federalidea.com

By SARATH De ALWIS

When did Sri Lanka become a unitary state? It became a unitary country enslaved by the British as a crown colony under a single administrative system in 1832 that was applicable to the maritime regions of the island as well as the Kandyan kingdom that was ceded to the British Crown by the Kandyan convention in 1815.

According to our ancient chronicles the first king of this island, which was to be the exclusive habitat of the Sinhala ethnic community was Vijaya. (543 B.C.) The last king of the Sinhalese was Sri Wickreme Rajasinghe (1798-1815)

In all 172 monarchs ruled this resplendent island. The first capital was Tammaanna Nuwara, The second Upatissa Nuwara and in 437 B.C. King Pandukabhaya founded the Capital Anuradhapura, the cradle of Sinhala Buddhist civilisation. That it nurtured a great civilisation often described as the Sinhala hydraulic civilisation is beyond dispute.

[The 13th-century staircase at Yapahuwa, Pic by Nick Leonard]

What is in dispute is that the island was subject to the authority of a single monarch and more importantly he ruled over a homogenous Sinhala Buddhist ethnic entity. Over a period of 2551 years the Sinhala seat of power moved from Anuradhapura to Polonnaruwa, back to Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura and on to Dambadeniya, Yapahuwa, Kurunegala, Gampola, Kotte, Sitawaka and finally Kandy. Why?

[Sangiliyan statue in Jaffna - Pic By HumanityAshore.org]

The answer is found in the Great Wall of China. Until the concept of the nation state was firmly established after the Second World War, frontiers were expected to be breached or defended. This is the story of human history of peaceful migration, assimilation or conquest. The decline of the Rajarata kingdom from about the 13 th century coincides with the emergence of a Tamil kingdom in the Jaffna peninsula.

Professor W. I. Siriweera in his History Of Sri Lanka writes, “The historical fact is that there were waves of Indian migrations from Eastern and Western India during the latter part of the proto-historic era. Vijaya and his followers bringing in spouses from the Pandya country — Madura — indicates that there were migrations from south India as well.”

These migrations at times were for conquest and plunder.

The first Chola king to rule the Anuradhapura kingdom was Elara. His rule lasted 44 years — in the words of the author of Mahavamsa “administering justice impartially for friend and foe.” He was defeated and killed in battle by the great Sinhala hero Dutta gamani.

According to the Mahavamsa he had to fight 32 battles before defeating King Elara.What is significant in this battle was that many of Elara’s forces were Sinhala. Nandimitta one of the 10 great warriors of Duttagamani was a nephew of Mitta a general of Elara. (Mhv. Ch.XXIII. 4.5.6.)

The Mahavamsa in Chapter XXVI .1 states “When that king of high renown united Lanka in one kingdom he distributed places of honour to his warriors according to their rank.” After Duttagamani who ruled for 24 years passed away his brother Saddatissa was anointed king.

[In Polonnaruwa, Statue of King Parakramabahu - Pic by Sachintha Jinadasa ]

Since Duttagamani who ruled a united kingdom of Lanka, only four other Sinhala kings succeeded in keeping their realm as a united kingdom where the sovereign overlord extended his writ throughout the island. They are Sena 2nd (866 A.D. 35 years at Polonnaruwa), Vijayabahu 1st (1065 A.D.55 years at Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura), Parakramabahu 1st who is also referred to as Prakramabahu the Great (1164 A.D. 33 years at Polonnaruwa) and Parakramabahu 6th (1464 A.D.52 years at Kotte). This they achieved by appointing trusted officials as regents in charge of various regions.

Professor A.V.Suraweera in his translation of the Rajavaliya uses the term one canopy, which implies the existence of regional rulers with allegiance to the king.

Professor Sirima Kiribamune in an article Tamils in Ancient and Medieval Sri Lanka: The Historical Roots of Ethnic Identity (ethnic studies report vol.iv (i) 1986 writes “It is suggested that the Tamil community in Sri Lanka was the result of peaceful migration, trade contact, political domination and military recruitment.”

Sir Ponnambalam Arunachalam, scholar statesman in his Sketches Of Ceylon History written in 1906 is more forthright. He writes “After Duttagamani’s time the Tamils proved a never failing source of harassment, They made frequent incursions into Ceylon and Tamil kings often sat on Wijaya’s throne.”

What is of significance to us is that during the recorded history of 2551 years of Sinhala monarchial rule interspersed with occasional Tamil monarchs with the last four Nayakkar Buddhist kings, monarchial rule of the entire country, as one political entity is only 199 years in total.

What we should also realise is that an untold number of traders, artisans, mercenaries and aristocratic Brahmins who migrated from South India embraced Buddhism and were totally assimilated in to the Sinhala milleu. This assimilation was a two way process. The Sinhalese adopted their gods and goddesses and many customs.

This phenomenon has been well researched and documented by scholars such as Professors Gananatha Obeysekera, H.L. Seneviratne, Stanley Jeyaraj Tambiah and Michael Roberts. Of these scholars special mention should be made of Stanley Tambiah whose book Buddhism Betrayed? was banned in this country purely because its cover depicted a photograph of a Buddhist Bhikku addressing a crowd with a clenched fist.

That in the excavations conducted throughout the Asokan empire and in Sri Lanka we have not found an image of the Buddha with a clenched fist is no fault of Dr.Tambiah.

Historical facts should be presented to shed light on the present, totally detached from prejudice and pre conceived beliefs. Emperor Asoka did not send only Arahat Mahinda to Sri Lanka. He also sent 160 loads of hill paddy to his friend King Devanam Piyatissa (Mhv.)

The cultivation of rice was introduced by importing Tamil agriculturists on a large scale as at this point of time, South India had made rice cultivation a principal source of their agricultural production. One may ask why hill paddy? The hydraulic civilisation was yet to come. So the Dravidian advent to this island was not far behind the arrival of the Indo Aryans.

History is meant to be a dialogue between the past and the present. If that is so why are we saddled with two seven-letter words-one dirty and the other sacred-Federal and Unitary?

By ASANGA WELIKALA

Today, Tony Blair leaves office after little over a decade as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He leaves office a reviled figure, largely due to the widespread unpopularity of his decision to support the United States in the invasion of Iraq, and its continuing disastrous consequences.

Be that as it may, Blair is one of the most successful prime ministers in British history. He resurrected an antediluvian Labour Party from electoral obscurity into one that accomplished an unprecedented three successive general election victories. He realigned forever the left-right axis of British politics and redefined its centre.

[Prime Minister Tony Blair in the cover of The Economist, 12th May 2007]

However, perhaps the aspect of his legacy that is least talked about, and about which he is himself strangely ambivalent, is Blair’s contribution to constitutional reform in the UK.

The Belfast Agreement that brought an end to one of the most intractable conflicts in the world in the form of power-sharing in Northern Ireland is perhaps too great an accomplishment for one man to achieve, but Tony Blair can with justification claim a large slice of credit.

In more tractable areas of constitutional reform, his modernisation agenda is incomplete no doubt, but his government introduced a devolution settlement for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland; enacted a Freedom of Information Act, and introduced into UK law the European Convention of Human Rights in the form of the Human Rights Act.

Within 10 years, such a tremendous record of success has not been sufficient to keep Tony Blair riding upon the waves of popularity that brought him to power: his own party as well as the electorate expect him to go. Indeed, as Blair ruefully found out and others before him have, the merest hint of overstaying one’s welcome is fatal in British politics.

Without any written constitutional rule limiting tenure, British politicians are kept in check, including on the manner and timing of their departure from office, by convention animated by public opinion and a fearless media.

This is a central characteristic of the vibrancy of liberal democracy in Britain, and it is pivotal to any political culture elsewhere that calls itself a liberal democracy or aspires to that condition. That the electorate entertains a healthy sense of irreverence and scepticism about political leaders is inherent and indispensable to democracy; it cannot function without this attitude.

Machiavelli had an instructive observation on this point. Pointing to the institution of the emergency dictatorship in the Roman Republic, he argued, in an implied indictment of Florentines in his own time, that the abuse of such absolute power was prevented, not by the perfection of the Roman constitution, but by the ‘incorruptibility’ of the public.

