Archive for the ‘Features’

Reconciliation, Rights & Freedom: Four years after the end of war in SRi Lanka

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Image courtesy The Telegraph It is now 4 years after the end of the war. The way we Sri Lankans will remember the end of the war is likely to demonstrate once again how divided we are, as North and South, as Sinhalese and Tamils. Some Tamil friends in the North told me that they will try to have some events to remember the large numbers who were killed and disappeared, despite the past threats and intimidations. “We will try to have it quietly and low profile way” was what one friend told me. It is unlikely that families of those killed, disappeared, injured, those whose land has been occupied by the military after the war, will be in the mood to celebrate. This of course should not be confused with the fact that they are indeed relieved the war is over – that they don’t need to be in bunkers, duck shells, bombs and shooting, run over dead bodies…

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A New Political Regime Post-2010 in Sri Lanka: A Hybrid Regime

Mohinda Rajapaksa at election rally at Homagama, Sri Lanka.

Image courtesy Brisbane Times by Laksiri Jayasuriya, University of Western Australia Introduction The 2010 Sri Lankan Presidential and Parliamentary elections that took place shortly after the end of a debilitating 25 year-old civil war in 2009 constitutes a watershed in Sri Lanka’s politics. Despite the unsettled conditions over the last two decades emanating from this turbulent environment created by the civil war and the seemingly intractable obstacles encountered, Sri Lanka was able to maintain some semblance of the principles and practices of a liberal democracy (Clarence 2008). However, the dramatic events more recently surrounding the end of the civil war and the emergence of a ‘culture of violence, anomie and impunity’ (Devotta 2009) have cast a heavy cloud over the future of Sri Lanka’s democratic polity. The political order that emerged in 2005 with the Mahinda Rajapaksa-led Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) government has served to consolidate the illiberal political culture and institutions that evolved with the radical social and…

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Rally for Unity: Standing up for an inclusive Sri Lanka

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Groundviews strongly endorsed a rally held in Colombo on Sunday to reaffirm the fact that Sri Lanka is not only a Sinhala-Buddhist country. As the movement’s Facebook event page noted, this non-partisan, non-violent awareness raising rally aims to empower the silent majority of moderate Sri Lankans to stand up for an inclusive Sri Lanka. At its peak, Groundviews was told the rally had around 500 walking from point to point. View Rally for Unity in a larger map In the lead up to the rally, the organisers produced and released a number of videos in support of the rally and the larger movement behind it. All the videos can be viewed here, and interestingly, they feature high-profile individuals and MPs with the Government, those who have represented and defended the Government diplomatically in the past, a World Cup winning doyen of cricket, a well known actor, a senior member of the UNP and senior members of the Buddhist clergy. Groundviews…

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Gotabaya Rajapaksa: Are you listening?

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Image from Lanka Standard After nearly 7 years of postgraduate education and independent research experience abroad, I returned to Sri Lanka in mid 2003, to work in my mother country Sri Lanka that gave me free education all the way upto university level. When I left Johns Hopkins University in USA, some of my friends cautioned me of the danger I might face in a possible breakout of the war in Sri Lanka. Still, a strong compulsion kept me firm on the decision to return. When I was interviewed by the University of Moratuwa, where I received undergraduate education, I made it clear to the Vice Chancellor that my intension of joining the University would be to set up a laboratory to develop new technologies to detect landmines. Within a week, I went to Jaffna to see what technologies were being used by deminers. In Jaffna, I can never forget the fear I felt when I was asked to experience…

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Sheep No More…

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Image from video on the vigil, broadcast by News 1st. (A Personal Response to the quashing of the first anti BBS protest on Havelock Road) This evening (Friday, April 12th 2013) around 7.15pm on Havelock Road in front of the Sambuddhatva Jayanthi Building adjoining Laurie’s Road, I was reminded anew that there is no freedom in our land. I am nearly 45 years old now, and for 30 long years, I have been reminded over and over again in different places, at different times that in many ways the citizens of Sri Lanka are trapped. We have been and still are, in fact increasingly so, trapped by our fear, our intolerance, our ignorance, our sheep like obedience, either to the powers that be or to our own desperate need to play safe and stay safe. I am not a lawyer, a journalist, an academic or an activist. I am just an ordinary citizen who is sick of being intimidated by…

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A Tolerant Sri Lanka: Report on online poll

