Second-guessing the lockdown

Three days into a COVID-19 lockdown, the Government is engaging in a quirky double-speak that is bound to sow confusion in a country wracked by disease and fear. For some reason, after making the long-overdue decision to impose a lockdown to stop the spread of the deadly Delta variant across the island, the Government appears to be second-guessing the move.

This week, the Secretary General of SLPP accused 10 constituent parties in the ruling alliance of conspiring against the Government. The 10 constituent parties in the SLPP-led ruling party coalition including Wimal Weerawansa’s NFF, Udaya Gammanpila’s Pivithuru Hela Urumaya and Vasudeva Nanayakkara’s New Left Front wrote to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa last week, calling for a three-week lockdown in the face of surging COVID-19 infections. Now the SLPP is accusing these constituent heavyweights of being involved in an international plot to effect regime change in Sri Lanka. While the quarantine curfew is underway in all parts of the country, senior Government officials are posting communications and statements opposing the decision to lockdown.

The truth of the matter was that the SLPP constituent allies were echoing calls from across the medical community including frontline workers for tighter restrictions on movements after Sri Lanka’s daily COVID-19 death toll hit the 150 mark. The Government only relented after the Chief Prelates of the powerful Malwatte and Asgiriya chapters requested a countrywide shutdown to contain the spread of the virus. These jumbled messages emanating from different quarters of the regime fail to create confidence among the public that the Government has a coherent and effective plan to deal with the pandemic. For months, the medical community has spoken in one voice, about the need for a strict lockdown countrywide for three or four weeks to control to control the fourth and most devastating wave of the pandemic, spreading like wildfire across the country. Having made that medically sound decision, the Government should have an effective communications policy in place, to put guidelines in place for restricted movement, ensure the steady supply of essential goods and services and use the lockdown to increase testing and contact tracing capacity to address the public health crisis. Instead, the Government is engaging in the dangerous game of mixed messaging at a time when the people need their leaders to speak coherently and provide assurances. After making the one sound decision to lockdown the island to prevent tragic loss of life and the inundation of the medical facilities, why is the Government turning on itself, and behaving like it was forced to impose a lockdown?

The decision to impose the 10-day lockdown was an educated and well-informed policy decision. There is no doubt that there will be economic consequences for the country from the shutdown. But there is a far better case to be made that once the pandemic is handled the economy can recover. For example, countries that made the tough decision to lockdown in order to manage the second and third waves, and subsequently took the necessary action to vaccinate their populations, are beginning to open up and slowly return to normalcy. Though their economies suffered initially, along with the rest of the world, these nations are now on the path to recovery. Having failed to bring the situation under control, Sri Lanka’s economy will continue to suffer in the medium to long term.

Thanks to the 20th Amendment to the Constitution, Sri Lanka currently has at the helm the most powerful president in the history of the republic. The SLPP-led coalition has one of the biggest majorities in Parliament the country has ever seen. The SLPP is a political behemoth that has all the political and media space to make the tough decisions and execute them without fear of political vulnerability. Yet with more power than any Government in living memory could have dreamed of, the SLPP coalition has failed manifestly and on every conceivable level in carrying out its basic duty towards the citizenry. The hour is desperately late. But having made the decision to impose a countrywide lockdown, the Government should double-down on its policy, and optimise its benefits, to track and control the spread of the virus. Half-hearted second guessing will only erode what little credibility is left with the regime. Worse still, it will erode the benefits a COVID-19 lockdown could yield, bringing Sri Lanka back to square one when the time comes to open up again.