Lifting of the Emergency and
democratic vibrancy
A great weight will be lifted off the shoulders of the
citizenry of this country with the lifting of the prolonged
Emergency and President Mahinda Rajapaksa could not have made a
more correct decision for the country at this juncture. His
special announcement in Parliament yesterday on this issue could
not have come at a more correct time because it was yesterday
that the country's major political parties handed in their
nominations for the October 8 remaining Local Government
elections.
The holding of the Local Government polls in the country is
proof of Sri Lanka's democratic vibrancy and more solid proof of
this came with the conduct of such elections in parts of the
North a few weeks back. It should be noted that although the
Emergency was on at the time these polls were held in the North,
the majority of local bodies in the province were won by the TNA,
further establishing that the government was not at all inclined
to misuse or abuse its power for the purpose of winning at the
polls. Therefore, in a very importance sense, democracy was the
victor at the polls.
It also reflects well on the state that the decision on the
Emergency has been taken in the aftermath of some bouts of
public unrest in parts of the country. If, as sections within
the UNP claimed, the government was behind the unrest, with the
aim of prolonging the Emergency, a decision to end the state of
Emergency would never have been taken.
Now the inference is inescapable that critics of the
government have spoken out of turn on this issue.
Over the years, forms of democratic governance have
co-existed uneasily with Emergency rule in Sri Lanka. This is a
contradiction in terms because Emergency regulations have the
effect of containing democratic freedoms. Nevertheless, Sri
Lanka was compelled to live with this anomaly because the state
was duty-bound to fight the LTTE and to see and end to it. Now
that the latter task has been accomplished, there is really no
need to persist with Emergency rule.
Nevertheless, the Emergency could have been prolonged if the
concentration of power in the Executive Presidency and its
perpetuation was high on the President's governing agenda. Now
it is clear that this is not at all the case. The space, so to
speak, is wide open for the exercising of the full range of
democratic freedoms by the people.
That said, we are compelled to add that these freedoms must
be jealously guarded and judiciously used by the people. As
should be known, Emergency rule emerged in this country in a
major way with the outbreak of the conflict in July 1983. Since
then, except for a brief interval or two, Emergency rule has
been with us over the years. Therefore, it is up to the Lankan
polity to ensure that the Emergency would not be our lot in the
future.
The Emergency is best characterized as a necessary evil.
There are times in the life of a country when the state is
compelled to perceive that Emergency rule is necessary. A state
of lawlessness is one such instance, and July 1983, for
instance, offered sufficient grounds for the clamping of a state
of Emergency.
However, a state of Emergency must be the exception rather
than the rule in a country claiming democratic credentials.
Emergencies bring about a curtailing of democratic freedoms and
this state of affairs would not be in the best interests of the
people. A country thrives, materially and otherwise, only amid
democratic rule proper and this is the ideal all states must aim
at.
While the state must persist on the path of ushering durable
ethnic harmony, all the necessary assistance must be provided to
the government in this enterprise by the people. For instance,
the people need to help in strengthening the bonds of amity
among the communities of the land. Besides, the public needs to
conduct itself on the basis of democratic values at all times.
Eternal vigilance is the price of democracy. The people
cannot afford to forget this nugget of wisdom. Not only must all
kinds of elections be held according to democratic norms and
principles, relations among individuals and groups must be
forever nurtured by the values of tolerance, amity and goodwill
if hard-won freedoms are to last. |