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by V. Thirunavukkarasu
Former Member,Colombo Municipal Council New Left Front

It is obvious from some recent incidents in the North-East including the Manipay episode that, sections of the armed forces are working at cross purposes that could impair the ongoing peace process. On the pretext of ceasefire violations/provocations by the LTTE, animosity on their part becomes increasingly evident.

On critical questions such as the resettlement of internally displaced persons (IDPs) including those in the so-called High Security Zones (HSZs), matters are largely left to the armed forces instead of sensible political decisions being taken by the Government. The women LTTE cadres no doubt violated the ceasefire agreement (CA) when they entered the so-called Government controlled area wearing combat belts.

Such violations though relatively trivial in nature, should nevertheless be scrupulously avoided. On the other hand, when the soldiers pounced on the women cadres to rip apart the belts and mercilessly beat them up, it is crystal clear that they were rash and pound foolish, in that the paramount consideration of peace was far removed from their minds.

Severely attacked

They didn't pause for a moment to seek the intervention of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) to sort out the issue. What is more, civilians who came up to protest against the attacks on the women cadres were severely attacked, too, by the soldiers despite the presence of the SLMM that later arrived on the scene.

The SLMM had reportedly expressed their displeasure over the armed forces and the LTTE getting their tempers frayed over minor issues.

It is imperative that both sides should comply strictly with the MoU; especially the LTTE should leave no room for them to be arraigned as the villain of the peace as that would eminently suit the agenda of the hegemonistic, militarist and racist anti-peace forces since they are all-out to torpedo the peace process one way or the other. It is open secret that the Government too has yet to fully comply with the MoU.

As is well-known the international community is intensely involved in the peace process, and that is all the more reason why all the major local actors in particular, should play a sincere, serious, and productive role to usher in that elusive peace, a sine qua non for the whole country to rise from the ruins.

PA's agenda

The People's Alliance (PA) proceeds with its agenda to dislodge the Ranil Government by any conceivable means. It keeps up its dialogue with the JVP to form an alliance, which shows that the thirst for power overrides the quest for peace.

President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga had immense power when she was first elected President with a 62.38 percent mandate. But she failed to adopt the political strategy that was open to her to convert the Parliament into a Constituent Assembly to enact a new constitution, incorporating a solution to the National Question, while also abolishing the Executive Presidency.

Instead, she sought the support of the United National Party (UNP), then in the opposition, to secure a two-third majority that was mandatory to adopt piecemeal constitutional changes. The dialogue she had with the UNP hierarchy for this purpose proved to be a wild goose chase.

On the other hand, when the talks she had originally initiated with the LTTE broke down in April 1995, she at once switched gears to adopt the infamous 'war-for-peace' strategy that eventually consummated the devastation of the North East, while also causing enormous damage to the country's economy, recording a negative 1.43 percent growth, unprecedented in Sri Lanka's post-Independence history.

Vivid description

US Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, who visited Jaffna last August, has given a vivid description of what he saw there. In a comprehensive speech he delivered a few days ago at the Washington based Strategic Centre for International Studies (SCIS), he has said thus: "Sadly I have had the chance to see the costs of the war up close.

Last summer I travelled to the Jaffna peninsula. We first flew over the area in a helicopter and saw below a blasted landscape pockmarked with thousands of bomb craters and shell craters. For me the view reminded me strongly of my time in the service in Vietnam.

I really don't think I had seen anything like it since. And I am talking both about the physical devastation and the sense of futility that was unmistakable on the ground." Armitage also said that the US will never accept the tactics of terror regardless of any legitimate Tamil aspirations.

It is then imperative to pinpoint that Tamil national liberation struggle was left with no alternative but to take up arms in the 1980s, having seen enough and enough of the futility of 3 decades of peaceful campaigns.

