Restoring Government in Sri Lanka
Repost This Article
Image courtesy Transcurrents
If Sri Lanka is fast becoming a pariah state in the eyes of the world, it has nothing to do with the recent UNHRC Resolution.
The writing has long been on the wall. As a nation, we are ruled by a group of men who seem to have nothing but contempt for the rule of law, let alone for truth in the public sphere. Violence and threats of violence against critics, the suppression of media freedom, extra-judicial killings, misplaced economic priorities and corruption on a scale that made even previous governments look clean, have become the order of the day.
The minimal definition of government has to do with the rule of law: namely, that as a people we should be governed not by arbitrary fiat but by a system of laws to which the law-makers and law-enforcers themselves are accountable. The opposite of government is sovereign will, where the King/President decides what is “good for the nation”, and changes his mind from day to day- and uses the police and army not to uphold the law but to carry out his private will.
To some extent, the LLRC Report draws attention to this pitiful state of affairs. It is unfortunate that the so-called international community has focused so much on alleged war crimes and the protection of minorities; important as these are, they are part of a bigger picture of the steady erosion of respect for human life and freedoms that has been orchestrated by the ruling regime before and after the end of the war.
Indeed the LLRC Report was roundly criticised by the TNA for, among other things, its lack of attention to the carnage inflicted by all sides in the closing months of the war. So to label the Resolution’s insistence on the implementation of the Report as evidence of “pro-Tamil” sentiments is the height of ignorance or deliberate mischief.
The spate of abductions and “disappearances” has gone unabated and affects Sinhalese as much as Tamils. Clearly criminal gangs and paramilitary groups are operating with impunity under the protection of politicians. No citizen today who lacks family or political connections to the ruling regime can expect protection from the judiciary or the police. Is it surprising, then, that we have to look beyond our shores for assistance in restoring proper governance in this country?
No doubt the big world powers are all hypocrites and practise blatant double standards when it comes to war crimes and other human rights abuses. But nobody can say that the US, Europe and India do not practise the rule of law within their borders. There is a vibrant civil society in India, and an independent news media, that puts Sri Lanka to shame. We have been reduced as a nation to becoming an economic colony of the Chinese. I am amazed at how our Buddhist nationalists who protest outside Western embassies in Colombo, are silent about the brutal destruction of Buddhism in Tibet and other parts of China (or the imprisonment of Buddhist monks by another “friend” of ours, the military junta in Burma).
The way leading members of the ruling regime have responded to the UNHRC (before, during and after the Resolution was passed) demonstrates so clearly the need for such a Resolution. We have been treated to the pitiful spectacle of a foreign minister wasting huge amounts of public funds in desperate trips to Africa and Latin America to canvass support; and the continued use of the state media to whip up frenzy against local and foreign critics, instead of explaining to the populace the content of the UN Resolution; and the manipulation of schoolchildren as well as religious leaders, among others, to stage mass protests outside foreign embassies. Talking to some of the protestors, I found hardly any awareness of either the LLRC Report or what the UN Resolution was all about.
When proper government fails, so does diplomacy. Our diplomatic positions are occupied by men and women who have been rewarded, not for their diplomatic skills, but for having shown blind loyalty to the ruling regime. It is hard to find a single professional diplomat among them. Post-Geneva, the ruling regime is still courting support from the worst dictatorships around the world.
One cannot help thinking that if only we had a foreign minister and diplomats who have the humility to listen to some of their own fellow-citizens, let alone receive counsel from other friendly governments, an honest compromise could have been achieved at Geneva.
It is still not too late for such humility. Surely the future of millions of young Sri Lankans is more important than the survival of a few ministers and ex-army officers?
”I found hardly any awareness of either the LLRC Report or what the UN Resolution was all about”:
That’s why the government hasn’t translated LLRC report into Sinhala (and Tamil). Then we can’t expect it to translate UNHRC resolution. Had there been these translations, SOME of those who protested may not have turned up for the protest.
OK. let one family prosper.
Others, …. hmmmmm…..
I disagree with the writer’s comment that the human rights and freedom affect all the communities in Sri Lanka equally before and after the war. One had to just look at the successive election results to see who keep the abusers in power with overwhelming majority so that the regime can boast that it has the endorsement of the nation to rule with impunity. I hope at least now the Sinhala civil society will search into its own conscience, to see what is wrong and address it head on, like the way Indian civil society does!! Being a Tamil and thereby becoming a witness to this agonising past, I earnestly appeal to the writer and the others alike not to bemoan the Tamil predicament in Sri Lanka, only as bad as that of the Sinhalese nation. When the massacre was taking place in the North isn’t only a handful of Sinhalese nationals, Wickrama Bahu to name as one, raise their voice to condemn the violence unleashed by the regime on their fellow Tamil citizens?
