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The President's speech in Ampara is an interesting one to study & not just for the perspectives offered by @welikalaa https://twitter.com/welikalaa/status/1347932106282950658 To be fair by Gotabaya Rajapaksa, we see in this speech a reversion to type as exposition of what 2021 will more clearly amplify. #lka
A study of the president's more formal, prepared speeches since mid-'19 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m9xW25gOydXOzwWrReC2KKmV2VJgMRRF9mpS5h48S1I/edit#heading=h.9k4zd51qr2zl reveals a high-degree of consistency around a very limited set of tropes, framed in a vision bereft of references to rights & democracy. GR the autocrat isn't new.
The extempore speech in Ampara - arguably a better insight around man, mentality & mission - highly promoted on #Facebook's junk news/gossip & meme pages. Content & commentary openly welcome the avatar of Gotabaya Rajapaksa who was Defence Secretary. #lka
Same page constellation feats. number of posts against @fernandoharin who wasn't a target of any posts just a day prior to president's speech. Unsurprisingly, engagement high & commentary hostile to the MP & partial to SLPP/president.
Multiple by @adaderana strongly promote the president's speech. The engagement generated is significant just under 24hrs. But the speech by the president also refers to the killing of Prabhakaran "like a dog". That sentiment not amplified on most pages (yet). #lka
One of the Derana #Facebook posts links to http://bit.ly/3ovlC7x which feats. a longer excerpt of president's speech & embedded YouTube video of that segment While most focus on section referencing @fernandoharin, framing of Prabhakaran more revealing.
Translation into English done for likes of @UNSriLanka's Resident Coordinator @SingerHanaa & the hope tone-deafness https://twitter.com/sanjanah/status/1303920323847360513 in recent past when commending the govt, in future at least, accounts for sentiments in & substance of the president's speech. #lka
Why is president invoking killing Prabhakaran at start of '21, in thrust & timbre breaking sharply with his more prepared speeches since mid-'19? Observe delivery, body language, pause, signature chuckle & audience reception in this segment. What gives?
The path-dependency of a president whose brand is as violent crisis-manager works best out of power & seeking to gain it, destabilising whoever is in govt. In power & reeling from pandemic, one needs now a more familiar violence to restablish credentials w/ vote base.
It's what @MangalaLK flags https://twitter.com/MangalaLK/status/1347809459146428416 but more nuanced, because "government" isn't monolith. What president seeks not always compatible or sits well with what rest of govt wants, starting w/ his own family. But let's look at some data for insights. #lka
The president's official #Facebook page, from 1 Jan '19 to yesterday, reveals that most engagement around consequential socio-political upheaval, electoral moments or pandemic waves (all of which overlap). But output, followers & engagements now in decline or plateauing.
~200 pages I study mostly or exclusively promoting president, over same time span, show a similar data signature. Simplifying at some risk of violence to more granular reading, the president's brand is losing traction or flatlining, heading into 2021.
2021 is when the economic cost of #Covid19SL will hit like a sledgehammer as @shiharaneez flags https://ceylontoday.lk/news/sri-lanka-s-economic-dependency-deepens-after-moody-s-rate-cut. If things get worse given bizarre plans to open country https://twitter.com/sanjanah/status/1347676488389128192 resulting hit will be even worse. Distractions welcome. #lka
The ref. to killing Prabhakaran "like a dog", from delivery to reception, shows the president discursively slipping into the avatar of erstwhile defence secretary. This is his comfort zone. Ref. to monks who urge a return to his more violent avatar also not surprising.
Recall https://twitter.com/azzamameen/status/1009479268487737344?lang=en from 2018. @dbsjeyaraj noted at the time it could "seriously hurt his bid for the presidency" http://dbsjeyaraj.com/dbsj/archives/59666 It didn't. After Easter Sunday terrorism, Overton window shifted from democratic norms to strongman leadership & securitised state.
As @shamara4w noted at the time on @groundviews & even more resonant today, "The current context in Sri Lanka suggests that, as in Nazi Germany, the rhetoric of ultra-nationalist militant groups resonates with large segments of the population." https://groundviews.org/2018/03/09/on-kandy-how-myths-about-minorities-underlie-violence/ #lka
The president is clearly failing & floundering, outside the comfort zone of violence he is an architect of or is called to, with no strings attached, respond to - like when he was feared defence secretary under MR's presidency. Discursive slips reveal innermost frustrations. #lka
Not unlike the "narrative roadblock" I saw early on w/ '18's constitutional coup https://twitter.com/sanjanah/status/1060850381633142784 GR needs to spin (up) something to distract & have him, visibly, save & secure the Sinhalese. The pandemic shows him at his weakest. Ethno-political violence is his forte.
Which is why in tweet thread looking at significant growth of racism & Islamophobia on #Facebook over 2020, I ended by noting that 2021's political virus has me more worried than the pandemic https://twitter.com/sanjanah/status/1346669889004523520 Ref's to killing individuals like dogs amplifies those fears.
A manic mentality & resulting challenges aside, I told @welikalaa on recent call that #Facebook is now instrumentalised to eviscerate democratic norms like civil debate, critical dissent & working through partisan difference https://twitter.com/sanjanah/status/1346669874945265664 Proxies of president aid this.
So there we have it. A man w/ god-like powers, beyond reproach, nevertheless countenances a declining popularity. The resulting frustration & reversion to type brings out familiar fangs, deadlier to democracy than Coronavirus & w/ no vaccination to help contain. Disturbing. #lka
