Omanthai Checkpoint’s Challenge To National Unity And LLRC
Jehan Perera
The UN Human Rights Commissioner is visiting Sri Lanka during a time of peace, but it is indeed a fragile peace. This month alone saw two major breaches of the peace which are reflective of deep seated problems in the country’s governance. The army attack on the community level protestors at Weliveriya, and anti-Christian sentiment displayed, and the police inaction during the attack on a Muslim mosque in Colombo are still fresh in the mind of the general public and ethnic minorities in particular, even though a fortnight later most of the dust has cleared. The efforts by the opposition parties to highlight the flaws in governance, and the acts of violence by the state, have been sporadic and short lived due to their weakness. The weakness of the opposition and the ability of the government to co-opt or negate those who dissent are opposite sides of the same coin. The role of the international community continues to remain important in upholding human rights standards.
Just two days prior to the arrival in Sri Lanka of UN Human Rights Commissioner, Navanethem Pillay, the government implemented yet another one of the recommendations of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) by moving the Police Department out of the Ministry of Defence. It did so by creating a new Ministry of Law and Order which has been mandated to implement the Police Ordinance. The LLRC had said that “The Police Department is a civilian institution which is entrusted with the maintenance of law and order. Therefore it is desirable that the Police Department be de-linked from the institutions dealing with the armed forces which are responsible for the security of the State.” But indicative of continued resistance to a total de-linking, the government appointed a retired army general to be the Secretary to the new supposedly civilian-controlled Ministry.
The deployment of the police along with the military was not a recent phenomenon brought about by the present government but is a practice that has continued for many years. This may account for the resistance to de-militarising the country after the end of war. During the war, the police began to play an increasing para-military role on account of the need for more manpower to cope with the power of the LTTE. The period of the Ceasefire Agreement from 2002 onwards led to the creation of a short-lived Ministry of the Interior which was responsible for the police. But this ended when former President Chandrika Kumaratunga brought back the police under the Defence Ministry in 2004 so as to coordinate all the security forces under one unified command structure. The negative dimension of bringing the police under the Defence Ministry was that it was that it would be used as an adjunct to the military even in matters of preserving civil order and the two could be used interchangeably by the government.
Omanthai Eyesore
