existing party political culture does not give birth to genuine and passionate visionaries. 

Sri Lanka, you need a benevolent visionary leader with thousands of tasked missionaries to achieve the economic empowerment to enrich the people.

[The writer is the Chairman of Asia’s largest microfinance network Banking With The Poor Network (BWTP). He serves as the Special Advisor to the Asian Bankers Association on Financial Inclusion. He serves on the boards of a number of Sri Lankan and international financial institutions and currently heads CSR Sri Lanka as its Chairman. He is an innovator, advocate and practitioner of financial inclusion in Asia. He can be contacted at [email protected].]