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By Meno Thiruchelvam [Secretary, Henricians Colombo (OBA)]

In the 100 year old proud history of St. Henry’s of Ilavalai, the College had Rectors who were essentially educationists cum disciplinarians moulded into one. Following Rev. Dr. B. Deogupillai’s illustrious stewardship as Rector of St. Henry’s during 1954 to 1956 - came Rev. Fr. L.A. Singarayer as the next Rector who was cast into this twin-mould so splendidly.

An oblate by order, he had his Master’s from the University of London and Diploma in Education from the University of Ceylon and was endowed with a wealth of 16 years experience as Principal of the Teachers’ Training College at Colombogam. With this imposing background, he soon began to elevate the level of education at St. Henry’s from secondary to University Entrance levels in Arts, Bio and Maths. He got around the teachers to chip in extra hours of work and they too responded ungrudgingly to enhance activities in sports, elocution, drama etc.

All these efforts of Father Singarayer cumulated into raising St. Henry’s with other frontline ‘A’ Grade schools in the North. His yet another impetus was the home and school integration by reinvigorating the Parent Teachers’ Association (PTA). He laid larger emphasis on children growing into adults and that character formation and intellectual education could only be imparted best when home and school shared the responsibility. Away from the school, an irate storm was brewing in the nation’s political arena. With his customary missionary zeal Father Singarayer began to sense an uneasy feeling of what was in store for the College and the educational sphere.

1956 marked the beginning of the politics of estrangement imbued with conflict and turmoil, which saw to appease Sinhalese sentiments with the ‘Sinhala Only’ advocacy and moves to take over private schools. These political rumblings left Father Singarayer a deeply disturbed man. One could measure his tormented sentiments embodied in his Rector’s Report of 1957-58 where he said, “There is so much of talk in public platforms and political coteries about State Education, that the very mention of it changes the whole atmosphere with tension”.

He emphasised that the State had a duty to see that through education the young should grow up in national ethos and its influence should not ride roughshod over factors that contributed to the welfare of education. Thus he summed up his vision saying, “Hence, we believe that the secular State as representative of the whole community should control, though control should not be mistaken for monopoly of education or direct management of schools”.

In 1960, Fr. Singarayer’s fears began to unfold and we witnessed the escalation of the conflicts in the process of the takeover of private schools by the Government. Fr. Rector sought to fight the change in the prevailing order of things. He commandeered the support of the Henrician Old Boys’ Association of Colombo.

Veteran OBA steward A. Jesuthasan vividly recalls Fr. Rector’s fervent endeavours against the takeover of private schools, by sending his Vice Rector Rev. Fr. Anton T. Rajanayagam as his special emissary to revive the then defunct Colombo OBA, to re-tool and shore up support against the take over.

He wanted the OBA to give its mind to the proposed take over of private schools by the Govt. which move was detrimental and would have adverse effects on the system and the standard of education at large. Fr. Rector specifically requested Fr. Anton to move a resolution against the takeover of private schools at the meeting of the OBA. But sadly enough, many top rungs of the then OBA were government servants who had been understandably disdainful of a forthright challenge because of their positions, but sought to subtly influence a fair play of the issue in question.

But the tide was too awesome for any onslaught by anyone. St. Henry’s and many a Catholic and Christian schools were deprived of the State funding assistance. Lost in the struggle against the takeover, St. Henry’s had to saddle as a completely private school, solely sustained by the Bishop of Jaffna, who found that the luxury of playing Cricket was no longer manageable. So since 1960, playing cricket was halted at St. Henry’s, the greatest pinch the college experienced immediately after the takeover.

Father Singarayer was indeed an emblem of Christian leadership, as an educationist himself he bore public responsibility on the ethos of education on which he gave his concrete expression to his vision against the takeover of private schools during the transitional phase of political upheaval in the post independent era of the nation.

Fr. L.A. Singarayer was truly a reveres persona, to whom spirituality was not an ethical choice or a lofty idea rather an encounter with the Creator. These thoughts Fr. Rector had instilled in us with pragmatic discipline guidelines all the time.

His beaming influence lasted at St. Henry’s until 1963, as by then he became somewhat unwell to shoulder the heavy responsibility of the College. Afterwards, during 1964 to ‘68 he took Professorship at a Papal Seminary in Ampitiya and then as Spiritual Director at Holy Family Novitiate in Pasaiyoor in 1969.

He sought that his journey’s end be in the midst of the familiar surroundings of his native Mathagal Parish, ebbing his twilight years yet in the service of the Lord as Assistant Parish Priest until his eternal rest in the arms of the Lord.

The annals of Henrician history have no small measure to report to posterity of his unswerving stance against the takeover of private schools.

The entirety of the Henerician fraternity here and abroad will remember Dr. L.A. Singarayer fondly with gratitude at the most opportune time of his birth centenary this year and the centenary next year of the founding of of Ilavalai.

By Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu

With LTTE Leader Velupillai Pirapaharan’s speech, the prospect of protracted conflict into the future is confirmed. Tracing the evolution of the peace process, the LTTE Leader reverts to his argument that the Sri Lanka state has demonstrated time and time again that it is unable and or unwilling to recognise Tamil grievances and aspirations in a power sharing settlement within a united Sri Lanka.

