Nation-building through reconciliation

The Commonwealth of Nations could be considered an epitome of that timeless principle of Unity in Diversity. The scores of countries that are coming together at the Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference (CPC) currently being conducted in Colombo, while being highly diverse in terms of ethnicity, culture, language, religion and other elements of plurality, are mainly democratic in political orientation and democracy could be seen as a principal commonality among them.

This coming together of a diversity of identities in the CPC is the appropriate backdrop, we feel, to ponder deeply on the importance of reconciliation and unity in nation-making. As we have time and again maintained, nation-building is unfinished business in Sri Lanka and many other developing countries and one could be glad that this issue is receiving the attention of no less a person than President Mahinda Rajapaksa. In fact, the President dwelt at length on reconciliation and nation-building in the course of his address at the inauguration of the CPC on Tuesday and we hope his thoughts would be a catalyst for in depth deliberations on the subject at the Commonwealth meet.

In the case of Sri Lanka, the time could not be considered more appropriate for a resumption of efforts at nation-making. To begin with, LTTE terror which proved one of the biggest impediments to nation-making has been wiped-out and the stage set for a possible meeting of minds on the issue. The parties could now deliberate on the question of bringing our communities together in a relatively calm atmosphere and we hope this would happen sooner rather than later. Besides, the political leadership of this country is now highly desirous of bringing our communities together and the political will could be considered as present to forge ahead with the undertaking.

Over the past decades, the endeavours were numerous in the direction of working out a political solution, between the state and the more moderate Parliamentary Tamil political parties, but they all ran aground as a result of irreconcilable positions and on account of opportunistic political forces undermining the process of arriving at a negotiated political solution. Moreover, with time, LTTE terror made the effort of working out a solution most difficult to carry out.

With the downing of terror, the conditions are seemingly just right to go ahead with finding a political solution to the conflict, but this process needs to evolve in a spirit of reconciliation and empathy because animosities and heartburn among the parties involved need to be defused and healed. Wrongs have to be righted and a sense of justice made to prevail in the country and we should evolve a broad-ranging comprehensive solution which would meet this every requirement.

Accordingly, we call on the state to convene the long promised Parliamentary Select Committee, for, on paper at least, this is the ideal forum to deliberate on a solution to the conflict. However, this process needs to be conducted in a spirit of understanding and compromise because in the absence of these factors a solution that is acceptable to all the relevant quarters cannot be arrived at.

This solution that we need to aim at, in fact, could lay the groundwork for nation-making because if the solution is found to be acceptable it could unite our communities as never before. As mentioned, nation-building is all about uniting our communities and the final solution could also act as the blueprint for nation-building, while resolving the conflict politically.

But the parties to the conflict need to forge ahead in a spirit of compromise and understanding, for reconciliation is made-up of these elements. Accordingly, we need to be of mature spirituality, it could be argued, for going ahead with nation-building. Political skills alone would not suffice because reconciliation is closely bound-up with spiritual development. This aspect of the matter too requires to be pondered upon.