Moving forward: an assessment of ongoing initiatives

Continued from yesterday

Text of a lecture by Prof Rajiva Wijesinha MP, adviser on reconciliation to the President given at the panel discussion on reconciliation arranged by the Consortium of Humanitarian Agencies’ Reconciliation and Development for Peace Section on December 15

Later, when the West decided to fight the Cold War through dictatorial regimes, ranging from the Shah in Iran to Mobutu in the Congo, they found that vice brings its own punishment. I hope it is that perception that prompts the present, not entirely perfect, but still better, allegiance to democratic practice.

How then have we done, in terms of this model of Reconciliation, which so clearly worked? We have certainly put in place our own Marshall Plan, in terms of the massive infrastructural development that has been brought to the North. Unfortunately, with what I have come to think of as its customary incompetence as far as telling its story goes, government has not made clear what it has done in this regard. There is a perception that everyone knows, but that is simply not good enough.

I would also go further. I think one puts things on record not only for others to know, but also for oneself. Clear accounts of what has been achieved, set in context, also help one to see what more needs to be done. Thus, while every time I travel to the North I am impressed by the building that has taken place, the commerce that flourishes, the re-establishment of administrative structures, I can also see shortcomings that greater transparency might have avoided.

Rural areas

In terms of what some might think my own characteristic obsession, but which I have good reason to believe is a prerequisite for development, we have not done enough about providing teachers in essential subjects in rural areas, to go with the very attractive schools that have been set up. I was pleased, even a couple of weeks back, to see that we are delivering very thoroughly the services that we continued to provide even during Tiger times, books and uniforms, which sometimes served no purpose in those days when the Tigers saw the vast majority of schoolchildren as cannon fodder rather than assets to be nurtured and developed. But though our intentions are much better, we must make sure that the English books I noticed awaiting distribution are actually taught effectively.

Another area in which we should do better is coherent planning with regard to what is provided. I am sure much is done, and perhaps the shortcomings I noticed are exceptional, but better systems of accountability would ensure that they are overcome. An example that struck me as particularly unfortunate is the road going up from Mannar to Jaffna. There was much fanfare over the construction of this, and the bridge at Sangupiddy, but I found the road almost impassable. The bridge is certainly marvelous but on either side, in the Jaffna peninsula as well as on the mainland, travel is painfully slow, painful being the operative word.

Cultural triangle

My own view, given the speed with which much was done in the North initially by the forces, was that this road too should have been entrusted to the army. Unfortunately what I can only describe as a pernicious effort to perpetuate a conflict mentality has led to diffidence on the part of government in deploying the army in some areas where its efficiency would considerably benefit the population. I believe too that a model whereby soldiers worked together with those who need work would assist considerably with Reconciliation. My view, that people establish lasting relationships when they play together and work together, has led to efforts to encourage project work as a component of the many educational exchanges that are taking place.

It occurred to me then that the same principle should apply to adults, working together on a project that would benefit the community which contributes its labour, on the basis of course of equal remuneration.

Reflecting on this I realized that one major problem we face in Sri Lanka is our failure to lay down a clear agenda for the North and the role of external assistance in this. We seem to be stuck still in the mode of humanitarian assistance, whereas by 2010 we should have made it clear that what we wanted was development assistance. I was astonished thus to find that the UN was complaining recently that it had not been able to collect enough funding for food distribution. We should not be engaged still in food distribution, but should rather be concentrating our efforts on cash for work in line with the programmes the World Food Programme engaged in when it first came to Sri Lanka, assisting with the restoration of the Cultural Triangle. The workers obviously benefited, but so did the country, and those who took part in the construction had a sense of pride in what they had achieved.

I believe what I term the old UN, the agencies that should be flourishing in a country like Sri Lanka, the ILO and FAO and WHO, along with that splendid American invention when they could not cope with a democratic United Nations, the IOM, should be at the forefront of support for government efforts in the North, as indeed elsewhere in the country. UNHCR of course has a role with regard to the refugees now in India who wish to come back, and we should never forget its seminal contribution to the services proferred to the Internally Displaced in 2009 and thereafter, but its confusion about its role now is what has contributed to the current effort to suggest, confusing what are called old IDPs with new ones, that there are a few hundreds of thousands still not resettled. Fortunately recently efforts have been made to introduce some clarity into the notion of tens of thousands of IDPs still with host families, and I hope those myths can soon be laid to rest, but this should have been done many months ago.

Welfare Centres

We ourselves sadly failed to keep careful track of what were termed old IDPs, and are now faced with allegations that are totally misleading, in part because of the sterling and concentrated effort to resettle the new IDPs.

That, I should note, required great devotion, in particular with regard to demining which was mainly done by the army, much more quickly than in similar situations elsewhere in the world, and more efficiently, I should add, given recent casualty figures because of mine related incidents, in comparison for instance with the Jaffna Peninsula where demining by international agencies took aeons while the conflict was in progress.