According to him he has tried and tried again to resolve differences through negotiations, only to be sorely disappointed. The strategy of the current government, he says, is one of pursuing war and peace. It is fundamentally flawed. It seeks as its objective the isolation and marginalisation of the LTTE, which is the champion of the Tamil liberation struggle and it has effectively made the CFA defunct.

Cynical ploys

Presidential commissions, commissions of inquiry and all party conferences he dismisses as ruses and cynical ploys to avoid addressing the main issue of Tamil grievances and aspirations — “They are like looking for a black cat in a dark room,” he says.

At the same time he expresses disappointment, even hurt with the international community for accepting the arguments advanced by the government and proscribing the LTTE as a terrorist organisation. He hopes that the international community will recognise the suffering and privation on the human rights and humanitarian front that the Tamil people are going through as well as the frustration their political leadership meets in its attempts at negotiation with the government be it on normalisation, ISGA, P-TOMS, paramilitaries or the opening of the A9. Therefore he hopes that the international community will also recognise that the Tamil people in political terms have to be allowed to go their own way.

Pirapaharan concludes with thanks to the international Tamil community, Tamil Nadu and the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora and appeals to them to continue their support and solidarity.

Clues

Much is read into Pirapharan’s ‘Heroes’ Day’ speeches in the search for clues as to what the LTTE strategy is and as to what its future actions will be. Precise identification is risky, but there is no escaping from the fact that hostilities are in store for the future and of an intensified nature. This has been the trajectory of the conflict since the last presidential election and in that sense is nothing new. Likewise, the reiteration of the goal of a separate state.

The Oslo Communiqué contained a commitment to explore a settlement along federal lines; it did not, some optimistic pronouncement notwithstanding, constitute a categorical disavowal of the goal of a separate state. The most optimistic interpretation was that in the event Oslo yielded a viable alternative to the secessionist goal, the latter could have been jettisoned once the viability of the alternative was irrefutably demonstrated.

Force of arms

Given Pirapaharan’s rhetoric, the question as always remains as to whether secession is feasible and viable for the LTTE. He points out that it was because of their force of arms that the government came to the table to enter into negotiations. It would seem that it is only force of arms that can secure secession for him and that too is problematic. The factors constraining this in the past have not gone away. Pirapaharan needs to remind his constituency of the importance of military force to the LTTE and in doing so, try to secure their support for his project into the future. However it is unlikely that he will succeed.

As he points out in his speech, there are key internationals which support the current government strategy of militarily weakening the LTTE. As the last Co-Chairs statement revealed, there are limits to what the international community is willing and able to do in respect of a political settlement, humanitarian concerns and human rights protection. It is only India that can play a higher profile role at this point.

India doing so is not necessarily to the advantage of the LTTE — indeed the message that will be forcefully put across to the President of Sri Lanka on his current visit is precisely that the LTTE and the Tamil people are not synonymous. The political rights of the Tamil people are not necessarily the political interests of the LTTE. The political rights of the Tamil people include the merger of the north and east, a settlement along federal lines, human rights protection as well as the opening of the A9. None of this amounts to a separate state.

The real battle

What has been said time and time again continues to be of relevance. The likelihood of a military victory in this conflict is slim. Protracted conflict at great cost will result in mutual exhaustion and a return to the table, not because either side wants to but because they have concluded that they have to. The real battle therefore is about the future political architecture for Sri Lanka — the shape and substance of a political and constitutional settlement.

In this respect, even though he says it is both too late and in any event highly unlikely, the best response to Pirapaharan’s speech is a genuine offer of federalism as the basic design of a peace settlement. The APRC and its panel of experts should expedite their efforts in this respect and move speedily towards multi stakeholder acceptance and implementation.

Alleviating suffering

In the meantime, since it will take some time, there have to be effective measures to alleviate the suffering and privation of the Tamil community be it in the peninsula and in Vaharai. Pirapaharan’s speech holds out the prospect for them of greater suffering and privation in the pursuit of a separate state; government activity also subjects them to suffering and privation in defence of the status quo they long concluded is unfair and unjust. And the international community insists that only Sri Lankans can resolve this conflict, they can only facilitate its resolution.

The people of the north and east need at least a respite. Whoever ends up governing them will only be able to do so with legitimacy and credibility. Alleviating their current appalling condition will be a first step in winning hearts and minds and in saving lives. [MorningLeader.lk]

