Three potential sources of pluralist reform in post war Sri Lanka
By Dayan Jayatilleka
As Paul Berman once wrote, “somewhere in the world it is always 1941”. There comes a time in the life of every society when it is faced with an existential threat or challenge. It is the social forces or elements that rise up to this challenge and successfully overcome this threat that then have the power as well as the legitimacy to place their stamp on what comes after. Those who stood on the wrong side of history, or never rose to the occasion, or who abandoned the struggle partway, or simply failed; the defeated enemy, the collaborators, the appeasers and the fence-sitters — and these are not one and the same — all forfeit the chance to place their values, ideas and programs as the leading ones of the social order that follows the great test.
The truths are threefold. The truth is that the Tigers and the Tamil ultra-nationalists overestimated themselves and underestimated the Sinhalese, due to arrogance and racism. The last stage of the war saw a titanic clash of wills, between, on the one hand, the Tigers, the Tamil Diaspora and overseas Tamils from Canada to Chennai, their Western supporters and the Western media, and on the other, the Sinhala people, the armed forces, the Rajapakse leadership, a thin stratum of heroic Tamil rebels against Prabhakaran, and several friendly states. The Balasinghams wrote a book about the Tamil Eelam struggle with a neo-Nietzschean title, The Will to Freedom. The truth is that from a classically Nietzschean perspective, the Sinhalese Will to Power, i.e. to “prevail over” to “overcome” (which was Nietzsche’s meaning) on and over this small island, was and will in the final analysis always be, cannot but be, greater than that of the Tamils to secede. The truth is also that the Tigers, weakened by an Eastern Tamil rebellion, were defeated by a largely Sinhalese army, sustained by the Sinhala people whose collective will refused to break under decades of suicide bombings, body bags coming home to villages and assassinations of their leaders; the Sinhalese who, this time around, like the paradigmatic Silindu in Woolf’s Village in The Jungle, finally turned on their tormentors and blew them away.
If the social bloc that dominates the UNP wished a postwar Sri Lanka of their liking they should not have repeatedly blown the chances they had of defending the country’s territorial unity, integrity and sovereignty -- but blow them it did.
JR Jayewardene did want to win the war, though Lalith Athulathmudali did say that operations were intended to prove to the Tigers that they had no military option. JRJ was perhaps the only UNP president that wanted to win the war and tried to, but he and his administration did not have the basic capacity or intelligence (a) to suppress Black July ’83 (b) not to tamper with the rules of the democratic game to such a degree that it split the Sinhalese and destabilized the domestic situation and (c) to maintain the kind of political relationship with India that would have permitted it to win the war and pre-empted Indian pre-emption, so to speak.
The Premadasa presidency had an admirable degree of multiethnic, multicultural pluralism in its make up and dominant ideology but it allowed the war effort to be paralyzed by infighting within the officer corps and under-funded by bureaucrats with a possible bias or lack of commitment. It made the right decision in putting Gen Denzil Kobbekaduwe in charge of the military effort but it did not consider a military victory possible or, on balance, desirable. (I was possibly the only one in the Premadasa camp whose policy memoranda to him pushed for a military victory. This heartbreaking effort is reflected in my book The Travails of a Democracy: Unfinished war, Protracted Crisis, Vikas, New Delhi 1995).
The UNP’s final chance came with the Prime Ministership of Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe who opted for a lopsided Ceasefire agreement at a time when the balance of forces had turned dramatically against the LTTE due to the successful operations of the Special Forces LRRP and the global anti-terrorist shift due to 9/11. The CFA permitted the buildup of the proto state structure of the Tigers and humiliated the Sri Lankan armed forces.
