Division!

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is talking ‘division’. No, it’s not THAT division which his party has been advocating on the sly or in the very least aiding and abetting. No, it’s not the incremental progress towards Eelam that has been a well-rehearsed script diligently played by Tamil nationalists. Let’s elaborate before we talk about the ‘division’ that Wickremesinghe is talking about right now.

Here’s the process: 1) Formulation of objective (Eelam), 2) Construction of history (‘Myth modeling’ a la Traditional Homelands), 3) Inflation of grievances, 4) Wild Extrapolation, 5) Demand the Unreasonable, 6) Armed insurrection (because ‘democratic avenues will not yield objective), 7) Obtain incremental gains. That’s Chelvanayakam’s ‘A little now, more later’ thesis in action and the oxymoronic  M.A. Sumanthiran is up to. 

Now. This is not THAT ‘division’. It’s something else. Think ‘Divisional Secretariat’ (for now).   Wickremesinghe has laid it out at the launch of ‘Citra,’ dubbed as ‘Sri Lanka’s first social innovation lab’.  

‘Our divisional level should work. President Premadasa wanted the division more independent but today it is overloaded. When you think of 2020 or 2030 is division enough? Or do we have to think of a new unit. We are wondering whether the Division can spend all the money that is being put by all levels of the government. There are many competing programs. We are now trying to identify a common unit to implement all these.’

‘Long ago the basic unit of administration was the province and a GA. In the 60s it was the district. However, subsequently early 80s it was a division. Divisional secretariats are in a tug-o-war with the central government and the provincial council. However, those are today’s problems. I am looking at tomorrow’s problems. Is this model outdated? Have we got to rethink of divisional structure,’ he added.

Wickremesinghe is talking about getting things done and of course things not getting done. He’s talking about operational units. He is talking about provinces and divisions.  He’s focusing on the administration aspects but does talk of devolution units. 

First he says that the divisional secretariats are overworked. Then he claims that they are further hampered by tensions between the central government and provincial councils. 

The issue can be resolved in any number of ways. Endless postponement of provincial council elections and absolute silence on the part of the devolution lobby, provincial politicians and the people in the relevant provinces clearly indicate that provincial councils need to be done away with. They were, for those who may not remember, thrust down our throats by India and embraced by political parties and politicians to further political projects. Well, they are not functioning and no one is bothered. 

That alone will not resolve the issue. Wickremesinghe says that divisions cannot handle all the matters that come to them. He has mentioned that it is hard for citizens to interact with officials. He cautions that the bureaucracy is a problem. Most importantly, he asks, ‘is there enough space for citizen’s participation at the grass root level?’

That’s about participatory democracy. He should know better than most how democracy does and does not work. He can talk about participation and of course non-participation or rather the subversion of participation. 

The proportional representational system of elections has clearly distanced representative and the represented or rather those who ought to be represented. The elected are answerable to an entire district and not an electorate. It’s the same with the provincial councils. Electoral reform to cure these ills were deliberately fudged by those responsible. What was promised was a mixed system, but what we got was a perverted version of the same problematic system.  

The planning conundrum that Wickremesinghe has so accurately described is made worse by the decentralized budget where each Member of Parliament is allocated a certain amount of money to spend as he or she wishes. This turns legislators into mini-executives and nurtures a mindset that infringes upon the principle ‘separation of power’ in the state. 

So what’s the solution that Wickremesinghe is pointing towards? He has not spelled it out. What he has done is suggest that the way things are is not the way things ought to be. In other words, when it comes to decentralization, we need even smaller units, i.e. smaller than the ‘division’.  That would take us to the map of local government authorities or rather the lines that indicate jurisdiction. In an administrative sense we would be talking ‘Grama Niladhari Plus’ here. In a political sense, i.e. in terms of representational unit, it would indicate something smaller than the local government authority. 

Getting things done. That’s what devolution advocacy is mostly about. The Prime Minister has clearly indicated that the provincial councils are not getting things done and moreover are essentially subverting the development project. Even District Development Councils (DDCs) would not work according to his argument. 

The solution then would be an administrative/representational arrangement that is not burdened by PCs and kept to manageable proportions by going for smaller units. Interestingly this is the logical direction indicated by devolution ideology. That thought-process has stopped at the boundaries of the PCs, but Wickremesinghe has boldly come out and said, essentially, ‘it is not working!’  

Way to go Prime Minister! Now convince your party and your fervent allies!

malindasenevi@gmail.com. www.malindasenevi@gmail.com

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Grievances and resolution: the question of true dimensions

Grievances.  ‘Grievances?’ rather.  A word and a question.  The former implies a list or at least two issues that somehow cause distress.  The latter, the question that is, is something that has been customarily ignored or caused much shy-making, toe-watching and navel-gazing.  At best it prompts a highly emotion and even highly stylized narrative which is marked by marking out preserves (of grievances) where there are none and exaggerations where there is some degree of legitimacy to claim.  We are talking of ‘Tamil grievances,’ by the way.

Dr Nirmala Chandrahasan (LLB, LLM, PhD, Attorney-at-Law) in an article titled 'National Question and grievances faced by a minority’ (which she claims is a response to a piece I wrote, ‘Let’s make Sampanthan’s New Year wish come true’) does not indulge in such histrionics.  She offers some sober reflections on the issue, lists grievances and makes recommendations for their resolution.  They demand response.  

Nirmala begins by quoting the LLRC (Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission) report: ‘The Commission takes the view that the root cause of the ethnic conflict lies in the failure of successive governments to address the genuine grievances of the Tamil people (Chapter 9 para 184).'  

One doesn’t have to take the LLRC report as the last word on anything of course.  Those who could be called fellow-travelers in Nirmala’s pro-devolution caravan were shrill in their objections when the LLRC was set up.  The LLRC did not stick to mandate.  A minor misdemeanor, that.  I remember offering some observations on this a few years ago.   When the same shrill voices demanded that LLRC recommendations be implemented forthwith, I pointed out the following important ‘misses’ or ‘forgets’ in their pronouncements: “the LLRC was a far cry from a body enacted to draft a constitution. Secondly, some of the recommendations require constitutional amendment and even referenda. A third ‘forget’ can be added: the Government is not bound (as per the mandate-limitation) to implement all of the recommendations. There’s can-do and cannot-do in all this. There is, moreover, ‘done’, ‘doing’ and ‘forget it’ too. There is wanted-speed and doable-speed.” [For elaboration, please read, 'LLRC and Devolution: the politics of skipping caveats'].