Towards Cooperative Governance: Revisiting the Devolution Debate

By Sumanasiri Liyanage

Let me first focus on the current state of the devolution debate. A survey done by the Social Indicator in 2004 has revealed that only 44 percent of the respondents support reorganization of the Sri Lankan state on the basis of some form of power-sharing. This relatively weak support for power-sharing may be attributed to multiple reasons. In my opinion, the way in which the devolution debate was carried out by us, the federalists, also contributed to the current low level of support for power-sharing. So I prefer to begin with a self-criticism. Many of us took very conflictual attitude when discussing the importance and necessity of federal or quasi-federal arrangements. Besides this conflictual attitude among us there was another obvious reason. It was quite natural to introduce terms, concepts and categories in a more rigorous manner when the subject was first introduced. When the teachers are not mature and well experienced, it would be always safe if they stick to textbook definitions. When the teachers are well experienced and the subject is not unfamiliar to the audience, different and more flexible teaching methodology can be deployed. Nearly two decades after the discussion began, the debate on power-sharing has now advanced enough so that the participants of the two sides are in a position to interact in a more friendly and cooperative manner. This is one of the positive aspects of the series of seminars recently organized by the Ministry of Constitutional Affairs and National Integration. We meet there TNA Parliamentarians, Members of non-LTTE political parties, federalists like Rohan Edrisinghe, Shiral Lakthilake and Mario Gomez, and non-federalists like Udaya Gammanpila, Charitha Herath and Manohar de Silva. I feel this forum would be more productive than many federalism workshops organized by various NGOs in the country. Participation is more inclusive rather than selective. Mahinda Rajapakse was honest when he declared himself as a unitarist prior to the last presidential election. Two of his ‘coalition’ partners are well known advocates of a unitarist solution. Taking different position on controversial issues is not in itself bad. As Stuart Hall once remarked: “[we should] not afraid of positionalities. [But we should be] afraid of taking positionalities too seriously.” It is interesting to note that in the last decades or so, the constitutional discourse has been conducted on the basis of unitarist/ federalist dichotomy. However, the actual practice in pluri-national democracies in the last two decades has made this distinction interestingly blurred. So, one may even wonder whether it is legitimate to delimit the discussion within the boundaries of this conventional dichotomy. Binaries are useful for beginners, but in advanced understanding the role binaries may play would be limited.

Key Issues

So in this article I propose to federalists as well as to non-federalists that we should re-demarcate the boundaries of the discussion to go beyond the conventional dichotomy between federal and unitary. Why do I suggest so? I suggest it for two reasons. First, as I mentioned earlier, the international discourse on power-sharing in pluri-national democracies (PNDs) has advanced very much beyond this conventional binary analysis. Secondly, there has been a general consensus now that two constitutionally separate competencies –namely two-tiers of governments- should be established as one main element of the constitution. A third-tier can be incorporated into the constitution. However, as my discussion focuses on conflict resolution dimension in PDNs, I will not deal with the third-tier of government in this article.

In this context, the most legitimate questions to be asked are: What should be the relationship between these two constitutionally separate competencies? How this two-tier governmental arrangement could ensure co-operative governance instead of conflcitual governance? We can also add a question that would have economic implication. How and in what manner could the governance be effectively adhered to the principle of subsidiarity?

The setting up of constitutionally separate two-tiers of government can be justified on multiple grounds. The notion of subsidiarity has increasingly been invoked to legitimize the setting up of a lower level of government. It has multiple meaning, but most common and relevant here is that it refers to organizational and territorial principle requiring that decision-making and implementation be carried out in a space that is as close as possible to the citizen. This idea also goes with the notion of deliberative democracy that all the affected should be given an equal opportunity to participate in the decision-making as equals in a non-coercive context. Secondly, in pluri-national societies, the concept of majority is a fluid one. Had different national groups been marginalized or dominated by the majority national group, an asymmetry of allegiances to the state would have been the result. Two-tiers or multiple tears governance would provide a space to these national groups to exercise their authority in contiguous areas where they represent the majority. So it has conflict prevention or resolution aspect. Thirdly, as local representation in the center includes both individual and group interests, decisions that would injurious to numerically small communities can be prevented. So that pluri-national character of the country will be reflected in making decisions.

I believe we have now reached some kind of consensus on the above three points although there are unresolved complex issues. However the question is how this two-tier system of governance could be institutionalized to promote cooperative governance and to minimize prevailing suspicion, mistrust and fears of different communities. Different countries have tried different mechanisms. Some worked well while the others were not that successful. This mixture of results once again makes the constitutional design more problematic. In my opinion, the concepts of division of labor and subsidiarity would contribute in resolving these problems. In any country, there are issues that are nationally relevant. These subjects include in modern polity, inter alia, the national defense, macro-economic management, international relations, maintenance of minimum standards on social welfare, education, health, environment protection and similar issues. Then there are issues that are locally specific. The distinction between national and regional may be blurred in some issues but quite clear in many issues. So the notions of subsidiarity and division of labor can be deployed in constitutional design. Hence the question of which tier is superordinate or subordinate would become a non-issue. The issue is which tier can perform the function effectively, and efficiently. In this sense, the criteria may be not political but economico-technical. So the relationship between national and provincial with regard to these two categories should be based on the principle of non-hierarchical horizontality.

Nevertheless, there are two additional questions to be answered. As I mentioned earlier there are some issues that may overlap both local and national spheres. How could these concurrent subjects be addressed? In South African constitution, the subjects in the concurrent list are used as a one way of developing cooperative governance. There are multiple ways in dealing with concurrent subjects. A joint mechanism –such as the conference of chief ministers- can be used in dealing with concurrent subjects. Alternatively, provincial governments can be given power to make laws on concurrent issues subject to the minimum standards laid out by the national government. The second contentious issue is what mechanism should be devised in case the governments, both national and provincial, overstep the boundaries of their respective legislative and executive powers. In many situations, the constitutional court is given the authority to decide in such situation. In Sri Lanka, one of the fears expressed by the Sinhala nation is based on so-called slippery slope argument, i. e. that Thamil nation will use power-sharing as a stepping stone for secession. Similarly, the Tamils have raised the fear that the national government would use its authority to weaken the provincial government. Of course these fears cannot be handled completely by constitutional means although constitution can devise many mechanisms to address and redress these concerns. Besides the constitutional court, such mechanisms include bi-cameral legislature, finance commission, the conference of chief ministers. In my opinion, the second chamber can be set up following the old principle of 50-50 proposed by G G Ponnambalam.