[Statue of Niccolo Machiavelli in Piazzale Degli Uffizi]

In modern parlance, Machiavelli’s point is that the ultimate safeguard against anti-democratic abuse of power is not a paper constitution, but the disposition of the people to reject such behaviour. In other words, constitutional government is guaranteed to the extent, and only to the extent, that the people are willing to uphold it and deny democratic legitimacy to autocrats.

In Sri Lanka, as elsewhere in the old Empire, Britain left behind constitutional structures modelled on its own Westminster parliamentary system, with an expectation, perhaps also shared by the local grandees to whom power passed, that we would all get along imperfectly, but reasonably well, under parliamentary government and the separation of powers, the rule of law, seemingly cosmopolitan and well-educated elites and a serviceable economic infrastructure.

If we consider the period of the last decade when Tony Blair has been doing the things in government just recounted, the depth of the malaise afflicting democracy in Sri Lanka becomes evident. One objection to this of course is the familiar point about the fallacy of comparisons between the First and Third Worlds.

To acquiesce in this argument is to succumb to the bigotry of low expectations: our poverty and cultures disinherit us from aspirations to peace, prosperity and good government. Sri Lankan politicians are frequently in the habit of trotting out this argument, which their electorate, myopically and self-defeatingly, have only been too keen to swallow.

Had Nehru, Patel and Ambedkar adopted the same attitude in 1947, there would not be such a thing as India: for all its flaws, a triumph of constitutional democracy, secular and federal unity in diversity, and increasingly a global economic powerhouse.

[President Mahinda Rajapakse]

That the Rajapakse government was doing what many governments before had tried and failed, did not appear to result in any democratic social impulse that checked its insolent irresponsibility. Clearly, three decades of unwinnable conflict was insufficient for the southern electorate to internalise the inescapable reality that peace comes through the political language of fairness, dignity and justice; not through attempting to bomb a section of their compatriots into submission.

Given the current state of affairs, one almost looks back with fond nostalgia for President Kumaratunga’s constitutional reform efforts. In 1997 her government produced a detailed set of proposals and in 2000, presented to parliament a draft Constitution Bill.

Both envisaged extensive devolution of power in a manner unthinkable by the present regime. Both of course were of limited application from a conflict resolution perspective due to non-engagement with the armed combatant on the other side of the ethnic divide, but the 2000 Bill collapsed in parliament mainly due to Kumaratunga’s attempt through it to prolong her entitlement to office.

On the economic and peace fronts, most was achieved during the UNF interregnum of 2001-04, but the fact that subsequent elections have been lost by the UNP and it’s leader on such matters as charisma and not record, and failure in ethnic outbidding in the South points to the real dynamics of electoral competition in Sri Lanka.

The only successful attempt at constitutional change was the enactment in 2000 of the 17th Amendment, with significant cross-party support and as a key initiative in de-politicising such state services as policing, human rights and public administration. Like the ceasefire, this has also now been rendered a dead letter in what can only be described as an intentional violation of the constitution by the refusal of the President, on spurious grounds, to appoint the Constitutional Council.

Compounding this, he has demonstrated open contempt for the constitution by making his own appointments to bodies which require to be recommended by the Constitutional Council. Other governance related reforms such as a Freedom of Information Act went so far as to gain cabinet approval in 2004, but have fallen by the wayside with little hope of revival.

In a nutshell, what has democracy and democratically elected governments achieved in Sri Lanka in the decade since 1997? We are back at war, the economy is taking an unbearable battering, the rule of law is collapsing, authoritarianism is setting in, perceptions of rampant corruption are widespread, and the human rights and humanitarian situation is in a parlous state.

Peace and prosperity – the fundamental promises of the democratic form of government – are becoming unthinkable and seemingly unachievable. To apply Machiavelli’s argument to this miserable predicament tells us that we, the people, are as much or more to blame for this present state of affairs as any politician.

It is clearly apparent that it is not only secessionist Tamils that are disgruntled with the state and its current agent, the Rajapakse government. That the JVP is attempting to harness economic and social discontent and to distance itself from the President is a reliable indicator which way the political winds are blowing in the South. The altercation in which Minister Chamal Rajapakse was embroiled recently in Wariyapola is a particularly apt illustration of Sri Lankan politics in action.

The point is that a culture of liberal democracy defined as a set of values, principles, practices and institutions, does not exist in the life of the community in Sri Lanka. Democracy is understood merely as a procedural mechanism of occasionally deciding patronage allocation; its deliberative function is performed through negotiations between politicians and voters, not as such, but as patrons and clients.

One result is a high tolerance of abuse and authoritarianism; but once that threshold is breached, the subaltern response is usually violent, and occasionally vicious.

This government has never been amenable to institutional politics and constitutional democracy, as the Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse has made plain over the past few weeks.The government’s recent actions show that, intoxicated by power, it may not be sensitive to dissatisfaction expressed even in its own discursive language of political negotiation, evinced by the Wariyapola contretemps.

This, unfortunately, is history merely repeating itself. The Sri Lankan state has always seen its primary role as being the principal patron of the people, and when the gap between promise and performance widens, it turns predator as well. With the Rajapakse administration, we are now embarking on the latter, predatory phase, and history abounds with reasons why we should fear for our liberty, limb and life.

Given the debilitation and irrelevance of democratic institutions, the looming conflict between the state and its citizens will, as before, pan out in a lawless context of inflamed passions, grim determination and extreme violence. In this re-enactment of the commonplace drunken village brawl writ large, the wretched casualty will be the remaining remnants of democracy in Sri Lanka. Thus, whatever it is that is Tony Blair’s legacy in Britain, we at least know what Mahinda Rajapakse’s in Sri Lanka will be.

By Farah Mihlar

It was first the Tamils and now the Muslims and despite all the recent rumblings on increasing abductions amongst ethnic minorities there is still a deafening silence. Silence because still a large part of the country is either unaware of it or refuses to accept it. Silence also because the existing ranting lacks any sense of earnestness and has turned into a political spectacle. This silence isn’t unique in the wider Sri Lankan human rights context just as much as abductions in Colombo is not necessarily the most compelling problem of the day. But this latest string of incidents appears to be defined by a more disturbing nationalist campaign that warrants comment.

There is however an inescapable elitist element to all of this that must be highlighted right at the very inception. Tamils and Muslims particularly in the north and east have been facing human rights violations for the past two decades, including killings, abductions, extortions, ethnic cleansing and displacement. Whilst this current spate of incidents has gripped Colombo based Tamils and Muslims in fear, such circumstances are not unprecedented in Sri Lanka. In the case of the eastern Muslims, for instance, for many years they faced the same calamity largely without exposure and not having the luxury of escaping to a foreign country as is happening today. However the current focus on urban wealthy elites has managed to in a relatively shorter period draw more attention than in previous cases of similar violations.

Notwithstanding the elite angle, the recent spate of abductions and extortions is worrying because it uniquely affects minorities. To this day there has been no issue of abductions or extortion amongst Sinhala elite clearly making this part of a targeted wider campaign against ethnic minorities. When it started amongst Tamils-most people were silent. Part of the reason was because few were willing to come forward and give evidence and also because it was only one amongst several human rights violations faced by the Tamils. Outside of abductions and extortions Tamils are also victims to killings, threats, eviction, harassment at check points, arbitrary arrest and detention all of which made the first two issues less significant. The other factor was that in the case of the Tamil abductions there were multiple perpetrators including the LTTE and Karuna group, which brought in a terrorism and para-military dimension. But largely the reason for the silence was because it was Tamils who were affected.

Whilst similar factors prevail with the Muslims their case is slightly different. Because the Muslims are not one of the armed parties in the conflict the abductions and extortions they face can be seen as rid of the politics of the conflict. In the Muslim situation it appears that it is the very rich businessmen/families that have been targeted in a bid to quash Muslim’s socio-economic position. In some cases, as was with the Tamils, the perpetrators were privy to information belonging to the State, including tax details. This makes it difficult to argue that the State has not had a hand in all of this.

