No release from militarisation: soldiers get involved at Keppapulavu temple

01Jan 2018

Sri Lankan soldiers were heavily involved in new year rites held by villagers at the newly released Keppapulavu Pillaiyaar temple.

Owners of recently released land at Keppapulavu and Seeniyamottai who were allowed to view their lands for the first time today held a service at the Pillaiyaar temple which had also just been released from occupation.

Soldiers from the Keppapulavu camp were heavily involved with the service, as well as engaging in surveillance of the landowners that were viewing their lands.

"We protested for almost a year for the army to leave our lands and our village, yet it seems they are still going to interfere in everything," one resident said.

Related Articles: 

29 December 2017 : No access to land for Keppapulavu residents despite military fanfare over release

30 December 2017 : More militarisation in Jaffna over Christmas

29 December 2017 : Sri Lankan troops involved in temple festival at Trincomalee

28 December 2017 : A militarised Christmas in Amparai

Opposition to Jaffna funeral shows need to promote plural ethos 

BY Jehan Perera-January 1, 2018, 6:28 pm

The recent divergence of opinion over the public funeral of a Buddhist monk who had been the chief incumbent of the Buddhist temple in Jaffna is an unfortunate example of the need for greater sensitivity, consultation and dialogue in situations of ethnic contestation. The Ven Meegahajandure Gnanaratana had been the chief incumbent of the Buddhist temple in Jaffna since 1991. He was also the chief monk for the Northern Province. The Naga Vihara temple in Jaffna is an important religious site. It is the first place of visit of Buddhist pilgrims from the south of the country who come to Jaffna on pilgrimage to other sites of historical antiquity, including the islet of Nainativu where the Nagadeepa temple is located which traditions states the Buddha himself visited. The Naga Vihara temple is also the main Buddhist temple for military personnel stationed in Jaffna.

Accordingly when the venerable monk passed away it was deemed fitting that his funeral should take place in Jaffna and not in his hometown in the south of the country. Tradition dictated that his funeral would be a public one in a public place. In the Sinhalese Buddhist tradition, when an important monk passes away, it is common to have a public funeral in a public place to enable a maximum number of people to attend it. This confers merit on all concerned. Public places where these funerals take place include parks and school grounds depending on the availability of such places. Independence Square in Colombo, which is near to sports grounds and shopping complexes, is one of the places where public funerals have taken place. But in Jaffna, in which there are hardly any Sinhalese civilians living as residents, this tradition became a matter of controversy and subject to much suspicion and speculation.

The venerable monk’s cremation in Jaffna was opposed for several reasons including being in a location adjacent to a memorial for Tamil victims of a 1974 assault by police and a Hindu temple. A group of 12 Jaffna-based lawyers filed action in the Jaffna Magistrate's Court to disallow the cremation of the monk in the location that had been selected. They claimed that cremating of bodies could be harmful to the environment, and that no permission had been obtained from the Jaffna Municipal Council. In addition, concern was expressed that holding the funeral in that location would be a pretext for building a monument in the monk’s name and furthering that attempt at domination. However, after inquiry the judge decided that the land was government land belonging to the Archaeology Department and that the funeral could take place.

MILITARY ROLE

When there is ethnic contestation, different views may prevail as to the suitability of the funeral venue just as much as it would in the case of more directly political issues. In the Tamil tradition funerals of religious clergy usually take place at cemeteries rather than in public spaces. Therefore the public funeral of the venerable monk in a public space became seen by opinion formers in Jaffna as another effort at demonstrating Sinhalese domination over Jaffna. The funeral itself took place with high level participation of the military, including the army commander who had a long period of service in Jaffna in different capacities, including commander of all security forces. With the resident Sinhalese population in Jaffna being negligible most of those who attended the funeral were from the military. This added to the northern perception that the funeral was meant to assert Sinhalese domination over Tamils and further inflamed their opposition to it. Usually it is the lay faithful of the temple together with the monks in the temple who make the arrangements for a funeral of a monk. But in this case in this was not possible. Due to the war nearly all the Sinhalese who resided in Jaffna had left with hardly any returning. This prevented the normal course of making the funeral arrangements and this role was taken over by the military.