Let me recap my main argument. In my opinion, the continuation of power-sharing debate on the basis of unitary-federal dichotomy will not be capable of breaking impasse in current constitutional debate. So I propose that the constitutional discourse should be redefined focusing on inter-governmental relationship. This will allow us to address more important issues of non-hierarchical horizontality, concurrency, and co-operative governance.

[This is the text of speech given at the seminar organized by the Ministry of Constitutional Affairs and National Integration in Colombo on November 25, 2006. The writer teaches political economy at the University of Peradeniya. E-mail address: sumane_l@yahoo.com ]

[The full text of the official translation of LTTE leader’s Heroes’ Day speech]

“We are at a cross roads in our freedom struggle. Our journey has been long and arduous, and crowded with difficult phases. We are facing challenges and unexpected turns that no other freedom movement had to face. Unprecedented in history, we are dealing with war and peace talks at the same time.

Six years have passed since we dedicated ourselves to find a solution to the ethnic conflict through peace talks. In this long time span, has a solution been found to the burning Tamil national question? Was there any visible change in the mindset of the Sinhala leadership that continues to inflict unrelenting cruelty on the Tamil people? Were any of the justifiable requests of the Tamils been fulfilled? Were our people able to find relief from the daily harassment and misery at the hands of the occupying military? Were the daily basic problems of our people resolved? None of these has happened. Instead, death and destruction were heaped on the Tamils who hoped that they would receive justice.

While the countries that preached peace maintain silence without conscience, a great tragedy is unfolding in the Tamil homeland. The Sinhala government has imprisoned the Tamils in their own land after closing its main supply routes. Having removed their freedom by restricting their movement and constrained their lives, it is inflicting great suffering on them. It has split the Tamil homeland, set up military camps, bound it with barbed wire, and has converted it into a site of collective torture.

The Sinhala government has unleashed a two pronged war, military and economic, on our people. Our people are subjected to unprecedented assaults. Arrests, imprisonment, and torture, rape and sexual harassment, murders, disappearance, shelling, aerial bombing, and military offensives are continuing unchecked. At the same time our people are subjected to an inhuman economic embargo on essential items including food and medicine.

Even after the ceasefire, negotiations and the five years of patiently keeping peace, the dividends of peace have not reached our people. Instead our people are faced with unbearable burdens in their daily lives. Thousands of our people have been forced out of their homes and are languishing with disease and hunger in refugee camps. No one should expect that this Sinhala government which is denying food and medicine to our people to the extent of starving them would show compassion and give them their political rights.

The monumental growth in knowledge and the resulting global outlook is taking humanity into a new era. Ideas, views and philosophies are changing in tandem with this growth in knowledge and this is resulting in changes in society. Yet, within the Sinhala nation, there is little change in its ideas and philosophies. The Sinhala nation is refusing to broaden its thinking and take a new approach. The Sinhala nation remains mislead by the mythical ideology of the Mahavamsa and remains trapped in the chauvinistic sentiments thus created. Unable to free itself from this mindset, it has adopted Sinhala Buddhist chauvinistic notions as its dominant national philosophy. This notion is spread in its schools, universities and even its media. The domination of this Sinhala Buddhist chauvinism is preventing its students, intellectuals, and writers from stepping out of and thinking free from its domination. This, unfortunately, is preventing the Sinhala nation from undertaking a genuine attempt at resolving the Tamil national question in a civilized manner.

Both our liberation movement and our people never preferred war to a peaceful resolution. We have always preferred a peaceful approach to win the political rights of our people. We have never hesitated to follow the peaceful path to win our political rights. That is why we have tried to hold peace talks beginning in Thimpu right through to Geneva on several occasions, at various times, and in many countries. The current peace efforts, with Norwegian facilitation and with the blessings of the international community, taking place in the capitals of various countries are unique.

This peace journey began on 31st October 2000, when the then Norwegian special envoy Eric Solheim visited Vanni and met us. This peace journey is taking place in a unique period, under unique historical conditions, in a unique format and on a unique path. It is moving on two fronts, peace talks, on one hand, and a war of occupation by the Sinhala government, on the other.

During the six years when we kept peace, we were sincere in our efforts. Indeed, we initiated the peace efforts. We created a strong foundation for peace efforts by unilaterally declaring a ceasefire. We refrained from putting conditions or time limits for peace talks. We did not undertake these efforts from a position of weakness. We had recaptured the Vanni mainland and the Iyakkachchi-Elephant Pass military complex. We had beaten back the ‘Operation Fire’ of the Sinhala military. We carried out great military feats in the history of our struggle. It was from this position of strength that we undertook this peace effort.

The situation was just the opposite in the south. The south had faced defeat after defeat and was losing its will to face war. Its military had lost its backbone. The economy was very shaky. It was only under such conditions that the Sinhala nation agreed for peace talks. In this five years since the peace efforts began, three governments have come to power, that of Wickremasinghe, Bandaranayake and Rajapakse. Each time the government changed, the dove of peace moved from one cage to another but it was never able to fly freely. Stabbed many times, the dove is now struggling for its life.

