Gamini Dissanayake:

Liberal vs the arrogance of power

Lucien RAJAKARUNANAYAKE

With the end of the war with the LTTE so close behind us, it is inevitable to recall the brutality that took away the life of a man in the prime of life, with so many achievements behind him, and so much promise left in him of future success, both for him and the country.

The peace we have achieved today, with the defeat of terrorism, is also dedicated to the many who were the victims of that period of unbridled violence and savagery that battered our country and its entire people for nearly three decades; in addition to the troops who defeated terrorism militarily. Gamini Dissanayake stands out among those thousands of victims, as one who made his own major contribution to defeat the forces of terror, and had a vision of a new era of tolerance, understanding and harmony among the people of Sri Lanka.

Political career

Commitment, perception and foresight were qualities that dominated Gamini’s character and were seen throughout his political career, which officially began at age 28, but was preceded by association with politics in a family where his father was deeply involved in politics, too. His maturing in politics did not take long after his successful initiation to electoral politics from Nuwara Eliya at the request of Dudley Senanayake in 1970. He cut his teeth in parliamentary politics as a Member of the Opposition from 1970 to 1977, during which time he faced ouster through an election petition, made a resounding comeback through a by-election - that great test of public mood denied to us today and was a prominent member of a battered and weakened Opposition; facing an array of political giants across the floor of the House.

Cogent contributions

It did not take long for him to be recognized as a Parliamentarian, in the true sense of the word, with his skill in debate and repartee, the deep study of issues, and cogent contributions to discussions in the House. His opponents of the day, such as Dr. N. M. Perera, Dr. Colvin R de Silva, Pieter Kueneman, Bernard Soysa, and Felix Dias Bandaranaike, all of whom had both experience and exceptional skills in debate, were quick to recognize and respect Gamini’s acumen and readiness to be involved in the give and take of debate; while upholding the high standards of Parliamentary debate that prevailed at that time.

Gamini is most remembered today for the success he had in completing the Accelerated Mahaweli Diversion Scheme, telescoping a 30-year development project into a decade. The dams and reservoirs at Victoria, Kotmale and Maduru Oya and the many canals that take the precious waters of the Mahaweli to the rural cultivators of Raja Rata, remain thriving monuments to his memory.

At a time when there are many who rush to identify and name current personalities as the personifications of Mahasen, the great tank builder, Gamini Dissanayake would dwarf and make irrelevant many such persons, with the scope and scale of his achievements in what has been the traditional commitment of our rulers of the past; who built the massive irrigation works that still water the rice fields of Sri Lanka and are bringing us ever closer to the days of self-sufficiency in our staple food.

Recording his achievements in agriculture, irrigation and land development, would take much more than the scope of this piece written to mark the 15th anniversary of his tragic assassination.

Yet, the success he achieved demonstrated his commitment to a task, the readiness to accept the most formidable challenge, as well as his deep concern and understanding of the rural people of Sri Lanka and their many needs and aspirations.

Great work

He was not the politician who worked from the isolation of a city office, but moved with the people at every stage of this great work, oversaw the work being done and together with the excellent team he had brought together for this work, made many important corrections to original plans, that would prove to be vitally important to the overall success of the project.

Mahaweli project

Gamini Dissanayake was not content with the immediate success of construction work of the Mahaweli Diversion Scheme. He saw other areas of importance beyond irrigation, which led to establishing marketing facilities for Mahaweli Zone products, and programs for vocational training for youth in the Mahaweli areas. He was keen to see the emergence of a newly empowered rural sector in the country, which would be the greater driving force for the social changes that were needed in a post-colonial society; hopefully, the cradle of a modern Sri Lanka of unity in diversity, which he always believed in.

It is the liberal thinker in him, his constant touch with the world outside and the advances of thinking on social issues worldwide, which made him, see some of the downside of the Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme, too, and seek to address them without delay.

He was deeply conscious, and even worried, about the long-term environmental concerns of the Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme. The Maduru Oya National Park was not only for leisure and entertainment for the public, but to save nature, that was facing the many and heavy blows of accelerated development.

He had great concern about the adverse effects of rapid de-forestation in the Mahaweli project, especially its impact on wild elephant migration patterns.

It is this thinking that made him ponder on the necessity for a major re-forestation program in the Mahaweli areas and even beyond, which saw little encouragement from those he had to work with later. It was a concern that he gave much priority to, in his thinking in the new political challenges he took up, and later was trying to lead his party into, when tragedy struck in the form of an LTTE suicide killer, taking away the man and his even greater dreams for the future of Sri Lanka.

Plantation sector

Looking beyond the ambit of Land, Land Development and Mahaweli Development to which he gave of his best from 1977 to 1989, Gamini brought his eager mind and all energy to the plantation sector when he was placed in charge of that important sphere of the economy, by the later government in 1989.