The military in the north seeks to win the hearts and minds of the people by engaging in social service and by undertaking development projects. This is strongly criticized by political activists from Tamil civil society and also by politicians as part of a government strategy to weaken Tamil nationalism. However, a few days before the controversy over the funeral arose, the army had organized a food festival in Jaffna. This was appreciated by the general population who got an opportunity to savour different types of food at reasonable prices. On the other hand, the continued presence of large numbers of military personnel in Jaffna and in the north is a source of much heartburn to the Tamil people who see them primarily as an alien force meant to subdue them and deny them their aspirations. The army was deployed as early as the 1960s to keep Tamil nationalism in check and prevent it from mobilizing in protest against Sinhalese dominated government rule.

This history of the usage of the military to resolve problems arising from ethnic politics has made it politically strategic to those who have political aspirations to demand the withdrawal of the military and to gain political support as a result. The funeral of the venerable monk provided such an opportunity to those who hold nationalist positions. Many of those who took up stances in opposition to the funeral of the monk were those who engage in the politics of confrontation with the government. One northern political leader said: "On the one hand, they talk about reconciliation while on the other hand they proceed with creating divisions, which is not acceptable. Tamils have no qualms about the cremation of the deceased Buddhist monk taking place in their territory, but the venue for such cremation should have been carefully selected after the concerns of the people have been carefully weighed."

INSUFFICIENT CONSULTATION

One key problem in Jaffna that led to the tension over the venerable monk’s funeral is that there was insufficient dialogue and consultation on both sides. On the side of the government there was the need to discuss the issue of the venue with the municipal authorities and the provincial council. They may have offered better options for the place where the funeral could have been held. The government could also have sought to discuss with the civil society. The verdict at recent elections has shown that the people of Jaffna have opted for cooperation with the government as their preferred way forward. The power of the government is a reality that people who live in all parts of the country realize, and accommodate themselves to. The politics of confrontation which reached their height under the LTTE led to much loss rather than to the anticipated victory and separation.

In Jaffna there are several inter-religious committees and groups. The deceased monk’s assistant monk the Ven Meegahajandure Sirivimala, from the same ancestral village as his mentor, has shown himself to be both liberal and conscious about the need to engage with those of other religions and has been an active member of inter-religious committees. These inter religious committees could have been invited to take the lead in organizing the funeral ceremonies. If this had been done there would have been a section of civil society that could have advised the other section that the public funeral was part of Sinhalese Buddhist culture and not another crude attempt to dominate the north. In addition, the military role could have been subordinated to the civilian, as is necessary in a democracy.

Sri Lanka needs to aim to be a pluralist society, in which no one community can lay claim to territory as theirs, and the others are in second place. In this regard Colombo city has a positive practice of permitting religious processions that block traffic for hours to take place, which are open to all religions. This is the way it should be in all parts of the country, in recognition of its multi-religious, multi-ethnic and plural nature.

Sri Lanka’s wait for Godot

2017-12-27

Sri Lanka’s perennial quest for national leadership continues. Of late it has assumed proportions bordering on desperation. 
So many figureheads who promised Lee Quan Yew or Fidel Castro type leadership have ended up Marcos or Najeeb type. Our neighbour India invokes our envy in terms of their fortune to be blessed by Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi.
We encounter political leaders and not national leaders by any stretch of the imagination. When one finds a rare strand of liberal mindedness in one leader, he turns out to be without political resoluteness. When another has that, all traits of bad governance negate the positive.
Moderate leaders are without backbone, while those inclined towards extremes lack integrity and competence.