This spate of abductions and extortion appears to be one part of the current Sinhala nationalist hegemonic project aimed at completely suppressing minorities. This latest campaign can be seen in many ways including the manner in which people are displaced and resettled, the creation of high-security zones, changes to the ethnic compositions of electorates and eviction of Tamils from the capital. It constitutes an article on its own, but what needs to be made clear here, is that this kind of targeting of the economic interests and social status of ethnic minorities has to be more than just underworld thugs in operation.

The response to all of this, particularly since the Muslims became targets, has been appalling. The politicisation of the Muslim abduction issue is clearly a disgrace. Both government and opposition ministers, as if starved for any other issue, have hijacked this to score political mileage. The opposition has plenty of general human rights issues to respond to but Muslim oppositional MP’s are up in arms on this one. The government response, at least on the part of their Muslim representatives, has been to completely downplay the problem. The volleying of blame by Muslim politicians on either side only emphasises the depths to which Muslim politics has fallen where not even a crisis of this nature can escape political division. The political vacuum amongst the Muslims is further exacerbated by the fact that SLMC leader Rauf Hakeem one of the few leaders who has come out strongly against it remains in the government.

The media too has taken it up as a human rights issue but somewhat with an agenda. In some instances the media has played heavily on the ethnic chauvinasm of some Sinhala politicians in references to the Muslims, encouraging the stereotyping of Muslims. The manner in which the problem has been reported also raises other serious concerns. In the cases of Muslim businessmen/families some media groups have gone as far as naming them and providing figures. This could potentially put these individuals at severe risk. In most cases the victims are not individual traders but are large scale industrialists who employ thousands of people from all ethnic communities. The impact not just to the Muslim economy but to the country’s economy has been sidelined by the media. More importantly the media has completely shelved the key point of minority targeting.

The expansion of this problem of abductions and extortions beyond the Tamils to the Muslims has to be seen in the larger spectrum of things. It is increasingly appearing as part of a bigger more concerted campaign. In the case of the Muslims being the second minority they are doubly affected. In the east their economic base in agriculture was heavily affected when the LTTE forcefully took over their paddy lands pushing them to seek alternative sources of income. Then Colombo based Muslims stood silent. Now the victims are the urban businessmen and industrialists who have been forced to cough up millions of rupees. In some cases businesses have been severely affected making it no longer viable to continue and in other situations top business figures have fled the country. This chauvinistic project is forcing the minorities to either seek refuge abroad or live in Sri Lanka weakened and subjugated by the majority.

This is what deserves protest and should attract debate. Abductions and extortions certainly are serious problems. But the underlying issue is more severe. Once the figures are added it is apparent that in the past months the extortionists and abductors must have gained billions of rupees. Clearly this money must be going towards a more organised project than simply filling the pockets of individuals. This is what the minority leaders need to question and stand up against. Unlike the Tamil politicians, some of whom who are linked to the LTTE (also reputed for abductions and extortions), the Muslim leadership has a more open platform to do this. In the wake of government denials and a defensive strategy on human rights violations it is only the people that can demand accountability.

The response should not simply be left to the minorities. Where are the Sinhala voices on this issue? Sinhala business leaders have previously publicly taken a stance on the conflict, where are their voices now? If this latest abduction saga has taught us anything it is that no one can afford to be silent for too long. [Courtesy:Daily Mirror]

By Nirmala Chandrahasan

Internal armed conflicts within states between government forces and insurgents or militant groups is a phenomenon seen throughout the world. It is widely recognised that in all these conflicts it is the women and children who are the most affected. In this context, the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 of 2000, is most relevant as it addresses the impact of war on women while also recognising the contribution that women’s participation can make to conflict resolution and peace building. It calls upon all actors involved in peace negotiations to adopt a gender perspective, and urges member to ensure increased participation of women at all decision-making levels in national, regional and international institutions for the prevention, management and resolution of conflicts.

['Kanthari', from paintings on High Security Zones in North-East, by Thamotharampillai Shanaathanan]

The Resolution expresses concern that civilians, particularly women and children account for the vast majority of those adversely affected including refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPS). It calls upon all parties to armed conflicts to respect the civilian and humanitarian nature of refugee camps and settlements and to take into account the particular needs of women and girls. The Resolution also stresses the obligation of all parties to the conflict to respect the obligations applicable to them under the ‘Geneva Conventions of 1949 and Optional Protocols of 1977, Conventions on the Rights of the Child, and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) among others. It calls upon the parties to armed conflicts to protect women and girls from sexual assault and other forms of violence in situations of armed conflict. It should be noted that the case law of the International Criminal Tribunals recently constituted i.e. International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia and International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, as well as the Statute of the ICC, makes it clear that the laws of war (International Humanitarian Law) are applicable in internal armed conflicts as part of customary international law.

["I want to become a teacher, but unable to continue my education due to displacement" said Ishwarya Yogarasa (12) of Karadiyannaru]

It has been pointed out by peace negotiators that the presence of women at the peace table can make an important difference because when women are present the talks tend to adopt a more inclusive view of security concerns and also address issues related to the reintegration of children and women post conflict. Moreover, as they are the persons most affected, they are more inclined to work towards the resolution of the conflict. It has been pointed out that while women and children have an important stake in political outcomes, they have so far had little power to shape them.

["My son went to watch a cricket match, played between the local teams on January 6th 1990. He went missing since then", says Hapuruge Dili Nona (66) of Rathawaduna, Gampaha]

In Sri Lanka, in December 2002, a subcommittee on gender issues was established during the peace process. This was a good beginning but was not inclusive enough as it consisted of 10 persons, five of whom were appointed by the Government and five by the LTTE. What is proposed is a more inclusive consultation between women’s groups from all parts of the country and which should include women from villages, towns and IDP camps, cutting across ethnic and religious lines. Such a consultation should not be politically directed. Local NGOs with branches in the rural areas, religious bodies and other concerned parties could help to set up such groups and facilitate their travel and networking.

[Sivananthi Varnalingam (37) lost her father in law in the violence in Allaipiddy. Her husband owned a tea shop there.They have no income due to displacement. She has four children to take care]

It is submitted that while on the one hand constitutional and political processes should go forward for conflict resolution and peace building, there should also be an alternate track whereby the affected parties too could participate and bring to the fore their concerns and priorities. Furthermore, by involving the rural women from small towns and villages across the country, we will be drawing from and tapping into the cultural and religious traditions of the people, based upon the four great religions in the country, Buddhism, Hinduism Christianity and Islam. In the rural communities and towns across the country there continues to exist a respect for the sanctity of human life, compassion for the sufferings of fellow human beings and good neighbourliness. Violence and ethnic/religious hatred have little place in this philosophy of life, neither does strident nationalism of any kind. On this basis, the Sinhalese, Tamil and Muslim communities living in threatened villages, as well as throughout the island, have interacted with each other over the years.

["I got married earlier since I was not able to continue my education due to poverty. I got displaced when I was one year-old baby. Now I am a mother of two-month old baby" said Subaitha Abdul Wahab (18)]

The traditional values of a society are most evident in the woman folk who are in the greater part peaceable. This attitude is also borne out of experience, because in times of war and armed conflict it is they who suffer the most. They have to see their young children, husbands and brothers forcibly taken away by armed groups to be killed and maimed on the battlefields. They have to watch, caught between opposing forces, their homes being battered and destroyed by the heavy artillery and mortar firing. They have to salvage whatever belongings and flee from the theatre of war. They have to make the long trek through country roads and jungle paths fleeing from the bombs and fighting carrying their young ones till they find shelter in an internally displaced persons ( IDP) camp.

[Women say that, there is no privacy in the refugee camp as they are sharing the space with a lot of people]

Here again it is a struggle to provide for their families out of the meagre rations, and amidst poor sanitary conditions. Their children are denied education, which is their right, and the normal pastimes of children, and instead live in a trauma of fear which could have long-term psychological impact. In other parts of the country are women who know the grief of sons and husbands killed or maimed in battle, family members blown up in bomb blasts, while in threatened villages, people live in fear of sudden attacks and wanton killings. People outside the theatre of war may applaud some military victory here or bombing raid there, depending on which side they support, but it is the mothers and children of all communities caught up in conflicts the world over, who know the true cost of the war in terms of suffering.