The LLRC note on ‘root cause’ is incomplete.  It is correct that successive governments have been in part responsible on account of their inability to address the genuine grievances of the Tamil people, but that is not the only root cause.  Tamil chauvinism predates the much maligned ‘Sinhala Only’ legislation.  But let’s ignore all that.  The key terms here are ‘root causes’ and ‘genuine grievances’.  We’ll take up ‘root causes’ later; for now, the key descriptive of the word ‘grievances’ is the word ‘genuine’.  This has been ignored by those who have hurrahed the LLRC report.  

‘Genuine’ is about true dimensions — fact, not falsehood; history and not myth-models.  

Nirmala, having started with that LLRC quote appears to have forgotten that the issue is root causes in the main. She’s flagged eight points of contention: 1. Implementation of the Language Act, 2.Equal access to services and opportunities, 3. The principle of equality in the dispensation of justice, 4. Fair and just treatment of those detained, 5. Transitional justice, 6. Return to rightful owners of private properties secured by the state during the conflict (Points 4, 5 and 6 being essentially elaborations of Point 3), 7. Lack of state-sponsored economic development in the northern and eastern provinces, and 8. Non-implementation in full of the 13th Amendment.

Of these, Points 3-6 and 8 are not 'root causes'.  They are issues that have arisen long after tensions snowballed into a full blown armed conflict. Even Point 2, touches on language-related issues, i.e. Point 1.  They are certainly valid concerns and anything less than comprehensive addressing of the same cannot help the cause of reconciliation.  However, to flag these as valid or strong justification for ‘devolution’ is simplistic and demonstrates the pretty thin case for federalism championed by Tamil nationalists long before the LTTE came into the equation.  Indeed, it shows that the unadulterated chauvinism of the Tamil political leadership was as potent a poison as that of their Sinhala counterparts.  They’ve offered therefore a ‘Tamil counterpoint’ to ‘the non-addressing of grievances by successive governments’ by articulating ridiculous aspirations, confusing cause, effect and objective, and thereby feeding militancy among Tamil youth.  They’re as culpable as lax governments in the production of the LTTE and the terrible thirty years of conflict.  

Of course it is the state that has pick up after the fact.  Those who funded, armed and in other ways backed the LTTE can adopt and have adopted a hands-off policy in the matter of infrastructure development and other necessary action to rebuild conflict-ridden territories including rebuilding livelihoods.  It’s never enough, of course.  Charles Haviland, one time BBC correspondent in Colombo, once wrote about a ‘rehabilitated’ LTTE militant in Jaffna who was lamenting about being unemployed.  [For an elaboration of the kind of ailment that the likes of Haviland suffer, read 'Towards a post-complicit moment for those in pre-sleep slumber' and 'HRW and Brad Adams need to get some sleep']

Haviland's wail was rich.  Terrorists were offered skills that would help them earn an income, they were allowed to study and sit for examinations, they were released (if anyone wants to know what the countries that champion human rights and have berated Sri Lanka for being 'non-complient', all that is required is to whisper the name 'Guantanamo Bay' several times before and after meals) and the state is required to find them jobs as well?  It’s great if any state anywhere in the world can do a fraction of all this, but this was being demanded of Sri Lanka, a not yet middle-income country, that was in no position to eliminate unemployment and certainly not required to babysit ex-terrorists!   

The issue of justice (Points 3, 4 and 5) are valid. Of course one need not elaborate that injustice is not a badge that only Tamils have to wear.  In fact the entire justice system in its operation heavily favors the privileged.  Privilege is not the preserve of any particular community.   Nirmala’s point is valid when it comes to disappearances.  Proper investigation and follow-up action is necessary and sadly has been most manifest in absence.  

Just to get the ‘ethnic’ dimensions of the perspective right, the kind of justice that is sought was something that was not offered to victims of the 1988/89 insurrection either. And, in the larger narrative of ‘reconciliation’, it has to be remembered that it was not just the security forces that were engaged in strewing misery.  Who conscripted children?  Who killed members of rival Tamil political and military groups?  Were all members of the clergy, intellectuals, professional and ordinary people in the Tamil community killed by the security forces?  The LTTE’s track record is known in all this.  And it was not only ‘innocent Tamil civilians’ who were killed.  There were civilians of all communities who died, some were massacred, some villages were burnt and not all of them warrant the ‘Tamil’ marker.  Widowhood.  Becoming orphans.  Sinhalese know all this.  Muslims too.  The baby belongs to the state by default of course, but when we talk about it, we can’t talk of certain widows and not others, certain orphans and not others.  That’s a crime of selectivity that demands the descriptive 'pernicious'.

Does this absolve the state from finding out what happened to those who were taken into custody and then disappeared?  Can the state shove it all under a carpet called ‘forgive and forget’?  No.  Allegations have to be investigated.  It may take time, but it has to be done.  The LLRC is absolutely right on this.  Nirmala has picked the correct quote which bears re-telling: ‘The government is duty bound to direct the law enforcement officers to take immediate steps to ensure that these allegations are properly investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice. It will be recalled that this report came out quite a few years ago, but evidently these recommendations have fallen on deaf ears.’ 

It is a problem.  Not a root cause.  Perhaps a ‘cause’ for delay in reconciliation or even a cause for another round of violence, but certainly not a ‘root cause’ that warranted armed insurrection or even a demand for devolution.  It's none of that simply because of the error of chronology.

The same holds for Point 4, the indictment or release of those held in detention.  The release of over 90% of those taken into custody at the end of the conflict, many of them as mentioned above after being provided the opportunity to obtain marketable skills and useful qualifications (something unheard of in countries whose leaders regularly lambast Sri Lanka for ‘doing nothing’ by way of reconciliation), is not a valid excuse for denying justice to those who remain in custody.  Again, as pointed above, ‘not a root cause’ but a consequent whose genesis is not neat, not tidy and marked by multiple traces of 'ethnicity' if that's the preferred frame.  The state has to hold the baby, of course since no one is saying ‘I am an LTTE member’ these days, not even the LTTE’s conflict-time proxy, the TNA, which by saying ‘the LTTE is the sole representative of the Tamils’ covered itself with the Tiger flag.  The state has to hold the baby, yes, but this doesn’t mean that we say nothing of the baby’s parentage. But again, let us not forget, it’s not a ‘root cause’.

Point 6 is also an issue of justice.  However, demilitarization is a process and no one can say that this Government or the one before did nothing on this count.  Security is and always will be an issue, but 'return to normalcy' requires that properties secured for whatever reason be returned to rightful owners, subject of course to the often difficult process of establishing legality of claim.  Thorny, but addressable.  A must, in fact.  The fact remains, it is not a ‘root cause’.  Not a grievance that caused conflict of a military nature.  

