The ethnic front in Sri Lanka’s contemporary history

R.J. de Silva, Attorney-at-law

(Continued from last week)

The political history of Sri Lanka changed for the worse after 2000 due to intense rivalry between the UNP and SLFP-led coalitions. The two major parties failed to co-habit under President Chandrika Bandaranaike Cumaratunga in 2001, due to politicians of the UNF and UPFA failing to prioritizee the interests of the country over their own. With it failed a grand opportunity to build on the Ceasefire Agreement signed with the LTTE between 2001 and 2003 by the UNF government, assisted by the international community.

With it Sri Lanka lost tremendous goodwill that would have enabled developing the country including the war torn areas. Reconciliation and ethnic peace had a positive vibration, when the SLFP led UPFA government and the opposition UNP braced to face the December 2004 Tsunami disaster that killed about 45,000 people and destroyed their homes. Thereafter, the MOU signed by the LTTE and the UPFA Government in 2004 to start the Post Tsunami Operational Structure (PT-OMS) for reconstruction of the North and East, was scuttled by the Sinhala nationalists within the UPFA government.

The Supreme Court ruled against P-TOMS decreeing it as against the constitution. As a result, the possible resolution to the country’s ethnic relations did not receive a political solution. Activities of power hungry, short sighted politicians resulted in the poor and the marginalized people of both communities suffering death and destruction by a prolonging war.

In political and ideological terms, the new UPFA regime elected in 2005 under the Mahinda Rajapaksa Presidency, represented a nationalist coalition that was hostile to the internationally backed political engagement between the government and the LTTE. The clever use of religious and ethnic propaganda to win over the Sinhala majority by using men dressed in yellow robes by Mahinda Rajapaksa between 2005 and 2014 and thereafter by the Gotabaya Rajapaksa regime after 2019 using men in robes and in uniform, resulted in a lack of direction, a breakdown of administration and rampant corruption.

In fact, the war victory in 2009 precipitated unmitigated greed for power, family bandyism, blatant acts of corruption and authoritarianism. Communal reconciliation was abandoned. A combination of all these factors weakened the already fragile democratic fabric.

The powerful Mahinda Rajapaksa government was defeated in the presidential and parliamentary elections of 2015 by a coalition led by the UNP running a senior SLFP defector for president. Rajapaksa and the SLFP were defeated by a common opposition. There was much goodwill and support of the minority parties in politics in achieving this objective. The mandate to punish the corrupt, killers, abductors for ransom in the north and east and the promise to bring back democratic institutions abolished by the 18^th amendment, was partly fulfilled.

But an inexplicable lack of political will to successfully prosecute the guilty became a major setback for the Yahapalana government when the presidential election of 2019 came round in November. This together with the planned Easter Sunday attack of April 2019 enabled Rajapaksa Inc. of Mahinda and Gotabaya to return to power decimating the UNP to a single National List seat in parliament.

Corruption

Corruption in Sri Lanka is crime without identifiable criminals. It occurs from top to bottom at various levels. It is a vast subject that needs a separate discussion. But it will not be out of place to mention the Mafia in the power generating sector, tax concessions given to cronies, 16 controversial transactions revealed by COPE in 2007 and half-hearted efforts of the Bribery Commission to prosecute the revelations to date together with the withdrawal of cases by the AG such as that of misappropriation of Rs 200 m of Treasury funds by RADA- to mention a few only.

Corruption is one the main reasons for the worst ever economic and political crisis that has hit the people after 1948. The country is in turmoil and the people are forced to spend their day looking for gas, fuel, kerosene, milk, drugs while being clobbered daily by galloping food prices and power cuts.

The future of democracy in Sri Lanka

Democracy is built on four pillars – the Executive, Legislature, Judiciary and Free Media. If one of these pillars collapse, we will face the consequences democratic countries like Nicaragua and Brazil were confronted with.

The UN’s ‘International Day of Democracy’ (September 15 ) gives us an opportunity to review the state of democracy in Sri Lanka. The values of freedom, respect for human rights, holding periodic free and fair elections by universal suffrage – are essential elements of a democracy. In turn, democracy provides the natural environment for the protection and effective realization of human rights.

In Sri Lanka, civil rights activists and the opposition fear a trend towards dictatorship and military rule under the retired Lt. Col. and later President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

These concerns surfaced particularly after the 20^th Amendment which gave unlimited power to the president by engineering a two thirds parliamentary majority by questionable means. Arrogance of power made the president appoint retired military commanders to high administrative positions, bring a dual citizen to parliament and replace the aiya with the malli as finance minister – neither having any credentials to hold the post. This ensured 70% control of the national budget within the Rajapaksa family.

The IMF Chief lamented that mismanagement created the worst ever economic crisis since independence. It brought all people down to their knees in despair, including those racists who loved Sinhala Buddhist Rajapaksa regimes. One is reminded of John F Kennedy’s famous saying : “A Nation which is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market economy, is afraid of its people”.

