Features

The end of the Liberation Struggle

Published

5 years ago

2021/05/21

Sahan Weerasooriya

The Times of Senthan: Little known Liberator and Silent Giant – II

by Rajan Hoole

Senthan’s Exceptional Perceptiveness

Dietrich Bonhoeffer observed, in his Letters and Papers from Prison, that there were two groups who successfully resisted the Nazi propaganda onslaught: they were the strong Christians and the Marxists. Their perceptions were rooted in their understanding of History. Senthan was a critical reader of Marxist literature, whose mind and literary style were enriched from school days by the late classics of English and Continental authors such as Chekov and Joseph Conrad. His defiance of what was inimical to society was total and unwavering. In July 1983, communal violence was unleashed with high level connivance following a bomb attack on an army vehicle in which 13 soldiers were killed. Senthan who was living on Brown Road, not far from the incident, held his son and daughter, each by a hand, and stood still for a long time.

He told his assistant, “They [the LTTE] have started a war without any preparation among the people. This will lead to total destruction.” Unlike most of us, who were to a varying extent guided by emotions and public feeling in the rage and fear of the moment, Senthan was quite firmly guided by his intellect.

He viewed the communal violence unleashed on the Tamils in 1958 and 1977 as unpardonable crimes to assuage Sinhalese nationalist compulsions. Sinhalese politics carried on without the slightest expression of remorse, and wanted the Tamils to forget that they ever happened, without any visible change of attitude. He regarded a Tamil liberation struggle to be fully justified, but after preparation and taking the people into confidence.

Senthan had his ear close to the ground and what he had observed in the TULF and the LTTE was their political bankruptcy. With their rhetoric they created unrealistic expectations and when they found themselves at a dead end, they drew sympathy by provoking the State into some reckless or barbaric action where the people bore the brunt of reprisals.

An early example was the police charge into the crowd on the final day of the International Tamil Research Conference in Jaffna on 9th January 1974, with the intention of arresting the Tamil Nadu politician Janarthanan. Mrs. Bandaranaike’s government was sensitive about an outpouring of nationalist fervour, and the organisers had given the Police word that Janarthanan would not speak from the platform. However Mr. Amirthalingam had invited Janarthanan on to the platform for a ceremony of garlands and expressions of mutual esteem. Although Janarthanan got down at the organisers’ request, intelligence of the event resulted in armed policemen charging in. Nine civilians died of electrocution by a live line being brought down by police firing into the air.

The political version of the event that received wide circulation, is that the tragedy was a result of instigation by the Jaffna mayor, ‘the traitor’ Alfred Duraiappa (Arrogance of Power). Of this allegation there was not the slightest hint in the highly commended unofficial De Kretser committee of inquiry report. The rumour, which was given traction from political platforms, set the course for the execution of Duraiappa; his purported killer Prabhakaran earned his spurs as the supremo.

The 1983 July bomb blast was triggered by a crisis within the LTTE. If their militant network lacking political roots among the people was checked by intelligence operations, they would have been in a pickle. Seelan, after his injury that was treated by Rajani was taken to India for advanced treatment. There he fell in love with a Malayali nurse and the Leader ordered him back to Jaffna. In Jaffna Seelan isolated himself, refused to see the Leader and confided remorsefully to his friends, his regret for having on Prabhakaran’s order murdered his fellow freedom fighter, Sundaram. He stayed on in a camp after being warned of its discovery and was ambushed and killed. A former Chief of Staff told me that Brigadier Balthazer had worked hard and had cracked several militant hideouts. This work was thrown to waste by the political insanity of the July 1983 violence as an answer to a routine setback.

Most Tamils reacted to the 1983 violence without any hope of justice for the victims, which the appointment of the Sansoni Commission had given in 1977. Some concentrated on exposing the Government internationally or lobbying India or other foreign powers. A choice that seemed to many the only option available was to collect money for the armed groups.

Senthan at this crucial time stood among the exceptions on the ground, totally disillusioned with the fatal direction in which the LTTE was bound to drive the militant struggle. For him the politics of the TULF and LTTE had the same rhetorical roots. Both for him were products of the unimaginative Tamil middle class. As an example of its actual and potential criminality, he saw the elite clinging on to the hideous institution of caste that made a mockery of liberation. The new caste elite represented a marriage of convenience between powerful sections of the Vellala elite and the Valvettithurai elite. The latter lost its importance after the war, while the former became vicarious carriers of LTTE’s heroic ideology and rhetoric, purely as a source of power.

