Unmasking of the false heroes

"The mass mobilisation tactics that were used so well by the Rajapaksas for so long have also come back to now hasten their fall. Every word uttered, ever image posted now becomes a potential liability and a cause for a protest"

Gotabaya Rajapaksa, is set to become the first of many things. The first executive president of Sri Lanka to be chased out of power through a popular uprising. The first executive president to resign. The first executive president to go incommunicado and by some accounts spent the last days of his presidency off the shores, floating on a ship. Part of a sibling trio, the first to rule with dynastic gluttony, then to resign in ignominy one after the other within a span of two months. This list could go on and on. 

In the life story of Gotabaya, there is a big gap of public knowledge. Those are the years between his retiring and leaving to the US in 1991 and his return to Sri Lanka in 2005. But since his return as the powerful Defence Secretary his persona and image has taken a different trajectory. That is till protests erupted in April seeking his ouster. 

"Mahinda Rajapakse  knew when to bide his time, when to launch into an action plan and did all that while maintaining a public persona that resonated with a large section of voters, a section strong enough to elect him to office. No one has come anywhere close to matching this"

This was an image that was carefully crafted. The tough, no nonsense former military officer who gave vital leadership to the war effort without cutting corners or corruption. This was an image that survived the unexpected defeat suffered by Mahinda Rajapaksa in 2015. In fact, as the in-fighting between Maithripala Sirisena and Ranil Wickremesinghe drove the Yahapalana government to a state of comatose, Gotabaya’s image was on the rise. 
His brother Mahinda had been an ace in the hole in terms by public image building. He knew when to bide his time, when to launch into an action plan and did all that while maintaining a public persona that resonated with a large section of voters, a section strong enough to elect him to office. No one has come anywhere close to matching this. 

Mahinda was also one of the first to latch on to the growing penetration of digital and online platforms. He was one of the first to engage on social media. He did this with the same penchant he applied to his years before he became president. It was not only Mahinda, but it was also a large community of singers, actors, sports personalities, business bigwigs and others who massaged the message. 
His brother Gotabaya rode this same trend and was successful in creating an image of a tough talking technocrat backed by the best brains in the nation who could usher in change. That image would prove decisive when the 2019 elections rolled in. 

This is when it started to unravel. First there was COVID-19 pandemic just as the nation was moving away from the impacts of the Easter Sunday mayhem. Then it was all self-inflicted wounds one after the other. When the queues became longer, the blacked-out nights never-ending and the prices sky rocketing, no amount of digital image building can undo mass despondency without addressing the core issues.   

The mass mobilisation tactics that were used so well by the Rajapaksas for so long have also come back to now hasten their fall. Every word uttered, every image posted now becomes a potential liability and a cause for a protest. 
The freedom to express that exists online was what Sri Lankans used first to vent out their frustrations and anger. As their anger grew so was their expression and when there was no respite, the protests moved off-line. It is this same trend of online dissent forerunning offline protest that has persisted. 

Facebook and other social media platforms were gamed by the Rajapaksa PR machine to their advantage. It is the same mechanics that yesterday combined with off-line protests to prevent one of the brothers from leaving the country.  Every step, every move, even every anticipated, imagined move by the clan now has it digital footprint that prompts offline in-person reactions as what was witnessed at the airport. The offline and online has coalesced much to the determent of the once all powerful. 
The writer is a journalism researcher and a writer. He can be contacted on 
amantha.perera@cqumail.com