We held talks with the Wickremasinghe government for six months after signing the Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) with him. Like all previous Sinhala regimes, the Wickremasinghe regime dragged time without implementing the clauses in the CFA and the agreements reached at the talks. Its military failed to move out of people’s homes, schools and hospitals and instead declared these vast areas of land as military security zones and permanently prevented the people from returning to their land. The sub-committee for De-escalation and Normalization became dysfunctional. The sub-committee created to solve immediate humanitarian needs of the people also become defunct due to planned sabotage by the government.

The Wickremasinghe government that refused to solve the humanitarian problems facing our people, secretly worked to marginalize our movement on the world stage. Even before setting up a working administrative structure in the Tamil homeland, it conducted donor conferences to obtain aid for the south. By failing to facilitate our participation in the donor conference held in Washington, it marginalized and humiliated our movement. As a result we were forced to stay away from the Tokyo conference. The Wickremasinghe regime did not stop with this. It plotted to trap our freedom movement in an ‘international safety net’ and destroy us.

When we put forward the proposal for an Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA), startling changes occurred in the southern politics. The Kumaratunge government took over the reins of power. While refusing to hold talks on the basis of our proposal, her government, using the paramilitary phenomenon, intensified the shadow war against us. The paramilitary factor turned the Tamil homeland into a violent blood stained theatre. Intellectuals, political leaders, journalists, LTTE members, supporters and civilians were all murdered. We were forced to halt the political work, carried out according to the CFA clauses by our members in Sri Lankan military occupied areas of the Tamil homeland. As a result, our people were left alone in the cruel grip of the occupying military. Finally the Kumaratunge regime failed to implement even the Joint Mechanism (PTOMS) agreement signed by her regime for tsunami rehabilitation. The Supreme Court, unable to step outside the Sinhala chauvinistic notions, rejected this purely humanitarian focused agreement citing the unitary constitution.

It was at this time that the Sinhala nation elected Rajapakse as its new President. Like the Sinhala leaders of the past, he too is putting his hopes in a military solution. He rejected our final call in our last year’s Heroes’ Day statement, to find a resolution to the Tamil National question with urgency. Instead, he intensified the war, on the one hand, with the view to destroy our movement and, on the other hand, he is talking about finding a peaceful resolution. This dual war and peace approach is fundamentally flawed. It is not possible to find a resolution by marginalizing and destroying the freedom movement with which talks must be held to find the resolution. This is political absurdity on the part of the Sinhala leaders.

The Rajapakse regime hopes to decide the fate of the Tamil nation using its military power. It wants to occupy the Tamil land and then force an unacceptable solution on the Tamils. Due to this strategy of the Rajapakse regime, the CFA has become defunct. The Rajapakse regime, by openly advocating attacks on our positions, has effectively buried the CFA. The Rajapakse regime’s attacks have expanded from land to sea and air. It has given a free hand to the paramilitary groups to kill at will. It has occupied Mavilaru and Sampur blatantly breaking the terms of the CFA. The Sinhala military misjudged our strategic withdrawal from Mavilaru and Sampur. It used heavy firepower and launched large scale offensives to bring Tamil lands under its control. Tamil land was soaked in blood. It is at this time we decided to give a shock to the Sinhala regime. Our forces conducted a massive counter-offensive on the Sinhala forces that attempted to move from Kilali and Muhamalai. The military sustained heavy losses and was forced to abandon its offensive temporarily. This, however, did not persuade the Sinhala regime to give up its military plans. It continues on its military path.

The Rajapakse regime, while conducting genocide of the Tamils, is portraying our movement which is waging a struggle to save the Tamils from this genocide as a terrorist organization. It has launched a malicious propaganda campaign to defame our movement. Ignoring the unanimous opposition of our people and the objection of the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission (SLMM), the European Union and Canada have yielded to diplomatic pressure from the Sri Lankan government and listed our movement as a terrorist organization. They isolated us as undesirables.

This hasty decision, arrived at without considering the prevailing context, has created serious repercussions. It has gravely disturbed the parity of status and balance of power we held with the Sinhala regime. It encouraged the hard line stance of the Sinhala regime. It weakened the SLMM and facilitated the war plans of the Sinhala regime. Some countries that proclaim to be helping the peace efforts, have not only failed to condemn the genocidal attacks on our people but are also giving military and financial aid to the Sinhala regime to support its war plans. These are external factors that are encouraging the Rajapakse regime to carry on with its brutal military offensives in the Tamil land with absolute impunity.

The Rajapakse regime is not giving due importance to the peace talks because it has confidence in its military approach. The two Geneva talks were unproductive because of its lack of interest in the peace front. At the first Geneva talks, we placed evidence of military-paramilitary cooperation in the form of documents, statistics and incident reports. Unable to reject the solid evidence, the Sri Lankan government agreed to implement the CFA clause by removing the paramilitary groups from the Tamil homeland. After this first Geneva talks, there was only one change. State and paramilitary terror in the Tamil homeland escalated.