As for the nature of Tamil politics, Senthan said that while the educated classes seldom understood, low level officials like village headmen (GS officers) who dealt with the ordinary people knew it from the start. When the report of the 1976 meeting between Amirthalingam and Prabhakaran hit the local grapevine, Senthan told me, a village headman swore in colourful language that knowing the essence of these two, it is a miserable fate that awaited the Tamils.

A healthy liberation struggle, Senthan said, should have no truck with crime, and any occurrence of it should be rooted out; individual killings like that of Alfred Duraiappah for their political leanings were costly crimes. The Irish Easter Uprising of 1916 through the occupation of Dublin Post Office by members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, who surrendered and were executed by the British State, was described by the poet Yeats as a ‘Terrible Beauty.’ It reflected the sacrifice by the surrendered men that their execution would lay the seeds for the birth of a new, free, Ireland.

Contrarily, there was no beauty terrible or otherwise in murdering defenceless individuals and the killers parading themselves as heroes and patriots. A public that gives credit to such claims degrades itself by rejecting the first principle of a free people, which is justice.

Senthan explained further on the theme of criminality. Valvettithurai which played an important role in the militant struggle had a legitimate trade with India which was stopped early in the Second World War. Its legitimate activity gave way to a smuggling industry, which also harboured a criminal element that is not good for any society. This element, he said, was in evidence at local sports matches between schools, where strong arm methods were in evidence when their side was losing. The talks between Amirthalingam and the killers of Duraiappah symbolised a liberation struggle drawing on this criminal element. The dangers were sensed by several ordinary people, like the village headman cited earlier.

The first phase of the war

After July 1983, several militant groups confronted the Sri Lankan security forces, with the leading groups patronised by India, whose role is still the subject of speculation. The killing in 1985 of two MPs, Dharmalingam and Alalasundaram by elements from TELO, the group seen as most favoured by India, could not but induce an element of menace into the prevailing ceasefire brought about by India. With the Army confined to its bases, it had given the civilians relief; and there was relative freedom of expression. Dissenting publications came out with the aid of militant sponsors, notably the Theepori group’s book on PLOTE’s torture camps on Indian soil. The book’s leading author Nobert, was last seen in an LTTE prison camp about 1992.

A particular menace was the shelling from Jaffna Fort, which surrounded by militant emplacements, was supplied by helicopter. It was very unlikely that the Army would have started shelling in January 1986 unless it had felt threatened and found it necessary to hold on. The two parties had to settle, or status quo could not hold. At that time the Air Force had also started aerial bombing apparently targeting militant camps, but frequently hitting civilian targets as seen on inspection.

Apparently to test the strength of the militant resistance a commando force was landed by helicopter in early 1986 to take an LTTE camp in Suthumalai. But the TELO joining forces compelled the commandos to withdraw and the LTTE publicly thanked TELO.

Not heeding the lesson, the LTTE largely wiped out the TELO at the end of April 1986. Prabhakaran was then in India and the Indian government could have exerted itself to prevent the annihilation of its protégé. But it did not lift a finger. One wonders if Indian intelligence felt that giving the LTTE a long rope to hang itself would enable India to intervene as saviours of the Tamil people, as happened.

Meanwhile, constant shelling and bombing by the Government had become a hazard that kept everyone on the edge. The militants had no counter at that time. EPRLF leaders Pathmanabha and Douglas Devananda approached Senthan. Senthan, far from being a text book engineer, had a brilliant practical mind. He picked up his skills during working sojourns in Iran, France and Canada before deciding to set up a company in Jaffna. He agreed to manufacture cannon. An assistant told me that tests were carried out with payloads of 25 and 40 kg comprising sea sand. One test was carried out by firing from the railway goods shed to Ariyakulam, a tank. Despite the success the project was stopped when the LTTE after finishing off the TELO banned the other groups, including EPRLF in December 1986.

