Biggest challenge, bringing communities closer - Vasudeva

Nethali STRUYS

The biggest challenge is to bring the communities closer to one another to facilitate a better understanding among all communities in Sri Lanka, said National Languages and Social Integration Minister Vasudeva Nanayakkara. The minister said so during his recent visit to the Sri Lankan embassy in Paris on July 5.

He said that this has to be done through the implementation of the bilingual national languages policy and ultimately by facilitating communication among people which gives access to emotions as well as sensitivity.

The minister said: "In a sense, the real ending of war has not perhaps yet been reached. The implementation of the national languages policy of using both Sinhala and Tamil languages is a crucial goal in the current post-war context. This policy strives to bring together all communities with better understanding and closer cooperation. The promotion of cultural pluralism is a major challenge. In this regard much has to be done to normalize the country." Nanayakkara said to demonstrate that we are prepared to offer such a commitment is a way of enabling diverse communities to feel that their dignity can be expressed and is recognized.

"The perceived exclusion of certain communities in the social dimension and the unavoidable byproduct of war needs to be addressed immediately," the minister said.

The minister highlighted the importance of initiatives being taken by both state and civic levels for the actual task of gathering communities around intercultural activities and understanding each others languages and cultural life.He pointed out that the current governance of former conflict areas need to be discussed, debated and reconfigured on current issues with the government and the representatives of communities. Continuous dialogue is therefore needed to come to an acceptable solution, Nanayakkara said.

Nanayakkara said as National Languages Minister, he believes that building social infrastructure will prepare people for the ultimate accomplishment which is integration on the basis of equality and not the dominance of any community over any other.

Following the interactive discussion, Minister Nanayakkara distributed both Sinhala and Tamil text books to the representatives of the language teaching Sri Lankan associations in France.