“Shirley and I were by this time very attached. All of Colombo knew about it—even those very close to Shirley’s life were aware of this.”
--Madam Boonwaat’s paramour
As Rex played the first chords of love, a love forbidden blossomed in the soft-lit precincts of a night club three years before. Lady Boonwaat, the wife of Burmese Ambassador, first saw bearded pianist on the bandstand. But love has nothing to do with persons, traditions, values, laws or customs.
It was a sad tale from the beginning to its ghastly end. The diplomat was revoltingly unconventional when he desisted from interfering with his wife’s illegitimate romantic affiliation under his own roof. Filled with tragedy, a conflict with protagonists, Madam Shirley Boonwaat was at the centre of an illicit tryst. Then a superior force with a disastrous conclusion brought out terror.
Wilbert and Wimalasena, the two young bricklayers, were shocked by the report of a gun coming from the ambassador’s residence. It was around 8.30, the morning sun shone brightly at the Burmese Ambassador Boonwaat’s residence a little later. The two bricklayers and a resident in an adjoining house saw a woman clad in a nightdress making a dramatic dash towards a vehicle which was parked near the rear (Green Path) entrance to the mansion. As they watched in stunned silence, they saw a man following her who fired a second shot. Then, to add to the bewilderment, a third man emerged, who ran out of the house, embraced the frantic woman and carried her into the house—he almost dragged her in; they told the police.
Diplomatic immunity
The three young men were shaken again when they heard three more shots. Shirley Boonwaart was no more. An hour later, Dr. L. C. Mendis certified that death was due to cerebral haemorrhage due to hypertension. The doctor told the police that he discovered Shirley Boonwaat’s body at the foot of the staircase; also told the police that he had suggested that a postmortem be held but was rejected by the diplomat. Claiming diplomatic immunity, the police were not allowed to enter the premises. As the news of the sudden death spread, massive crowds thronged outside the Boonwaat residence and remained till late at night.
Raymonds was summoned, who wanted to take the measurements of the corpse for the coffin—but was not allowed. The undertaker told the police that he had been told that the body measured 5ft and 3 inches. Thereafter the undertaker had been asked to return with the coffin. They did so at 12.30 p.m. having made arrangements to cremate the body at 1 p.m.
The gates of the embassy remained closed immediately after the ambassador returned.
As the Burmese Embassy officials kept mum over the death of the wife of Boonwaat, and Government’s law enforcement units being unable to intervene, Defence Ministry immediately ordered the Immigration authorities to ground any aircraft which tried to fly any personnel of the Embassy out of the island. Accordingly, the CID and Customs too were ordered to thwart any attempt by the Burmese to forcibly board any aircraft or ship. Immigration officers were flown to the airport in KKS as a preventive measure against any attempt by Burmese personnel to slip through the security net. They placed immigration, customs and CID men on a 24-hour alert at all ports and airports.
In a dramatic turn of events, the investigation took an amazing twist when a request by the Ceylon government, to interview the 26-year-old son of the Malaysian High Commissioner Kib Bahadun, was turned down by the High Commissioner. Police wanted him to help them with inquiries into the Boonwaat murder.
The Malaysian High Commissioner claimed diplomatic immunity too for his son and expressed his regret that he could not grant Ceylon government’s request. But our police failed to explain this requirement. Defence and External Affairs Ministry cabled the Burmese government through Nandadeva Wijesekara, the Ambassador in Rangoon, with attached details of the police investigations into Shirley Boonwaat’s death. Burmese Government replied stating that both the Burmese Embassy’s and the Ceylon Government’s versions would be analysed carefully and that ambassador Boonwaat would be recalled, indicating that the investigations would be taken off the hands of Sri Lankan authorities. The government had not stopped the investigations and had ordered the CID to go ahead vigilantly watching certain diplomatic residences.
Paramour Rex de Silva
“It is three years to the day almost when Shirley Boonwaat and I first met. I remember very well… it was October 27, 1964, when I met her I was playing at the ‘Blue Leopard’, Shirley walked in and we were introduced.” Rex answering a scribe who interviewed him on the day after the murder at his residence continued, “I still cannot think that Shirley is no more. It is only the previous night that she dropped in at my office, waited for me and drove me home.” Breaking down at this stage, he continued, “She was full of spirits and dynamic and had a zest for living. She could get excited as nobody could for any reason which motivated her sympathy, shortly after Shirley and I met we started to get together and one of the foremost things she confided in me was her sorrow and sadness.”
That morning, Rex even told the police who arrived at his house that he lived in the ambassador’s house for about a year before he decided to leave. “As she dropped me off my flat for the last time before her death, she asked me to call her the following morning and accompany her to a dentist. I visited her around 7.30 or 7.40 am but the gates were closed, therefore I returned home. All I have to say is that; let justice prevail.”
A week later four senior government officials arrived from Rangoon, Burma and had meetings with their counterparts. The police briefed them on evidence gathered so far. The case remained wide open and the veil of mystery that covered the diplomatic community. The public which watched with respectful admiration at the diplomats who live in a world of their own have suddenly been introduced to its stupidities and bad practices, its enjoyment and obsessions, its flaws and powers.
The diplomats are helped by a coterie of Sri Lankans who comprise the hub of cocktail culture. Naturally, the diplomats imagine that all locals are accessible at a mere crack of their fingers to do their slightest request. It was so then, and it remains so up to now. Just as much as the diplomatic missions here should understand that, they are here to forge stronger ties with the peoples of this nation, so too Lankan politicians must not put up for sale their birthrights for ‘wines and scotch’.
A bundle laid desolately, sadly on the table in the sitting room once overflowing with musical laughter, the gay liveliness of the woman who was now condensed to a petite pile of ashes. In life, hundreds fawned over her; gathered around her. She was the sparkling hub, the magnetic of every social gathering. She had lots of friends from all walks of life, from elite to the ordinary. Madam Shirley Boonwaat’s relics, ashes, held in an urn, wrapped in a white cloth, all that remained as dusk falls on October 15, 1967.
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