The Tamil liberation struggle as prospectively a democratic exercise was killed. For Senthan, this particular use of his skill was an act of civil defence. It suggested that if the Tamil militant struggle had been rooted in the wishes of the people and consideration for their safety, he would have supported it more fully. The coup, where the LTTE using their superior communication equipment for surprise, took sole control of what might have been a liberation struggle, had reduced Senthan along with the people to bystanders. A model Senthan spoke of repeatedly was Che Guevara, of total commitment with concern for the people. While all the groups were active, the Army might have been immobilised as had already happened in several areas; and it had opened up the prospect of a negotiated settlement. Instead, the field was now wide open for the Government forces to break out. The Jaffna Fort from having been a vulnerable defensive position had become a prospective launching pad.

It was a question of time before the Sri Lankan Army advanced and the people were resigned to it or even secretly welcomed it as an alternative to the LTTE’s vindictive regime. Meanwhile in late 1986, as shells continued to boom from Jaffna Fort, many among the elite hailed the self-isolated LTTE, an organic growth of elite nationalism, as the sole saviour of the Tamil people. Their commitment did not go beyond words. The rise in repression was signalled by the LTTE’s abduction for non-political reasons of the University student Arunagirinathan Vijitharan, who subsequently disappeared. University students undertook a protest fast and large numbers of civilians joined in support. It was to be Jaffna’s last spontaneous mass uprising.

Religious and civil society leaders attempted to negotiate a settlement at the University and LTTE Jaffna leader Kittu, with whose personal vendetta the student’s disappearance was associated, came at their request. One of the arguments put to the student protestors by some of the negotiators and academic staff was that the LTTE were doing yeoman service keeping the Army at bay, a hugely important task, they said, compared to the issue of one missing student.

Prabhakaran returned to Jaffna from Tamil Nadu in early January 1987. Senthan and a colleague walking along Stanley Road, near the Railway Goods Shed, saw a car stop on seeing them and the lights were switched off. The two found that Prabhakaran had been in the car surrounded by persons protecting him. It struck them that no Tamil group under attack by the LTTE tried to kill Prabhakaran, which would have been relatively easy at that time. Instead they had each separately tried to talk to the LTTE knowing that their end was inevitable.

Once the LTTE cleared the way by eliminating other groups the Sri Lankan forces made rapid advances in the East taking back areas previously controlled by the militants; notable being the Kokkadichcholai Prawn Farm massacre on 27th January 1987. As was expected, the Army launched its operation to take Vadamaratchi in Jaffna’s northern sector on 26th May 1987 and there was a large exodus of civilians through Varani to Thenmaratchy. Prabhakaran’s home of Valvettithurai was among the first to be taken. It was the talk among evacuees that several cadres protecting Prabhakaran had narrowly got him to safety. I heard it spoken among university staff that when Prof. Sivathamby made the crossing, he had whispered to another, “Did you see who that was?” The reference was evidently to Prabhakaran wearing a sari carried on a bicycle.

The operation was halted by Indian pressure as preparation to its direct entry to much relief among the civilians. Around this time Senthan left with his family to India and returned in 1988. This was the time my regular contact with him commenced.

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Features

Defend civic space upon which peace is built

Published

10 hours ago

2026/09/22

Sahan Weerasooriya

by Jehan Perera

International Peace Day was observed on 21 September. It finds Sri Lanka with a genuine achievement to record and a demanding test to meet. The UN’s theme this year was “Invest in Peace: For Everyone, Everywhere, Every Day.” It also honoured the “everyday architects of peace”—people driving local action and building a lasting peace from the ground up. In the 2026 Global Peace Index, Sri Lanka rose 30 places, from 97th to 67th among 163 countries. Over the same period, global peacefulness declined for the twelfth consecutive year to its lowest level since the index began, and South Asia suffered the sharpest regional deterioration. The test is whether the government will protect the civic space in which those architects of peace work.

Sri Lanka’s improvement is real and deserves acknowledgement. In this year’s review, issued a few weeks ago, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights acknowledged progress in the form of action against corruption, arrests and investigations linked to political killings, enforced disappearances and the 2019 Easter Sunday attacks, and continued official denunciation of racism. A ranking, however, records conditions at a particular moment. It does not guarantee that they will last. Sustainable peace will depend on three factors. These are whether the government addresses the unresolved causes of conflict, whether it strengthens accountability for past and present abuses, and whether it protects the civic space in which peace is built from below. On the first two the record is incomplete. On the third, the draft NGO law threatens to weaken the very organisations that press for the other two.

