The equitable development challenge

If at all the great tsunami tragedy of December 2004 drove home a message to Sri Lankans it was that they need to get together for purpose of nation-building. That is, they must strive together for national progress, sinking all differences.

The tragedy also contained a priceless opportunity for the Lankan State. This consisted in the avenue the debacle opened for the equitable rebuilding of Sri Lanka, casting aside regional differences, such as, North, South, East and West.

We now have the glad news, on the authority of President Mahinda Rajapakse, that the latter opportunity has been seized by the State, for the even-handed development of Sri Lanka, cutting across regional differences. The President was quoted telling UN Special Envoy for tsunami rebuilding, former US President Bill Clinton that post-tsunami reconstruction would be carried out equitably by the State in all regions of Sri Lanka.

This is a policy thrust which must be pursued with consistent vigour. The State needs to marshall all its resources and assets to develop all parts of the country on an accelerated basis and we welcome the creation of a new institution by the President for this purpose - the Reconstruction and Development Authority.

The success of this rebuilding effort depends on consistent hard work on the part of all involved in the project and we call for unrelenting exertions by them to take the initiative to fruition. The State should ensure continued dynamism in projects of this kind, for, grand plans only on paper would hardly be to the purpose.

The challenge posed by the LTTE is that the Lankan State should deliver justice to the Tamil people. What is essentially meant by this expression is that the State should deal with the Tamil community even - handedly. The development process, for instance, should be extended to cover the outlying regions of the land, including the North-East.

This is where the Lankan State failed in the past and to the extent to which it could undo this damage it would be able to integrate the North-East into the rest of the polity. Accordingly, the time's ripe to prove that the unequal development of the past would be a closed chapter in our socio-political history. Needless to say, this a prime challenge for the Mahinda Rajapakse administration.

In fact, the political demands emanating from the North-East, particularly in relation to regional autonomy, would decrease in severity in degree to which the essential needs of the people of the region are met by the centre. So, equitable development it must be if Sri Lanka is to prefigure for itself a future filled with hope.

This should be also a moment of profound soul-searching by all. The challenges facing us call for a high degree of magnanimity and caring on the part of all those making decisions in the public sphere.

Self-centredness on the part of communities and an inability to think and act in broad, universal terms on the part of governments have taken Sri Lanka on the path of conflict and war. This trend has to be completely reversed if we are to traverse the path of progress and equitable development. We need to build a Sri Lanka in which all our communities would be stake-holders.

The country should dwell long and deep on the words of former US President Bill Clinton: "Any recovery progress achieved this year will be quickly reversed if Sri Lanka returns to civil conflict." This is a statement which is profoundly true. We just cannot afford to get back to a state of war. This would wreck completely all our hopes of launching ourselves on the road to progress.

On the contrary, we need to work hard towards reviving the peace process and steadily advancing it. However, self-centredness and a lack of vision on the part of our communities could blight our future.