Wed all though we are going to have a happy, safe country after the thirty year war. Did we achieve that? Abductions , murder and rapes , suicides , is that what we achiebed? Let us all live in peace.Ina democracy let everyone has his or her say without being harassed or even murdered.
Anti-reconciliation initiative?
Colonial Governor closes down computer section of Jaffna Public Library
http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=35079
This regime is too drunk with power that it will not heed to such good advice and cautioning as has been done in this article. Just like a drunkard who would continue to do irrational things until he ends up in a ditch or crashes against a brick wall, this government too will continue to drive the country and its people to hell. The irony is that some of the Ministers of the government who have better brains and can act soberly are just letting the drunken government to continue merrily until it exhausts what little energy it is left with and the country is ruined.
The only solution to the problem of the island will be a two state solution with SL and TE, workng together peacefully.
The UN and the IC will soon realise that LLRC cannot work and that it was just an eyewash by the GOSL.
If Sinhalese have these feelings even after 64 years, then the international community should let the Northern Provincial Council function for five years without much interference of the central government and let the Sinhala masses review the last 64 years. Then a decision will hopefully emerge …..
That cat has been always in the bag. It puts its head out whenever it gets chance. But cat is not the answer. It is an evil wishful dream, that made this county to suffer for over three decades. Do not take out your evil cat, keep it with you, really it is a tiger cub.
Thanks!
This is an excellent article. I hope more of this same thinkig will emerge.
Good analysis. These should reach the Sinhala and Tamil readers in their own languages for a fuller understanding.
Excellent article.
Dr DJ seems to be an exception and I hope he continues..(http://www.lakbimanews.lk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4987:dayan-decides-what-he-is-paid-for-&catid=47:interview&Itemid=48)
“When proper government fails, so does diplomacy. Our diplomatic positions are occupied by men and women who have been rewarded, not for their diplomatic skills, but for having shown blind loyalty to the ruling regime. It is hard to find a single professional diplomat among them. Post-Geneva, the ruling regime is still courting support from the worst dictatorships around the world.”
Dear Sarwan
“The only solution to the problem of the island will be a two state solution with SL and TE, workng together peacefully.”
How do you hope to accomplish this solution?
Change the constitution of this country.
”Surely the future of millions of young Sri Lankans is more important than the survival of a few ministers and ex-army officers.”
What hope do we have of reconciliation and peace when utterly false facts are presented to the future generation even at this juncture of our history.
Is the author of the following singing for his supper without the slightest regard for the future of this country:
”Sudan was never a single entity in the pre-British past. It was put together by the British for their administrative and other convenience without the slightest regard for ethnic and other factors, as part of the entirely arbitrary redrawing of the map of Africa by the Western imperialists in the nineteenth century. Sri Lanka, on the other hand, has always been known as a single entity” – http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=49425
When the Portuguese arrived in 1505, there were three Kingdoms in Ceylon, one in the North called Jaffna Kingdom and two in the South viz Kotte and Kandyan Kingdom.
The island of Sri Lanka, then known as Ceylon, was ceded to the British Crown in 1802 by the Treaty of Amiens of that year. The map of Ceylon attached to the Treaty of Amiens call the Arrow Smith Map of Ceylon depicts the Island of Ceylon as two (if not three) different countries – a Tamil country composed of the Northeast and a Sinhala country composed of the South West and central parts.
In an oft quoted minute, Sir Hugh Cleghorn wrote in June 1799 to the UK Government: “Two different nations from a very ancient period have divided between them the possession of the Island. First the Singhalese, inhabiting the interior of the country in its Southern and Western parts, and secondly the Malabars who possess the Northern and Eastern Districts. These two nations differ entirely in their religion, language and manners.” (Malabar meaning Tamil).
Also Chief Justice, Sir Alexander Johnstone wrote on 1 July 1827 to the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland:
“…. I think it may safely be concluded both from them and from all the different histories which I have in my possession, that the race of people who inhabited the whole of the Northern and Eastern Provinces of the Island of Ceylon, at the period of their greatest agricultural prosperity spoke the same language, used the same written character, and had the same origin, religion, castes, laws and manners, as that race of people who at the same period inhabited the southern peninsula of India:……”
The Cleghorn Minute of 1799 and the Arrow Smith Map of 1802 are official proof that the Island of Ceylon consisted of two separate countries. We quote Sir Alexander Johnstone’s letter merely to show to the conclusions of a Chief Justice on the basis of available evidence.