The moderate, Westernized wing of the SLFP had its chance to win the war and re-mould Sri Lanka in accordance with its more reformist pluralist ideology but it threw the chance away. The re-taking of Jaffna was vitiated by the failure to cut off the LTTE’s retreat thereby permitting the Tigers to escape together with large number of civilians, base themselves in Mullaitivu, regroup and make a dramatic comeback. The strategy was one of taking territory rather than annihilating the enemy; recruitment was negatively affected by campaigns such as Sudu Nelum, Thavalama and the efforts of NIPU etc; corruption was rampant in the sphere of procurement. Above all, there was no commitment to a strategic goal of destroying the enemy but rather to one of driving the Tigers to the negotiating table. Worst of all, Karuna’s rebellion was double-crossed and Prabhakaran’s Sea Tigers allowed to violate the CFA and land in his rear area; General Sarath Fonseka was transferred from Jaffna and placed on the shelf in charge of the Volunteers ( the Sunday Island carried many pieces by me around the time and after, vigorously criticizing the decision and arguing for his placement at the helm of our army); and the tsunami weakened Tigers were sought to be given an administrative–financial authority in the form of the PTOMS, probably as part of a deal with the TNA which would give a third term to the incumbent.
These are not the only critics of the Rajapakse administration and the postwar outcome. Others include the local and foreign NGOs comprising self–proclaimed civil society; the Churches; and the non-Tiger Tamil dissidents such the UTHR and SLDF. Had Colombo’s cosmopolitan civil society not been so totally pro-appeasement, had the churches been visibly and audibly critical of Tiger totalitarianism and exercised greater internal discipline (instead of allowing some of its clergymen to opt for Barabbas, as Fr Bernard continues to do from Mindanao), had the Tamil dissidents worked for a united front of anti-Tiger Tamils which could have launched a resistance struggle in the rear of the LTTE or backed Karuna and Douglas Devananda, who were the actually existing alternatives to the Tigers, their criticisms - pious, petulant or patronizing - of trends in postwar Sri Lanka would not have so little social legitimacy and traction. (I recall the response of an award winning Indian journalist of Tamil ethnicity who wrote a book on the war, when I praised the UTHR-J reports: “yeah, except for that Church of South India tone of preachy Protestant moralizing!”)
None of this justifies any attempt by extremist lobbies to translate and degrade the victory of the Sri Lankan state, its armed forces and the people over the Tigers, a valiant victory which has the potential to be a liberation of all the peoples of the island from LTTE fascism, into an armed version, a militarized equivalent of 1956 or 1972 (the abolition of Section 29 and the formal enthronement of one language, religion and specific state form over others).Whatever their socially enabling and democratic aspects for the vast majority, both 1956 and 1972 contained for the minorities, a dimension of discrimination, domination and divisiveness.
No current critique, however trenchant, of postwar Sri Lankan trends approximates in its luminous perspicacity the following judgment:
“Separate identities have been sustained and fortified by deep antagonisms and wildly contested facts which extend over two millenia and more…Each fresh confrontation and every violent eruption becomes an instant invitation to an overpowering onrush of self-righteous recidivism, against which reason can only erect the feeblest defenses... Having co-opted the clergy, can militant Sinhalese-Buddhism rely on support from the armed services, too?... Now regional councils are coming up for air for the third (and last?) time. All the political parties are discussing the proposal, a shrewd… move to gain endorsement from a national consensus. But has political power already slipped out of the hands of politicians?”
Amazingly, these words appeared a shade over a quarter century ago in the pages of the Far Eastern Economic Review of January 26, 1984, pp22-23, and were written by Mervyn de Silva. Though a little late, I have wised-up sufficiently, not to doubt my father’s wisdom, but was this a description of some aspect of the reality at the time, or a latent tendency at any time given Sri Lankan society, history and mentality, or an early warning-cum-prediction? Only future history will tell.
Does this mean that from a pluralist, reformist or modernist perspective all is lost either by cultural fore-ordination and teleology or by default and abdication? I would argue not necessarily, not inevitably, for three reasons, all discernible from a dialectical standpoint. These are the three potential sources of pluralist reform in postwar Sri Lanka. In ascending order of significance, the first is comprised of the Tamil allies and partners of the state and the governing party. Contrary to the crude, congruent distortions of Colombo’s liberals and their western patrons as well as the Sinhala hardliners, it is not the case that the anti-Tiger camp is monolithically and exclusively Sinhala hard-line while those who are for ethnic equality and autonomy belong to the “antiwar”, “anti-state” and “antigovernment” camp. There is a strategically significant anti-Tiger, pro-state, pro-Govt Tamil stakeholder segment, which stands for equality and devolution.