What holds Sri Lanka back from a higher place are the same things that fed the war at home and also feed international conflict that rages elsewhere in the world. These are racism or ethnic nationalism that is narrow-focused, corruption and lawlessness. Equality, accountability and the rule of law are their remedies. The present government has committed itself to these, and is a significant improvement over governments of the recent past. But these pillars are not held up by governments alone. Peace is made in villages, workplaces and university campuses. It is made by families who insist on the truth about their disappeared, by journalists and lawyers who expose abuse, and by community organisations that bring Tamils, Muslims and Sinhalese into practical cooperation.

Unfinished Work

The UN High Commissioner’s report to the current Human Rights Council session, covering October 2025 to July 2026, shows how much remains to be done. The Prevention of Terrorism Act is still being applied, producing arbitrary arrests and long detention without charge. The report calls for a moratorium pending repeal and for the release of long-term detainees. Military-occupied land has not been released, memorialisation lacks support, and tensions over land and religious sites persist. The Batticaloa district illustrates how such problems endure. In the past three years, two Presidents, Ranil Wickremesinghe and Anura Kumara Dissanayake, have visited and instructed that the dispute over grazing land in Mailaththamadu and Mathavanai be resolved. It is a dispute between Tamil cattle farmers and outside Sinhala cultivators, and it has not been resolved. When two Presidents issue instructions and nothing changes, the fault lies in the machinery of State. An unresolved dispute does not stand still. It hardens into the next grievance.

Accountability shows the same pattern. The report documents torture and deaths in custody, and surveillance and intimidation of activists, journalists and civil society. Serious cases remain stalled for years, among them the killing of seventeen aid workers of Action Contre la Faim in Muttur two decades ago. Sharper still is the case of the Eastern University refugee camp at Vantharamoolai, where in 1990 the army took away 158 persons in a single day. They were never seen again. The camp’s officer-in-charge, Dr T. Jayasingam, later Vice Chancellor of the university, identified the officers responsible. More than three decades on, those officers have not been questioned. These cases are still remembered because families, survivors and independent witnesses have refused to let them be forgotten. Meanwhile several commissions of inquiry have completed their investigations but nothing further has happened.

What South Africa, Argentina and other post-conflict societies have found indispensable are four pillars of what is called “Transitional Justice” which are truth, accountability, reparations and non-recurrence. In Sri Lanka’s circumstances, truth means credible, independent investigation of what happened to the disappeared, and support for memorialisation. Accountability means prosecuting Muttur, Vantharamoolai and comparable cases, and removing credibly accused persons from senior office. Reparations mean compensation for victims and the return of military-held land. Non-recurrence means repealing the Prevention of Terrorism Act, releasing those held under it in the meantime, and resolving local disputes such as Mailaththamadu before delay hardens them. A country that buries its past does not escape it. The past returns in the next generation.

Civil Society

It is against this background that the draft NGO law is most troubling. The proposed legislation contains sweeping provisions for State oversight and control of civil society organisations. Among these are enforcing a licensing requirement on NGOs, which is to be renewed every three years, and severe penalties for not submitting reports on time, or for spending on emergency flood relief (for instance) when the NGOs mandate is peacebuilding (as an example) with possible sanctions including deregistration and having to shut down. Civil society groups have warned that it would confer excessive discretion over their registration and operations. Officials in Sri Lanka have abused such powers in the past. Additional power without effective checks invites further abuse. Sound regulation would have clear criteria for registration, an independent registrar and a right of appeal to the courts. What cannot be justified is a regime in which registration becomes a licence to be withheld from organisations that scrutinise policy, expose abuses or advocate for the rights of citizens.

Democracy is based on checks and balances. Those who press for accountability are part of those checks. The contradiction is plain. A government that has pledged accountability, equality and the rule of law ought not to be preparing to weaken the very organisations that press for their fulfilment. The organisations most exposed are those working on disappearances, land, memorialisation and reconciliation in the North and East, where the State’s record is weakest and the need for independent witnesses greatest. Silencing them would not remove the grievances they document. It would remove the channel through which those grievances are addressed peacefully. The government appears to be relenting, which is welcome, but a pause is not a withdrawal. The bill should be withdrawn and any replacement drafted in genuine consultation with those it would govern.