The second Geneva talks were also a failure. At these talks, we gave priority to the humanitarian issues facing our people and requested that the A9 road be opened and the SLMM be given freedom to function. The Sri Lankan government, putting military advantage ahead of humanitarian concerns, rejected both requests.

The Sinhala government that failed to show mercy to the people affected by a natural disaster is never going to budge on a humanitarian crisis that it planned and created. How could the peace talks move forward when the peace delegation is made up of people who proclaim that they will wage war and hold peace talks at the same time? How can trust be built? How can peace be arrived at like this?

To improve his posturing as a peace dove, President Rajapakse staged a deceptive ‘All Party Conference’. The Sinhala leaders have practiced this infamous political tradition of initiating commissions of inquiry, parliamentary select committees, all party conferences, or round tables to procrastinate whenever it is unable to face up to a situation and wants to drag time until attention is diverted. This is exactly what he is doing now. Rejecting our call to speedily find a resolution to the Tamil national question, he is hiding behind the All Party Conference. For the last ten months, the all party committee is looking for the Tamil question, like searching for a black cat in a dark room.

Once the All Party Conference lost its deceptive power, President Rajapakse has taken up his next card, the MoU between the two major parties. These two major parties that effectively have hegemonic control over the south are both essentially chauvinistic parties. Both these parties are born of Sinhala Buddhist chauvinism and compete with each other to carry out genocide of the Tamils. This MoU is a temporary opportunistic move by Rajapakse regime to avoid the multiple problems of international pressure to find a peaceful solution, the declining economic situation, and the opposition of his political partner, Janatha Vimukthi Perumuna (JVP). There is no sincere motive in this MoU agreement. These two parties will never put forward a just solution to the Tamil issue. Despite this, the Rajapakse regime continues to show interest in keeping the all party conference alive simply to deceive the world.

My beloved people,

A long time has elapsed since we embarked on this journey for peace with Norway’s facilitation. We have tried our best to take forward this peace effort. We have practised patience. We gave innumerable opportunities for finding peaceful resolution. We postponed our plan to advance our freedom struggle twice to give even more chances to the peace efforts, once when the tsunami disaster struck and again when President Rajapakse was elected.

It is now crystal clear that the Sinhala leaders will never put forward a just resolution to the Tamil national question. Therefore, we are not prepared to place our trust in the impossible and walk along the same old futile path.

The uncompromising stance of Sinhala chauvinism has left us with no other option but an independent state for the people of Tamil Eelam. We therefore ask the international community and the countries of the world that respect justice to recognize our freedom struggle. At this historic time when the Tamils are recommencing their journey on the path of freedom, we seek the unwavering support and assistance of the world Tamil community. We express our gratitude to the Tamil Nadu people and leaders for voicing their support and ask them to continue their efforts to help us in our freedom struggle. We express our gratitude to the Tamil Diaspora, our displaced brethren living all around the world, for their contribution to our struggle and ask them to maintain their unwavering participation and support.”

By Amantha Perera and Jamila Najmuddin

The LTTE last week warned that it has decided to take ‘decisive action’ to reopen the A9 if the highway remains closed any longer.

“The highway has remained closed for way too long. Because of this the people in Jaffna are facing a starvation crisis. The closure of the highway is a violation of the Cease Fire Agreement and it is time we made the government aware of this,” LTTE Military Spokesperson Rasiah Illanthirayan told The Sunday Leader.

He added that the LTTE had last week held internal discussions on the above matter and has decided to take action if the government does not open the highway within the next few weeks. The Tigers however did not specify what action they would resort to.

Meanwhile, the SLMM has come forward to negotiate with the Tigers to reopen the highway in order to allow a one off convoy to the peninsula.

During a routine meeting with the Government Peace Secretariat last week, the monitors had agreed to discuss with the Tigers modalities of reopening the highway.

“We will talk to them on how to reopen the highway for a convoy to pass through,” SLMM Spokesperson Thorffinur Omarsson said adding that the attempt was to get the one off convoy through in order to transport food to half a million civilians.

The Tigers have been made aware of the new proposal, but have stuck to the hard line stance they have maintained since the A9 was closed in August.

“We will not open the A9 just for one convoy. The government has to realise that the peninsula needs to be supplied with continuous food if the civilians are to get out of a starvation crisis,” Illanthirayan said.

“We will not open the A9 at any cost, even if we are approached by the UN,” the Tigers said. [sundayleader.lk]

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Bishop calls for urgent transport of food to Jaffna via A9

Bishop of Jaffna, Rt. Rev. Dr. Thomas Savundaranayagam, in a letter addressed to Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse Sunday Nov 26th, urged the President to follow through on his proposal to send food and other essentials to Jaffna through A9 highway. The Bishop said he would like to believe that the proposal is “a humble and good gesture on the part of the Government. to build trust and confidence with the Tamil people,” and as a “genuine desire of the GOSL to attend to the Humanitarian needs of the people.”

Full text of the letter follows:

His Excellency Mahinde Rajapakse
President of Sri Lanka
Temple Trees
Colombo.

