VISIONARY THINKING FOR NEW SRILANKA!!!

A crisis and an opportunity
Notebook of nobody ............by Shanie

It could be a matter of days or weeks but the Sri Lankan Army will soon re-take Kilinochchi town. The town last came under the writ of the Government of Sri Lanka during the Chandrika Kumaratunga Presidency over ten years ago. Soon after she assumed the Presidency, the Army was able to take Jaffna city and most of the North. But with the reverses suffered by the Army in 1999 epitomised by the loss of Elephant Pass, the whole stretch of territory to the west and east of the Jaffna-Kandy Road (A9) from Omanthai to Muhamalai, collectively referred to as the Vanni, has remained under the de facto control of the LTTE. But the organs of the government like the district administrations, hospitals, schools and state banks continued to function. Travel to and from the Vanni involved hassles and for the civilian population inside the Vanni, it meant facing the deprivation of some basic human rights – the right to dissent, the right to freely choose their political leaders, the right to be free from forced conscription, the right to travel, etc.
But the ongoing war between the state security forces and LTTE has caused many more problems for the civilian population. The violation of their rights to adequate shelter, health, education and security has become a harsh reality. Many in the South unfortunately still do not recognise that the entire civilian population, not merely the tens of thousands of internally displaced persons, face a huge humanitarian crisis. The situation of the recent IDPs is, if course, infinitely worse. The callousness to the plight of the Vanni civilians is reflected in the smuggling in by some unscrupulous persons of explosives and communication devices into the food trucks. The UN has also "condemned the attempt by persons unknown to disrupt the aid effort" by placing the illegal cargo on trucks provided by the government.

But every crisis presents also opportunities which a wise political leadership will seize. The Government has the opportunity to tell the minorities that it does not see the military victory as an end in itself; that it intends addressing their grievances with political and constitutional reform that will lead to genuine power-sharing. But sadly there have been no indications that the government intends following in that direction to win the hearts and minds of the minorities. The President has given no indication of any meaningful power-sharing proposals. Instead, he refers only to the APRC, whose Chairman has been repeating for over an year that his Committee has reached consensus on 90% of the issues. People have grown cynical of the APRC whose only tangible work so far has been to produce at short notice an interim report on the lines required by the President.


The need for a national consensus

We trust President Rajapakse will recognise the need for genuine power-sharing. His political background and past actions indicate his belief in pluralism and egalitarianism. But unfortunately he has pushed himself into a corner with advisers who are majoritarian chauvinists, who think that this country does not belong to all her citizens, irrespective of ethnicity or religion. The President must assert himself and make bold statements that reach out to both the majority and the minority. To do, as this column has repeatedly been urging, he must seek the support of the other major national party to put forward a political package that will satisfy the majority of all communities. We believe that such a package is possible. We believe such a package in consultation (but not necessarily receiving their full agreement) with the representatives of the parties representing the Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim communities and acceptable to the two major national parties will be acceptable to the war-weary people of our country. But for this the two major parties must put country before party.

We also believe that such a package will end terrorism and lawlessness in our country and restore real democracy and the rule of law. It will enable the writ of the Government to prevail in all nine Provinces and in all 22 districts of our country. It will enable people of the North and South, East and West to travel freely and develop relationships with each other.

In 1986, following the collapse of the talks at Thimpu, a left alliance ‘led’ by Vijaya Kumaratunga (comprising the LSSP, CP and SLMP) issued a joint statement which stated, inter alia: ‘Our three parties are of the firm opinion that a negotiated settlement would be more easy to achieve if the government and its spokespersons as well as the Tamil and other organisations and the extremists conduct themselves in the perspective of the highest interests of all the people of Sri Lanka and not primarily or solely as representatives of any particular community in Sri Lanka.’ This caution is applicable more than ever today. No one in authority should make general statements that hurt the feelings of any community or question that every citizen in our multi-cultural society has equal rights to sharing power and equal rights to the protection of the law.

Merely capturing territory from the LTTE is not going to lead to peace in our country, as we are already seeing in the East. As long as military victory is not accompanied by a political package that meets minority grievances, the LTTE will continue as a guerrilla force. It will also lead to a worse political quagmire if power is given to another fascist group, which perhaps enjoys even less civilian support than the LTTE.


Responsible Journalism

The caution expressed in the joint statement of the left alliance twenty years applies to statements in the media as well. Journalists and columnists must exercise care in the choice of words and in their reporting. Izeth Hussain is quite right in complaining about references to a ‘Muslim’ home guard in relation the killing of the 17 ACF workers in Mutur. The UTHR report, as Hussain rightly points out, refers the actual assassination being done by three persons but with the complicity of several others. From the names, we gather that of the three persons one was a Muslim and two Sinhalese. The ethnicity of the Naval Special Force personnel and Police higher authorities is not known. So what was the need to single out the ethnicity of only the single home guard?

The other instance was the banner headline of a report by two journalists [of The Island]that an INGO official had joined the LTTE as a fighting cadre. This was a very serious charge, particularly in the context of NGOs being ordered out of the Vanni. Only the denial by the INGO concerned brought an admission by the journalists that they had erred with what was stated in the banner headline. But the damage had already been done. In fact it has transpired that on the day the news report appeared, the official was already in Vavuniya. It also appears that this official was committed to his duty by the civilian population and that on several occasions previously he had taken on the LTTE for their gross violation of human rights.

A Franciscan Blessing

On Thursday of last week, there was a service of recommitment and witness to the UN’s Millenium Development Goals at the New York Cathedral which was attended by a galaxy of leaders that included Queen Rania of Jordan and Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain. At the end of the service, Katharine Jefferts Schori, Presiding Bishop of the US Anglican Church, had offered a ‘Franciscan’ Blessing with these words:


May God bless you with discomfort, at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.


May God bless you with anger, at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.


May God bless you with tears, to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and turn their pain to joy.


And may God bless you with enough foolishness, to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.

Amen! It is a blessing needed for all people, irrespective of their faith or no faith.

courtesy: www island.lk
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WTRF greatly appreciate Shanie and Island.lk for publishing such a needful article!
We hope visionary/intelligent/humane people like Shanie shd find a way to organize a 3.front or a "Srilankan Equality-Unity and Progress Party" for next SL-President/ Parliament election!Then all true Srilankan patriots including Tamil diaspora will help to find unity and progress in SL!