The illusory messiah

So the Messiah we have been waiting for is still illusory; it does not come in one package.
The removal of competent political leadership from the national political arena due to violence in past decades surely depleted the pool of leaders such as Wijeweera, Premadasa, Lalith and Gamini.
What was left is second string, perhaps with the exception of Ranil Wickremesinghe. Even then, he too exhibits a frustrating trait of irresoluteness in matters of dire importance.
Why are we incapable of producing Mandelas or Ho Chi Minhs? For that matter, why can’t we produce a Macron? It is not easy to answer the question, yet one worth scratching our heads over for an answer.
I think Lenin nailed in on the head in saying that people got the leaders they deserved! Surely, do not the citizenry of this island deserve better than what they have been dished out since independence?
After all are we not better than most of the developing countries in so many aspects such as literacy, GDP, human rights etc. ? Should not that progress translate into and be reflected in our national politics? On the other hand, can our politicians and their brand of politics, be termed national in the first place?
We are unable to think nationally; our horizons never reached beyond the individual at worst and caste, creed and race at best. We think we are better than our neighbours in the sense that we are more refined, globally oriented, and cosmopolitan. Yet it is a self-deception at best.

"Sri Lanka’s perennial quest for national leadership continues. Of late it has assumed proportions bordering on desperation."

A nation split in two

Ever since independence we have been divided into two main political blocs; namely the United National Party (UNP )and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and their insignificant pillion-rider parties in terms of regime-making.
For some time there was a lamentation that party politics should be shelved for national progress, which did not come to any fruition when the nation needed it most.
The civil war with the LTTE never saw the two main parties coming together. Any attempt to salvage the situation without going for all out war, as it eventually did, has been thwarted by either of the main parties in opposition ever since independence.
The Dudley-Chelva Pact, Banda-Chelva Pact, the 13th Amendment and the proposed Constitution were glaring instances that show our incapability of having national level leadership even in crucial matters of importance.
But the biggest disappointment today is not that we failed then, but that we failed to learn from them. For the first time in our election history we are confronted with a situation with possibly two years to go for the next presidential or as it might turn out, premiership election, with neither of the two main parties having a clear-cut nominee for national leadership. While during the MR regime, although the UNP was all at sea until the last moment in deciding who their champion was, which they decided ultimately in favour of common candidates, there was not an iota of a doubt that it would be Mahinda from the ruling alliance.
Even prior to that there has never been this type of uncertainty or suspense as to who would represent the main political alliances at the final bout at the ring.
The Joint Opposition (JO), despite the bravado, lacks sufficient clout to go it all alone and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), despite salutary achievements in terms of their public regard does not seem to produce that type of leader of late.

"We are unable to think nationally; our horizons never reached beyond the individual at worst and caste, creed and race at best. We think we are better than our neighbours in the sense that we are more refined, globally oriented, and cosmopolitan. Yet it is
 a self-deception at best."

 The TNA umbrella has mature and competent figures yet the racial factor makes short work of any serious national leader emerging from that quarter.The traditional Left is left with no choice but to play bride’s maid to, either Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) 
or JO.

Second level leadership

Sub-tiers of governance such as Provincial Councils and Regional Councils are hardly the nurseries to look out for budding national leaders. Instead, they are breeding grounds for scoundrels and rogues who are there to have their scoop of the porridge under the aegis of one or another demi-god at the top level.
These forums are teeming with the kith and kin of the top politicians , thus sealing off the opportunity for young and talented leaders to ascend the ladder of political prominence, thus depriving Mother Lanka of a pool of talent to draw from.
When one looks at the J.R. Jayewardene era, one sees the second tier leadership consisted of politicians of no less the calibre of R. Premadasa, Gamini Dissanayake and Lalith Athulathmudali.
Now there is talk about individuals without prominent political affiliations aspiring to contest at the next election for national leadership.
Nagahananda Kodituwakku, a fearless and a progressive activist and a legal practitioner, has made it known that he would be going at it.

"When one looks at the J.R. Jayewardene era, the second string leadership consisted of politicians of no less the calibre of Premadasa, Gamini and Lalith."