Investment in peace as called for by the UN in its International Peace Day theme implies commitment over time, with returns that come slowly. Sri Lanka’s 30-place rise on the Global Peace Index is a first dividend and nothing more. It can be built upon only if the government matches its commitments with action: withdrawing or fundamentally redrafting the NGO law, repealing or suspending the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and bringing Muttur, Vantharamoolai and Mailaththamadu to resolution. A higher place in a global index is not a certificate of success. Sri Lanka’s higher ranking is an encouraging start, but it will endure only if the space in which citizens speak, question and organise is protected. Peace is built from below, and a government that is serious about it will treat civil society as a partner rather than a threat.

Features

Africa is buying: Sri Lanka must start selling

Published

10 hours ago

2026/09/22

Sahan Weerasooriya

A call to Sri Lankan exporters and agencies: Can Sri Lanka compete with China and India in Africa?

By Kana V. Kananathan
Former Ambassador

Sri Lanka has spent decades concentrating its exports on traditional markets in Europe, North America and Asia. Yet across the Indian Ocean lies a rapidly expanding market that remains significantly underdeveloped by Sri Lankan exporters: Africa.

The opportunity is not theoretical. Sri Lanka already exports packaging, textiles, rubber products, pharmaceuticals, paper, machinery and electrical goods to African markets. The question is whether these modest beginnings can be transformed into a serious export strategy—and whether Sri Lanka can compete against the enormous commercial presence of China and India.

The answer is yes—but Sri Lanka must compete differently.

Kenya: Gateway to East Africa

Kenya should be the starting point.

Sri Lanka exported approximately US$32.08 million to Kenya in 2025, while importing US$11.41 million. But US$32 million is tiny compared with the opportunity: Kenya imported more than US$24 billion in 2025. Even a 1% share of that market would represent nearly US$240 million in annual exports.

And the commercial base already exists. Sri Lanka’s 2025 exports to Kenya included approximately US$9.99 million in paper and paperboard products, US$9.73 million in knitted fabrics, US$3.64 million in pharmaceuticals, US$1.24 million in rubber products and US$1.20 million in machinery.

Kenya’s import structure is equally revealing. In the third quarter of 2025, industrial supplies represented 34.4% of imports, machinery and capital equipment 19.2%, food and beverages 9.0%, and consumer goods 7.3%. The opportunity for Sri Lanka, therefore, extends well beyond consumer goods—we can become a supplier to African industry.

But competition is fierce. Asia supplied around 70% of Kenya’s imports in 2025, with imports from China rising 16.5% and those from India 11.3%.

Sri Lanka cannot challenge China and India across every product category. Nor should it try. We must target sectors where quality, specialisation, reliability, technical capability, smaller production runs and flexibility matter more than simply offering the lowest price.

Where Can Sri Lanka Compete?

Packaging is an obvious starting point. Cartons, boxes, bags and labels are already among Sri Lanka’s exports to Kenya. Importantly, some Sri Lankan companies operating in Kenya are themselves importing these products from Sri Lanka. The market already exists; the challenge is to scale it.

As Africa’s food-processing, pharmaceutical, apparel and consumer-goods industries expand, demand for sophisticated packaging will grow with them. Sri Lanka already possesses the manufacturing capability and industry experience to capture a larger share.

Industrial rubber products, tyres, gloves and specialised rubber components offer another opportunity where Sri Lanka has established manufacturing expertise.

The apparel supply chain is equally promising. Rather than competing directly with African garment factories, Sri Lanka can supply fabrics, elastics, labels, packaging and specialised textile inputs.

Some Sri Lankan apparel manufacturing and export companies already established in Kenya, Togo, Ghana and Ethiopia are importing several of these inputs from Sri Lanka. The supply chain, therefore, already exists. The next step is to move beyond supplying Sri Lankan-owned factories and become a competitive input supplier to the wider African apparel industry.

Other sectors deserving systematic market development include pharmaceuticals and medical consumables, processed foods, biscuits and confectionery, coconut products, cinnamon and spices, electrical products and cables, industrial chemicals, ceramics, light engineering, agricultural equipment and food-processing machinery.

