Archive for the ‘Politics and Governance’

Food or Poison?

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Image courtesy Ceylon Luxury The food drive announced by the Government, Api Wawamu Rata Nagimu, has to look at the whole question of public health very seriously or we could wind up doing more harm than good to our population. Food, must contribute to the health of the individual, but food grown with toxins detracts from individual health.  The quantity of food we produce will not help national development, if eating that food compromises health of the consumers.  Many other countries are taking serious steps to combat the scourge of sub lethal poisoning (where the victims do not die) very seriously. When the volume of food produced becomes the only goal of agriculture and issues such as public health are ignored, the mere operation of high-input industrial agriculture allows many toxins enter the diet of people.  In this article we will examine the effects of two classes of toxins, endocrine disruptors and estrogen mimics. Many modern conditions of ill health…

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Exclusive: Syllabi and timetables from compulsory University ‘leadership’ training course

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Image from Virakesari Online Great controversy and concern surrounds the ‘leadership’ training programme designed by the Ministry of Defence for under graduate students, conducted in around 28 military installations around the country. As the Young Researchers Collective recently noted on Groundviews, “Although the government has stated that this will be a leadership training program rather than a military training program, it has conceded that the military will be involved in a number of aspects of the program. Students have also been informed that this training is “mandatory” for university entrance, though there now appears to be a great deal of confusion with regards to this provision as Government officials have issued a series of contradicting statements. These decisions have also been challenged by many students, rights groups, student unions, teachers’ unions and academics who have raised a number of concerns about the way in which this program has been conceived and implemented. This issue has also exacerbated a worsening crisis…

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Months after the 18th Amendment: Is the Executive really more accountable to Parliament?

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Image credit Sunday Leader The 18th Amendment, we were told, would make the President more accountable to Parliament. The Editorial of the Sunday Observer noted back in the day, By making it mandatory for the President to attend Parliament at least once in three months to answer questions by MPs, the 18th Amendment has not only made a vital link between the Executive and the Legislature, but has also made the President answerable to Parliament. Had President Rajapaksa given thought to dictatorship even in his wildest dreams, he would never have decided to attend Parliament once in three months. Despite being elected twice to the high office, President Rajapaksa strongly believes in parliamentary democracy and is keen to attend Parliament and follow proceedings whenever time permits. Isn’t this characteristic of a truly people’s leader who firmly believes in the power of the ballot? Emphasis ours. But has the President in fact entertained any questions from MPs in Parliament since the…

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‘BE YOUNG AND SHUT UP!’: A COURSE IN CIVIC DISENGAGEMENT

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‘Sois Jeune et Tais Toi’ – Be Young and Shut Up, May 1968. Image from  Qwiki.   It is always intriguing to revisit the ideas of Paul Goodman; not exclusively for his writing on sexuality, film and politics, but also for his pertinacious desire to problematise key aspects of American society during the 1950s and 1960s. Goodman’s ideas on education were provocative and challenged ‘organised’ society by contesting what appeared to him as the distorted constitution of social order. The cant of anarchism is impractical and an idyllic fantasy, but some of Goodman’s ideas are highly persuasive. It would be appropriate to begin what is hopefully a laconic critique of the government’s leadership programme with a quote from an essay Goodman wrote to the New York Review of Books in 1969 titled, The Present Moment in Education; ‘there is an authentic demand for Young People’s Power, their right to take part in initiating and deciding the functions of society that concern…

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Killing and State Intervention into a Funeral: A New Form of Suppressing Liberty in Sri Lanka

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Crime of “Dissent” & of Murder Killing of Roshen Shanaka Ratnasekara,  a factory worker in the Free Trade Zone (FTZ), Katunayaka gives a signal to the country on how peaceful protesters would be dealt with. Those who are familiar with police accountability will accept that police cannot carry guns and ammunition, without accountability. The records of the police must reveal as to who issued firearms and ammunition and who, in fact, ordered the police to fire.  Police is required to make frank notes of their actions after they return to the station. However, all these come out only if a credible investigation is conducted. Knowing the track record of governance in the country and impunity with which law enforcement and political authorities operate, there is hardly any genuine hope of such transparency in any investigation. The purpose of this article is to briefly examine the legality of use of excessive force by law enforcement officers and the impact of the…

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Checkmate, Rajapakse! The UN Report, Militarism and Public Religion in Sri Lanka

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The author of this article, in January 2012, wanted us to take it down. Although published under a pseudonym on Groundviews, the real name of the author and the full content of the article is available online on a number of websites.