["The Sinhalese are very kind, and love each other.They would not have done something like this. They do not like to kill people. I have been helping the affected since the incident happened.It is very sad that we lost 64 lives, and more injured" says Jayawathi (40) from Kebittigollewa.]

There are examples in recent times where the participation of women has had a positive outcome. In Northern Ireland, with its long history of conflict and religious animosity, over 200 women’s organisations met in 1996 to create the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition, the first female dominated political party. The movement cut across religious lines and included women from both Protestant and Catholic communities, and worked as a cross-community party to promote civil, human and workers rights. George Mitchell the US Senator, who mediated the Northern Irish peace process, credits this movement with having helped achieve the successful outcome in the peace process. In other parts of the world too women’s participation has had some impact. In the Afghanistan peace process, five women out of approximately 60 delegates were included in the Bonn talks of 2001. The women’s’ representatives fought for women’s rights and one of their achievements was the creation of a Ministry of Women’s Affairs.

["My husband has disappeared on January 8th 2007 from Mattakuliya. He went to a shop with his friend. Both of them never returned home" says Anbuchelve Morrison (34)]

In Guatemala, the participation of women in the peace process of 1996 led to the creation of a national health programme for women and girls and a programme to reunite families and locate missing or separated children and orphans. In Sierra Leone, two women were involved in the peace process, and a key article of the final agreement calls for special attention to be paid to victimized women and girls in formulating and implementing rehabilitation, reconstruction and development programmes. In the Darfur Peace Agreement negotiations in 2005, a gender experts support team gathered women from a variety of tribal and ethnic backgrounds to create a unified platform of women’s priorities and gender issues. The outcome document “Women’s priorities in the peace process and reconstruction in Darfur” contains a number of key provisions related to women and children including specific protection of women and children in conflict situations provisions for secondary education in the camps for refugees and IDPs and the creation of an institution to provide legal support, psychological counselling and other relevant services to women and children (This material is sourced from the UNICEF publication “State of the World’s Children 2007″)

[Mothers say that, they do not eat nutritious food,and unable to breast feed their babies.And they have no money to buy infant food]

Similarly in Sri Lanka too women of all communities cutting across ethnic and religious barriers should come together, as in Northern Ireland. They should be able to meet and share their common concerns and voice their priorities. In this way a consensus can be built up against violence and the security concerns of all communities identified and issues critical to the well-being of women children and families, included in the peace process and political settlement proposed. Such contacts would also be a unifying factor, making people of all communities conscious that they belong to one human family.

["I was displaced from Mannar in 1990 along with my family. I have been living in Arafa Nagar since then. I had to leave my own house and belongings. I am living with my daughter now. I work in the agro filed which cultivates onion, chillies, and cabbage. I go to the field and earn Rs.150/= per day, which is not enough to manage myself" says Sabeena Zubair (54)]

The UN Security Council Resolution 1325 has focussed attention on critical issues which should be given effect to in internal armed conflicts, both in its call for women’s participation in the peace processes as well as its call for the parties to armed conflicts to respect the laws of war. It stresses the fact that even in war the laws are not silent. These injunctions, if adhered to, would help in creating the conditions for a just and inclusive peace building process.

Nirmala Chandrahasan, former acting dean of Law faculty at Colombo university is a member of the experts panel at the A.P.R.C. and was a signatory to the report submitted by a multi -ethnic majority. She is the daughter of Dr. E.M.V. Naganathan and daughter – in – law of Mr. S. J. V. Chelvanayagam.
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["We want to draw the attention of both parties,which are engaged in fighting. There is an ugent need for negotiations. Any kind of conflict using arms is unacceptable. Thousands of people are displaced in welfare camps.We have seen this over and over again.This is not new to Sri Lanka.Violence should be stopped immediately, and lives should be respected" says Sepali Kottegoda, Director, Women and Media Collective]

Pictures by Dushiyanthini Kanagasabapathipillai

by D.B.S.JEYARAJ

The Banda – Chelva pact of 1957 was the first instance of Sinhala and Tamil leaders in post – independence Sri Lanka (or Ceylon then) attempting to resolve the Tamil national question through appropriate political arrangements. Three major grievances affecting Tamils in the spheres of language, land settlement and regional autonomy could have been redressed through the pact had it ever been allowed to work.It’s jettisoning by SWRD Bandaranaike led to further deterioration of ethnic relations resulting in massive communal violence. The causes leading to the B- C pact’s failure merit a more detailed analysis in the future.

[Statue of late prime minister D. S. Senanayake at the Independence Square, Colombo, Sri Lanka - Photo By Dhammika Heenpella]

1960 saw two elections to Parliament being held in March and July. A significant outcome of both polls was the re-iteration by Tamil voters in North – East that the Ilankai Thamil Arasu Kastchi (ITAK) or the Federal Party was their chief political party. The ITAK won 15 comprising 10 seats in the North and 5 in the east in March; In July it won 16 including 10 in the north and 6 in the east. If the proportionate representation system was prevalent the ITAK could not have won so well. But the first past the post winner system enabled it to reduce the Tamil Congress to one and the LSSP and CP to zero in both polls.

The ITAK under SJV Chelvanayagam adopted the strategy of non – violent agitation and negotiation. This was the method of Mahatma Gandhi during India’s struggle for Independence. The Tamil leaders of that era were greatly influenced by the “ahimsa” concept and Chelva himself was referred to as “Eelathu Gandhi” (Gandhi of Eelam)by his followers. Eelam was the ancient Tamil name of the Island and did not carry any “separatist” connotations then.

The ITAK was for federalism in principle. The party clamoured for a “Thamil Arasu” or Tamil State comprising the Northern and Eastern provinces. The demand however was for a federal state within a united Country. In practice Chelvanayakam was prepared to compromise for political arrangements falling far short of the federal ideal. In 1957 the B – C pact was for setting up regional councils. The North was to be one region and the East two regions to accommodate Muslim interests.

Another tactic on which the ITAK relied on was power brokering and political bargaining.The expectation was that Sinhala dominated political parties would not be able to command clear majorities in Parliament and would require assistance from a third party to form governments. The ITAK was to be the “king- maker” third force capable of making and unmaking Colombo governments. Therefore the ITAK appealed to the Tamil voters that they elect party candidates as a “bloc” to broker and bargain.

[Statue of SJV Chelvanayagam in Vavuniya - Photo TamilNet]

In March 1960 the UNP under Dudley Senanayake had 50 and the SLFP under CP de Silva had 46. Both sides wooed the ITAK but Chelvanayagam opted not to support the UNP and arrived at an understanding with the SLFP. The Senanayake Govt could not forge a majority and elections were held in July. The Federal party called upon Tamils in the South to support the SLFP. The SLFP got 75 seats and with the six appointed members had a razor thin majority. It had no need for Tamil support and the understanding with the ITAK was not honoured.

This resulted in the ITAK conducting a satyagraha campaign which virtually paralysed civil administration in the North – East. The ITAK even printed stamps, postcards and envelopes and ran its own postal service. The Govt clamped down by deploying the army. The unarmed Satyagrahis were bodily assaulted and key leaders arrested. A curfew was imposed. The Tamil leaders were detained without trial at the Panagoda army camp. The ITAK had its revenge when it voted with the opposition over the Press takeover bill in 1964 and helped bring the Govt down.

1965 March saw the UNP coming to power with 66 seats. The SLFP (42) LSSP (10) and CP (4) had 56 seats. If the ITAK which won 14 seats supported the SLFP coalition then Mrs. Bandaranaike could have formed a Govt with the help of some independents and the six appointed MP’s. There was frantic lobbying by both parties for Tamil support. The ITAK smarting from SLFP betrayal in 1960 opted for Dudley this time. The Tamil Congress with three seats also supported the UNP. Dudley Senanayake formed what was called the “National Government” then. Eminent queens counsel and Chelvanayakam’s confidante Murugesu Tiruchelvam became local government minister.