The second driver of a more pluralist postwar outcome is the democratic system which includes the courts and above all, competitive elections. Municipal elections are imminent, Parliamentary elections are scheduled for the first half of next year and Northern provincial elections are unavoidably on the agenda. With proportional representation, the Tamil people will punch pretty much their demographic weight. Political space cannot but broaden, and the ensuing give-and-take is inevitable, eroding ideological blocs. Post-election, the postwar power bloc would be recomposed.
The third and final source is the external factor. Forget the unfair critics of Sri Lanka and those who tilt to the pro-Tiger Tamil Diaspora for one reason or the other. Those who stood by Sri Lanka during the war and its aftermath are crucially interested in political accommodation of the Tamil minority – with India being an obvious case in point, but by no means the only one holding this view. The statement of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization led by China and Russia, which has admitted Sri Lanka as a “dialogue partner” (my regular readers, going back to the Weekend Express column may recognize that I canvassed for affiliation since its founding almost a decade ago), mentions not only “independence and sovereignty” but also “the rights of minorities”.
It is the dynamic of interaction of these three factors within the anti-Tiger, “patriotic” universe, within the cosmos of the Sri Lankan state, within the power-bloc that won the war, which will make for pluralism, reform and possibly paradigm shift.
We shall need to pay heed to the views of our friends, local and foreign, as it becomes increasingly obvious that the Tiger army is destroyed but the Tiger movement or global network is still alive, a well-placed new generation of Tamil secessionists have been born overseas and have come of age, and though the war is decisively won, the protracted struggle with Tamil Tiger separatism on a world scale is hardly over. A long Cold War has just begun.
(These are the strictly personal views of the writer).
9 Comments
It might do you some good to read up race theory. Tamils can't be accused of racism because they are a minority. Racism is not only about antagonism to another community, but about the ability economically and politically to weaken the other community through racial discrimination. In Sri Lanka, only the Sinhalese can be accused of racism because they have the economic and cultural power to weaken others. A minority's attempt to separate or even its hatred of the majority community cannot be labelled as racism because it lacks racial power.
At any rate, even in the layman's understanding of the term, this is not about racism as Sinhalese and Tamils are of the same race.
Dayan,
First portion of your article failed to mention that significant but silent Tamil majority has abandoned LTTE unceremoniously, long before the war was over.Hence no posthumous honor or grieving for VP.The defection of Karuna,Indian antagonism of VP all contributed towards the final outcome.
The pluralistic nature of SL is an undeniable fact. If Britain with long history of anglo-saxon lineage claims to be a pluralistic society ,the SL from time immemorial has been one.Once every one accept these reality and move on, the future for next generation of lankans is safe.That would be accommodation politics not appeasement as you are trying to portray.
The record of shanghai cooperation member states regarding minority rights is nothing to be proud of to quote as an example.
Over all you make a case for pleuralism for the wrong reason.It is the moral responsibility of every one to take care of minorities. It's the right of minorities and indeed every citizen to expect to be treated with dignity,honour,equality and expect rule of law to prevail.That is the right reason.Today the biggest threat for SL is not Tamil nationalism or the diaspora children.It's the militarisation of society and failure of rule of law and devaluation of democratic insitutions such as free press and Judiciary and the Sinhala ultra nationalist.
Tamils have paid their price for the same mistakes can every one learn from this?Doesn't look like you have learnt from it.
Pluralist reform? What is being seen on the ground is Tamil Bashing, and this is going to increase and it is not only being done by the Sinhalese. We are watching Sinhala Buddhist fascism consolidating the supremacy it has achieved by force of arms. The Tamils of Indian Origin have already been ground into silence. What remains of the Sri Lankan Tamil community is now being squeezed out of the economic spaces they occupy. As usual in such cases the land owners are the first to lose their lands, being forcibly taken over. There is no mass attack as in 83. Now it is careful selective effective targeting. You are dead right, it is 1941.
.
Looking back at history from 1948, Srilanka under Sinhalese rulers, it is obivious that Sinhalese are very good warriors but not rulers.