The implementation of the Language Act has been slow.  Nirmala is correct.  Reasons include lack of resources and lack of political will.  There’s movement on both, however.  It is a grievance that needs to be rectified, the LLRC is correct.  Perhaps it is a root cause in generating a sense of being subject to discrimination, but whether the dimensions are significant enough to warrant insurrection is not clear.

Let us now take on Points 1 and 2

Point 2.  Equal access to services and opportunities.  Of course.  The Tamils were favored by the British in the public service and that edge did erode.  If that’s a grievance and therefore should be addressed by restoring the percentages we had in 1948 then the Sinhalese would be edged out for all time.  We can play the proportions game in many ways.  We call it multi-ethnic and multi-religious as though the population is equally divided among ethnicities and religious communities.  Not true, but it’s not said is it?  

Nirmala, however, is absolutely correct about the low representation of Tamils and Muslims in the armed forces and the Police.  This has to be rectified.  It will be slow, in the case of Tamils at least, for understandable reasons, but progress should be made.  The recruitment of a full complement of Tamil speaking officials as per the requirement of providing meaningful services to all citizens is a non-negotiable.  Here too, Nirmala is absolutely correct.  Point 2 is a demand and it outlines a genuine grievances.  A root cause?  Well, as much or as little as Point 1, as argued above.

As for job opportunities and the lack of effort by governments to set up factories in the conflict-ridden areas (the ‘development-deficit’ discussed in Point 7), one must understand that it was not possible for thirty years and little thanks to those who went around burning all state institutions, factories included.  People all over the country are struggling to make ends meets.  Farmers all over the country are suffering.  It’s not just Tamil farmers.  As for fisherfolk, there was a time when they couldn’t go out to sea and they can thank the LTTE for that!  

Governments can only do so much.  Much has been done, in particular by clearing the ground for development.  It is unfair to expect a country like Sri Lanka to turn a war-torn territory into a flourishing industrial zone overnight.  Nirmala talks about benefits of development not accruing to ordinary people, but then again when was that ever an objective of any government?  Development was never for Tamil ‘ordinary people’ and not for Sinhalese 'ordinary people’.  Nirmala should be commended for noting this.  

The one telling ‘deficit’ is a comprehensive irrigation program for the northern province that matches development in this sphere elsewhere.  The issue of a ‘River to Jaffna’ has been debated for a long time.  There are disputes over technical feasibility.  One must take into account that not all areas have the same complement of resources.  However, if devolution is about each devolved entity making do with what's contained in the relevant geographical boundaries, then the ‘Jaffna River’ is out.  In any event, the lack of development argument only alludes to something that few Tamil nationalists acknowledge or want anyone to mention: 

‘Development-lag is an issue that can gather greater currency if it is dressed in an ethnic garb’.  

Let’s consider devolution.  There’s nothing in Nirmala’s ‘Seven Point List of Grievances’ that makes a case for ‘devolution’.  Point seven, in fact, is dependent on the ‘center’ and not periphery.  It’s not a root cause or a grievance.  An aspiration, yes, but not a grievance.   The grievances, the genuine ones that is, call for action and resolution but nothing that can be pinned on devolution of power.  If there’s a wound in a foot, one doesn’t apply medicine on the neck.  Apples and oranges.  Call it whatever you will. The 13th Amendment is an aberration.  It presumes historicity and scientific validity of arbitrarily drawn lines and markers that neither the Tamils nor the Sinhalese had anything to do with.  The President himself has correctly pointed this out and the most ardent devolutionists have maintained a deafening silence on the matter.  

Nirmala asks if devolution is good for everyone, not just Tamils, never mind that devolution to the current ‘lines’ will concretize the myth-models of Tamil chauvinism.  She quotes Mahinda Rajapaksa on this, ‘people in their own localities should be able to guide their own destinies’.  This of course presupposed a neat and equal distribution of resources, but even if that were true, then the devolution logic demands that we move to village councils and not stop at provinces.  Nirmala says decentralization can do it but strangely does not apply that logic to the only two valid ‘issues’ she has flagged (Points 1 and 2).  

Many have misquoted or selectively quoted the LLRC report on the issue of devolution.  Nirmala is not an exception.   I strongly recommend a re-reading of the LLRC report with close examination of Section 9.231 which interjects 4 caveats to the principle of ‘devolution.

Section 9.231 of the LLRC report, which interjects 4 caveats to the principle of ‘devolution’:  (A) Devolution should essentially promote greater harmony and unity and not disharmony and disunity among the people of the country, (B) The focus should be to ensure that the people belonging to all communities are empowered at every level especially in all tiers of Government, (C) The democratic empowerment of the people should take place within the broader framework of the promotion and protection of human rights, and (D) In addressing the question of devolution two matters require the attention of the government: empowering the Local Government institutions to ensure greater peoples’ participation at the grass roots level, and lessons learnt from the shortcomings in the functioning of the Provincial Councils system be taken into account in devising an appropriate system of devolution that addresses the needs of the people, (and finally) it should at the same time provide for safeguarding the territorial integrity and unity of Sri Lanka whilst fostering its rich diversity.

Caveat A imposes the condition of ‘harmony’. Now if devolution uses the current provincial boundaries (randomly drawn, let us not forget), which constitute the basis for the (diminished) Eelamist demarcation, if the majority of Tamils people live outside the North and East (for example), devolution along these chauvinist lines powered by myth-models and exaggeration cannot inspire anything but suspicion and anxiety among the Sinhalese.

Caveat B speaks of empowerment and calls for much better governance and greater affirmation of citizenship-meaning.  Caveat C is about human rights. The upholding or subverting of human rights has nothing to do with the structure of the state (for example, whether it is a federal, unitary or other arrangement). So Caveat C, like Caveat B, is an add-on that is not devolution-specific.

Finally, Caveat D. It is about ‘building on what we have’, i.e. the local government institutions. It is about greater and meaningful participation. Such ‘democracy,’ again does not require devolution as per the 13th Amendment, 13 Plus posturing etc., but about scripting in checks and balances into the relevant articles of the constitution. Caveat D also unequivocally salutes the need to ‘provide for safeguarding the territorial integrity and unity of Sri Lanka whilst fostering its rich diversity’. The devolution debate has gone too far with taking as ‘fact’ and ‘legitimate’ the extrapolations of Tamil chauvinism for any power-devolution to established provincial lines not be seen as a threat to territorial integrity and unity.

A common and not very innocent ‘error’ is to confuse ‘devolution’ with ‘power sharing’.  Power sharing is about checks and balances that forbid the abuse of power, celebrate equality of opportunity in letter, spirit and practice, and about leveling playing fields to the extent possible in a capitalist economy.  Devolution is certainly not a necessary pre-condition; more robust legislation that insulates citizens from power-abuse is.  