The ITAK extended support to the UNP after protracted negotiations. Just as Chelvanayakam signed a pact with Bandaranaike in 1957, he signed one with Senanayake too in 1965. This was called popularly as the Dudley – Chelva (D – C) pact. Interestingly all three persons, Bandaranaike, Senanayake and Chelvanayakam were old Thomians. A key element of the D – C pact was the setting up of district councils. Tiruchelvam was made local govt minister to steer the District councils through.The federal idea in the form of “de- centralisation -devolution ” was back again.

[President Mahinda Rajapakse garlanding statue of Prime Minster S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, Galle Face, Colombo in 2006]

Unfortunately the District Councils scheme became a non – starter. An analysis of reasons for this requires a detailed article in the future. In a nutshell the situation was something like in 1957. Then the UNP under JR Jayewardene and the Sinhala – Buddhist extremist forces found common ground in opposing the regional councils. Now the UNP was opposed by the SLFP and Sinhala Buddhist elements. “Dudleyge Bade Masala Vade” (The tamil delicacy masala vadai was in Dudley’s stomach)was the slogan.To their eternal shame the Trotskyites and Communists went along with this chauvinist line.

A white paper on the district councils was presented in Parliament. The floodgates were opened for torrential waters of opposition . Within the UNP a “ginger group” of 16 MP’s under Festus Perera opposed it. People like Cyril Mathew resigned from the party in opposition. Dudley even suspected JR of instigating protests from within the party. Senanayake lost the nerve to go through with the district councils.Unable to honour his pledge Dudley offered to resign but Chelvanayakam did not agree. The ITAK pulled out of the Govt some months later when Tiruchelvam resigned over the Koneshwaram temple sacred zone issue.

Interestingly the sixties had seen the ITAK reaching the high watermarks of its agitation cum negotiation strategy. The 1961 Satyagraha was the zenith of its non – violent agitation; the 1965 – 69 period where it formed part of the Govt was its peak in terms of the negotiation strategy. Both were now tried and exhausted. The 1970 electoral verdict delivered a shattering blow to Tamil ambitions of making and unmaking Governments.

The United Front of SLFP (91) LSSP (19) and CP (6) had 116 seats in Parliament. The ITAK had 13 and Congress 3 but they were of no use as this steam roller majority needed no props. SJV voiced Tamil frustration at this turn of affairs by proclaiming “Only God can save the Tamil people”.

One of the new regime’s first tasks was converting Parliament into a Constituent assembly to evolve a new, republican Constitution.The LSSP veteran Dr. Colvin R de Silva was Constitutional affairs minister.Initially the ITAK or FP participated in the Constituent assembly and tabled a proposal seeking to set up five auronomous units in the Country. This was summarily rejected and the Federal MP’s walked out. This exercise provided an opportunity to make a fresh start in forging justice and equality through the federal idea. . But it was lost. Furthermore the situation worsened.

Though the Soulbury Constitution was unitary in nature it had not been explicitly stated so. But the new Constitution proclaimed it as “Unitary”. The Country’s name Ceylon was changed to Sri Lanka. Buddhism was given foremost place. Section 29 of the earlier Constitution that provided limited protection to minorities was no more. It was Colvin who pithily summed up the future in 1956 during the Sinhala only bill by saying “One language two nations;two languages one nation”. Ironically the same Colvin’s Constitution by ignoring the federal idea was making the ground fertile for seeds of secession to grow.

Political course of events took a new turn. The Tamils became disillusioned with the quest for federalism. It was seen as futile. On ground there was broader Tamil unity with the Federalists and Congressmen coming together as the Tamil United Front (TUF). Youth power too came to the fore. The cry for a separate state called Tamil Eelam gathered momentum. Some youths became enamoured of an armed struggle to achieve this. The TUF re- named itself as the Tamil United Liberation Front in May 1976. A formal demand for Tamil Eelam was adopted with only veteran Educationist Nesiah master disagreeing openly. The TULF contested the 1977 elections on a separatist platform seeking a mandate for Tamil Eelam and swept 18 of 19 Tamil seats in the North – East.

The overall situation was gloomy with the separatism dominating Tamil politics. Any visionary Govt would have adopted political means to contain this trend and through political concessions tried to pull back the Tamils from a secessionist precipice. No such attempt was made though at the tail end of her rule Mrs. B held informal talks with the ITAK about getting support in a situation where further extension of Parliament was being explored. This came to naught.

There was however a silver lining. The need to de – centralise administration for greater equity, productivity and efficiency was beginning to be felt. The district was becoming the unit of de- centralization.The Dudley Senanayake Govt started this process by setting up co-ordination committees at district level to boost agriculture and food production.Mrs. Bandaranaike’s UF govt introduced a special de – centralised budget for districts. Divisional development councils were set up. A district political authority for each district was also appointed. Thus de-centralised activity at district and grassroots level became official.

[A. Amirthalingam]

The UNP under Junius Richard Jayewardene won 141 seats out of 168 in 1977. The SLFP was reduced to 8 and the TULF with 18 sears became chief opposition. Amirthalingam was leader of opposition. The Tamil people who voted overwhelmingly for the separatist TULF were unaware that backroom negotiations had been on before polls with the UNP. JR then expected only to win 70 seats and through Saumiyamoorthy Thondaman had met TULF leaders to arrive at an understanding. The UNP manifesto had several progressive clauses regarding solutions to Tamil grievances.

[S.Thondaman]

The massive majority removed the need for the UNP to depend on the TULF. JR brought in the executive presidency through the 2nd amendment and also appointed a Parliamentary select committee to draft a new Constitution. The TULF did not participate but Thondaman did so and was able to restore lost rights in language and citizenship. But the federal idea remained elusive as Thondaman was not concerned too much about power – sharing at the periphery. The UNP’s democratic socialist Constitution made the unitary clause an entrenched one. It required two – thirds majority and a referendum victory to change the Constitution’s unitary character.

The UNP also enacted progressive measures to plan, coordinate and implement developmental activity at a district level. The de – centralised budget was enhanced further with each MP being allocated 25 lakhs per year for projects. A Plan implementation ministry was set up and integrated district development plans were formulated. Unfortunately the Tamil districts were ignored for a long time. Finally integrated plans were formulated for Mannar and Vavuniya but by then events of 1983 had transformed the situation.

JR also appointed district ministers. Under the executive Presidency all executive power was concentrated in the President and the district minister systm was a delegation rather than devolution of powers.. The district minister chaired district development committees comprising MP”s from each district.The Government Agents became District secretaries.

Meanwhile violent activity by armed Tamil youths began increasing. JR adopted a “carrot and stick” policy. The stick had two items. One was the promulgation of emergency for Jaffna and sending “Bull” Weeratunga with instructions to eliminate terrorism in all its forms. The other was the draconian Prevention of Terrorism act.

The carrot was Devolution. A Commission on Devolution was appointed under former Chief Justice Victor Tennekoon.Prof AJ Wilson and Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam were also Devolution Commission members.Tiruchelvam was the TULF nominee.

The Commission after protracted sittings came out with a report. Neelan wrote a dissenting report. A bill to set up elected district development councils was passed in Parliament in 1980.Many of the clauses were similiar to Tiruchelvam’s dissenting report. Elections were held to DDC’s in 1981. The TULF won Jaffna, Mannar, Mullaitheevu, Vavuniya, Batticaloa and Trincomalee. TULF Members were chairpersons of all these councils. For the first time Devolution of powers to the regions (district level) had taken place. The federal idea was riding high.

Unfortunately two things happened. The Councils found themselves powerless in a functional capacity. The Trincomalee DDC found it unable to impose taxes on tourist projects. The DDC’s were strapped for cash and Colombo did not allocate special funds. Moreover it was found that powers could not be effectively devolved under an executive presidency. Negotiations to make the DDC’s work dragged on and on.

The other thing was increasing Tamil militancy. Events began to overtake and July 1983 exploded in frenzy. The Country’s history changed drastically. The sixth amendment to the Constitution disallowed separatism and the TULF went out of Parliament..India stepped in with its good offices.