:-)
Very entertaining piece there, Dayan. I especially like how you throw around such banter as "pluralist, reformist, modernist." When the supremacist vision of Cyril Matthew, of the Buddhist flag on all four corners of the island, solidified by the grip on power afforded by uber racist JR's Executive Presidency, and supplemented by the infinite assistance of a few Indian despots, finally takes root - you come along and add a slight disclaimer along the lines of "even a significant % of Tamils believe democracy is now inevitable." Of course, to satisfy your masters elsewhere, and perhaps avoid the hassle of a white van ride, you begin your article by adding maximum racial dimensions to the conflict. Naturally, the hero in your saga is the "Sinhala." Never mind the sordid, low-interest deals worth mega-billions with Iran, Libya, and that lover of Tibetan-Buddhism, China - this was the penultimate struggle of the Sinhala against his arch-rival of millenia, Dravidian Man. If that other witty patriot of yesteryear, Dharmapala, had had the fortune of going into the diplomatic service, I dare say a more capable mentor could hardly be found. Again, timely peace, considering that that other "inevitable consequence" of "post-war democracy" - elections - might well be lost in the annals of the impending "Cold War." Or does doing away with elections constitute as "reformist" here? I want to add "modernist" but on a comparative scale, the "modern" nations seem to value elections rather highly. Thus I will constrain my dichotomy to "reformist"... after all any "home-grown" solution, to rephrase your masters in Temple Trees, is surely reformist.
The cold war has begun but it does not have to be long if MR & Bros gather sufficient backbone and yield to the wisdom you eloquently displayed in Geneva (the 13th amendment) That other good man Tissa Vitharana is labouring to show the world that can also vindicate the Sinhalese. More than once, the good Professori was made to bite dust in public including that time when the Boss crudely interfered with the direction of the so-called free APRC process – “Guided Democracy” in its unadulterated form since Soekarno. The attack dog has already gone after Tissa V and now threatens to unleash his vulgar vitriolic on you to coerce you to submission. The cultured Mervyn de S (not to be confused with the scum who prides himself as Godfather of those ten underworld gangs of killers and kidnappers that shames the capital’s decent citizens and yet has the eye and the ear of the Bros) titled his piece when the army hit back at the JVP madness in 1988/89 stridently as “the empire strikes back.” This fine journo of tremendous foresight then speculated if some sections of the army heirarchy, having then saved the regime and the country, might develop agendas of their own in the future. He was right to levels more than he ever figured.
LTTE’s KP neither has the brains nor what it takes to lead the dead LTTE. The diaspora may not have the appetite to get involved with another extortionist Mafia. They are relieved the army and MR saved them from the fascism that hijacked the struggle midway. The Trans-national Govt-in-Exile is a non-starter and Ethiopia/Eritrea is hardly an auspicious place to start a venture of such import. KP has already made a fool of himself with "the death" and is desperate to keep the funds flowing. The Tamil resistance will continue and gain greater support and strength globally. It will be lead by the TNA and others from Lankan soil with emerging forces, like the young academics in the SLDF you refer to, offering guidance. But if the Bros get their act together as they for the umpteenth time assured the Brahmins in Delhi “more than the 13th” will be offered, then all of us have reason to rejoice. Boggles the thick-skinned F/M was once again kept out ungraciously – not that he could have contributed much. But why does the country need such an unproductive profligate when the Bros do all the talking and make the decisions. What are the Ambassadors and Missions for?
And, answering Crazyoldmans, may I say Tamils of recent Indian origin have not merely been ground into silence. They have been sold out lock, stock and barrel for filthy lucre and an army of a security retinue. As Uyangoda concluded, they scream loud and clear they are quite happy their people are treated as 2nd class citizens so long as the leaders “are taken care of” Old Thonda, your dad’s dear pal, must be turning in his grave.
ISS
"on the other, the Sinhala people, the armed forces, the Rajapakse leadership, a thin stratum of heroic Tamil rebels against Prabhakaran, and several friendly states"
If we are to believe your inclusion of "the Sinhala people", then the Tamils has a reason to ask for separation. Tamils wanted united Ceylon in 1925 in preference to Federal structure proposed by SWRD. Tamils were not the racists, it is the other way around. Tamils did not underestimate Sinhalese but Pirabhakaran underestimated India. Others are mere dummies. It is the supply which made the difference. What you are doing to Karuna now is the one you have done to us in the past. Made use of Tamils for a safe passage to freedom and threw them like dead rat. Now Karuna and Douglas are at the receiving end. In the future, for good or bad, no one will turn to you, they will probably turn to India for safe residence and no jail term. Keep it up your performance.