A glorious future envisaged by our enterprising youth who created a strong movement towards the much awaited System Change and a new political culture, has already given birth to racial unity and made inroads into the hearts and minds of all Lankans from GotaGoGama in Colombo, Kandy and Galle. .

These Pro- Democracy advocates have begun the second phase of democracy after the first phase ended in disaster despite 74 years of independence. Sri Lanka’s ‘flawed deocracy’ should not be weighed down by the legendary curse of Kuveni, the Easter Sunday murders of the innocent or the misfortunes of Muslims who were forced to cremate and not bury their dead in accordance with their religion due to racist ideology, the rule of incompetent politicians or the assault on the dignity of Tamils .

Our recent past should remind us all, how in 1933, Germany transited from a democracy to a dictatorship and how it caused mayhem throughout the world. Hitler’s autocratic dictatorship caused the unforgivable holocaust of about six million m Jews before the second world war ended in 1945.

Sri Lanka’s Parliament should recall, how Hitler got the “Enabling Act” passed in parliament on March 23, 1933 by physically intimidating MPs in Nazi controlled camps and persecuting remaining MPs in order to obtain a two thirds majority. Only the Social Democrats voted against Hitler who succeeded in achieving his rand design and began to pass laws without the approval of Parliament or the President and violating the Wiemar Constitution.

A mad man’s dream of cleansing Germany saw Nazis targeting Germans with physical and mental disabilities, Soviet prisoners of war, Poles, homosexuals and Jehovah’s witnesses. Unfortunately, contributions to this ethnic cleansing were made by professioals like doctors, lawyers, teachers and civil servants who believed in Hitler’s policies.

The role of the legal profession and judges was critical. After new laws were passed between February and July 1933 and after all state officials were asked to take an oath of loyalty (we saw this being done after Gotabaya Rajapakse came to power), lawyers helped the Nazis to oust Jewish lawyers from courts and law firms while permitting a mere 35 lawyers to apply to practice.

Although Hitler promised to restore judicial authority, he instituted re-education programs cleverly designed to indoctrinate Jurists in ideological goals of the Nazi Party. In the guise of protecting the State, Nazis hold on power was developed by passing several laws to consolidate the power of a dictator accompanied by military expansion and racial justification. A Judiciary steeped in the values of respect for judicial independence, equality and fair trial, shamelessly rendered verdicts to justify principles of Nazism and wishes of the Fuhrer.

The overwhelming majority of judges failed to challenge Hitler’s laws that restricted political freedoms, security of property, freedom of speech and association and instead interpreted laws in broad language that facilitated Nazi’s ability to carry out their diabolical agenda.

After the end of World War 2, pressures faced by individual Judges with intense personal and ethical dilemmas, became a fascinating study all over the world. But the damage done to grieving families could not be compensated or corrected.

Conclusion

Sri Lankan leaders in the latter years, implemented no political structural reforms to meet four decades of rebellion or corrupt practices at all levels of government. After 73 years of independence, Sri Lanka is careering down the slope into an abyss where its citizens are facing increasing militarization at the expense of the legitimate administration of Sri Lanka. Today, the country has had to declare that it is unable to pay its debts until the IMF assists in restructuring its massive debts.

US President Franklin D Roosewelt said , “Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely.” This is the “democratic paradox” of Sri Lanka.

It is gratifying to note that a struggle has erupted spontaneously all over Sri Lanka led by Youth, for Constitutional reform to restore the citizen’s faith in quality, integrity and efficacy in representative democracy. Liberal Democracy will dominate the world in the years to come. Sri Lanka will need to design an ethno religious system of governance where majoritarianism will coexist in a peaceful and diverse setting.

The famous definition for democracy was enunciated by US President Abraham Lincoln as “A GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE AND BY THE PEOPLE”. He gave the leadership to the civil war (1861 to 1865 ) to liberate the colored American people from slavery from white racists extremists. Fortunately for America and the world, US President and business tycoon Donald Trump ( 2016 to 2020 ) failed in his attempt to revive white populist extremism.

Sri Lanka’s ageing and unprofessional leaders, who quote Abraham Lincoln ad nauseam, do not think innovatively, are rigid and unresponsive to reason and lack innovative ideas. Instead they play cheap politics to win the votes of gullible voters on the guise of enacting development projects.

The youth have shaken the mindset of rural villages who effectively avoided challenging Rajapakse regimes, given their mutual commitment to Sinhala Buddhist supremacy. Their discipline, innovative presentation of well-articulated demands that the Rajapakse family which has hitherto controlled 70% of the National budget and Chairmanships of many State Institutions, must leave politics, have won Sri Lanka much admiration worldwide for the country’s resilience towards Democracy. Time has come for future leaders of Sri Lanka to give up the elitist tradition of Constitution making and jump out of the box to build into the 3^rd Republican Constitution ‘The right to recall’ corrupt officials in Government, Parliament, the police and the legal services.