Sir Robert Brownrigg, Governor of Ceylon, 1813 Dispatch to the British Colonial Secretary of State, Reported in the Tribune, 12 January 1956 stated as follows:
“As to the qualification required in the knowledge of the native languages, the Portuguese and Sinhalese only being mentioned excludes one which is fully necessary in the Northern Districts as the Sinhalese in the South. I mean the Tamil language, commonly called the Malabar language, which with a mixture of Portuguese in use through all the provinces is the proper native tongue of the inhabitants from Puttalam to Batticaloa northward inclusive of both these districts.. Your Lordship will therefore, I hope have no objection to my putting Tamil on an equal footing of encouragement with the Sinhalese” – Sir Robert Brownrigg, Governor of Ceylon, 1813 Dispatch to the British Colonial Secretary of State, Reported in the Tribune, 12 January 1956)
It is important to remember that the British Government became masters of the whole island only after the fall of the Kandyan Kingdom in 1815 and the Vanni Chieftains in 1818 and looked at this Island from the distant West as a geographical unit and not as political or national state.
Hope Friday Forum will issue a statement just as it did after the infamous training of university entrants with the army:
http://transcurrents.com/news-views/archives/1190
Friday Forum deeply concerned about leadership training outside university system, 10 June 2011: ‘’The curriculum of the training programme obtained by the Friday Forum after some effort reveals extremely problematic aspects. …. On the whole the curriculum seems to discourage tolerance for viewpoint difference, and sensitivities for the pluralism and diversity of our country.”
See the following analysis which is a snapshot of how South Indian commentators are viewing Sri Lanka;
South Asia
Mar 27, 2012
ASIATIMESONLINE
Sri Lanka rights vote stirs nationalist passion
By Sudha Ramachandran
BANGALORE – A new wave of nationalism among the Sinhala majority in Sri Lanka following a United Nations vote last week could embolden the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa to avoid ensuring accountability for atrocities committed against Tamil civilians in the final stages of the civil war and continue ignoring the need for a political solution to the country’s decades-long ethnic conflict.
The US-sponsored resolution, which was passed on Thursday at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) by a vote of 24 to 15 with eight abstentions, aims at jumpstarting the process of bringing to justice those responsible for the systematic killing of civilians in the final stages of the war that ended in May, 2009, but could end up having the opposite effect.
Nationalist passions have surged in the wake of the resolution. The run-up to the vote in Geneva saw Buddhist monks and Sinhala nationalist groups protesting the selective ”victimization” of Sri Lanka, with some seeing it as a diabolical conspiracy. A statement issued by monks at the end of a demonstration drew attention to ”evil forces both local and international [that] have joined hands to deprive Sri Lanka of the present environment of peace.” These forces, the statement warned would take ”this blessed island back to an era of darkness”.
In a significant shift in position, India, which strongly supported the Rajapaksa government’s conduct of the war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) voted for the resolution. The resolution calls on Colombo to provide a comprehensive action plan detailing steps the government proposes to implement the recommendations made in the report of the government-appointed Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), and to address ”alleged violations of international law”.
New Delhi’s vote in favor of the UNHRC resolution has angered Sri Lanka’s Sinhala majority. ”They feel India has acted antagonistically to Sri Lanka,” Sumanasiri Liyanage, professor of economics at Sri Lanka’s Peradeniya University, told Asia Times Online.
This could result in a fraying of Colombo’s ties with its northern neighbor, prompting the Rajapaksa government to move closer to China, reducing among other things India’s leverage.
The Sri Lankan civil war was a brutal one. A UN panel of experts concluded last year that “a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law was committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
There is considerable evidence, including video footage of the final days of the war, that provides chilling insight into how the Sri Lankan armed forces bombarded Tamil civilians in so-called no-fire zones, prevented humanitarian assistance from reaching civilians there and systematically executed surrendering and captured LTTE fighters and their relatives, even if they were mere children.
In the circumstances, the UNHRC resolution is a mere rap on the Lankan government’s knuckles. Its text falls far short of demands by human-rights groups and Tamil diaspora organizations for an international probe and trial of the Rajapaksa regime on war crimes charges. The resolution calls on Colombo to implement recommendations made by the LLRC. It ”encourages the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and relevant special procedures mandate holders to provide … advice and technical assistance on implementing” the steps it has outlined.
Even this advice is only ”in consultation with the concurrence of the government of Sri Lanka”. The intrusive content of the resolution’s text was diluted considerably.
In spite of this, many have opposed the resolution on the grounds that it undermines Sri Lankan sovereignty.