Ahimsa struggles

When State terror was unleashed with ever increasing frequency and fury to put down all such "ahimsa" struggles, Tamil youth was driven to take up arms in defence of the Tamils - indeed for their very survival even in their native North-East heartland. And, the LTTE, out of a host of Tamil armed organisations that sprang up, emerged as the dominant and domineering outfit.

It will thus be seen that the LTTE is, after all, the very product of the sins of omission and commission of successive majoritarian hegemonistic governments. And therefore, Armitage's exhortation to the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) to institute reforms that will address the legitimate aspirations of the Tamil people cannot be more timely. In retrospect, even before the emergence of the LTTE, the North-East Tamils had mandated the Tamil old guard, in the 1977 general elections, to pursue the goal of a separate state.

Nevertheless, the old leadership was later prepared to settle for meagre alternatives such as the 1981 District Development Council (DDC) scheme, dropping the independent state project.

Self-determination

As is now known, the LTTE too has since expressed its desire to settle for "internal self-determination based on a federal structure within a united Sri Lanka".

This is in line with what the Tamil leadership sought to achieve since the late 1940s. It remains to be seen if the final outcome of the ongoing GoSL-LTTE negotiations would prove to be a concrete, worthwhile federal solution, and then again, whether the Government will implement it fully so as to reach the "vision of prosperity which will require a strong and sustained commitment by the GoSL", to quote Armitage.

Armitage then went on to say that President Chandrika as Head of State and inheritor of a powerful political dynasty enjoys a unique position, though herself being a victim of the whole conflict. Her father, the late S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, was perhaps the first leader who advocated, way back in 1926, a federal system as the best recipe for the country's unity.

Adverse measures

No doubt, he later metamorphosed greatly through the vicissitudes of history. For, exactly 3 decades later, in 1956, as Prime Minister he made Sinhala only as the official language, completely ignoring the Tamil language. That he did, brushing aside grim warnings from outstanding Left leaders at that time that that would eventually lead to a disaster including possible division of the country.

"Two languages, one nation; one language, two nations", they thus predicted. His widow, Sirimavo Bandaranaike, who succeeded him, followed his footsteps. She also was instrumental in introducing some adverse measures such as media-wise standardisation of marks depriving otherwise eligible Tamil students, access to university education.

And that served all the more, to polarise Tamil youth. And, it was during her early regime that the army was first sent to Jaffna to crush a peaceful "satyagraha" campaign (1961) launched by the Tamils to secure their rights.

Notwithstanding such a preceding scenario, Tamils did hail the rise of the charismatic Chandrika in the 1990s, and overwhelmingly supported her in the 1994 Presidential election. Most unfortunately however, they found life far worse under her regime than even under the earlier UNP regime which prosecuted the war for 11 years. Perhaps President Chandrika naively believed that her "war for peace" strategy meant that the war was not against the Tamils but only against the LTTE as profusely propagandised by her regime.

But in reality the Tamils had suffered the worst ever under her regime and became gravely disillusioned.

PA's draft

Of course, she has expressed her sorrow and sadness for the immense suffering heaped on the Tamils without granting their just rights for a period of 52 years. She did so particularly when she presented the PA's draft constitution in Parliament in August 2000. Tamils always demanded only their just rights and not concessions or condescending sympathies.

The foregoing is, by and large, a mere restatement of history to put the record straight for all people concerned to look objectively at the totality and trajectory of the Tamil National Question and its ramifications dispassionately, for the greater good of the whole country. And so this is certainly no attempt at denigrating any leader or leaders. Hightime the two so-called major parties, the UNP and the SLFP, desisted from their pettifogging and opportunistic positions designed to gain what is pyrrhic political mileage.

And the extremist sections would do well to shed their obscurantist positions that would refuel the separatist project with all the attendant consequences in their amplitude. It is incumbent on all those who have the real interests of the country at heart, to seize the moment for a federal solution that would really re-unite a divided country. Only the inveterate racist lunatics who do not matter could cry hoarse that federalism means division of the country.

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