Rohan Pallewatte, who is a successful businessman, also says that he possesses a unique plan and a team, for the country’s future.
If one wants to be pessimistic about these types of challengers, they can reiterate the obvious-that they lacked the political backing and the popular support to topple professional well-rooted politicos.
But France’s Macron gives us potential for optimism and a direction to look forward to.
Yet, still there is no need to overlook and totally write off the traditional contenders that each party or political block might offer for the bargain.
The Yahapalanaya Government will eventually have to face the obvious dilemma of whether they are going to go separate ways at the 2020 show-down with their own candidates.
The upcoming Local Government polls would be a good litmus test of their political worth and will be an eye opener for all.

"Let us hope, as we start a new year and a crucial one at that, that we too will receive a messiah, who will deliver us from the quagmire that we have been in since independence and lead us as a nation. "

JVP almost, but not quite

When the JVP asks the constituency to hand them over the village (Gama Deela Balamu) they are making a valid point and an ethical challenge to the voter.

Yet, whether they could have the same confidence and perhaps the audacity to ask for the country, itself, is uncertain.

In all likelihood it might not be in 2020 itself. Given such a situation it is unlikely that anything that would augur well could come out other than from the SLFP or the UNP, the main constituents of the Good Governance brand.

Anything that comes out from those stables, the way things are positioned now, does not promise much for the country.

With the ultra Sinhala-Buddhist right, although fringe in terms of popular backing, dominant in terms of vociferousness and their ability to hijack the majority on the chauvinistic susceptibilities they display time and again, the JO is certainly not the stable from which  a horse, who can run the race of the nation, economically, politically and ethically could be released.

In fact a lot will depend on a number of criminal cases of murder, abduction, bribery that are pending against most of the front-line faces of that bandwagon.

Let us hope, as we start a new year and a crucial one at that, that we too will receive a messiah, who will deliver us from the quagmire that we have been in since independence and lead us as a nation.  

2018 – The Year Of Opposite Truths

By Sarath de Alwis –January 1, 2018

“Your beliefs become your thoughts, your thoughts become your words, your words become your actions, your actions become your habits, your habits become your values, your values become your destiny.”  ~ Mahathma Gandhi 

The opposite of a truthful statement is a false statement. In exceptional instances, the opposite of a profoundly truthful statement is another profoundly truthful statement.

President Sirisena’s recent statement that politics of this country is corrupt is a truthful statement. The opposite of that statement which is equally profound and truthful is that he is either incapable of doing anything about it or he will do nothing about it.

Minister S.B. Dissanayake was thepick of the President to address the candidates of the SLFP and the UPFA on contemporary political climateat the Sugathadasa Stadium. His homily on corruption was a masterpiece of distilled gimmickry and mediocre inanities. The other clean leader picked to administer the oath of ethical politics to candidates contesting local government elections was Minister Susil Premjayanth.

Indeed, they are master manifestations of our mechanics of governance. They epitomize the rewards of our political discourse.Wealth without work. Pleasure without conscience. Knowledge without character. Commerce without morality.

The President has the report of the Bond Commission. We are yet to be told what he proposes to do with it. If President Sirisena takes good governance, accountability and transparency beyond their slogan value in his now routine sermonizing,he should release it to the press and the public.

In Athenian democracy all citizens were participants in the democratic process. Slaves and serfs were spectators. In modern democracy, universal citizenship has made us slaves to the process. Now we are anxious spectators awaiting to know about Sovereign Bonds and Ranil’s sovereign right to pick the governor of the central bank.

We will learn of the contents of the Bond Commission when our Good Governance President decides to share its findings with ‘we the people’. Till then we must wait.

Just now, President Sirisena has more important matters in his mind. To remain credible in 2018, he must make a decent performance in the local government elections in February.

He must beat the ‘Pohottu Platoon’ to become the undisputed leader of the SLFP. Till he does that convincingly, his flock will remain fickle pilgrims at his shrine and pragmatic pagans performing their totemic dance round Mahinda Rajapaksa’s ancestral mausoleum that Gota built in a civil transaction with a statutory body. Nudging them on are the senior SLFPers – Susil Premjayanth and John Seneviratne.

He must also lead the SLFP to some substantial gains at the local government elections at the expense of the UNP. The appointment of the Bond Commission was a pivotal event.