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Deliberative Democracy and the Sri Lankan Parliamentary Committee System

Any State policy affects its citizens. All State policies should be designed to benefit citizens and ideally citizen’s perspectives or representations should be included within the principles of a particular policy. Hence, State policies should be designed by State representatives to ultimately benefit citizens and not themselves. This basic and broad understanding of what policies within a state mechanism should achieve is the ‘norm’ in a relationship between State Policy Design and the political rights of its Citizens. Although this is a ideal and is probably not practiced perfectly anywhere in the world, it is something we would like to believe we can achieve in the 21st Century of political thought. This link between citizen consultation and state policy design is non-negotiable, while the method through which it is done could be negotiable. The real problem lies when the very link between citizens and state policy design is severed. When politicians or state officials start to design policies without consulting…

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Perspectives and Commentary on the Leadership Training Programme for University Undergraduates

[Author's note: As you are probably aware the leadership training for undergraduates is now well under way in 28 military installations around the country. Although the government has stated that this will be a leadership training program rather than a military training program, it has conceded that the military will be involved in a number of aspects of the program. Students have also been informed that this training is “mandatory” for university entrance, though there now appears to be a great deal of confusion with regards to this provision as Government officials have issued a series of contradicting statements. These decisions have also been challenged by many students, rights groups, student unions, teachers’ unions and academics who have raised a number of concerns about the way in which this program has been conceived and implemented. This issue has also exacerbated a worsening crisis in local universities as the Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (FUTA) are also in the midst of trade...

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Identities And Borders In South Asia: A View From The Left

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Partition, 1947, courtesy The Hindu Introduction From the partition of British India to the civil war in Sri Lanka, the attempt to impose national borders in accordance with ethnic, linguistic or religious identities in South Asia has spawned civil wars and crimes against humanity, resulting in almost unimaginable suffering and bloodshed. This is all the more preposterous in a region where migration and the mixing of peoples and cultures have been occurring from time immemorial. The Left potentially has a conceptual and theoretical framework which would allow it to propose solutions to these conflicts, yet flawed interpretations of ‘the right to self-determination’ have led many on the Left to compound the problems instead. A different interpretation suggests that the key goals should be less violence and more democracy, and taking down barriers between peoples rather than erecting more and more of them. The birth of India and Pakistan It is surely a paradox that a non-violent movement in India for…

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Overseeing the Farm

Planning a visit home is not easy for a Tamil returning to Jaffna. First, he needs to fly into the international airport at Katunayake and pass through customs like any traveler. He may be asked to step into a back room, to answer why he carries the Economist in hand luggage, or stickers from the World Wildlife campaign to save the tiger, given that such animals have not been spotted on the island in thousands of years, if indeed they ever sauntered through the wild grass or paddy fields. He may be grilled about family members in Wellawatte, and what career he pursues in the Scarborough, Ontario refuge where wild and liberal creatures found a home before conservatives took over in Ottawa; he may be whisked through secondary, and into a waiting vehicle for a fast ride to the upstairs room at CID headquarters where he will meet his guide, his helper, who will say, come friend, the campaign is…

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When allegations become evidence

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Media and advocacy groups make mistakes. It’s true. The reason for the errors can vary from simple human error, time constraints resulting in insufficient research to subtle manipulation of facts and wording to push an agenda. Once a mistake has been pointed out, most reputable organisations will publish an acknowledgement along with the correction. Less reputable organisations may ignore the error or correct the error without any acknowledgement. How organisations deal with errors are a great indicator of the quality of the publication. The United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, appointed an advisory panel to report on the final stages of Sri Lanka’s separatist war. The Darusman report was published in April and human rights advocacy groups, including Amnesty International, International Crisis Group and Human Rights Watch, initiated a controversial media campaign accusing Sri Lanka of war crimes. The most glaring error propagated by this media campaign is the assertion that there was “credible evidence” of crimes. There was not. The…