Incidentally the success with regard to resettlement of the new IDPs confirms how sensible government was not to permit free movement from the Welfare Centres initially. We used to point out then that there were three reasons for this, namely the need to demine, the need to ensure basic facilities before resettlement, and of course security considerations. But I can see a fourth too, namely the tendency of those for whom life is difficult in their places of origin to stay on in refugee centres, find work, and also enjoy free lodging and food for a long period of time. As it is, the manner in which almost all areas in the North are now developing, with substantial populations in place, is a tribute to the policy of ensuring rapid resettlement rather than allowing displacement to continue for years, as unfortunately proved unavoidable in Sri Lanka when the LTTE was in control of substantial areas.

To complicate matters, given the internationalization of the conflict and efforts to resolve it during the early part of the last decade, the habit has developed amongst some development partners of asserting principles that have no basis in law or custom. Most recently these efforts have crystaliized around efforts to limit military involvement in reconstruction. Various pronouncements are made on the basis of what is termed humanitarian practice in a conflict situation, when Sri Lanka is not in a conflict situation and needs developmental assistance rather than handouts. I am reminded of the effort three years ago to create a role for what was termed the Inter Agency Standing Committee, which the then head of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance claimed was set up in accordance with accepted UN principles. Unfortunately for her I had actually read up the relevant documents, which she had not anticipated since I gather it is not the practice of most officials dealing with the UN and INGOs to study the principles on which they are supposed to act.

I was able however to show her that the IASC as it functioned in Sri Lanka was nothing like the IASC as proposed by the UN body that had discussed the concept, and that in any case that concept was a suggestion that had not been formally proposed and that Sri Lanka had not accepted.

I should add that those in the Foreign Ministry I tried initially to explain this to had no idea of the IASC and no idea of how to deal with it, except the classic double edged sword that Sri Lankan officials used with such disastrous consequences, either accepting blindly whatever the West proposes, or else objecting doggedly to even well meant suggestions. Fortunately, the situation being serious three years ago, they were prepared to listen to a serious detailed exposition of the actual situation, and accepted the point I made in that regard.

That was the end of the IASC which had previously made grandiose pronouncements as though, to use the preposterous phrase the EU had coined for what they termed Modes of Operations, they held the balance between the elected government and a terrorist group.

When I pointed that out, the Modes of Operation were forgotten, though there was a last ditch effort by the then Canadian High Commissioner, whose writ still seems to run in Ottawa, to resurrect it.

I suppose all this was what led OCHA then to tell me that I had won, though I had to point out that this was emphatically not the case, given my affinity with RAB Butler who always played the game and always lost it. In fact we have continued to be patronized outrageously. All I had achieved, in terms of the mandate of the Ministry of which I was Secretary, to coordinate humanitarian assistance, was the acknowledgment that government was in charge and aid programmes had to be developed in collaboration with relevant Ministries, and monitored by them.

The acknowledgment in fact meant nothing, without careful monitoring, and since we were not capable of that, most aid agencies continued to do what they wanted, producing occasionally reports that were never read so that they could get away with whatever they wanted. And the IASC was replaced by the Coffee Club, led by the more critical of the International NGOs, which continued to make extravagant claims for its members and trot out what they claim are IASC guidelines without checking on their validity or relevance.

Sadly, with the abolition of our ministry, and the movement into development mode, which was of course essential, we did not ensure that structures were in place to ensure compliance with national plans in the development and implementation of aid projects. Thus we find now the old hoary devils being resurrected and no idea in government, with its lack of institutional memory, of how to point out the illogicality and impropriety of claims now being advanced.

So we find that the Paris Principles with regard to aid, developed with such fanfare some years back, when the world was more balanced, have been totally disregarded in this particular area, though I should note that more principled nations such as India and Japan have been a welcome exception to this, with their understanding of how a democratic society should actually function.

I should add though, in fairness to OCHA, that one of its more perceptive officials told me, just before he left, that he felt OCHA had made a mistake in Sri Lanka. Most of its employees, he said, had experience of working in Africa where often the writ of government did not run, and they had thought Sri Lanka was like that. This, I suspect, to give them the benefit of the doubt, was why they had assumed an inflated idea of their own role.

My own view was that was not their fault, and we ourselves should have made the position clear, whilst expressing appreciation of their work at a time of crisis. However, when I told the Head of OCHA in 2009 that I assumed they would leave by the end of 2010, they did not demur. That they are still around, and still making plans without adequate consultation of government, is our fault.

The failure of government to have proper planning meetings when ministers and ministries change, and make provision for continuity and informed understanding of existing situations, will however continue to plague us, given the breakdown of administrative principles, which results in dedicated individuals having to work twice as hard as they need to, with no awareness of the context in which they have to perform.

Concluded