It transformed the relationship between the common candidate and the UNP the principal party that backed the common candidate. The accessory to the victory of 8^th January 2015 has become the UNP’s distinct adversary by 1^st January 2018.

In the last week of December President Sirisena made two significant statements.Both were historically defining and politically pivotal in the year 2018.

He rebranded the SLFP. He replaced Mahinda ‘Chinthnaya’ with his ‘Nidhase Sammuthiya’ – ‘Freedom Compact’. A clever stratagem in political communication.

At the launch, President Maithripala Sirisena drew a parallel between himself and Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita. He stressed on the righteous neutrality of the sword of Krishna. The choice of the Gita allegory was ironic. In the Gita Krishna asserts that, when dharma declines and the purpose of life is forgotten he manifest himself on earth. In every age his task is to protect the good, to destroy evil, and to reestablish dharma. The President warned “Mage Kaduwata Kawuru Kapeida Mama Danne Nehe.”

In the original Gita the line is followed by another ironic parallel. “All paths, Arjuna, lead to me.”

In the latter event, Presidential pronouncements were more biting. Essential rules of shadowboxing were observed, but the phantom enemy was less disguised.

“Politics of this country is corrupt. The SLFP led UPFA under my leadership would usher in an era of clean politics. The leadership of the SLFP would not be bequeathed to a member of my family. The mantle of SLFP leadership awaits to be earned by a bright, knowledgeable, enterprising young person who is amongst those present at this gathering today.’

This writer does not expect President Sirisena to eradicate corruption. It cannot be done. No country in the world has succeeded in eliminating corruption. What we can endeavor to achieve is to minimize institutional corruption.

By handpicking his brother to head the Telecommunication Authority, no sooner he assumed office he redefined nepotism and reframed the moral borders of discretionary powers of the Presidency.

He amplified on his commitment to meritocracy by appointing A.S.P Liyanage as our Ambassador to Qatar- rich in natural gas. Rather a symbolic act of indicating that he doesn’t give a fart for our opinion on the matter.

The purpose of the present essay is to disentangle the doublespeak in the two most recent Presidential sermons on good governance and corruption. 

The opposite of a truthful statement is a false statement. However, as pioneering quantum physicist Niels Bohr has said, the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.

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Going Left, Right or Nowhere Demystifying Sri Lanka’s party politics

By Arjuna Ranawana-2017-12-31

As the Local Government (LG) polls loom, voters in Sri Lanka must have their confusion compounded as to whom to vote for and what the parties stand for. Never has there been a more mixed up political party situation in the country. In the past, the choices were clearer.

There was the United National Party – the creation of our founding fathers, firmly to the Conservative Right but attracting minority support most of the time.

Then there was the Sri Lanka Freedom Party – slightly to the Left and tinged with Sinhala nationalism, harnessing the majority community's powers.

Both are essentially centrist, although the UNP was pro-business.

On the Left there were the various, raucous Communist Parties, divided along allegiances to international power blocs, the Trotskyist Lanka Sama Samaja Party and off-shoots such as the Nava Sama Samaja Party.

Later of course, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna came along to claim the extreme Left spot.
Regional or Communal politics were represented by Tamil parties and that remains the same although there is a confusing mix-up there as well.

The Muslim Parties – a creation of the 1980s – are also fragmented with several parties claiming the crown.

Alliances, alliances

But look at the alliances that are presenting themselves at the LG elections.

There is the UNP and its allied parties, some of whom, like Mano Ganesan's Tamil Progressive Alliance, is contesting in a number of districts on their own. Ganesan is also including non-Tamil candidates he says.

Huh?

As far as the SLFP is concerned, confusion has reached new heights. It looks as if there are two of them, the faction led by President Maithripala Sirisena and the other by former President and current SLFP Kurunegala District Parliamentarian Mahinda Rajapaksa.

And adding to the confusion is the United People's Freedom Alliance which brings in other former SLFP allies.

The third major formation is the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, where the so-called Joint Opposition led by pro-Rajapaksa politicians has found space.