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The state of tomfoolery: 2018 Comonwealth Games in Hambantota

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A prominent English newspaper recently reported that the government has paid US$ 2.4 million to a British PR firm to promote its candidacy to host the 2018 Comonwealth Games in Hambanthota. This news item would definitely raise the eye brows of many Sri Lankans who constantly get beaten by the scourge of cost of living. For those who are not aware of international currency rates; 2.4 million US dollars means 264 million Rupees. The minimum salary of a state sector worker in Sri Lanka is Rs. 11000. The average monthly income of a middle class family in Sri Lanka is Rs. 20,000. But, the average monthly expenditure of an ordinary middle class family is way higher than that. As we all know, almost every one of us can feel the excessive pressure, generated by the soaring cost of living. Everyone in this country, including the government of Sri Lanka, has adopted a “hand to mouth” policy when it comes to…

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History is Irreversible – A ‘Postmortem’ on the Seminar, “Defeating Terrorism: Sri Lankan Experience”

The three day long seminar titled “Defeating Terrorism: Sri Lankan Experience” conducted by the SL Army and Ministry of Defence was concluded recently. During the event, top level military and civil officers addressed the international delegates and shared their experiences with regard to ‘defeating terrorism”. However, there are many views, opinions, doubts and speculations about the outcome of this seminar. Hopefully, the wheeling of time will provide satisfactory answers to many of these questions. Apart from this, I would like to point out another visible issue that prevailed throughout the seminar, which strikes me as pertinent. All the speakers who addressed this event prevented themselves from uttering one significant name. That particular name was ‘unmentioned’ and ‘unmentionable,’ and it was of course “Former Army Commander Former General Sarath Fonseka”. As we all know, Fonseka was responsible for engineering the military victory by using his knowledge, skills and combat experiences. Soon after the war, he was praised and honoured as the…

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The limits of the Mahinda Chintanaya: FTZ workers and Buddhist monks rise up against government

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Photo courtesy Vikalpa Protests in Katunayake Free Trade Zone: No police in sight has audio and video footage of the violent protests over the course of the week in the Katunayake Free Trade Zone. A 10 minute video of the protests on Thursday, after the Police killed 21 year old Free Trade Zone (FTZ) worker Roshan Chanaka, can be seen below. As Rasika Jayakody notes in an article dealing with Rohan’s killing, “Apart from this tragic death, this brutal police attack against Free Trade Zone workers left more than 200 people injured. On Monday evening, Ragama and Negombo hospitals were flooded with injured protesters. It is, undoubtedly, one of the brutal crackdowns in recent history. There are several video footages which clearly show the barbaric and inhuman manner that some police officers carried out attacks against unarmed protesters.” The withdrawal of the proposed pensions bill is a major embarrassment for the government. So embarrassing in fact that some reports suggest…

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Giving the middle finger: Sri Lanka’s conflicting responses to war crimes allegations

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Mr. A Nawan, Deputy Solicitor General of Sri Lanka This symbolic screen grab is from a short video on Channel 4′s website, on the occasion of screening in Geneva a one-hour documentary into the denouement of the war in Sri Lanka. As Channel 4′s website notes, “Disturbing footage in the film includes the apparent extra-judicial massacre of prisoners by government forces, the aftermath of targeted shelling of civilian hospitals and the bodies of female Tamil fighters who appear to have been sexually assaulted. Also examined in the film are atrocities carried out by the Tamil Tigers, including the use of human shields, and footage depicting the aftermath of a suicide bombing in a government centre for the displaced.” The Deputy Solicitor General of Sri Lanka notes in response to the screening of the documentary, “We have already made a preliminary investigation on the video and we have scientific material established that this particular video is not authentic.” Clearly he knows…

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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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