Easwaran
*** they scream loud and clear they are quite happy their people are treated as 2nd class citizens so long as the leaders “are taken care of” Old Thonda, ***
Senguttavan,
You are an old timer right?…so you should remember the time 20 to 30 years ago when you Uppity Jaffna Tamil doctors refused to Treat Upcountry Tamils? Do you remember that? Funny how Sinhalese Doctors like my father had to go tend to those people you refer to as “Second Class Citizens”…eh? I’m curious as to why you continue to Rag on Upcountry Tamils who have chosen to be part of Sri Lanka? Is it because their party (the CWC) is part of Mahinda’s government? Or that they as Tamils don’t make the unnecessary Fuss you Jaffna Elite like to make..?
*** The Tamil resistance will continue and gain greater support and strength globally. It will be lead by the TNA and others from Lankan soil with emerging forces ***
Don't worry your self about this Old Man,... We will ensure that any sort of Tamil Nationalism Fantasies of Separatism are met with Lethal Force and smothered in the manger. Anyone who entertains the idea of a Tamil Separate State in Sri Lanka will see just how quickly their Stupidity is met with Dire Consequences.
As for your TNA...LOL! I predict they will become even more Fringe than the JHU after the next election. They have come to represent everything that is FAILED about the Tamil so-called Struggle... Who will embrace them now? Full integration of the North and the East with Muslims and Sinhalese will ensure that none of this Festering Communalism will ever rear its ugly head again in Sri Lanka. Tamil Patriots who chose to embrace the National Sri Lankan Identity will be given equal opportunity to Life Liberty and the pursuit of happiness... those who cling to Communalism and Separatism will not.
Devinda,
Elsewhere in these columns I have responded to your comments re. my age,
I am glad your dad, the good Doctor no doubt, was of help also to the Estate Tamils. You will learn in due time the family of the late Thonda treated me with much warmth and discussed many matters of interest to the well being of their people. The old man was passionate that his community reach the PQL of other communities in the Island and he achieved much on their behalf. Among matters we discussed was the discrimination his people suffered at the hands of other Tamils here. Who could foresee these very same people had to turn to old Thonda and concede in public their safety, well-being and future are now in his hands – a task he handled with much humility, without prejudice and in the sincere belief that the crushing weight of majoritarian communalism harms all Tamils – in the North, East and elsewhere. And, to overcome this for 40 years he sought and eventually received political support and strength from the UNP/SLFP lead Sinhala regimes although both sides were poised against him and his people from 1947 onwards. Your threat “full integration of the North-East with Muslims and Sinhalese will ensure…” has now been in motion for decades. The recent events in the Wanni are only a small fraction of this formulae. This process, I fear, will bring greater disaster to the Sinhala south as time goes by than to the Tamils as 1956, 1983 and other major anti-Tamil events have established. Remember, that brilliant Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban “ the ....…never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity” Fill in the blanks with “GoSL and the Sinhala majority” That learned man George Santayana observed “those who fail to learn from the lessons of history are condemned to re-live it” If you indeed bring your act together heeding both the country will gain. The key to Sri Lanka’s undiminishing and growing minorities’ problem lies in coming to terms with hard lessons. Locking up a million Tamil civilians exposing them to hunger, disease and starvation; killing and jailing fearless journalists; punishing defiant Shastara-karayas or rewarding square pegs in round holes (where ministerial appointments are made to satisfy suspect political goals) will not bring the required results. As the Israeli’s and the Arabs - including the hawkish Netanyahu, the PLO and Arab radicalism - now realize the answer to their problem, as it is ours, is the 2 States solution. As to us, it is 2 States within an undivided political entity whereas the Israelis and the Palestinians will have two different, sovereign States living side by side, hopefully, forgetting the battles and bloodshed of the past and looking for days of peace and harmony of the future made of hard but right political decisions. The path to that happy land beyond the blue mountain, flowing rivers and eternal rainbows to them, as it is to us, is well within reach. What we have lacked so far and do today are leaders who failed us by their lack of political will and wisdom and so the haemorraging continues – unabated.
ISS