Indian efforts succeeded in an all party conference (APC)in 1984. Discussions began on annexure C. The CWC on behalf of the TULF submitted a proposal to set up a linguistic region of the Tamil speaking North and Eastern provinces. The final outcome of the APC was disappointing with the district being promoted as unit of devolution. The TULF demanded a unified North – East with Amirthalingam emphasising the “security of our people” and “integrity of our homeland”.

The Thimphu talks saw five militant groups the LTTE, PLOTE, TELO, EPRLF and EROS also being brought in along with the TULF. The Tamils presented four principles demanding self – determination, nationhood, homeland and citizenship for Up Country Tamils. The talks broke down.

Govt negotiators along with Indian officials drafted a working paper in New Dlhi outlining the district as unit of devolution and providing for districts to join together.At India’s behest the TULF engaged in negotiations with the Govt in Colombo and increased the substance of devolution further. The unit however remained a stumbling block.

The December 19th 1986 proposals envisaged the excising of Amparai electorate from the East and setting up of two separate provincial councils for North and East. Both provinces could have common institutions. This proposal also failed to gain wide acceptance.

Then came the Indo – Lanka accord of July 29th 1987. As a result the13th amendment to the Constitution was brought in. This ushered in the Provincial Councils. The North and East were temporarily merged. A referendum was to be held in the East to make it permanent.Three lists of devolved subjects – central, provincial and concurrent – were formulated. The Substance of devolution was inadequate in some respects. JR gave a written assurance to New Delhi that he would rectify matters in due course.

War erupted between India and the tigers. New Delhi held a rigged election to the North – Eastern provincial council and propped up Annamalai Varatharajapperumal of the EPRLF as chief minister. Ranasinghe Premadasa was now president. He promised “Ellam” (all) if Tamils gave up “Eelam”. But when the N- E Council tried to extract structural and functional powers Colombo did not budge

Furthermore Premadasa did a deal with the LTTE and got the Indian army out. He set up a round table conference to come up with proposals through “consultation, compromise and consensus”. The tigers also had observer status.This conference petered out gradually.

With the LTTE demanding it , Premadasa enacted a law enabling him to dissolve provincial councils. When Perumal got a resolution passed, expressing intent of making an unilateral declaration of independence, Premadasa promptly dissolved the N- E council. Thus the LTTE and EPRLF played into Premadasa’s hands in negating a major gain made through the Indo – Lanka accord.

The provincial Councils were brought in mainly to remedy Tamil grievances and satisfy Tamil aspirations. It was a landmark in the long, long road to federalism.But the N- E council remains defunct from 1989. The seven councils are functioning in Sinhala majority provinces. The people who wanted to share power at the provincial level are denied it while those who were not so keen are having it. A unified N- E adminstration continued. But after the Supreme Court decision the temporary merger is out and both provinces are now separate. The Indo – Lanka accord provided the greatest benefits to the Tamils. Now most of it undone.

Premadasa also appointed a Parliamentary select committee under Mangala Moonesinghe’s chairmanship. The committee recommended enhanced devolution through removal of concurrent lists. It envisaged separate councils for North and East but provided for an apex council to link both in some aspects. Though the UNP and SLFP agreed on this the Tamil parties rejected it.

Then came Chandrika Kumaratunga who captured the nation’s imagination as an angel of peace. A devolution package to make Sri Lanka a union of regions was drafted by Prof – GL Peiris and Dr.Neelan Tiruchelvam and was presented in 1995. It was dismissed by the LTTE. Years later Anton Balasingham was to praise Tiruchelvam’s package as “acceptable”. The GL – Neelan package lost its potency to some extent when presented as the SLFP proposals in 1996. It was further eroded during Parliamentary select committee proceedings. When tabled as a white paper in 1997 powers had been further reduced but still remained a vast improvement on the existing Provincial Councils scheme.

Separate negotiations between the TULF and Muslim Congress had seen an understanding on the N- E unit. Trincomalee and Batticaloa districts were to be linked to the North to form a Tamil majority province. The electoral divisions of Pottuvil. Sammanthurai and Kalmunai were to form a Muslim majority South – Eastern province. The Amparai division would form another Sinhala majority province or merge with Uva province.

Neelan was brutally murdered in 1999 by a tiger suicide bomber. With his death the Country in general and the Tamils in particular, lost an ardent advocate of the Federal idea. That vacuum is yet to be filled. In 2000 Kumaratunga tabled in Parliament a draft bill for power sharing. The draft had been formulated in consultation with the UNP. Yet the UNP refused to support it in Parliament saying Kumaratunga was trying to prolong her presidency. The TULF under R. Sampanthan also opposed it saying it was too little. The draft bill was abandoned.The march towards greater devolution suffered a set back.

The next phase was the advent of Ranil Wickremasinghe as Prime minister in 2001. A ceasefire agreement came into force with the LTTE in Feb 2002. Direct talks between the Govt and LTTE commenced in September in Thailand. A tremendous breakthrough was made during the third round of talks in Oslo in December. Both sides agreed to explore a federal solution.

This was a historic event for two important reasons. This was the first time a Sri Lankan Government had openly agreed to explore federalism; This was the first time the LTTE had agreed to explore federalism as an alternative to secession. The F- word had bounced back into Lankan political discourse.

Alas! hopes were dashed as further progress on federalism discussions stalled. The LTTE dropped out of talks and demanded an Interim Self – Governing Authority (ISGA) Before any progress could be made Kumaratunga dissolved the Wickremasinghe government and called for elections. The UNP was defeated and with that the peace process reached an impasse. In 2005 Mahinda Rajapakse became President aided by Sinhala and Tamil extremists. The war escalated.

But Rajapakse too went through the motions of Constitutional reform. He convened an All Party representative Conference minus the Tamil National alliance and also appointed an expert panel to assist it. A majority group of the experts consisting of six Sinhala , four Tamil and One Muslim submitted a highly commendable report Other experts also submitted three reports. The APRC chairman Prof. Tissa Vitharane compiled all reports and drafted a working paper that inculcated the bulk of majority report recommendations. The UNP also backed the majority report.

Political parties have also submitted respective reports.The SLFP report sent shock waves. It was a climb down from the SLFP position of 2000 when a draft bill was presented in Parliament. The SLFP report emphasised a unitary state in unambiguous terms.It also reduced the substance of devolution.

The unit was reduced from the present provincial level to district and village level. The SLFP stance has come in for heavy criticism from academic circles. Now Prof. Vitharana is saddled with the unenviable task of reconciling different perspectives regarding devolution into a coherent and acceptable whole. The exercise is doomed unless the SLFP shows flexibility.

[Cranes in Kirimichchai jungle - East of Sri Lanka, May 2007, Photo Dushiyanthini Kanagasabapathipillai]

This then is the tragic tale of the post – Independence quest for greater devolution in Sri Lanka. The federal idea has proved elusive so far. Still it is a matter of pride and satisfaction that the Country has been able to pursue the goal of Constitutional reform in spite of the on going war. Ultimately there can be a durable political settlement only on the basis of the federal idea. The sooner this is realised the better it is for the Country and all its people.

DBS Jeyaraj can be contacted on: djeyaraj@federalidea.com

by LAKSHMAN GUNASEKERA

“We have inherited, today, a structure of a State that was defined, in its immediate past not so much by us as by our European colonial masters. After half a millennium of European colonial domination and manipulation, this island and its communities of people has been subverted, exploited, re-ordered and traumatised to a degree that with withdrawal of the British after the Second World War, we could do little but accept the half-baked, inorganically designed political structure that we were happy to call in 1948 the independent State of ‘Lankaava’ (Ceylon). The fact that we have, since then, tried to reform that State twice already (1972,1978) indicates the inadequacies of that State in effectively managing the various aspirations for social community on this island of ours. ” stated Lakshman Gunasekera , veteran journalist and media consultant.

