Sri Lanka Phobia

Prof. P.A. de Silva Emeritus Professor University of Moratuwa

The European Community (EU) appears to be suffering from a terrible Phobia about Sri Lanka. Perhaps these people are knowledgeable only on the latest technological attainments of the West and not their own history of the not so distant past. It was just about 500 years back that a western nation came to this island in ships loaded with cannons. These were the Portuguese.

They asked for an ox skin sized piece of land for trading near the Colombo Harbour. The King of Kotte, who met these people with curiosity as they were the very first white men he had seen granted their request without hesitation, but these men are said to have stripped the ox skin to fine shreds and surrounded a land that was within the loop made by the threads.

The Kings of the East never changed their word. It was so in Lanka as well as in the Middle East. To prove this I give some poems, so that the westerners can memorize these if they have a memory. Now they only have RAM and ROM of several GB on chips and not the natural memory, that is why their thinking is distorted.

This poem is about an ancient happening in Persia the present Iran. The poem is titled Harmosan and the Caliph and written by R.C. Trench. Harmosan was a Persian General who did not surrender to the Caliph’s army.

Harmosan, the last and boldest the invader to defy,

Captive, overborne by numbers, they bring forth to die.

Then exclaimed the noble captive; “Lo, I perish in my thirst! Give me but one drink of water, and let then arrive the worst”

(I am omitting some lines here, he was given a cup on the orders of the Caliph)

In his hand he took the goblet; but awhile the draught forbore, Seeming doubtfully the purpose of the foe men to explore.

(Actually Harmosan thought that the goblet was poison, a way of killing in the past)

“But what fear’st thou” said the Caliph; is it friend a secret blow? Fear it not our gallant Moslem no such treacherous dealings know” “Thou may’st quench thy thirst securely, for thou shalt not die before.

Thou hast drunk that cup of water. This reprieve is thine no more”

(The goblet drops, and the water is in the sand, it is not clear what happens, perhaps a soldier’s spear. Now Harmosan speaks)

“Thou hast said that mine, my life is, till the water of that cup I have drained; then bid thy servants that spilled water gather up”

For a moment stood the Caliph as by doubtful passions stirred, Then exclaimed “Forever sacred must remain a Monarch’s word”

“Bring another cup, and straight away to the noble Persian give Drink I said before and perish; now I bid thee drink and live”

Our King of Kotte did the same and stood by his word of the Ox skin. But the cunning Portuguese later captured the entire western coast using their cannon power.

Emerson Tenant states clearly that what the Portuguese did in this island is a blot to Western Civilization. I feel their idea of civilization is wearing well tailored clothes complete with shoes and hats and doing the most despicable acts that man is capable of.

Such an incident is documented by E.M. Wilmot Buxton in Highroads of History Book VIII. After Sir Walter Raleigh’s trip to the American continent, a certain Ralph Lane was sent to establish a colony. He was well looked after by the Red Indians and even provided with food for some time. Later the Indians went inwards leaving the place for the settlers. Lane, a so-called Governor then plotted to kill the Indians. He asked the Indian chief to come for a conference with all his headmen. The well dressed Englishmen thought the partly clad civilized people who only spoke the truth and trusted fellow men were savages. Actually we must in this twenty first century recall these events and the UN should define who is a “savage’. Lane had a code word ready, this was the most barbarous thing he did. When all the unsuspecting Indians were well in to the conference room he shouted his code word ‘Christ our Victory’. All his armed men fell on the unarmed Indians and killed them all.

I would ask the EU members is this approved behavior, because the Indians were not Christians and therefore should be removed from the Earth. When these happened just 500 years back what right have they to talk about us, who have allowed all foreigners to come and go as they please.

The Japanese who kept away from all foreign interaction were forced to give up several ports to English and American warships in 1839. Perhaps when Japan also learned the arts of mass murder from the west they attacked Pearl Harbour. The Hiroshima Nagasaki Atom Bombs are glowing examples of English and American mass murders. So was what Hitler did to the Jews, perhaps millions of Jews, were killed or jailed. If we go further back into western history, the doings of the Duke of Marlborough against the French on their own land with the help of the German Prince Eugene is well known. Even the little scrap of paper on which the Duke of Marlborough wrote a note to his wife is preserved to this day.

I would like to add at least a few lines from the poem, the story of old Kasper and his Grand Children, Wilhelmine, and Petrkin. Kasper the old farmer tells the kids,

“But what they fought each other for,

I could not well make out”

But everybody said, quoth he

That “twas a famous victory

The reader can get the whole poem ‘After Blenhiem’ by R. Southey.

These were all wars by the westerners for domination over the others. We in Sri Lanka did not have a 30 year Civil War. What we had was a few terrorists worse than the Taliban who killed not only Sinhala and Muslims, but even the Tamils opposed to their fascist dictator Prabakaran. If an opposition party in a western country starts killing the ruling party members secretly or in the open, what will happen to their democracy. This is what happened in Sri Lanka, a determined leader President Mahinda Rajapaksa a man from the South, a part of the island that has always saved this land from the foreigners came forth and taught the world and the Colombo henchmen how to ‘Win wars and make Friends’.

He is our friend, not only of the Sinhala, the Tamils and the Muslims, the Buddhists, the Hindus, the Muslims and the Christians. He did not wage a war he liberated the country from the worst terrorist group in the world. Instead of appreciating his courage, if the west is trying to cripple our economy by keeping their GST+ (Ghosts of the Slain Terrorists) we have to tell them that we lived for seven years from 1970 to 1977 without any aid from anybody either eastern or western. We had a little rice and not even chilies for a pol sambol, but the country survived.

I would like the expatriates who are earning fabulous salaries abroad, who left this country, as Engineers, Doctors, Scientists, Economists, Planners and Lawyers to rise up to the occasion and save the country from the scheming traitors here and abroad. I make this appeal to all communities irrespective of race.