Sri Lanka should also look beyond physical goods. IT, fintech, banking technology, engineering, healthcare, hospitality management and professional services largely escape the freight disadvantage confronting merchandise exports.

The Tariff Problem Can Become an Opportunity

Market access cannot be discussed without tariffs.The East African Community applies a Common External Tariff with bands of 0%, 10%, 25% and 35%, while certain sensitive products attract still higher protection. Simply filling containers in Colombo with finished consumer goods will therefore not always be commercially competitive.

But that obstacle points towards a bigger opportunity: manufacture in Africa.

Sri Lankan businesses could export intermediate materials while undertaking final assembly, manufacturing, processing or packaging in Kenya. Packaging companies could establish converting plants; electrical manufacturers could assemble locally; pharmaceutical companies could explore manufacturing or packaging partnerships; and food companies could undertake final processing closer to consumers.

Kenya would then become more than an export destination. It could become Sri Lanka’s manufacturing and distribution gateway into East and Central Africa.

With the East African Community now comprising eight partner states and extending geographically from the Indian Ocean towards the Atlantic, establishing a regional presence is increasingly more important than viewing each African country in isolation.

West Africa Cannot Be Ignored

Sri Lanka simultaneously needs a West African strategy.

Ghana offers potential as an English-speaking commercial gateway and host of the AfCFTA Secretariat. Nigeria, with its enormous population and consumer economy, should be approached as a major market in its own right, despite its greater regulatory, currency and operational complexity.

ECOWAS tariff bands of 0%, 5%, 10%, 20% and 35% again make product selection critical. Sri Lanka should concentrate on products with sufficient differentiation and margins to absorb freight, tariffs and distributor costs.

Pharmaceuticals demonstrate both the opportunity and the challenge. Nigeria imported approximately US$766 million in pharmaceuticals in 2025, with India supplying roughly US$394 million and China US$131 million. Ghana imported approximately US$301 million, with India supplying about US$140 million.

Sri Lanka cannot simply offer another generic product and expect to beat India on price. We must identify specialised products, reliable supply arrangements, partnerships and, where commercially justified, local production or packaging.

Stop Promoting Sectors—Identify Products

Sri Lanka now needs an Africa Export Opportunity Study based on individual products, not broad sectors.

The Export Development Board, Foreign Ministry, chambers and private sector should jointly identify 15–20 priority products. For each product, Sri Lanka should calculate the HS code, African annual import demand, principal suppliers, Chinese and Indian market shares, applicable duties, freight from Colombo, regulatory requirements, distributor margins and final landed price.

That will tell us where Sri Lanka genuinely has a competitive advantage.

The Commercial Test

Before spending resources promoting a product, apply one simple test:

African import demand + Sri Lankan production capability + tariff + freight + distributor margin + regulatory cost = final landed competitiveness against China, India and local African production.

Only products that pass this test should receive concentrated export-promotion resources.

This would move Sri Lanka away from exhibitions, delegations and general discussions towards what ultimately matters: specific products, specific buyers, specific distributors and actual export orders.

Give Our Missions Targets

Commercial diplomacy must become results-driven. The Government should set clear annual trade and investment targets for every Sri Lankan mission in Africa.

Missions should be evaluated not merely on diplomatic activity, but on buyers and distributors identified, business introductions made, investments facilitated, market barriers resolved and measurable exports generated.

In a competitive Africa, our missions must become active economic frontlines not merely diplomatic outposts.

A practical strategy could operate through three commercial gateways: Nairobi for East and Central Africa, Accra for selected West African markets and Lagos for Nigeria.

Sri Lanka’s total exports of goods and services reached approximately US$17.25 billion in 2025. Capturing even a small additional share of Africa’s enormous import market could, therefore, make a meaningful contribution to export earnings, investment and foreign-exchange generation.

Africa Will Not Wait

Sri Lankan exporters must stop looking at Africa as a distant or difficult market and start treating it as a strategic growth market.

We cannot compete with China and India on scale, but we can compete on quality, specialisation, flexibility and reliability. Exporters must identify country-specific opportunities, establish strong local distributors, build partnerships with African businesses and use Sri Lankan companies already operating on the continent as gateways into regional supply chains.