Your Excellency,

Your our decision to send Food to Jaffna by A9 Road

We read from the papers your Excellency’s decision to send Food by A9 Road as a one time exercise to Jaffna and I welcome it . Considering the inclement weather in this part of the year, transport by sea is very tedious process and there are unavoidable delays. Transport by Road is easier and quicker if the Govt, wants to build a buffer food-stock in Jaffna. Your decision is a sign of your concern for the people of Jaffna and your response to the repeated request made by the people of Jaffna to open the A9 Road. This also would assist very much to revive the Private Trade sector in Jaffna.

Most Rev.Duleep de Chickera , Anglican Bishop of Colombo also has welcome this proposal to open the A 9 Road and also has appealed to the LTTE and the International community to co-operate to make this a success for the sake of the suffering people of Jaffna.

We don’t want to believe that this proposal of GOSL was done as a propaganda ploy to satisfy the Co-chairs before their important meeting but we see it as a humble and good gesture on the part of the Govt. to build trust and confidence with the Tamil people. We see it as a genuine desire of the GOSL to attend to the Humanitarian needs of the people. Should this effort turn out to be a big success there is nothing to prevent that this mode of transport to continue also in the future. It is our opinion that before its implementation it has to be discussed in detail with the LTTE and their consent is obtained. The services of the SLMM and the ICRC is necessary before it is put into operation.

Your Excellency , while we thank you for this bold decision and we pledge our support for the success of this venture, we also strongly hope that you would consent to the re-opening of the A9 eventually.

Yours sincerely

Rt.Rev.Dr.Thomas Savundaranayagam
Bishop of Jaffna.

[Source: TamilNet]

Link: TamilNet: Bishop of Jaffna urges Co-Chairs to prevail upon GoSL to open A9, implement CFA

Anniversary Blues:
One year forward for Rajapakse, twelve years backward for Sri Lanka

By Rajan Philips

As he completes his first year as President, Mahinda Rajapakse has taken the country back to its bad and dangerous past that many of us thought ended for good in 1994.

The People’s Alliance victory in 1994, after a decade of war and violence, had signaled a sea change in the Sinhala political leadership. The change was best exemplified by President Chandrika Kumaratunga who demonstrated a sincere readiness to address the Tamil question through a constitutional change. Alas, the sincerity and readiness could not be translated into peace as fighting between the army and the LTTE resumed in 1995 after a few months of ceasefire.

The ceasefire agreement of 2002, under Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe’s initiative, raised even stronger hopes of a permanent peace, while the Oslo Declaration by the government and the LTTE negotiators promised the search for a political solution predicated on a federal structure within a united Sri Lanka.

Within one year as President, Mahinda Rajapakse has abrogated the ceasefire with the LTTE all but in name, and swept back the south into the hands of ethnic chauvinists and military extremists.

To indict Mahinda Rajapakse seemingly so severely is not to let off the LTTE any lightly. The LTTE has contributed as much as the Sri Lankan Army and the anti-LTTE groups to the current stalemate of violence. All of them stand thoroughly condemned in the light of UN Ambassador Alan Rock’s devastating findings.

Yet, as the Head of a State that purports to include, protect and provide for all the people of Sri Lanka, Mahinda Rajapakse should be held to a higher standard of accountability. The scary aspect of the Rajapakse regime is that there is no apparent southern alternative to it in the near political horizon.

The regime’s subordination of the political to the military suits the LTTE just fine because, as an organization, the LTTE needs to fight to survive. When there is no fighting the LTTE suffers like a fish out of water.

Even at the worst moments between 1983 and 1994, there was reason for hope of a progressive southern alternative to the then militarist UNP. Vijaya Kumaratunga more than anyone else personified this hope and his brutal killing by the perpetual enemies of peace did not dampen this hope. Instead it inspired the emergence of the People’s Alliance as the alternative to the UNP.

Chandrika Kumaratunga and Ranil Wickremasinghe both created opportunities for peace and political solution but wasted them by failing to work together. Despite their adolescent inability to cohabit, Kumaratunga and Wickremasinghe never wavered in their commitment to devolution and federalism as the framework for a political solution. And after the ceasefire agreement of 2002, all the while squabbling with each other, they scrupulously avoided any misstep towards a return to hostilities with the Tigers.

The first year record of Mahinda Rajapakse is a consummate reversal on both fronts while trying to be too clever by half. It is clear that government is clearly bent on using the military stick as severely as possible while pretending to offer political carrots mainly to deal with international criticisms.

On devolution and federalism, the furthest that Rajapakse has shown that he is willing to go is to offer “maximum devolution within the unitary constitution.” Even this did not come about as a result of his own conviction but only as a result of the compulsion of India and the Co-Chairs.

Like J.R. Jayewardene between 1984 and 1987, Rajapakse has started a circus of consultation to achieve the elusive southern consensus. What more consensus is required when the two main southern parties, the UNP and the SLFP, are both committed to a federal solution?

Even within this charade of consultation, Rajapakse appears to have given power and prominence in decision making to those who are opposed to any form of devolution. For example, the lawyers who argued the case in the Supreme Court against the North-East merger are also among his advisers on constitutional reform and his delegates at the peace talks. Running with the hare and hunting with the hound, you might say.

Of course there are others, like the isolated Cabinet Ministers belonging to the two Old Left Parties, with a solid record of supporting a federal transformation of the state, but so far they have mostly been seen and not heard. And even when they are heard, they are heard only on such peripheral platitudes as the Panchayats and the Official Languages but not on the core issues of devolution.

