How Can We Become A Credible Country?

By R.M.B Senanayake -September 16, 2013

R.M.B. Senanayake

We have challenged the UN Human Rights Commissioner about her statement that those who met her have been questioned by the Security Forces? Surely she made her statement on what was told to her by the people themselves? The Government denies it and wants the UN High Commissioner to give concrete evidence. Surely the world knows how journalists have disappeared or have been killed for writing anything which has displeased the powers that be. So the Government must do more than asking the High Commissioner to give concrete cases which would involve betraying the trust of the complainants when the credibility of the Government is at low ebb. How has the Government’s credibility eroded?

At the end of the war the Government first took up the position that there were no civilian casualties but later modified its stand to say a few thousands only were killed. It also took up the stand that the Army was engaged in a humanitarian rescue mission to save the civilians from the grip of the LTTE. Each time the Government changes its stand it loses credibility. Then there are the disappearances not only of the Tamils but also of the Sinhalese journalists who have migrated stating that they were under threat. There was the farce created regarding Ekneligoda.

We must become a predictable country with a credible government if we want the world to take what we say seriously. If we want the world to think of us well we must become a normal country like other normal countries in the world.

If we want to attract foreign capital, to attract foreign investors and achieve growth we need to be a normal predictable country where there are established procedures and where the Rule of Law prevails and where the Security Forces are confined to their role to defend the country against external enemies instead of spying on our own citizens and seeking to intimidate them. The Government has a big task before it and it involves changing the image of the country across the world.  The UN Office must be receiving complaints from citizens and from Human Rights organizations. The Government must honestly find out what the world thinks of it and the country not from the hurrah boys but from normal educated persons. Usually, being predictable is what is expected of any normal country. Our foreign embassies must be encouraged to report honestly how these countries see us- as a normal democratic country where people are free to go about their ordinary business or a country described in George Orwell’s 1984 where the people are spied upon, intimidated and disappear. The spying is done largely on the Tamil citizens but also on journalists and critics and members of the opposition. Can the military involvement in civilian activities be justified in the North? A distinction has to be drawn between the military engagement in                         Read More