'Let us move forward as one nation in harmony'
THE following is the full text of the speech made by President
Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga at the 21st Anniversary of 'Black
July', at the Presidential Secretariat, Colombo, on July 23, 2004.
We know what occurred on that day (July 23, 1983) and I don't think I
need to remind anyone of the details of that day and the week that
followed.
Twenty one years is a long time, but I'm happy that at least today I
have the opportunity to correct, even in a small way the tragedy that
was perpetrated upon some of the Tamil people of this country.
Many years after 1983, my Government had the occasion to appoint the
Truth Commission under the distinguished chairmanship of former Chief
Justice, Mr. S Sharvananda and two other distinguished members, Mr. M M
Zuhair and Mr. S S Sahabandu, both legal luminaries; and that we were
able even to some extent to elucidate the details of the incidents that
occurred on those days.
I dare say much of the facts were not available to the Commission
because of the long period that had ensued between '83 and the
appointment of the Commission in the year 2001.
Whatever representations and facts that were made available to them,
I am aware the Commissioners went into in great detail and took much
trouble to investigate these complaints placed before them.
And as you know they have been able to find evidence of what was
nearly a 1000 killings during that period and I believe 18,000
properties were destroyed, mainly by fire, and thousands of others were
injured in incidents of violence.
We suppose that there must have been many more incidents that have
not been reported to the Commission, simply because there is nobody to
report them anymore, either in this world or in this country.
The Commission has recommended certain amounts of monetary
compensation to these victims of the various forms of violence. I must
hasten to say that we do not believe that these small amounts of
monetary compensation will in any way make up for the suffering
undergone by those people.
It is only symbolic of what the State wishes to do or say to those
people, it is only symbolic of the apology that we wish to make to all
those victims who have been identified and whose who may never be
identified.
The consequences of those incidents are horrendous. I don't think I
need to elaborate, those of you only too well aware of it. Over 700,000
Tamil people out of a total of about 1.2 million Tamil people living in
this country at the time had to run away and find homes in other
countries.
Among these we count some of the best qualified professionals of Sri
Lanka; committed qualified professionals and decent people.
In addition these incidents of 21 years ago have radically changed
the entire fabric of Sri Lankan society. From the top, right down to the
bottom, vertically, horizontally and entirely. Violence became a major
tool of socio-political behaviour in this country since then.
Violence has rulers, leaders and those who govern; and thereafter in
consequence many others have learned to use this tool of violence as a
form of resolution of all problems.
Sri Lanka has thereby become famous or rather infamous as one of the
world's most violent countries; All this in 21 years. As we know all
nations have great achievements which they are proud of, they also have
moments in their history which they need to be ashamed of.
Only very few nations seem to have had the courage or the right
leadership to accept the blame for their moments of shame. Some nations
have done this and have been able to put their past behind them and move
forward to becoming the world's most developed nations.
Many others like us have failed to look truth in the face, they have
failed for some reason which I do not comprehend; maybe the sociologists
and other types of researchers could tell us, tell us how to honestly
and truthfully look at what happened on that fateful day in Black July
1983, the reasons that led up to this and the consequences of that day.
I believe at 21 years, one is supposed to come of age, human beings
are said to come of age at 21 years. At least now I believe that we as a
nation and especially the Sri Lankan State should come of age, look the
truth in the face and make a national apology, first to all the victims
of that day in Black July and then beyond them to the entire Nation.
Perhaps it is the responsibility of the State and the Government to
engage in that exercise first and foremost, and then all of us as the
Nation, every citizen in this country should collectively accept the
blame and make that apology to all of you who are the representatives or
the direct victims of that violence, and through you to all the other
tens of thousands who suffered by those incidents.
I would like to assign to myself the necessary task on behalf of the
State of Sri Lanka, the Government and on behalf of all of us; all the
citizens of Sri Lanka to extend that apology. It is late but I think it
is still not too late.
There is one other country... well there are several others, but I
will only mention one, Germany, which also engaged in pogroms of this
type, though on a much more massive scale.
