Nationalism, National Anthem and the Constitution

by N. A. de S. Amaratunga

( March 10, 2016, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) One must understand what is meant by nationalism before one could understand the association between nationalism, the National Anthem and the Constitution. Nationalism is not racist; it is neither aggressive nor oppressive, on the contrary it is defensive and protective. It arises in the hearts of people who had built a civilization on the land that belongs to them and who would fight at the cost of their lives to protect it and defend it against all attempts to destroy, subjugate or dilute it. The important components of such a civilization would be the language, the religion, the culture and of course the land. Nationalism resides in the hearts of the people as the civilisational consciousness, and would come to the surface whenever their country is in peril.

The history of this country is the history of this consciousness, the history of the struggle of its people to protect their country, religion and language, their struggle against invasions from South India, Europe and the terror of Tamil separatists. At present the threat is as bad as ever with all of the three forces mentioned above joined in a major effort to destroy the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of our country. Each of the three forces mentioned above stand to gain by such action in different ways and are therefore working in conjunction. As in the past, it is the nationalism, the civilisational consciousness that has the strength to stand against this threat.

This nationalism by no means is anti minority, anti-Tamil or anti-Muslim. In fact, it would protect them whenever the need arises as has happened in the past. Sinhala kings have given protection to Muslims and Catholics when they were harassed by Portuguese and Christians respectively. The Tamils were looked after by the Sinhalese when they were subjected to attacks by goons of politicians. If this nationalism is discriminatory, the tremendous development seen in the North and the East would not have happened. In the year 2014, the household income in the district of Vavuniya was better than that in Kandy. Students in the North had recorded the best results at the GCE A Level exam. 65% had electricity. Roads were better than those in some parts of Kandy. Unemployment figures in the North and the East were comparable to the rest of the country. All this achievement would not have been possible if Sinhala nationalism had been discriminatory or racist. These achievements were gained during the time of the previous government, which is often castigated as racist. The Sinhalese had sacrificed a lot to make this possible, for, if the LTTE had not been defeated this development would not have been possible.

Therefore, Sinhala Nationalism is important not only for the Sinhalese but for everybody who inhabits this land. If it is destroyed, subjugated or diluted the country as a whole would suffer, may come under the yoke of foreign powers, we could be a subject nation once again and our country may even be divided.

There would be no peace, no reconciliation, no economic development and our resources would be exploited by foreign powers. This is what the western powers want to do in this country and we would be playing into their hands if we collude with them in any way. Our government seems to be doing just that. They have co-sponsored a UN resolution designed to erode into our sovereignty and independence and have agreed to do almost everything they want us to do, in the area of security, economy, judiciary, police, constitution, devolution of political power etc. It is nationalism that could stand against this onslaught and protect everybody who lives in this country.

The National Anthem is a symbol of this nationalism, and those with ulterior motives who want to dilute and destroy it would attack the symbols and make them meaningless. Thus, it was sung in Tamil at the last National Day Celebrations. The government is obliged to do the bidding of the western powers and also placate the separatists who are in cahoots with the west. To cover up their servile attitude to the West, the government likes to claim that they have established friendly relations with all the countries in the world. Prof. Carlo Fonseka says Belgium is a unitary state, but its national anthem is sung in two languages (The Island – 04.03.2016). This is not correct. Belgium was made a federal state in 1993.

Before that it existed as two language states. Their national anthem was sung in the language of the State in which it happened to be sung, and not in both languages at the same time. Belgium is in danger of being soon partitioned. Sri Lanka seems to have entered the path that Belgium followed step by step.

The Constitution of a country must be designed to safeguard its independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity. A constitution which does not give due regard to the fact that nationalism and civilisational consciousness is essential for the protection of independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity is not worth its salt, and could only pave the way for dominance and subjugation of the country by foreign powers. The symbols of this nationalism are clearly defined in the Constitution of all countries which have a written constitution and one important symbol is the national anthem. This symbol must be very important to deserve mention in the Constitution. To sing it in any language other than Sinhala is a violation of the Constitution, and what is worse it is a weakening of the protective function of the country’s nationalism.