Back to basics.  Root causes.  Trotting out issues produced by an armed conflict where the blame for the dismemberment, death, displacement and destruction cannot be placed at a single door is not an enumeration of ‘root causes’ but a description of what any conflict inevitably produces.  The only legitimate grievance Nirmala has expressed is about the language issue and here again it is more about sloth than anything else that one can complain about.  

‘Genuine,’ let me repeat, is about true dimensions — fact, not falsehood; history and not myth-models.  Genuine grievances are about true dimensions.  And resolution is about a solution that engages with grievance.  Devolution doesn’t arise from any of the genuine grievances Nirmala has outlined and certainly not the devolution to the Eelamist lines that are taken erroneously as a ‘goes without saying’ which, we all know, comes from a ‘comes without saying’ that has nothing to do with grievance.

Related Articles and videos:
My representations to the LLRC (along with responses to questions)
LLRC Proposals: let there be no foot-dragging 
Reconciliation and hallucination

*A shorter version of this article was published in the Daily Mirror on February 2, 2017.

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer. Email: malindasenevi@gmail.com.  Twitter: malindasene.  

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Words, deeds and devolution-fixations

The Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera, has pleaded that action be taken more seriously than word.  Speaking at a press briefing on the subject of a vote on a UNESCO resolution, Samaraweera referring to controversial remarks made by President Maithripala Siriesna raising questions on the work of agencies investigating corruption allegations, requested that the government be judged on its actions and not on statements made.  

Interestingly, Samaraweera also stated ‘the government has not veered from its mandate to create a dynamic and vibrant democracy in Sri Lanka’.  Mandates are words, not deeds, and mandates, Samaraweera once said, are meaningless after elections.  

But let’s get to deeds, proper.  Lakshman Kiriella, Leader of the House, in a recent interview with the Daily Mirror has said that equal rights of the people should be ensured through power sharing with the periphery.  This brings us to the vexed issue of constitution-making, the Mother of all Deeds, so to speak.  The Father of that process, if you will, Dr Jayampathy Wickramaratne himself has confessed that very little has been done so far by the Committee appointed to handle the subject.  Add to this the other ‘statement’’ by the President where he dismisses provincial boundaries (on which the Eelam map has been traced and which give Kiriella’s ‘peripheries’) as the work of British cartographers (he did not interject ‘arbitrary’, but that’s what they are), and we need not be surprised that the ‘deeds’ are still in the making.    

So we are forced to go back to words, because ladies and gentlemen words are all that this Government has gives us so far on the issue of ‘reconciliation through constitution-making’.  And we know that words are dangerous things, they are easily tossed around and are what turn myths into facts and what confuses grievances with aspirations.  Kiriella, now, believes he knows the words.  He says that people don’t know history.  Let’s listen to the erudite historian.

“The first people who asked for devolution were the Kandyan Sinhalese. When Lord Soulbury came before Independence to create the new Constitution, Kandyan Sinhalese went before him and said that they had been a separate country for 400 years and that they had a crown and a throne. That was what they said. They asked for a Federal State. What they suggested were three Federal States -Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti. Their basic argument was to seek devolution on the lines of the Indian constitution that was in the making at that time. The strange thing is that Tamil parties did not want devolution at that time. They preferred the status quo. The problems started after Independence. The parties that came to power offended the sentiments of Tamil people. Voting rights of estate Tamils were taken away. The Sinhala Only Act was introduced. The Federal Party was born after Independence.”

Our historian slips in the birth of the Federal Party after mentioning the issue of voting rights and the Sinhala Only Act, when that ill-birthing predates the other and more frequently mentioned ‘Post-independence’ problems. But let’s ignore such mischief.  The problem of drawing from history is the prejudice of selection.  There was context to what could be called a preposterous demand driven by the self-interest of the Kandyan ‘nobility’, the radalas, as preposterous as the similar demands made by spokespersons for certain castes.  They, like the Tamil ‘nobility’ in the North feared democracy because it threatened privileges enjoyed.  There was no ‘history’ buttressing the demands.  The problem of the Kandyan Sinhalese was ‘sorted’ through marriages which took families such as the Ratwattes, Meedeniyas and Dunuwilles out of the political equation.  The caste-based demand died a natural death.  Tamil chauvinism outlived both thanks, interestingly, to a disavowal of history by all relevant parties for a multiplicity of reasons including the existence of a strong anti-Buddhist political elite and a colonial and post-colonial mentality that cut across class, caste, region and even religion.

The historian does not challenge the claim that the Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti were federal states.  They were well defined territories of course and far more logical than the 5 provinces that the British first drew and the 9 they came up with later, but they were not states by any stretch of the imagination and certainly not for any length of time that makes an ‘example’ that can support a wishy-washy devolution proposal.  

The truth is that the notions of ‘unitary’ and ‘federal’ were foreign to this island, in name and substance both.  There were times the land was eksesath or under one flag, times of multiple centres of power, times of overloads exacting tithes of one kind or another and other political arrangements.    The logic of ‘unity’ was more defined by specific objectives than by common agreement.  There was more commonality, if you want to argue the point, on the matter of shared notions of cosmology.   

The problem is simply a matter of putting the cart before the horse for reasons of ignorance, sloth, convenience and last but not least pernicious intent; in the case of Kiriella I would go with any or all of the first three, and with Wickramaratne and Samaraweera, the last. 

A process that is determined by a preferred outcome is no process but a political charade.  A process marked by a refusal to audit grievance and assess aspiration is ill-starred, to put it mildly.  Typically they exacerbate inter-communal tensions and fall apart, and if there’s no bloodshed involved we could say ‘lucky’.  Even if ‘devolution’ was a logical outcome of process (rather than the pre-determined ‘solution’ it is and which robs the process of credence), a refusal to revisit relevant boundaries in a context of chauvinistic myth-mongering on territorial claims amounts to rank irresponsibility.  And what we are seeing it now a political charade that is ill-starred and irresponsible.  And we are being generous here.   

Political systems are not cast in stone, sure.  What we were is not what we are and will not be what we will be.  Fixation is a negative.  Fixation coupled to ahistorical balderdash is a double negative.  That’s where we are.  The ABC of a constitution-making process, as we have pointed out many times is about a) obtaining a coherent articulation of grievance, b) assessment of the same to prune out exaggeration, c) review of aspirations to obtain the ‘reasonable’, d) consideration of all relevant factors including demography, geography, economic sense and of course history, and e) an assessment of do-ability.  If and only if all this yields ‘devolution’ as a logical arrangement to resolve grievances (as of now, even with exaggeration, marriage with aspirations and coated with mythology, devolution is a laughable ‘solution’ to the vague utterances of grievances, please note), should such be considered.  Also, if devolution, then and then only should lines be discussed.  