Two political anniversaries and one Supreme Court judgment

I wonder whether Mahinda Rajapakse was delighted or disturbed by the Supreme Court judgment setting aside the executive order recurrently issued by all of his predecessors to keep the North and East Provinces merged. Questions have been raised about the priority given to hearing this case while cases filed against the imposition of High Security Zones by the army in Jaffna are still waiting to be heard. There have also been questions about the status granted by the court to lawyers appearing against the application to quash the executive order for merging. As well, rather than following the old dictum that justice must not only be done but must also appear to be done, the court appears to have diminished its own credibility by choosing a five-member, ‘pan-Sinhalese’ bench to hear an ethnically sensitive case. Just recall the damage done to ethnic relations by the 1931 pan-Sinhalese Board of Ministers under the Donoughmore Constitution.

The more substantive critique of the Supreme Court judgment, in my view, is about its rather unlearned and hypocritical use of the principle of ‘equal protection before the law’ as the premise for considering the arguments before it. I say ‘unlearned’ because the Court chose to apply this principle under a veil of innocence about the ethnic particularities that manifestly suffuse the question it dealt with. It is one thing to imagine such a veil of innocence for thought experiment purposes as John Rawls did in his celebrated Theory of Justice (not to mention that Rawls has been criticized specifically for this limiting idealization), but it is quite a different matter when a court chooses to be oblivious to the ethnic facts in deciding a political case that was in fact provoked by conflicting understandings of those very facts.

More importantly, the court’s emphasis on personal rights, as opposed to collective rights, flies in the face of current political and judicial thinking in plural societies. The approach now is to positively use the obvious tensions between the individual and collective spheres while appreciating that for minorities in a plural society the recognition of their individual rights will bear meaning only if their collective rights as a minority are affirmed and respected at the same time.

The invocation of the principle of equal protection is also hypocritical especially considering the fact that the de-merger judgment was delivered in the fiftieth anniversary year of that infamous thirteen-word “Act to Prescribe the Sinhala Language as the One Official Language of Ceylon” that was the ultimate violation of the principle of equal protection. So the one time the Sri Lankan Supreme Court came to invoke the principle of equal protection to decide a political question, it ruled in favour of protecting the majority Sinhalese from the minority Tamils. The judgment therefore is the bitter icing on the Fiftieth Anniversary Cake of Sinhala Only Act as well as the First Anniversary Cake of the Rajapakse presidency.

Prospects for the next five years

The political question after this unwise judicial activism is how Mahinda Rajapakse as President going to deal with the question of Northeast merger. The President could easily meet the procedural requirements laid down by the Court and maintain the merger with the help of UNP support in Parliament. Alternatively, he could propose to the LTTE, other Tamil groups, and the Muslims two new units – one a contiguous Tamil unit including the Northern Province and the Tamil majority districts of the Eastern Province and a separate Muslim unit including the Muslim areas of the Eastern Province.

But Mahinda Rajapakse would rather seem to take cover under the pseudo-democratic device of a referendum and leave it to the people of the Eastern Province to decide the matter. There is also mounting pressure on the President to insist that the North-East matter should be decided not just by the people of the Eastern Province but by a plebiscite of the entire country. Plebiscites offer a practically convenient mechanism for decision making in a democracy only where there is a priori and normative consensus on the organizing principles of that democracy. Sri Lanka manifestly lacks such a consensus among its ‘ethnic co-existences’ at the present time and trying to decide on fundamental questions through plebiscites is a sure recipe for more disaster.

The crucial question for a political solution is about the unit of devolution. President Rajapakse or any of his many advisers have yet to say anything at all about the unit of devolution. Some of us have been, for the whole first year of the Rajapakse presidency, making the case for replacing the unpopular and discredited Provincial Council system in the South with a more efficient system of administrative decentralization. We have also pointed out that regardless of the situation in the South there is no alternative to implementing political devolution in the North and East. The recent British experience of devolution – with devolved units in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland without any devolution in England, offers an excellent example for Sri Lanka.

It will not hurt for President Rajapakse to ask Prime Minister Blair for advice and assistance in regard to devolution. And it is more than likely that Mr. Blair, looking to leave the international stage on a high note after his disastrous nadir in Iraq, would be more than willing to help out his Commonwealth colleague. The question though is how serious is Mahinda Rajapakse about devolution and to what extent he is prepared to subordinate the military to the political.

If the first year of the Rajapakse presidency is a taste for the next five years to follow, it is difficult to be optimistic about Sri Lanka’s future. The fact that he has just now raised the military budget by 45% clearly shows where his mind is and where he is putting his money in. The military obstinacy of the government is also patent in its handling of the A-9 closure. It is illogical and immoral for a government that waged undeclared war on the LTTE on ostensibly humanitarian grounds over the Mavil Aru closure, to now refuse to reopen the A-9 roadway despite the humanitarian traumas of half a million people trapped in the Jaffna peninsula.

The Rajapakse government is clearly not in a mood to learn from the experiences of Northern Ireland, Kashmir, Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq - that military options do not solve any problem but only aggravate the old problems and create new ones. Unless and until there is a change in the government’s and the President’s thinking, Sri Lanka will be deepening for the next five years the hole that it fell into this first year of Mahinda Rajapakse’s first term in office.