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The past few weeks have seen a rise in incidents and publicly expressed sentiments against the Muslim community by groups who claim to represent the rights of Sinhala Buddhists in Sri Lanka. Expressing concerns of undue place given to Muslims in Sri Lanka – from entrance to the Law College to issuing Halal certification to even increase in Muslim population and property ownership by Muslims, groups such as the Bodu Bala Sena and Sinhala Ravaya have taken it upon themselves to educate the Sinhala Buddhists on these concerns. While these groups declare to be non violent, speeches given by them at various rallies, defamatory references to individuals and the attacks on Muslim owned businesses in the past few weeks give the impression of a situation of vigilante groups gathering strength. It is in this context that Social Indicator, the survey research unit of the Centre for Policy Alternatives created an online questionnaire to gauge the views of people on this…

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Police in Sri Lanka show their true saffron colours

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Lest we forget, the Sri Lankan police, who act under the orders and protection of the Ministry of Defence, are far from doyens of impartiality. A few weeks ago, we noted that ”it is quite clear that four policemen, no more than 3 feet away from and staring directly into the face of the Buddhist “monk” who is engaged in destroying private property isn’t quite enough these days for an arrest to be made”. There is evidence, from no less than the Government’s Minister for Justice himself, that the Muslim owners of the property the “monks”destroyed were forced to withdraw their charges against the perpetrators. Contrast this Police inaction and collusion with fascist forces with their behaviour today in Colombo, against a peaceful vigil, as clearly indicated in a Facebook page that promoted the event. Sirasa TV captures the response by the Police in grim detail. Clearly then, in Sri Lanka today, Buddhist “monks” destroying private property are kosher, but citizens attempting…

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The empty findings of Sri Lanka’s Military Court of Inquiry

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Image courtesy RNW Colombo’s contempt for the international community seems to be increasing. The recent media release on the findings of the Military Court of Inquiry stretch credibility. While I have not had access to the full report and to the evidence presented to the Military Court of Inquiry, I am shocked by the Court of Inquiry’s findings. I was a member of the The Panel of Experts appointed by the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon, to look into accountabilty for the final stages of the war. The Panel rejected with utter certainty the notion that the Sri Lankan Military mounted a “humanitarian rescue” and that the war was conducted with “zero civilian casualties”. The Panel’s work revealed “a very different version of the final stages of the war than that maintained to this day by the Government of Sri Lanka“. The panel found “credible allegations” which, if proven, indicated that war crimes and crimes against humanity were…

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‘Where every prospect pleases, man alone is vile’

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Image courtesy Aaron Joel Santos The title of this article is a line from a beautifully haunting hymn written by Bishop Heber of Calcutta who, clearly, had an imperialistic mindset.  He visited our island in 1825, and the hymn must have been written around that time.  The next line reads, ‘The Heathen in his blindness bows down to wood and stone’.  Because of the racism implicit in it, this hymn is no longer sung in most churches.  But in the light of the extended anti-Muslim hysteria sweeping the country, we may need to pose the question, ‘are we vile?’ Are Sri Lankans a nation?  Are we one people? Are we a law abiding democracy?  Are we a model of friendly co-existence?  Till a few decades ago the answers would have been a resounding no to the first question and an emphatic yes to each of the others.  But now there are some fanatical groups claiming be Buddhists who seem determined to…

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A Tolerant Sri Lanka: How far will we go?

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The past few weeks have seen a rise in incidents and publicly expressed sentiments against the Muslim community by groups who claim to represent the rights of Sinhala Buddhists in Sri Lanka. Expressing concerns of undue place given to Muslims in Sri Lanka – from entrance to the Law College to issuing Halal certification to even increase in Muslim population and property ownership by Muslims, groups such as the Bodu Bala Sena and Sinhala Ravaya have taken it upon themselves to educate the Sinhala Buddhists on these concerns. While these groups declare to be non-violent, speeches given by them at various rallies, defamatory references to individuals and the attacks on Muslim owned businesses in the past few weeks give the impression of a situation of vigilante groups gathering strength. It is in this context that Social Indicator, the survey research unit of the Centre for Policy Alternatives created this online questionnaire. How seriously should we take the anti-Muslim sentiments being…

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Impeachment of Sri Lanka’s Chief Justice and its impact: Poll results

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Photo courtesy Euronews From 6 – 21 March 2013, Groundviews ran an online poll to ascertain opinions on the lasting impact of the unprecedented impeachment of Sri Lanka’s Chief Justice. The online poll was hosted on Typeform.com. 177 responses were generated. The questionnaire can be downloaded as a PDF here. The full poll results, for statistical analysis and verification, can be downloaded as an Excel spreadsheet here. Excerpts to the answers given to Question 1 and 7 are reproduced below, which some language edits. Unedited responses to these questions can be downloaded as plain text files (Question 1 and Question 7). Select quotes from the responses generated by Question 9 are also embedded in the infographic below. Unedited responses to this question are included in the Excel spreadsheet above. Clicking on the heading of any chart will take you to infogr.am and allow you to share and embed the specific infographic across a range of leading social media sites and…