The historian is wrong about the federal claims associated with Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti, of course, but if devolution is an outcome of a (far more transparent and ideologically-free) process of deliberation, then such demarcation makes far more sense than the arbitrary lines drawn by a thief who was also a mass murderer operating with the intent to ethnically cleanse vast swathes of the island of Sinhalese, i.e. the British, folks.  

As for words and deeds, if you get the former wrong you are not going to get much of the latter.  Indeed you end up talking nonsense.  If nonsense is the talk, need we even debate possible outcomes?

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer.  Email: malindasenevi@gmail.com.  Twitter: malindasene

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‘Resolution’ is never obtained by myth-modelling, misnaming and mischief

Today, post-election, post-Mahinda and a marked absence of devolution and resolution talk, the focus is on good governance, constitutional reform and correction of flawed institutional arrangement. Other issues will surface, sooner or later.  Good to be alert to the non-said or less-said about 'resolution'.  This was first published in the Daily Mirror four years ago, on January 4, 2011. 

Harim Peiris, spokesperson for Chandrika Kumaratunga from 2001-2005, in an article titled ‘Rahul Gandhi, the UN and US express concern about Sri Lanka’ (Daily Mirror of December 30, 2010), has argued that when friends raise issues they need to be taken seriously.  He is correct.  We need to listen to friends. 

In this case however the friendship credentials of Gandhi (as or not as proxy for India – he’s just an MP), the USA and UN are pretty thin, all things considered and are of the contractual kind or worse, the mas raaththala (pound of flesh) type, not forgetting of course a manifest hypocrisy when it comes to these ‘concerns’.  These are not hands-without-blood folks we are talking about and indeed the crimes against humanity they are guilty of by omission and commission make the concerns expressed regarding Sri Lanka (much of it unsubstantiated allegation and not fact) sound rather silly.  In short, Peiris is not making much of a point. 

What is really intriguing about his article is the slipping in of two very serious caveats that are so unrelated to the title of his article that one must conclude that this and not the expressed and commented on ‘concerns’ are what really concerns him. 

Here’s the first: ‘A political solution to the ethnic problem should be found within a united Sri Lanka enabling the Tamil people to participate in their own governance in the North and East. Implementing the 13th amendment is an important first step.’

What is this fascination about the 13^th Amendment?  Is he saying that it needs to be implemented because it is part of the constitution?  That’s legitimate but pray tell us which part of the 13^th is yet to be implemented and what is to be gained by implementing such sections in terms of the stated intent, ‘solution to ethnic problem’.  Police powers?  De-merger?  To resolve what part of this so-called problems? 

First of all, if it is about implementing articles of the constitution, it implies an unholy conclusion that the constitution is somehow error free.  That would involve a cheering of the 18^th Amendment.  To the extent that these are not entities cast in stone and are not error-free it is beholden on the discerning commentator to point error and offer recommendation.  The 13^th, now, was a solution that was thrust down the throats of the citizenry in the most undemocratic manner possible (by Rahul’s father, no less, with the happy consent of the UNP regime of the time).  It sought to resolve articulated grievances which included unsubstantiated claims on territory based on concerted myth-mongering. 

The 13^th ignored demographic realities (53% of Tamils live outside the North and East).  If Police Powers can resolve identity-based citizenship anomalies then Peiris must dreat the fate of all Tamils living outside the North and East.  It is a white elephant (66% of monies go to cover administrative costs) and goes against the grain of current thinking on regional development.  Developing regional economic hubs is discarded old-hat.  If the spirit is implemented to the letter then the Western Province can say ‘to hell with Uva’ and keep for itself its over 70% of the national income. 

‘United Sri Lanka’ did he say?  Not ‘unitary’?  Does ‘unitary’ necessarily rebel against ‘unity’?  ‘First step’ did he say?  What’s the ‘second step,’ pray?  And the ‘third’?  When he says ‘Tamils should govern themselves’ he is a) demanding regional ethnic ‘enclaving’, b) seeking to legitimize the ‘exclusive traditional homeland’ myth and c) seeking to resurrect the LTTE’s ISGA (Internal Self-Governing Authority) proposal (yes, as ‘first step (to Eelam)’!).   The 13^th was a travesty on all counts and it has ‘legitimacy’ only in terms of its utility value for self-seeking politicians.  Peiris cannot say the 18^th is ‘great’ and if ‘un-greatness’ requires revisiting legislation and seeking amendment, then the 13^th too needs to be similarly investigated.     

Here’s the second slip-in: ‘The real issue is why the government of Sri Lanka is stonewalling on addressing these issues. The influence of a handful of majoritarian ethno religious nationalists should not be allowed to prevent the essential reconciliation measures that are needed in the post war period.’

He forgets that he was spokesperson to the most rabidly anti Sinhala, anti Buddhist leader in post independence Sri Lanka.  At that time, a handful of racist, chauvinistic, minoritarian separatists were embraced by his boss and they convinced her that not only could the LTTE be militarily defeated but that they held the moral high ground in the matter of inter-ethnic antagonisms. The kind of reconciliation she tried to push through would have legitimized a myth, heightened such antagonisms and put a terrorist in control of two-thirds the coast and one third the land mass of the nation.  She had her day. So did Peiris.  Lost out.  This is nothing but the while of kids who have lost their toys. 

The demise of the LTTE and the reduced circumstances of Eelamsits in all garb are not celebrated by just these so-called ‘handful of majoritarian ethno religious nationalists’ (whoever they happen to be and whether or not they deserve such tags). The majority of the people voted against the ideologies that dominated the political discourse when Peiris was in and out of the then President’s office.  Sure, they were convinced by the ideas propagated by a handful of people, but that is always the case in the matter of turning idea into ideology and mobilizing people on such basis.  Reconciliation is good and of paramount import.  Had we gone the way Peiris’ heroes wanted us to go we would not be terrorism-free today.  There would not have been resolution. 

We are not ‘resolved’ yet, sure, but we have the territory cleared for engagement in meaningful ways.  ‘Development’ won’t do it. Necessary but not sufficient, as they say.  It has to begin with examination of grievance (real, not imagined and not fluffed and frilled on account of political expediency).  A good place to start is history.  We could throw in demographic realities.  These are not things that the Harim Peirises of the federalist lobby were ever interested in discussing or debating. Instead they slip-in preferred outcome in de-contextualised and mischievous ways.  Does not help.

