Sri Lanka President Maithripala Sirisena launched an attack against the organizers of pop star Enrique Iglesias’s Love and Sex concert in Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka. He said that they should be “whipped with toxic stingray tails” after finding out that local women removed their bras in public and threw underwear at the pop icon who put on a one-hour performance at the CR and FC stadium on December 20.

He was stunned to find out that some women had flung themselves at the singer, grabbing and kissing him. Unconfirmed reports state that the daughter of a top Sri Lankan military commander personally handpicked for promotion by Sirisena was among the women flinging themselves at the Latin crooner.

“This is most uncivilized behaviour that goes against our culture,” said President Sirisena. “I don’t advocate that these uncivilized women who removed their bras should be beaten with toxic stingray tails, but those who organized such an event should be.”

Concert organizer Live Evants, co-owned by Sri Lankan cricket stars Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene, will be lined up for a public flogging by decree of Sirisena. Whipping with stingray tails was reserved for hardened criminals in medieval Sri Lanka, but now Sirisena says the time has come to bring it back. Justifying his decision for the flogging, the president said: “Our young people were so possessed during the one-hour show that the women offered their bras to the singer! This is uncivilized behavior that goes against our traditional values.”

Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene

The president’s outrage is further fueled due to the fact that Sangakkara is the man he had chosen to endorse Sri Lanka’s traditional values as its High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.

The Iglesias concert scandal has enveloped the whole of Sri Lankan society where public displays of affection even among married couples is forbidden and where police are known to have arrested courting couples for kissing in the park.

Worst yet, there is speculation as to whether the two organizers had skipped paying entertainment tax for the one-hour concert whose prices ranged from 5,000 rupees to 35,000 rupees. Local media reports that an investigation for alleged tax fraud is underway by the Colombo Municipal Council as it is believed that the two cricket stars underpaid 30 million rupees worth of taxes.