[Lakshman F.B. Gunasekera, delivering the first D.Sivaram Memorial lecture, in Colombo, Sri Lanka]

” The simplistic form of ‘nation-state’ left behind by the hurriedly departing British, was convenient to the simplistic self-conception of the Sinhalayo themselves. Given that our self-image is that of a ‘pure’, island-exclusive ‘race’ (ethnic group) which refuses to acknowledge the composite nature of our ‘Sinhala-ness’, the Sinhala defined ‘nation-state’ also fails to institutionally and symbolically accommodate the extremely composite ‘nation’ of people with several different identities that live within the boundaries of that nation-state. Hence, the crucial failure of the successive post-colonial Sri Lankan polities (the Dominion State, First and Second Republics) to acknowledge the equal national-cultural significance of Tamils, Veddas, Burghers, Moors, Malays, and others, including the various Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim castes.” Gunasekera pointed out.

” In fact, all three efforts at conceiving a ‘State’ were efforts and processes manipulated by the Sinhalayo without adequate regard not only for their own sub-Sinhala complexity, but also for other co-existing ethnic groups. Consequently, the polities that emerged, including the current Second Republic , reflect that simplistic exclusivism. This exclusivism, however, today has the respectability of a vision of supremacy over the island ‘State’ – in short, a fantasy of empire. When Sinhala ultra-nationalist politicians today insist on something called ‘unitary’ (further revealing their English colonial subservience!), they are doing nothing more than clinging to that fantasy of empire.” he emphasised.

These observations were part of the first Sivaram memorial lecture delivered by Mr. Gunasekera in Colombo on June 21st. Mr. Sivaram widely known by his nom de guerre “Taraki” was abducted and killed in Colombo . Mr. Gunasekera’s lecture in Sivaram’s memory was titled “Good News for ThGood? Media, the Fantasy of Empire and, Sri Lankan futures – some journalistic reflections.”

[A cross section of audience at the lecture]

Mr. Gunasekera who is currently senior programme manager (policy and advocacy) at the Colombo office of International Alert” went on to say that ” the devastating trajectory of the ethnic conflict has been such that the power of the trans-cultural audiovisual media is wholly inadequate today to overcome the rigid barriers of communal hatred and vengeance that have arisen along with the sheer attrition of the war. ”

“For that, there has to be a comprehensive change across the canvas of the Sri Lankan social configuration. This is something to which the mass media can contribute, but ultimately it is up to the peoples of this island to adjust their perspectives, make realistic choices and/ to discard fantasies – both of hegemony as well of vengeance. “Gunasekera further said.

Some extracts from the lecture are re-produced below -

” A study on Sri Lankan media observes: “Sri Lankan newspapers of the three language media cater to sets of individuals who inhabit different worlds and espouse different worldviews.

That same study concludes that “Broadly speaking, the effect of the Sinhala-English coverage of the North and the East is to create and nurture a war mentality.. .. When combined with the findings that media reportage of the conflict offers different perspectives to different audiences based on ethnicity and language, these and other studies that have been done have all gone to show that the content of the mass media’s production and the behaviour of the mass media institutions themselves, in terms of owners’ policy and media professionals’ behaviour and attitudes, have had a bearing on the ethnic conflict.

It is abundantly clear that more than the deliberate intentions of the media content producers themselves; it is the compulsions of the market that drives ethnically biased media content. This is why it is wrong to simply ‘blame’ the mass media for ‘bias’. Very often media practitioners tilt their content emphasis quite unconsciously in accordance with their instinctive reading of audience preferences and sensibilities rather than in accordance with deliberate policy or political motive. This “instinctive reading” is derived by these media practitioners own affiliation to the social groups that comprise their audience. This is not to downplay the degree of influence of policy and human motive on media content.

[Audience at the lecture]

The studies referred to above, however, are primarily an assessment of print media behaviour and impact and were done when the electronic media was only just beginning to make its presence felt in Sri Lanka. The past decade has seen the gradual market consolidation of television and radio and, today, the sizeable impact of these media must be seen as having a considerable influence on social attitudes and social consciousness. The difference in the nature of audio-visual media opens up new possibilities in terms of audience responses.

In terms of ethno-cultural differentiations, the rise of the audio-visual media has some significant outcomes. If the print media, by its very logo-centricity, sharply divided audiences linguistically, the audio-visual media/ by its very graphic communication capacity, does the opposite. The captivating power of the audio-visual breaks through the linguistic divide to encompass a range of, otherwise separated/ audiences into a single, unified meta-audience that collectively enjoys the visuals and the ambience within the aesthetic of a regionally common culture. Thus, Tamil and Hindi language films and teledramas gain the largest audiences by far, bringing together the entirety of the non-English speaking population – Sinhala, Tamil, Muslim – in a collective aesthetic enjoyment that serves to bridge cultural differences seamlessly. The constant trans-cultural identification can only help draw together ethnic communities rather than distance them. The emergence of indigenous fusion music on the platform of a multiplicity of radio stations is also a new cultural bridge that is helping bring Sinhala and Tamil speakers together in a single musical entertainment market.

Of course, the devastating trajectory of the ethnic conflict has been such that the power of the trans-cultural audiovisual media is wholly inadequate today to overcome the rigid barriers of communal hatred and vengeance that have arisen along with the sheer attrition of the war.

[A Buddhist monk, reading the Sivaram Memorial Lecture]

For that, there has to be a comprehensive change across the canvas of the Sri Lankan social configuration. This is something to which the mass media can contribute, but ultimately it is up to the peoples of this island to adjust their perspectives, make realistic choices and/ to discard fantasies – both of hegemony as well of vengeance.

Such a scale of transformation at a socio-cultural level musk necessarily involve the Sinhala community in a very central way. In order to do justice to the commemoration of an anti-hegemonist fighter such as Sivaram, I will, in this final section of my Lecture, focus on the complex issue of Sinhala hegemonism. This is a subject that I have focussed on often in the past, especially in my ‘Observations’ column in the Sunday Observer.

The biggest single obstacle to peace is the ideology of Sinhala-Buddhist ethno-supremacy and the hold that this ideology has on the Sri Lankan State. To put it simply, peace can come to Sri Lanka only with the defeat of Sinhala-Buddhist ethno-supremacism. True, there are several other major elements in the Sri Lankan crisis that also need resolution, especially the question of a democratic self-rule for the Tamils, but Sinhala-Buddhist supremacism is at the core of the problem.

In exploring this problematic, it is imperative that I do so from the point of view of the interests of the Sinhalas themselves. This requires an examination of the Sinhala collective mindset – the mass psychology of supremacism (to paraphrase Wilhelm Reich). After all, the very intent of Sinhala supremacism is the perceived survival and future of the ‘Sinhala jaathiya’ (or, race). The object of this ideology is the supremacy of a defined ‘Sinhala jaathiya’ over the Sri Lankan State and the maintenance of a State with a configuration that enables the continuity of this ethnic hegemony. The rationale for this hegemony is the threat perception and presumed survival need for this denned “sinhala jaathiya’. What I will examine is the self-understanding of the Sinhalas as to their identity which would include narratives of their social evolution (history) as well as the contours of their ethnic description or self-description.

Most significant is the fact that the modern definitions of ‘Sinhala’ attribute a central role to a purely (or largely) internal or indigenous socio-cultural evolution without sufficient acknowledgement of the continuous other (i.e. ‘external’) influences in a way that would expose the composite nature of the Sinhalayo. Rather than giving an equal weight to the obviously very powerful influences from outside the island, the modern practise of Sinhala identity emphasises primarily an isolated, island-exclusive civilisation.

This historiographical logic then results in a major difficulty experienced by the Sinhalas in recognising the co-existence today of (a) various sub-Sinhala demographic groups as well as (b) other non-’Sinhala’ ethnic groups, mainly the Tamils and Muslims/Moors/Malays.