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Taking old friends too seriously: Sri Lanka, Burma and Buddhist extremism

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People collect pieces of metal from the rubble of a neighbourhood in Pauktaw township that was burned in recent violence October 27, 2012. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun (Caption and content from Reuters) Sri Lanka’s long relationship with Burma is something that anyone who has even a nodding acquaintance with Sri Lankan history is aware of. In both nations, Theravada Buddhism has been a vital political idea that has cemented the legitimacy of monarchs. Both Burma and Sri Lanka saw a Buddhist revival as a response to colonial occupation, a revival which has allowed Buddhism to fuse with nationalism as both countries achieved their independence. With such a similar and connected past, it should come as no surprise that the Bodu Bala Sena’s manifesto echoes that of the 969; an extremist Buddhist organization in Myanmar that seeks to ethnically cleanse Myanmar of Muslims, who make up 4% of the country’s population.  The 969 take their title from Buddhist numerology and have styled themselves…

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Helping the Police arrest brutish “monks” in Sri Lanka

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Apparently the infamous Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) has condemned the attack on Fashion Bug warehouse a few days ago and asked the Police to arrest those involved in it, even if they are monks. A Daily Mirror news report suggests BBS thinks the individuals captured on film destroyed private property were actually impostors. Prima facie, this then begs the question as to why dozens of Police failed to arrest any of these “impostors” on the scene. This is not the first time Police have stood idly by as militant and racist “monks” have gone on the rampage. As we noted on Twitter, So response of BBS suggests that mob was really in fancy dress dailymirror.lk/news/27442-bbs… Does anyone believe them? #lka #SriLanka — Groundviews (@groundviews) March 29, 2013 No arrests had been made, says Police. No arrests will EVER be made globalpost.com/dispatch/news/… #lka #srilanka — Groundviews (@groundviews) March 29, 2013 Here are two images to help the Sri Lankan Police in…

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  • 26 Mar, 2013
  • 1 Comment
  • Colombo,
    Education,
    Features,
    Peace and Conflict,
    Youth

The State of the Free Education System in Sri Lanka: Confessions of a Disgruntled Student

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Image courtesy The Nation I am one of the 243,876 lucky students who sat for the Advanced Level Examinations in 2011. It has been almost one-and-a-half-years since then, and I received my university registration form only yesterday (6 – 4 – 2012). I was privileged enough to receive A/L results four times in the space of ten months. For this, I am eternally indebted to the Examinations Department. The possibilities for further delay, once I start university are endless: the FUTA might decide to call for another trade union action; minor-staff may decide their wages are insufficient; fellow students may decide to oppose private universities by boycotting classes; and so on. The thought of how old I will be when I graduate is not entertaining[1]. Grand Promises and Disconcerting Realities All state school textbooks carry an excerpt from a speech made by President Rajapaksa in 2010: “Beloved Sons and Daughters, Many countries that lagged behind us at the time we…

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Geneva and Bodu Bala Sena: Two Dimensions of a Crisis

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  Original image by Azzam Ameen, on Twitter There are tensions and schisms erupting, there is a crisis in the making. One dimension of this crisis is the unfolding diplomatic debacle: the Geneva-crisis. The group Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) represents, and gives expression to, another dimension. The emergence of both was to be expected; both, however, were avoidable. Geneva-crisis After Sri Lanka’s sui generis performance in 2009, the Geneva-story has been a depressing one to a lot of people. Sri Lanka’s support-base has dwindled drastically. India which, in 2009, opposed a Western-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka, stood up to remind the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillai, where to get off. Today, India is endorsing Western or US-sponsored resolutions, and acknowledging in the process reports produced by Ms. Pillai. The contrast couldn’t have been more damaging than this. In the face of such developments, Sri Lanka’s message (articulated especially by her political envoys), both at the UNHRC as…

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About Groundviews

Located at the Centre for Policy Alternatives in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Groundviews is a citizen journalism website that uses a range of genres and media to highlight critical perspectives on governance, reconciliation, human rights, the arts and literature, democracy and other issues. The site has won two international awards, including the prestigious Manthan Award South Asia in 2009. The grand jury's evaluation of the site noted, "What no media dares to report, Groundviews publicly exposes. It's a new age media for a new Sri Lanka... Free media at it's very best!"

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