Malinda Seneviratne is the Editor-in-Chief of 'The Nation' and can be reached at msenevira@gmail.com

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If 19 is to equal 13 +...

According to National Freedom Front (NFF) leader Wimal Weerawansa a petition to get the 13^th Amendment abrogated was held back considering the current tensions between the Judiciary and Legislature.  Talks with the UNP and SLFP suggest that there are few takers for dogmatic positions on the 13^th Amendment.  Even the leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), R. Sampanthan, while holding fast to ‘devolution’, has expressed a willingness to go for re-demarcation of unit, i.e. three or four zones instead of the present nine provinces. 

Sampanthan has warned that repealing the 13^th ‘could cause grave and irreparable damage to the country’s future’.   It is heartening that the TNA leader, even at this late hour, is concerned about the country’s future.   Indeed his re-demarcation proposal amounts to a radical political shift from the previous fascination with white-lines or those provincial boundaries based on a map drawn by colonial rulers.   A re-demarcation, though, would necessarily amount to ‘modification’ and/or ‘nullification’ of the 13^th, an eventuality that Sampanthan opposes.  It is best that these ‘concerns’ are treated as the business-as-usual rhetorical of a politician and something that should not be allowed to rob the ‘statesman-like’ suggestion that the TNA leader has made in his interventions during the Budget Debate.

Sampanthan is of course erroneous when he says ‘the 13^th is the only constitutional provision that recognizes diversity’.  All it does is legitimate the work of a frivolous map-maker later used by Eelamist myth-mongers for their own purposes.  Communities are not held by maps, and fall out of provincial boundary.  The recognition of difference, as in the existence of different communities and people with different religious faiths, finds more than adequate mention in the constitution.  The only major differentiation that the constitution is silent on is that of class. 

Still, Sampanthan does make a valid point about efficiency in resource allocation.  The 13^th has seen enormous sums of money going waste, mostly to maintain the provincial councils rather than alleviating the conditions of the citizenry.  Moreover, the current lines rebel against contemporary economic thinking given anomalies of resource endowment across regions.  A re-demarcation then must correct for these inequalities.  In other words, logic and science as opposed to political expediency and untenable ethnic ‘enclaving’ should guide the cartographer.   It would logically take us to Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti, an option which even in these communal politicking times should be considered.  

What would result is ‘horizontal democratization’ as some have put it, provided of course that the devolved complement of powers exceed what is contained in the 13^th.  Provided, also, that the power of the citizen to participate in decision-making is enhanced in the process.  For example, devolving the power to exercise strong-arm tactics and be dismissive of manifesto post-election from center to province won’t make things easier for anyone but the politicians. 

The trick then would be to follow such re-demarcation as per a 13+ formula with vertical democratization which includes measure to correct current institutional flaws, ensure greater transparency and obtain greater degrees of accountability.  Ideally, the two processes, vertical and horizontal, can be sought through a single amendment or better still a new, that is a third, republican constitution, but this may not be the proper time. Insistence on a double-push might kill both. 

As of now, justice for all in the matter of having a meaningful say in designing laws and policies that affect people’s lives depend more on largesse than on constitutional provision.  That’s not a flaw in the 13^th Amendment but the 1978 Constitution. 

So if we have to go with ‘first-things-first’, then 13+ must necessarily pick up the Sampanthan proposal.  To make it really a ‘plus’ amendment, though, the vertical ‘re-demarcation’ if you will of power lines has to be pushed for.  

 

 

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Devolution talk and devolution talkers

Are you for 13, 13-minus or 13-plus, someone asked me.  Political circles are a-buzz with the 13^th, i.e. the Amendment thrust down the Sri Lankan polity by India in 1987, defended ferociously by Indophiles and non-Tiger separatists and happily used by politicians of all color intent on furthering careers and making bucks.  The pro-13^th commentators have all come out of the woodworks, as have those who opposed it and oppose devolution to boot. 

Debate on the matter is not new.  The present buzz follows a statement by Gotabhaya Rajapaksa advocating its repeal.  Context in brief is as follows: a) the 13^th is a part of the constitution, b) the President has at various times talked about devolution and pledged to go further, i.e. ’13 Plus’, c) it has no discernible connection with expressed grievances and makes no sense in terms of demographic, developmental and historical realities. 

And yet, those who are dismayed do make some interesting points.  Dharisha Bastians (‘From 13 Plus to 13 Minus’) argues that there is presidential double-speak.  Sumanasiri Liyanage (‘The UPFA government is heading for its first defeat in Parliament’) on the other hand is a victim of his own fantasies and notions of democracy predicated on faulty reading of conflict.  Laksiri Fernando (‘Gotabhaya’s talk about abolishing the 13^th Amendment’) is fascinated with status quo (right or wrong) and erroneous in the assertion that a repeal would necessarily wreck language rights. 

Tissa Vitharana’s outburst is perhaps the most clownish, for he sees ‘foreign conspiracy’ in moves to abolish the 13^th.  The biggest conspirator with respect to the 13^th was India and that’s certainly ‘foreign’, not to mention that the darlings of those intent on dragging his leader to the Haig are also ‘foreign’ or ‘foreign funded’ AND are staunch 12-Plus advocates (their backtracking from separatism to federalism to the 13th corresponds to the decline and fall of terrorism: no coincidence!). 

Fernando’s is nevertheless the most thoughtful of the responses.  He has detailed, for example, pre-13^th devolution talk.  He has also referred to the LLRC recommendations pertaining to devolution.  He has conjured a gonibilla factor: ‘Devolution and the 13th Amendment are the ‘trophies’ that the government has been showing the international community and the UN as indications of Sri Lanka’s commitment to resolve the ethnic question in the country. Backtracking on them would undoubtedly spell disaster for the country in the international sphere.’

Now the statements made on devolution from time to time does not necessarily make it logical, necessary, meaningful or sustainable.  These statements could be shot to pieces with the as-is situation of the 13th.  Fernando argues that as-is is mendable.  This is true except for the fact that devolution to provinces is antithetical to current economic theory in terms of resource endowment and allocation.  We have to keep in mind also that the X-Country success is not necessarily replicable in Country-Y.  

As for the ‘trophies’, Fernando misses the blatant truth that Sri Lanka’s detractors are as interested in ‘solutions’ as they are concerned about ‘democracy’ In Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya or the Arctic.  Showcasing ‘achievement’ is simply not going to cut ice unless the relevant lines are toed. 
Grievances (and no one can deny that Tamils have them, as do various other segments of society, including Sinhalese) need to be resolved in different ways, especially through democratization. Here, Fernando’s comments on the 17^th and 18^th are extremely valid.  But we are not talking about ‘democratization’ here but ‘grievance-addressing’. 