This lack of a pluralist or, composite, perspective of communal Self (as comprising several closely linked subgroups) and related Others is in stark contrast to a similar island society that is the ‘nation’ of Great Britain. The Sri Lankan social evolutionary experience is similar to that of Britain and not of Japan or Taiwan or other off-continental island societies which are far more homogenous. Just as Britain and its earliest indigenous population of Picts suffered successively or simultaneously very dislocative a nd powerful external influences via the Saxon, Angle, and Norse invasions, the Roman invasions and the Norman invasion, the Sri Lankan island and its population also underwent similar major intrusive experiences. Given this historical memory, today’s ‘British” people simultaneously also identify themselves as being a composite of, firstly Scots, English and Welsh, and secondly, of mixtures of Nordic, Germanic and Norman (Norse-French) peoples. For the Sinhalayo, however, a linear, very simple and singular composition of ‘Sinhala’ alone and none other is accepted as the civilisational identity of this island population. The successive or parallel intrusions over millennia from the -sub-continent as well as from Arabia and from South East Asia have not been accommodated in the self-definition of ‘Sinhala’ even though some of the very ancient texts that are referred to for founding myths explicitly indicate variety in demographic origins.-Thereis no practice of identifying ‘Sinhala’ with a composite mix of Veddahs, Prakrit speaking northern sub-continentals, Prakrit-Tamil speaking southern sub-continentals, Keralites, Tamils, Arabs, Burmans, and Javanese.

Our community’s very self-naming as “Sinhala” is a contemporary, lived, practice of a selective interpretation of especially the Mahaavangsa text, in, fact of its most ‘ mythic section, and of other texts that derive from it (the Teeka, Saamanthapaasadikaa, Raajaavaliya, Poojaavaliya, etc).7 Even if an individual Sinhalayaa has not read or does not read the Vangsa Kathaa, that Sinhalayaa’s life practices are explained through the interpretation of these texts by other Sinhalayaas and, indeed by whole social institutions, including the State, social scientific professions, education, the Sangha, other processes of ideological production which derive their moral justifications from this corpus of texts and, finally, the mass media.

And the whole experience of self-identification via these ancient texts is further sanctified by that thread of justification that runs through the Mahaavangsa: “Sujanappasaada-sangvegaththaaya”. And the Mahaavangsa declares this at the end of every chapter8 as this maha kaavya that we treasure inspires us with its imagery, metaphor, narrative, and direct moral instruction giving meaning to numerous currents of our lives here and now.

In our act of possessing the Vangsa Kathaa as “our” history, we, Sinhalas, then take possession of all its norms and definitions. Hence, the “Sujana” (in ‘Sujanappasaada-sangvegaththaaya’) that is, “the good people”, are we, the Sinhalayo and defined today in accordance with the simplistic historical interpretations described above. And, the telling of our history is done for our further “pasaadaya” (prasaadaya) and “sangvegaya”. That is, the telling of this history to ourselves, the “Good people”, then makes us feel good (or better). All the Vangsa Kathaa taken together enable us, Sinhalayo, to call ourselves many other beautiful things as well, including being the race of people that protected and nurtured a ‘pure’ form of humanity’s ‘most enlightening’ philosophy (i.e. Buddhism) – ‘most enlightening’ as defined by these texts and the interpretations of these texts.

In short, we Sinhalayo, love our selves and our ethnic community (as ideologically denned), and regard ourselves as being the ‘best’ (or greatest) community of humans in the world, and insist that we must have our own nation-state – which we already possess today in the form of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. In these living acts of self-definition, both individually and communally, as well as living acts of the self-love that is a part of that self-definition, we are no different from many other ethnic groups, be they the Americans, English, Indian, or Japanese in their own concrete affirmations of nationhood.

And, in a world where political relations are defined systems of relationships between political entities based on ethno-political communities, be they nation-states/ kingdoms or provinces, we, Sinhalayo too, are under the compulsion to fit into the dominant world system by ‘being’ a nation-state – Sri Lanka/ Heladiva/Sihaladiva/Hela/Lanka. Given this compulsion, the aspiration for, and retention of nationhood could be seen as perfectly justifiable and a viable practice of political community.

However, the shape of this political community of nationhood is one that also derives from historical realities that are somewhat beyond the control of the Sinhalayaas. We have inherited, today, a structure of a State that was defined, in its immediate past not so much by us as by our European colonial masters. After half a millennium of European colonial domination and manipulation, this island and its communities of people has been subverted, exploited, re-ordered and traumatised to a degree that with withdrawal of the British after the Second World War, we could do little but accept the half-baked, inorganically designed political structure that we were happy to call in 1948 the independent State of ‘Lankaava’ (Ceylon). The fact that we have, since then, tried to reform that State twice already (1972,1978) indicates the inadequacies of that State in effectively managing the various aspirations for social community on this island of ours.

The simplistic form of ‘nation-state’ left behind by the hurriedly departing British, was convenient to the simplistic self-conception of the Sinhalayo themselves. Given that our self-image is that of a ‘pure’, island-exclusive ‘race’ (ethnic group) which refuses to acknowledge the composite nature of our ‘Sinhala-ness’, the Sinhala defined ‘nation-state’ also fails to institutionally and symbolically accommodate the extremely composite ‘nation’ of people with several different identities that live within the boundaries of that nation-state. Hence, the crucial failure of the successive post-colonial Sri Lankan polities (the Dominion State, First and Second Republics) to acknowledge the equal national-cultural significance of Tamils, Veddas, Burghers, Moors, Malays, and others, including the various Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim castes.

In fact, all three efforts at conceiving a ‘State’ were efforts and processes manipulated by the Sinhalayo without adequate regard not only for their own sub-Sinhala complexity, but also for other co-existing ethnic groups.

Consequently, the polities that emerged, including the current Second Republic , reflect that simplistic exclusivism. This exclusivism, however, today has the respectability of a vision of supremacy over the island ‘State’ – in short, a fantasy of empire. When Sinhala ultra-nationalist politicians today insist on something called ‘unitary’ (further revealing their English colonial subservience!), they are doing nothing more than clinging to that fantasy of empire.

But such polities cannot survive for long without making adjustments to accommodate those previously ignored complexities. Thus, we have been experiencing the pangs of the internal crisis in all three successive polities – since 1948. 9 Today, since the succeeding polities have not only failed to remedy the problem but worsened it, the crisis is so severe as to bring the very survival of the Sinhala dominated State itself into question.

The historical imperative that confronts us, Sinhalayo, then is not merely ‘constitutional reform’. We must look forward to building a new Republic or republics. Our self-identification has to undergo a radical transformation so that our very practice of identity will begin to be more inclusive and cognizant of the composite nature of our collectivity. In fact, if we become less singular in our self-identification, we will gain greater self-confidence in ourselves as being ‘related’ via our various composite elements to our neighbouring ethnic communities. In short,

We, Sinhalayo, need no longer feel so alone, so besieged and under threat of dissolution – because we will be part of a larger, encompassing, regional society. Secession, then, will no longer be a ‘threat’ but merely a new configuring of our State with new forms and structures that enable interrelationships between groups and sub-groups. Indeed, ’secession’ will lose its meaning.

Such a re-configuring of our ‘national’ identity enables us to fearlessly aspire to a new range of political communities, perhaps a series of republics, ranging from the local to the regional and even sub-continental, where ‘nation’ is not necessarily bound by a geographical island and our islands are, once more, the inviting, beautiful, safe havens to the many ’sujana’ who arrive and depart from these shores. We could then envision not only a composite nationhood but also a composite statehood not restricted by western colonial borders but inspired by our own centuries-old sub continental political traditions that have supported powerful polities and wonderful civilizations. Surely, with all our modern technology and tightly connected market economies, could we not envisage a complex of interdependent polities that is as complex as those highly complex and successful polities that configured our lands in the past centuries? Is this not ‘good news’ for The Good (sujana)?

[Pictures By Dushiyanthini Kanagasabapathipillai]

EDITORS NOTE: Lakshman F.B. Gunasekera is a senior journalist who has worked in many Colombo newspapers. He is currently senior programme manager at International Alert (Colombo). The above extracts are from the first D.Sivaram memorial lecture. The FEDERAL IDEA is in agreement with Mr. Gunasekera’s comments about the “Sinhala defined nation – state” and of “unitary” being a fantasy of the colonial empire. Responses from readers are most welcome.

Feedback: djeyaraj@federalidea.com