Their campaign will be led by Rajapaksa although he is a member of the SLFP.

They have wrought together a coalition that has brought together parties as widely diverse as the National Freedom Front led by the openly racist and anti-devolution polemicist Wimal Weerawansa and the Makkal Thamil Viduthalai Puligal (Tamil People's Liberation Tigers) led by Vinayagamurthi Muralitharan, who is better known by his LTTE nom de guerre Karuna Amman. Added to this mixture is the Pivithuru Hela Urumaya which of course, advocates Sinhala supremacy.

Strange bedfellows indeed, but that is politics.

Poster war

The biggest compliment that has been given to Rajapaksa in the fragmented confusion of the SLFP's and SLPP's identity, is that he appears on the posters and leaflets of the SLFP, the UPFA and of course the SLPP.

So, if you are an MR fan which party would you pick?

Voters will also scratch their heads at the picture that appeared in Ceylon Today earlier in the week where the leader of the Eelam People's Democratic Party, Douglas Devananda was seen taking the oath at the launch of the UPFA campaign launch ceremony in Colombo alongside President Sirisena.

At the same time it is an open secret that his most senior lieutenant on the Jaffna Peninsula and former head of the EPDP's Maheswari Foundation is the chief organizer of the SLPP in the North.
This brings us to the convoluted politics of the North where there is a completely different development.

For many decades, politicians in the North vied to criticize what they called the 'Centre' orhe Sinhala dominated government in Colombo.

This time around things have changed.

If the South is confused, just think of the poor Northerners.

Northern blues

The dominant party is the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK) or in more prosaic terms, the current avatar of the Federal Party which is, just to add to the confusion, referred to as the Tamil National Alliance.

The ITAK's leader is FP veteran Mavai Senathiraja while the TNA is led by R. Sampanthan, the current Leader of the Opposition in Parliament.

In Parliament, the TNA comprises the ITAK, former militants - Eelam People's Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF) led by Suresh Premachandran and People's Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam led by Dharmalingam Siddharthan and the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization headed by Selvam Adaikalanathan.

Premachandran has now left the TNA and in the LG election, will join the old Tamil United Liberation Front which is led by V. Anandasangaree, veteran of the struggle. This group is contesting as the Tamil National Front.

This has left Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam who sought an alliance with Premachandran on his own.
As Ceylon Today's Northern affairs columnist Manekshaw wryly commented last week, this time, the Tamil parties will concentrate on attacking each other rather than the Centre.

So, across the country, where do these parties and their leaders stand? Are they Socialists or Capitalists? Nationalists or Liberals?

Nothing is clear and Political Scientist Dr. Suren Rāghavan wants to blame it on the Berlin Wall.
"After the wall collapsed, global political ideology was pushed into liquidization and there are no standpoints."

He reminds us that as far back as 1994 when the long-time Socialist Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga campaigned for a second term she said we cannot give up Capitalism: "We can only give it a human face."

Confusion

Well, now we know we can't figure out who's Right or Left.

If that isn't bad enough, this new election will be held under the new 'Hybrid' system where 60 per cent of councillors will be chosen under the 'first-past-the-post' system and the rest through the party list.

The process of elections will be all new and Rāghavan warns that without proper public education, there would be many mistakes and rejected ballots.

There are more than 56,000 candidates vying for the around 8,500 seats on offer – at a ratio of 7 to 1 – and how will they be heard by the voter and how will we choose?

Like many others Rāghavan says voter turnout will be low at the LG polls. "Winning will be by default," he predicts.

But he is not entirely pessimistic.

He says the results of the LG polls will prove to the people of Sri Lanka that solutions to their problems and the issues that plague their lives will not come from the political leaders.

Instead he says like in India and Bhutan and to some extent in Bangladesh, "people will seek thematic solutions such as through environmental groups, social movements against corruption and such like."
Optimistic indeed, but in the meantime the voters should try their best to navigate the LG elections as best they can and look for local solutions to their everyday issues.