What all these people forget is that the lines we are talking about here are white-drawn.  They have nothing to do with the longer history of the country (where demarcations – Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti --made political but more than this geographical sense) or make sense in terms of present day prerogatives (economic hub, resource-complement, seaboard and so on).  Secondly, I am willing to wager that if asked to enumerate ‘grievances’ and tie each of them to territory-based ‘resolution’, they would be stumped, particularly given the fact that the majority of Tamils live outside the North and East. 

It is in this sense that the line Fernando quotes from the LLRC Report (‘appropriate system of devolution’) and the one he misses (‘acceptable to all’) need to be considered.  We can have devolution, not to resolve grievances that are not devolution-resolved but for better and more meaningful development.  That would necessitate re-demarcation of provincial boundary.  That’s the ’13 Plus’ we could aim for.  If there’s anything that thumbs a nose at reality, then it is better to scrap.  No 13, no 13 Plus, no 13 Minus.  Zero.  

 

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A note on smart-ass devolutionists

When they called it ‘separatism’ is sounded like a cuss-word.  Separatists took time to get smart.  Perhaps it would be more correct to say it took them a long time to recover smartness.  S.J.V. Chelvanayakam hit the correct idea when he said it was possible to extract anything from the Sinhalese as long as it is done slowly, an idea he captured in the pithy ‘A little now, more later’. 

Leaving aside the notion that whoever did the ‘taking’ would be taking from all Sri Lankans and not just the Sinhalese, the slogan only pushed separatism to embrace terrorism while it rubbed the Sinhalese majority quite the wrong way.  Had Chelva thought but not said, separatism may have benefitted, but chauvinists and land-thieves often trip over themselves. G.G. Ponnambalam’s ‘Fifty-fifty’ for a little lover 10% of the population may have been the product of greed gone crazy but it also framed the dimensions of aspirations for more than half a century.  By 1976, Chelva himself lost his way, the Vadukoddai Resolution being nothing less than a go-for-broke adventure that wanted it all; not power-sharing but land and coast grabbing.  Blood-letting was the unscripted inevitable.  Close to a hundred thousand lives were lost. 

When the LTTE was in fully cry Tamil moderates (so-called) either out of fear or awe or outright salutation went gear-down on devolution.  The statements of the ‘moderates’, both individuals and parties (in coalition and isolation) make for a symptomatic reading on this aspect.  The TNA’s election manifestoes of 2001, 2004 and 2010 would do in fact.  Post-LTTE, devolution has been resurrected out of consolation-need more than anything else, one might argue, if not for Chelva’s Action Plan of incremental construction of Eelam. 

The 13^th Amendment’s most important contribution to the Eelam cause has been its utility as reference point. India fostered terrorism in Sri Lanka. India gave refuge, armed, trained and funded terrorism.  India took some sparks poured gallons and gallons of fuel, whipped up a roaring fire and then brought fire-size down (for a while) and now insists that where the fire is now is foundation-point for resolution. No mention now of what it is that is sought to be resolved.  No talk either of the fact that foundation-point is still a fire that anyone including India, Tamil Nadu, Tamil and Sinhala chauvinism included can add fuel to. 

Today’s Prescriber is undoubtedly India.  Today’s prescription-approvers are the Chelva-Tamils and wooly-headed Marxist-Leninists who are in a permanent state of denial about all that being passé.  Other approvers include anti-Buddhist heirs of the Colonial encounter who are smarter than their 16^th-20^th Century ideological and political forefathers.  Their logic seems to be based on the notion that if you rob from the Sinhalese it is the Buddhists who lose the most due to the sheer numbers.  They are smart, because they are not running around burning temples in the way the Portuguese did or extracting conversion through the carrot of privilege and the skewing of institution and process against Buddhists.  If you have any doubts about this, just check who the most vociferous approvers are, their ethnic identities, their ideological preferences and their faiths. 

The smartest of course are those who say without saying.  There are, for example, those who take ethnic identity and religious faith out of the equation and talk ‘development’.  They know that the Indian Thesis crumbles in the fact of history, geography and demography.  The history that is relevant to the discourse has always been that associated with the claims pertaining to traditional-homelands.  Those who are devolution-smart talk therefore about a history of relative self-sufficiency and administrative decentralization which they conveniently argue indicate that power-devolution was always with us and indeed made us. 

Anyone who has studied the extensive and intricate hydraulic system of this land as well as laws about resource exploitation and allocation would understand that while there were times of division, invasion and even anarchy, for the most part there was centralized control and decision-making.  Had it been otherwise, there wouldn’t have been an anicut built in Minipe.  We wouldn’t have the Yoda Ela or the Jaya Ganga.  Kings would not have employed large quantities of resources to build large irrigation structures, temples or places of learning in places far away from the capital.  Rivers would not have been diverted through a series of anicuts. Such schemes were not built subsequent isolated communities conferring with neighbours about how best to use the water flowing down a river. 

True, there is a vast mismatch of resource-allocation today. Certain things don’t get done.  The devolution-smart say triumphantly that in a devolved polity things would get done.  A decentralized administrative structure would suffice in most instances, but they don’t want to admit this.  Neither do they acknowledge the fact that devolution would not have given resource-poor areas the kind of access to education that centralized decision-making has.  There is also remarkable silence about the bridges, reservoirs, hospitals and other infrastructural facilities and services that would have remained distant dreams had it not been for centralized decision-making if not for anything the sheer lack of resources and other necessary capacities.  Nothing is said either of the fact that populations are not static, that they move, that we’ve moved a fair distance from (relatively) self-sufficient village-units, or that aspirations have spilled out of the idyllic ‘village’ and perhaps will never be containable in those territorial dimensions again. 

What is needed is an overhauling of the entire governance structure and a streamlining of institutional mechanisms and processes to encourage enlightened decision-making.  That this is an uphill task is used as logic for devolution.  That’s being lazy and indeed irresponsible for there are no short cuts to peace and wholesome citizenship.  In this case, any kind of devolution that takes current provincial boundaries as given (never mind their artificiality and pernicious association with homeland-claim – a convenient exaggeration of existing demographic patterns) will etch in such hard lines the Eelamist positions on the Sri Lankan political landscape that it would in effect transform into irreversible fact. 

We can do better.  We must.

[first published in the Daily Mirror, July 5, 2011]

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A note on the history-phobia of devolutionists

‘It takes centuries of life to make a little history; it takes centuries of history to make a little tradition.’ – Dr. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan

The term ‘power sharing’ (like its typically recommended, on-the-ground articulation, ‘devolution’) has been used for a long time in the Sri Lankan political discourse, especially in the context of resolving what are called ‘minority grievances’. 