The thrust of the government’s argument at Geneva was that it needed ”time and space” to implement the LLRC recommendations, ignoring that three years has passed since the end of the war in which it had not taken even baby steps toward meaningfully reconciling with the Tamils.
Other opponents of the resolution have questioned the moral right of the United States to sponsor it given its own abysmal record in Afghanistan, Iraq and dozens of other countries. Liyanage, for instance, questioned the Americans’ intentions, arguing that it was not concern for Tamils that drove Washington’s move.
Supporters of the resolution are under fire from Sinhala nationalists and the government. Sri Lankan rights activists and journalists who supported the resolution have been dubbed by the government-controlled media as “traitors” who have “betrayed the motherland”. Intimidation of critics of the government – always high in Sri Lanka – peaked last week when Minister for Public Relations Mervyn Silva warned several activists whom he named at a public rally that he would break their limbs in public.
Countries who voted for the resolution are being castigated. Protest demonstrations were staged outside the US embassy in Colombo. Wimal Weerawansa, the minister for housing and common amenities who is leader of the National Freedom Front, has called for a boycott of American brands such as Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Pizza Hut and Google’s e-mail service Gmail.
Another target of Sri Lankan ire is neighboring India. The pro-government English daily, The Island, mocked India as a “loser” that had “failed to carry Asia, or at least South Asia with it”. (Other Asian countries either voted against or abstained on the resolution). “Sri Lanka has won against India in Asia,” it gloated.
Delhi’s “yes vote” in the UNHRC is perceived by many in Colombo as the outcome of pressure from the US and of coalition compulsions, ie India’s ruling United Progressive Alliance was forced to heed the demand of its Tamil allies to support the resolution.
While there is some truth in this perception, it ignores the key concern that drove Delhi to vote the way it did – mounting frustration in India with the Rajapaksa government’s reluctance to take steps to find a political solution to the ethnic conflict.
“Delhi finally woke up to the fact that its gentle prodding of Colombo for the past several years to deliver on its promises for devolution of power was not working. Hence, its decision to vote in favor of the UNHRC resolution,” a retired Indian diplomat said.
Illustrative of the change in Indian mood is the shift in the editorial position of The Hindu, an influential Indian daily that has readership in Sri Lanka too. Till recently an apologist of the Rajapaksa government, it observed in an editorial that Rajapaksa brought the Geneva resolution on himself.
The question now is how the Rajapaksa government will respond to the message coming out of Geneva, one that the Hindu describes as a “wake up call for Colombo”.
The UNHRC resolution is not binding. Rajapaksa could therefore be tempted to respond with “bravado and defiance, a response that would strike a chord, no doubt, with his Sinhala nationalist supporters,” the Indian diplomat said.
This response is not without risks.
“Open violation of the UNHRC resolution (as non-binding as it is) will certainly bring the country closer to an international mechanism on war crimes and drag Sri Lanka into even muddier international waters,” the noted human rights lawyer Kishali Pinto Jayawardene warned in an opinion piece in The Sunday Times, a Sri Lankan English-language newspaper.
More importantly, a continued reluctance to address Tamil grievances and justice issues will only fuel further the simmering ethnic conflict.
There is a possibility of the Sri Lankan government introducing “some measures that would formally satisfy the international community,” Liyanage argues. “But its effects on national integration in Sri Lanka may not be significant.”
This would mean that the government will make some cosmetic gestures towards “reconciliation” with the Tamils.
That might satisfy what Liyanage describes as “a disinterested international community” but it is unlikely to assuage the Tamils.
The defeat at Geneva is being described in Colombo as a victory. “The cornered badger [Sri Lanka] bravely fought the mastiffs of neo-imperialism … and went down fighting,” the Island editorial said, going on to claim that “it certainly was a defeat as good as a victory!”
It is time Colombo read the message from Geneva correctly. As the Hindu points out, the resolution “means that gentle prodding and quiet diplomacy will not be the main means the world will adopt towards the island nation.”
Sri Lanka’s Sinhala nationalists might need to drop that self-satisfied swagger in their gait.
Sudha Ramachandran is an independent journalist/researcher based in Bangalore. She can be reached at sudha98@hotmail.com
“Make “enforced disappearances” a crime in Sri Lanka? How would one do that in practical terms with the current judiciary and law enforcement arms of the goverment in one man’s hand and thus manipulated by a family? Any enforced manipulation can be manipulated to show voluntary or non-involvement of the government for local consumption of low intelligent mass. Unfortunately it is coming to a serious and sad end thanks to their over indulgence in lies and deceptions. The attendance at the aborted meeting bears witness to this. We as true lovers of the nation prepared to hang on to even a straw of this nature to save our beautiful island.