Walking the talk on meritocracy

One of the main catch phrases of the Sri Lanka Podujana Party (SLPP) presidential campaign in 2019 was the clarion call for ‘system change’. Fed up with 90 years of party politics, partisan and family appointments to public office, the people of this country were enchanted with the promise of a true meritocracy.

In a meritocracy, individuals are selected for high public office based on competence and skill above all else. This was the mantra of the Viyathmaga, the purported vanguard of professionals who were to deliver this systemic change under the Gotabaya Rajapaksa presidency. Nearly seven million voters opted for this change, and expected the no-nonsense former Defence Secretary to deliver. Under his leadership, the country was to be governed the way the Sri Lankan armed forces executed the final phase of the war against the LTTE – with clinical, cohesive, coherent efficiency and discipline.

Sri Lanka has not been spared a global pandemic which has killed millions and devastated economies. The death and destruction COVID-19 has wrought, and its resultant economic devastation, will present the most daunting, existential challenge of our generation. Confronting that challenge requires exceptional leadership – the kind of leadership that is not afraid to change the system.

Real ‘system change’ would have placed the most experienced, and competent officials in charge of the crisis. But the failure is best illustrated in the place it was most needed in the middle of a deadly public health crisis – with the Ministry of Health. Health Minister Pavithra Wanniarachchi is an educated minister. Yet her failure to manage the health crisis confronting Sri Lanka has been acute. Instead of earning public trust, Minister Wanniarachchi has come to epitomise everything the Government has done wrong in terms of handling the pandemic.

When the Opposition raised the possibility of COVID-19 spreading in Sri Lanka in January 2020, Minister Wanniarachchi dismissed the concerns. As Health Minister, Wanniarachchi should geared up the health sector to meet the challenge of a deadly pandemic sweeping across the world. She should have enhanced ICU capacity, secured vaccines, and prepared for a possible third wave by increasing oxygen making and storing capacity. Instead, when the first wave of coronavirus was spreading across the island, she flung enchanted pots into a river and endorsed the ‘miracle COVID cure’ touted by a charlatan witch doctor, gulping it in front of cameras and eventually becoming an international media sensation when she was struck down by coronavirus herself and had a close encounter with death.

Of late Sri Lanka has been experiencing high number of deaths and infection rates. State Minister for Health Dr. Sudarshini Fernandopulle delivered cold hard truths to the public last week, indicating that true infection rates could be three times higher than current testing was showing. There was no way out, Minister Fernandopulle said, but to lock the country down for two weeks to stop the spread of the virus and prevent human tragedy. Days later, orders were issued that public officials were not permitted to “spread panic” by getting in front of the media to communicate the severity of the health crisis.

It did not have to be this way. Minister Fernandopulle is the clearest illustration of this fact. In Dr. Sudarshini Fernandopulle, the Government has within its ranks a medically trained physician of community medicine. In any other country, such an individual would become the face of the state response to COVID-19. 

Minister Fernandopulle may be junior in political rank, but she is by no means inexperienced in her medical specialisation. While President Gotabaya Rajapaksa made the correct decision by appointing her as the State Minister of Primary Health Services, Pandemics and COVID-19 Prevention, Dr. Fernandopulle was not given the necessary power or resources to really take charge. 

Despite this, Dr. Fernandopulle has been recognised around the country as the lone voice of reason and credibility, truthfully warning people of the risks and educating the public about management. Her colleagues have gone out of their way to undermine her. A sexist slur was hurled at her by a Cabinet Minister on public television, who claimed “she was under mental strain” by way of explanation about why she requested financial support from well-wishers to combat the COVID-19 crisis.

A first step to earn back the people’s trust about the promise to deliver a merit-based system would be to place Dr. Fernandopulle in charge of the Government’s COVID-19 response. The Government should recognise her merits, her experience and medical expertise, and ignore her position in the political hierarchy.

If the Government was serious about changing the system and has any real intention to deliver on election pledges to create a meritocracy, now is the time to walk the talk.