Now ‘devolution’ can be argued for outside of ethnic politics as well -- for example in discussions of development, better distribution of wealth, greater degrees of participation in decision-making processes etc.  On the other hand, there is nothing to state that the objectives relevant to these other arguments can only be obtained through devolution.  Better structures of governance and decentralization of administrative functions can do the same job.  As for ‘development’, the current thinking on relevant economics actually rebels against ‘devolution’. Indeed, in the Sri Lankan context, the devolution argument, when played to its logical conclusion, can result in exacerbating regional disparities. 

While many devolutionists have alluded to economic and governance factors (selectively and erroneously), these have been little more than addendum to the principal argumentative thrust, i.e. resolution of issues pertaining to the ‘ethnic’, in particular the grievances/aspirations of the Tamil community.  This in turn is predicated on two claims/assumptions: the notion of a ‘traditional homeland’ and demographic realities pertaining to ‘ethnic concentrations’.  The former necessitates a reference to and substantiation in terms of historical evidence.  The latter, often framed in terms of a description of Sri Lanka as a ‘multi-ethnic’ and ‘multi-religious’ country, necessitates a discussion of relevant numbers and demographic data.  On both counts, the advocates of devolution appear to fumble and tongue-tied. 

Let’s begin with the numbers.  First of all, in today’s world of massive demographic shifts within and without countries and continents, there are no pure mono-ethnic nations. The only mono-religious state would be the Vatican.  Thus the notions of multi-ethnic and multi-religious often amount to gross misrepresentation. Moreover, leaving them unpacked in terms of numbers indicates political and ideological sleight of hand.  Interestingly, though, the devolution advocates who use these terms liberally also talk of ‘majoritarianism’.  That term ought to be followed by a demographic breakdown but devolutionists are consistently loath to engage in any such exercise.  They don’t do this and one wonders if this is because the term implies that there’s something more than one-collective-one-vote in these things that have the ‘multi’ tag. 

 

When they do talk numbers and demography the discussion almost exclusively focuses either on ‘status quo’ or charges of deliberate attempts to alter the same through racism-motivated colonization.  There are three problems with hooking the number issue onto ‘status quo’. First, it assumes that people are born and die without moving around at all.  Today’s ‘status quo’ was not yesterday’s and will not be tomorrow’s and as such ‘resolution’ of ‘grievances’ relative to ethnic-enclave based status quo demands re-resolution each time the compositions get altered.  Secondly, ‘status quo’ by definition rebels against history and summarily throws out all arguments about ‘traditional homelands’ since this is a notion that is embedded inextricably in things historical and not ‘momentary’.  A third objection would be that the ‘multi-ethnic, multi-religious’ essentially calls for an erasure of citizenship anomalies across the board.  One cannot demand this and also want a privileging of certain collectives over another in a given territorial unit.  Devolutionists consistently gloss over these issues and this indicates a rank disavowal of fact and reason and thereby an unholy deference to myth, obfuscation, error and crass communal politics.

The question of ‘history’ is as interesting. Ask anyone who talks of traditional homelands how far back in history he/she wants to go. Ask him/her about substantiating claim.  Clamming up, shifting gear and diverting attention usually follow.  It is remarkable how those who strongly advocate devolution and liberally use terms such as ‘traditional homeland’, ‘self-determination’, ‘power-sharing,’ etc. are also extremely reluctant to talk about the history of this country.  We often here statements such as ‘the past is all over, let’s focus on the present’ uttered by devolutionists, even as they use history-laden terms such as ‘traditional homelands’.

It is no coincidence that the vast majority of those who get intellectually fidgety with respect to the above happen to be non-Sinhalese or non-Buddhists or else subscribe to apparently identity-less or identity-disavowing ideologies such as Marxism or at least have had their political baptism in such doctrines. 

The length of historical memory preferred indicates political location, ideological bent, preferred outcome and of course the defensible claim on historical time in terms of the particular individual’s ethno-religious identity.   Those who don’t have the ‘centuries’ relevant to Dr. Radhakrishna’s observation above cannot afford to talk history. They can, at best, fudge it (by tagging ‘multi’ to the ethnic and religious) or take it out of the equation by talking ‘present’ and ‘status quo’ (and of course fiddling with the curriculum as was quite effectively done in the nineties).  Without the centuries and the histories not much ‘tradition’ can be made except of course in the fly-by-night, one-hit-wonder kind of formulation that simply cannot replace ‘tradition’ made of way-of-life, cultural ethos and artifact-reality that show undeniable longevity and resilience.  An ‘I was here’ fact of an odd artifact or mention in a verse has very little historical weight and perhaps this is why the historically light would rather not talk about it.

No nation can move towards a better future if it is stuck in the past.  On the other hand, a nation that disavows the past, is destined to walk into trap and confusion.  Only clarity and a certain deference to reason, both about the past and present, can produce useful thinking when it comes to thinking about the future.  A greater claim on the past does not and should not translate automatically into greater citizenship privileges, but a reluctance to acknowledge that past and the who-did-what of civilization-building, it must also be acknowledged, is a recipe for communal disharmony.  If Community A, whose history is two days old, tells Community B whose history is 17 centuries old that history never happened and even if it did happen it is no longer relevant, no one can fault Community B for treating Community A with suspicion.  If Community B tells Community A, ‘we made this country, so you have to live with the fact and moreover submit to us,’ the Community B cannot claim to have acquired any civilization worth talking about.

History-Phobia is not healthy. It reveals pernicious design. History-Fixation is also unhealthy.  History-disavowal is a malicious project that seeks to erase ‘centuries of life’.  It is good to be clear on these things.  The more we try to hide history under the political carpet, the more untenable becomes the matter of inter-communal embrace on a common humanitarian floor.  We would all trip and fall flat on our faces.  We’ve done that enough now.  It is time to acknowledge fact and toss myth out.   It is time to name those who are reluctant to do this as political frauds, racists and chauvinists, and in some instances religious fundamentalists who for their so-called evangelical ‘mission’ fervently seek the erasure that the ‘multi’ tag gives, a kind of politics they would never ever advocate in countries where the particular faith is dominant.  The reason why this last category champions devolution, perhaps, is the knowledge that when you pull the rug from under the Sinhalese (in terms of land-theft for example), the vast majority of those who fall will necessarily be Buddhists. 

We are history-made.  That’s the bottom line.  Anyone who denies this denies instantly his/her parents. To begin with.  He/she then calls his/her child a bastard.  That’s also ‘bottom line’.

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