Anusha David spotlights the hottest styles and statements in and around Sri Lanka – from political leaders to celebrity CEOs, masters of the game to fashion icons and stars of the silver screen and stage. Here are society’s leaders talking about the determination, vision, smarts, competence and professionalism.

This week Rosy Senanayake.



Q. Are you a feminist?
RS. I would call myself an activist more than a feminist.



Q. Do you find your glamorous image a hindrance or an advantage in the execution of your duties.
RS. It’s both. I would say the hindrance part overtakes and surpasses the plus points. Even when I go for a meeting, before I get on stage, they’ll talk about me being a beauty queen and not the serious work I’ve done – whether I’ve been High Commissioner and proved myself worthy enough there, whether I’m a serious politician – all that is immaterial.


Q. What do you find most rewarding about being in government?
RS. For 20 years we were deprived of coming out and doing what should be done for the betterment of the country and the people. Now we have got the opportunity. However having said that, there’s so much to do. I’m inundated with work. I go to sleep very late at night and this is just doing the Ministry work. I’ve actually sidelined my political work for a little while to get acquainted with the work I have to do because I have three responsible institutions – I have the Child Protection institution, the Child Secretariat, and the Child Probation Department which is huge. And on the ground we have a cadre working with regards to these issues so it’s a very responsible job.

This plus furnishing my constituency and the constituents and doing politics but I’m happy for this reason – as I mentioned earlier, on a daily basis I’m almost in tears when I see these children and hear of their issues. These are issues I have been faced with day-in and day-out as a politician – whether it’s the Uva elections or the Wayamba elections or the North Central Province elections – I go and I live in those places. I don’t even travel daily – I go for four, five weeks, sometimes even seven weeks at a time . I engage with the people, I go to their homes and experience their grievances first hand. I find that being hands on is the most rewarding part.

Q. What do you find most difficult about being in government?
RS. When you’re frustrated and you can’t do things the way they should be done and you can’t undo some of the disasters of the previous regime; and the previous regime has caused so much damage and left us penniless that it is very frustrating. We can’t behave like them, we have to undo so much of what they have done . We have to set standards, we have to gradually change a lot of things – like the Child Protection Authority. As I said, after the war we had a golden opportunity to change things – whether it was with regard to strengthening women, their dignity and livelihood programmes, or women and children, children’s issues – it was not done. After the war we see that crimes have increased by 20% against children . That is an extremely serious issue; one that is most frustrating.

We need more resources . We need the infrastructure to get moving .The manpower is there with no job criteria. We need to strengthen these areas. But in order to strengthen these areas, whether the Treasury can actually release the funds until we regain economic stability is difficult to predict just yet. This is what makes me really frustrated. To undo and to correct the waste and corruption that has put this country in the situation it is in, really frustrates me.



Q. How will you work to make children more successful in their lives? This, especially when considering the rapid changes in society.
RS. One area that I believe the state hasn’t taken very seriously is early childhood education . For example, when we talk about education, the state-sponsored education system starts from Grade 1, at the age of 5. However it is in the first five years that 75% of the child’s brain is formed, so even the little activities children do in preschools stimulating the brain and fingers, enhancing their creativity and natural inherent talents – the platform that they get within that first five years to face challenges is of paramount importance.

Early childhood development starts from conception. If you look at malnourishment among pregnant mothers, 41.9% are malnourished in the estate sector and the low birth weight rate has increased from 16% to 18% in these last couple of years. Malnourishment among Under 5s has rapidly increased – even in districts like Gampaha. Malnourishment among children under 5 in Killinochchi is 40.9%. These are state statistics but research done by INGOs like WHO and other local NGOs say it’s between 50% and 55%, so one in every other child is malnourished.

If a child is malnourished, if their brain is not functioning properly from the time the mother has conceived them in the womb, that is detrimental to the child’s growth. Today, if you talk about malnourishment in the estate sector and the north and east, the statistics of stunting and wasting in children appalls me.

We have to look at children growing up as healthy beings with the proper nourishment, mindset, and mentality. The formative years of a child are very important which is why I talk about early childhood. Starting from the pregnant mother – how do we nourish her? How do we make her a healthy woman? Has she done her BMI test? Is the baby healthy? The low birth weight rate is detrimental for a child’s growth, which is why children are malnourished. And after birth when they are breast feeding, malnourishment is very high. Women are anemic and don’t have proper nourishment to bear a healthy baby so taking care of a child from that time onwards is very important. This is why we’re providing Rs 20,000 to pregnant mothers in the 100-Day Programme. The concept paper on implementation at grassroots level has been finalized and I’m waiting for dates from the Prime Minister and the President to launch it.
 

We also need advocacy with regard to parenting, nourishment, and making children healthy and safe. Protection is also a huge issue when we talk about the reported cases of incest, trafficking, and child labour.

