The Diaspora's obligations

In a manner which is admirable for its forthrightness President Mahinda Rajapaksa has called on the Diaspora to help in the development process in the North. 'Both the private sector and the Diaspora could play an active role in the North', the President pointed out.

He also mentioned, among other things, plans to establish an Expressway between Colombo and the North, which would enable the distance between the metropolis and Jaffna to be covered in just three hours.

Thus, it is evident that the state is ever willing to not only get on with the job of bringing prosperity to the North-East, but to also link hands with the Diaspora for the purpose of integrating it into the development drive of this country. In fact, the questions at issue here are not only those that may be termed bread and butter issues but the larger ones of nation-making and social cohesion and unity. If what has essentially happened over the past 60 or more years is the progressive alienation of sections of the Tamil community from the Lankan state, one of the things that are most needed now is a systematic programme to integrate these estranged sections with the Lankan state. In other words, the nation-making project has to be launched anew.

As we have time and again pointed out in this commentary, nation-building or nation-making essentially involves the adoption of constitutional and other means to unite the communities of this country into one indivisible collectivity or whole. It is up to the proposed Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to inquire into the issue of whether or not more constitutional and legal arrangements are necessary to accelerate this process of nation-building. Such measures could only be the outcome of deliberative processes of the kind the PSC is likely to undertake. Accordingly, they are matters for the future.

Meanwhile, practical measures should be undertaken to give nation-making a boost and the President's call to the Diaspora smacks strongly of such material means which could help considerably in fostering a sense of identity with the Lankan state among these sections which have been estranged from it.

These overtures by the President to the Diaspora are eminently practicable in that when the latter collaborate with the state in speeding-up development in the North, the result could very well be a sense of shared responsibility for the North among the relevant parties. The final positive outcome from such a partnership could be a strong sense of identity among the Diaspora with Sri Lanka.

We urge the Diaspora to strongly consider the President's call, in view of the foregoing, and to respond positively to it. Sri Lanka needs to begin from a clean slate and a harking back to the past and its estranging and alienating experiences would in no way help in the task of building a new Sri Lanka where the divisions of the past would not matter.

The challenge before those who have drawn away in a spirit of enmity from the Lankan state is to put the past entirely behind them and to cooperate in bringing about a new Sri Lanka where there would reign equality of condition and opportunity.

Instead of succumbing to the influence of the Tiger rump, those estranged sections of the Diaspora would do well to cooperate with the state in building a Sri Lanka which would be free of past tensions and divisions. This they would do, if they genuinely care for the Northern citizenry.

We call on all relevant parties to our issues to seek out more and more ways of cooperating in resolving them. From such efforts would come a unity of spirit among our communities and social groups. This is instrumental to the forging of a united polity.

All such undertakings need to be premised on the principle that Sri Lanka should find solutions to her problems independently. Let not any section succumb to the illusion that Sri Lanka's problems could be resolved by any foreign quarter. Such efforts could only lead to enslavement and not independence and national sovereignty.