Where freight and tariffs weaken competitiveness, businesses must be prepared to move towards local assembly, joint ventures and manufacturing in Africa. Exporters cannot do it alone. They need aggressive, measurable and results-driven commercial diplomacy from Sri Lanka’s missions.

Africa is buying. Its markets are being captured now. Sri Lanka must stop watching from the sidelines. We must enter, compete, build our presence and secure our share.

(Ambassador Kana Kananathan is a businessman, Diplomat, lobbyist and an expert in African affairs, with over four decades of experience on the African continent. A long-time resident of Africa, he served as Sri Lanka’s envoy to Uganda and Kenya, with concurrent accreditation to 22 African Nations, and was the permanent representative to UN Habitat and UN environmental Programme. Over the years, he has been the Elections Monitor across the continent, working closely with African governments, and built enduring partnerships with African leaders. He also served as Economic and Investments Advisor to former President Professor Alpha Condé of the Republic of Guinea)

Features

Memories and Midnight Magic: Recipe for a perfect 31st Night dance

Published

10 hours ago

2026/09/22

Sahan Weerasooriya

The heart of a great 31st Night dance is memory, and memories come rushing back when those 70s, 80s and 90s golden oldies begin to play — those timeless tunes that make revellers, young and old, rush to the floor and dance the night away.

A perfect 31st Night is not just a party. It is a journey. A journey through time.

The music should flow like a love story. Start slow, start soft. Let couples glide into a waltz for romance. Let the floor come alive with a twist, a rock ‘n’ roll, a jive. Let nostalgia build with beautiful sing-along oldies generally associated with a New Year’s Eve dance.

This is the art that many of our entertainers seem to have forgotten.

The final hour, before midnight, is sacred. It should be collective energy at its peak. The entire crowd, on the dance floor, linking arms, swaying together, singing, at the top of their voices, those sing-along favourites.

Yes, I’m referring to those immortal, nostalgic favourites that unite the world: ‘This Land Is Your Land,’ ‘You Are My Sunshine,’ ‘When The Saints Go Marching In,’ ‘Roll Out The Barrel,’ ‘Celebration,’ ‘She’ll Be Coming Round The Mountain,’ ‘Happy Days Are Here Again,’ and so many more.

One wonders if some of our modern entertainers have even heard of these nostalgia anthems that traditionally lead up to the dawning of the New Year! This is not just music; this is ritual.

Then comes THE moment: Lights dim. Music pauses. A hush falls. The countdown begins — 10, 9, 8… — hugs, wishes, tears of joy, and then … ‘Auld Lang Syne.’ Hands crossed, voices united, bidding farewell to the old and welcoming the new. That moment makes or breaks the night.

Here is the truth that many genuine 31st Night revellers feel but hesitate to say — an overdose of baila music at New Year’s Eve events is NOT welcome.

Of course, baila is required. Baila is our Sri Lankan heartbeat! But a 31st Night dance is for everyone.

When it’s ONLY baila, the twist and rock n’ roll lovers, the waltz kings and queens feel left out. And they are the very people who MADE nostalgia! They are the die-hard revellers who have kept the 31st Night spirit alive for decades.

A family mentioned to me that they went along with friends for a 31st Night dance, in the city, to usher in 2026, and were thoroughly disappointed with the setup.

The bands in attendance, they said, failed to generate the excitement generally associated with a 31st Night event.

If given a free hand, the music at certain Colombo venues will be mostly baila, and that is going to disappoint many. Some are already worried that it will be just a baila scene this year, as well.

A memorable 31st Night respects all rhythms … yes, a waltz for romance, a twist and rock n’ roll for that 60s magic, a cha-cha, a slow foxtrot, and then the baila, after the countdown anthem.

That balance is what makes it inclusive, classy, and truly fun-filled.

Organisers, especially in Colombo, should keep this in mind: let it be 70% nostalgia – Western, and 30% baila, with the last hour left for pure baila madness, after the New Year is in!

Organisers must work out the programme for their 31st Night and instruct the entertainers to follow those instructions. The band should not dictate the night; the spirit of nostalgia should.

This New Year, let’s give Colombo what it truly wants — memories, midnight magic, and music for every soul on the floor.

Let’s dance into 2027 with class.