His upbringing in Kotmale, close contact with the land and the rural peasantry, as well as the success he had in building the UNP’s plantation workers’ trade union, that came second only to the CWC in numbers, saw Gamini bring new insights into developing this sector that remained the biggest source of export earnings for the country.

Political thinking

It did not take him much time to understand the needs of the plantation workers and also the necessity to make the entire plantation sector more modern to bring greater benefits to its workers and the country, too.

But the political currents that prevailed at the time, with a presidency that saw it challenged by liberal thinking and successful delivery, combined with the insecurity caused by an unnecessary fear of the vulnerability of one’s own social class, stood in the way of the repetition of the success that Gamini had in the Mahaweli project in the plantations. Far from proceeding with his plans for the development of the plantation sector, Gamini saw him forced into the backbenches of Government.

Faced with powers that seemed insuperable at the time, Gamini tried to avoid confrontation at home, and saw instead the opportunity to expand his knowledge and better hone his liberal and modern political thinking. This took him to Cambridge to do development studies. His period of sojourn had not changed the politics in Sri Lanka for the better.

He returned to a society and political culture that was showing more of the arrogance of power, disguised in slogans for the common man; where ability was held in question and sycophancy replaced for capability. It was an increasingly divided society where the people’s voice had no place and media freedom was under great threat.

The events that followed were the challenges posed by him and others who believed in the need for a more democratic Sri Lanka. It saw the emergence of the Democratic United National Front (DUNF) which gave a new opening to liberal democracy, in a situation where the traditional opposition was weakened; with the then Left parties virtually eliminated and the SLFP of the day pushed largely into lethargy and inaction, exacerbated by infighting, and the Tamils virtually booted out of Parliament.

The violent politics of the time did not leave much time and room for the DUNF to take its message deeper into the country. The politics of assassination soon took the life of its leader Lalith Athulathmudali and in less than two weeks a sleeper cadre of the LTTE, ensconced in the home the President himself, saw to the brutal assassination of President Premadasa. With the violence of separatism raging in the country, Gamini returned to the fold of the UNP, to new battles within and shortly after emerging with the endorsement of his policies, assassins of the LTTE took his life too. The forces of terror had denied Sri Lanka an emerging leader of great promise.

It was the constant pursuit of the LTTE’s resolve to leave both the Sinhalese and Tamil people of the country leaderless in the face of its violent onslaught on democracy.

As we remember Gamini Dissanayake at the threshold of this new era of peace, with the key plotters of his assassination no more, it is important to recall his own contribution to peace in our country.

With his liberal thinking and understanding of real politik, he saw the necessity of India to any resolution to our own conflict.

Similarity of age and thinking, brought him and Rajiv Gandhi together and helped overcome the consequences of the adversarial position that J R Jayewardene had taken up against Indira Gandhi. While many still criticize the presence of the IPKF here, little is said of its success in cornering the LTTE, from which we could not fully benefit by President Premadasa’s resolve not only to order them out, but also to arm, fund and give material aid to the LTTE, against the IPKF as well as the Tamil National Army that its strategies helped build. As his strong opposition to the efforts by J R Jayewardene to strip the Civic Rights of Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike within that UNP Cabinet dominated by JRJ showed, Gamini was the constant liberal. He showed much more of the influence of Dudley Senanayake who brought him into politics and Neville Samarakoon in whose Chambers he apprenticed as a lawyer, than the authoritarian attitudes of JRJ, in whose Cabinet he served for so long.

As the Government moves to resettle the Internally Displaced Persons from the relief centres they have been forced into by the LTTE’s terror, there is more talk of a political settlement today. It is here that more is being said each day of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, with plus or minus arrangements, as a more acceptable solution. It will be to the lasting credit of Gamini Dissanayake that he was one who pursued with great vigour the enactment of the 13th Amendment, not because of the pressures of India, but because he knew of the need for a more lasting resolution of the ethnic question, changing from the belief in politics of confrontation that JRJ had almost fashioned his government into. The instances of such confrontation that Gamini was involved in will remain as part of the critique of his days.

But what we can cherish today is the much broader vision, which saw the enactment of Constitutional changes that would ensure a more pluralist and inclusive society, where the differences of ethnicity, creed and language will no more divide our people; but will rather make the colourful tapestry of unity in diversity, that was the ultimate goal of this son of Kotmale, whose life was snuffed out as he pointed to a new future for Sri Lanka.

Democracy in Sri Lanka is today poorer for the absence of Gamini Dissanayake, but it will always benefit from his commitment to the people of Sri Lanka both in development and liberal thinking.