There was one man in that country who 61 years ago believed that he
could annihilate a whole community of people in order to resolve the
problems of his nation and the rest of the world. He is today called a
mad man, but he managed to annihilate six million Jewish people before
he could be stopped.
I thank God that it did not go that far in this little Island of
ours, also we don't have so many people, but I believe honestly that
what happened in 1983, the attitudes that led up to it, and the
consequences are similar to what Germany suffered in the 1930's and
40's.
We are still suffering the consequences of that day, 21 years later.
Germany managed to resolve it very soon after that particular regime was
done away with, and today they are marching forward as one of the worlds
fiercest most democratic and developed nations.
Maybe if all of us can collectively put behind us all the little
pettiness that has bound us in shackles, free ourselves from those many
and numerous hatreds, jealousies that make of us little men and women,
then I'm sure we could move forward towards working, living as one
nation in harmony, in a search for that very necessary unity within the
diversity that is Sri Lanka, the diverse ethnic communities, the diverse
religious communities, and various other social groups that live
together in this country.
Sri Lanka is not a new nation, we speak of a history of 2500 years,
but now we know that it goes back to more than 5,000 years according to
recent archaeological discoveries, maybe even more.
We are proud we have a civilization, one of the world's most
developed civilizations, that we have had a technology that was one of
the most advanced the world knew at that time, we can boast of the
flourishing of the arts that had been stupendous; but somewhere down the
line we lost our way and meandered off into all kinds of paths of
conflict, without a vision, without knowing where we want to go, and I
believe the cut-off point was the moment of Independence.
We fought for our Independence together; we had great Sinhala
leaders, great Tamil leaders, Muslim, Malay and Burgher leaders. Leaders
of all the religions who worked and fought together, cried and laughed
together, to achieve that freedom from the shackles of colonialism.
I do not venture to explain the whys and wherefores, the reasons and
causes of what divided us and how we became divided, I shall leave that
to the researchers and the scholars. I have also attempted to write many
things about this, but this is not the moment to make exposes.
All I wish is that we can all do collectively; all I would like to
ask you at this moment is that we put that unpleasant past of about 50
years or a little bit more behind us and attempt to move forward. I
honestly believe we can do this successfully, but for that once again I
would like to appeal to this entire nation.
We cannot forget, we cannot blind ourselves to the mistakes we have
made; we will have to accept collective guilt for the wrongs, and then
move forward.
When I say collective guilt I mean first the State of Sri Lanka for
the horrors they perpetrated upon one section of our peoples, 21 years
ago and at other lesser moments, but I also mean all the others on the
other side of the divide who have also used young children as suicide
bombers, and killed hundreds of people and caused much suffering to
other people.
They will have all kinds of justifications, they will say, we have
been wronged so therefore we must do the same thing. I do not think any
of the religious leaders here or anyone of us would accept those
excuses.
Those who use violence as a response to violence will have to
understand as the Buddha has said and many others, Jesus Christ and all
the other religious leaders, violence begets violence, it will never
resolve the problem.
It is only through understanding, love for each other, friendship and
most of all understanding of each other's problems and limitations that
we can understand what has bedeviled this nation for many decades.
We will have to move beyond the frontiers of our needs and our
selfish requirements of what we think we should have as leaders, we will
have to learn to think of our peoples, to forget ourselves, specially as
leaders before anybody else, and think what the majority of our people
need, even if we lose our positions of leadership, we will have to
resolve this problem for our peoples.
I hope on this day, and I know that all of you here would hope and
pray with me that all those who call themselves leaders, among the
Sinhalese, the Tamils, the Muslims, the Hindus and everybody else would
be able to reach at least for a brief moment that level of greatness
that is required of us mere humans, those of us who pretend to be
leaders to reach that greatness in order that we resolve this problem
for our peoples.
We are willing to do that, I hope all the others are also ready to do
that. I am sure the Government will receive the support from all the
citizens of this country, irrespective of who they are, or to what
community they belong, in this enterprise which is the most difficult,
the most challenging and the most dangerous any Government of this
country has undertaken. |