The other area  is education. Education is important and the finer things in life to make a child a holistic being are also important. Today, we live in a rat race where people think that you need to pass exams. Our education system is like a pyramid: every year, 350,000 children enter the first grade, but only between 20 and 25,000 enter the higher education system. What happens to the balance 325,000 children? They drop out half way because of various reasons – poverty is one of the biggest hindrances when it comes to education and they have no proper financial support to go to school. By the time they get to Grade Ten, 50% have failed math. They have failed the qualifying subjects: not even 50% qualify for A-Levels, and even out of that only a few can afford to do their A-Levels because their parents struggled and got them through their O-Levels and they’re now looking for jobs. Today, even if you’re an upadhidhareen you can’t find a job, it’s so hard. It’s a very sad state of affairs.

I believe the early childhood programme would provide the platform and environment for children to go into primary and secondary education – it would give them the edge to continue. As of now, I’ve been having several rounds of talks with the World Bank, UNICEF and the Japanese mission to see how we could help the early childhood programme by strengthening the preschool system, training preschool teachers, and creating the infrastructure. Only 74% of this country’s children who are eligible to be in preschool are in preschools. 26% of children do not have any form of preschool education. Even the 76% who are in preschools, are in preschools that pop up from nowhere. People put up a board and somehow manage to get the license.

To regulate this, I have had a discussion with the Prime Minister and we’re trying to see how we could formulate a national policy and also look at ways in which the government could step in to support preschool education. The government can invest in preschools, so it can be a public-private partnership with a proper curriculum to regulate it, the right standards, and a preschool teachers’ training school.

These are areas that I’m looking at. Preschool education in particular is vital.
 

Q. Why did you enter politics and how have you overcome any gender-related roadblocks in your career?
RS. I didn’t mean to enter politics. I believe it’s a calling from the Lord because I have always been very passionate about doing social work. I’ve always got involved and done a lot of work with socially-oriented organizations and clubs.  I got involved with Mrs Premadasa and the Seva Vanitha movement in the late 80s. I went on field visits with her and basically travelled the length and breadth of the country, where I saw how deprived and destitute some of the women were in certain parts of the country. We did health camps, self-employment schemes, livelihood programmes, leadership training, and capacity building. We did quite a bit as members of the Seva Vanitha under the leadership of Mrs Jayewardene and subsequently Mrs Premadasa.

One thing led to another; I got so involved in my work to empower women that the UN invited me to be a Goodwill Ambassador in 1997. Simultaneously, I started working for the UNP. The party had just gone into the opposition after so many years of being in government and I was the coordinating secretary of the womens’ movement of the UNP.

I must say that in 1994 practically most parties wanted me on their platform. By that time I had become a serious women’s activist. I still remember Chanaka Amaratunge calling and asking me day-in day-out to contest in 1994. Chandana Ukwatte wouldn’t leave me alone – I used to even get calls  at 2am where he would try to convince me to join them, but for some reason I always had faith in the UNP. My family has had a lineage of being UNPers and my uncle was a minister. I also remember campaigning and working for the party when I was a child. So for me, I had faith and trust and I also believed in the ideologies of the UNP. Soon after we got into the opposition, Mr Wickremesinghe invited me to work in the women’s wing and I became the coordinating secretary of Lak Vanitha, the UNP’s women’s wing. I then got into the working committee in 1997. But at that point I had no idea that I would contest one day. My role had always been to support the party behind-the-scenes, although I’ve always held key positions in the party.

I worked tirelessly for the UNP and when we came into power I went as High Commissioner to Malaysia. We were out of power within 2 years, so I came back, and once again started working with the party. I have been in the opposition for the last 20 years. In Sinhala you say kata kagena deshapalanaya kela.

I’ve been with the party for almost 28 or 29 years now. There’s no turning back once you get involved in politics. Once you get engaged and develop a relationship with the public, it’s very difficult to detach yourself. You get more and more involved and engrossed with their day-to-day issues – mundane issues, serious issues, national issues. Then you become a fighter. My ambition was always to fight for women’s rights. So that’s how I got into politics and I’m quite happy at where I am today.





Q. Name three people in history you admire most and why.
RS. Locally, the Womens’ Franchise Union when they fought for universal suffrage. Women were able to have the rights to vote and contest. Just after Great Britain, we had the privilege to vote and contest because they worked tirelessly. My husband Athula’s grandmother, Hilda Kularatne, was also one of the members. I admire her for that . Being an Englishwoman, she came down and learned the language. She even used to write speeches in Sinhala. I derive strength from people like her. Women who have been very strong and committed. Another person who provided yeoman service for humanity is Mother Teresa, while Nelson Mandela is somebody we actually need to take as an example. He suffered in prison for so many years. He came back to become president and all he wanted was reconciliation for the people. It’s an amazing story and that opportunity Mahinda Rajapakse had after the war. He could have been the next Nelson Mandela, but he chose to throw it away. That was a lost opportunity.


Q. Which single book has greatly influenced you, and why.
RS. Biographies, mainly. Mandela’s story, JR Jayewardene’s story, Mother Teresa. There isn’t one single book. There are so many, because you learn so much. If you’re talking about a single book I would say it’s the Bible that has impacted me the most.