‘Central Schools were opened after 1956’ – a response

By Usvatte-aratchi-January 1, 2018

The medium of instruction in schools was NOT CHANGED from English to Sinhala and Tamil in 1956 and Solomon Bandaranaike cannot receive accolades or blame for that decision. The credit or blame rightly belongs to J. R. Jayewardene and V. Nalliah in the Legislative Council who together, in 1943, proposed that Sinhala/Tamil shall be the medium of instruction in schools. From my point of view, that legislation was excellent. It has contributed, in part, to the breakup of the monopoly of political power that was held by persons from Colombo, not that I see merit in those came from beyond. Water in all hell would have frozen to ice before all children in this society would have been made literate in English. They are nearly all literate now either in Sinhala or Tamil. Democracy makes no sense when government speaks a language alien to the governed. That was the essence of colonial government.

HL (Prof. Seneviratne) was quite wrong to say that there were English assistant teachers in most primary schools in 1956. (See the Annual Administration of the Director of Education for those years.) We still do not have information about English teachers in all schools including secondary schools. (See the Schools Census for 2016). Most schools in 2017 have an excuse for an English teacher. When Solomon Bandaranaike was elected to office in 1956, children in school were in their 11th year of schooling in Sinhala/Tamil. Dr. P. A. samaraweera of Brisbane does himself disservice when he claims so boldly ‘Central schools were opened after 1956’. The first Central School was opened in 1943 in Matugama and the last in 1947 at Kukiyapitiya. I was a student in Hikkaduva Central School, established in 1944, one of the earliest and the last in Kuliyapitiya, established in 1947.

In Hikkaduva I was taught English in my first year by Miss Prema de Silva, fresh with an SSC from school. (No, she was not waiting for results of the UE examination results.) and I still recall, with pleasure, constructions she taught me. In my second year, I was taught English by Mr. Gamani Weerasekere (SSC) and I often recall ‘Highwayman’ (‘The road was a ribbon of moonlight …’) that he taught us. In the first three years we were taught all subjects, except English, in Sinhala and switched to an all English curriculum in the fourth year. In our last two years we were taught English, as all other subjects, except Mathematics and Pali by people who had no university degrees and several students earned distinction in English (taught by Mr. K. Dahanayake) as well as in other subjects, most of which were taught by Trained Teachers. We were exceedingly well taught to be classed in the First Division, rare at that time, in even ‘ the top schools in Colombo’. Five in that class of 30 went up to Peradeniya in open and fair competition. We were 30 students in our class and 22 of them were girls; feminist, indeed, that far back.

Problems in education arose from the decision to impart education in Sinhala/Tamil in university. In a manner, it was inevitable after school education in those languages. How could those students have been asked to switch toEnglish at university? In a manner, it was not. Students who entered university could have been taught English for two years before they began their course work. Teachers in university were ready to teach in Sinhala/Tamil, as they indeed did. But in Sinhala (Tamil?) there was no material to read and there is no university learning in any discipline without reading. The last time that adults recall learning without reading is usually in kindergarten. In 1959, there were students who looked forward to study in university in Sinhala/Tamil. Sinhala (Tamil?) was and is centuries behind being ready to teach students at university. The wise decision, education wise, would have been to teach in university in English after two years of instruction in English. We had enough good English teachers in the country and it was feasible. And we could have taught in university in English. But wisdom had fled to the wild driven by a frenzy of nationalism. And we decided to teach in university in Sinhala/Tamil.

Sinhala scholarship over the ages had limited itself to Buddhist themes-from amavatura to saddharmratnvaliya, from muvadevdavata to kusajatakakavyaya. From 1500 to2000, there was no book in Sinhala which expanded knowledge. (The major part of the country was not under colonial rule until 1815 so that colonialism is no excuse.) During those five centuries, European vernaculars (Spanish, French, Dutch, English and later German) developed from mere dialects to massive vehicles of newknowledge which shaped the way people lived and thought. And we started teaching in universities in Sinhala without the advantage of a native literature or translations from European languages which the Japanese labelled barbarian but started, in 1664, to translate systematically into Japanese. When the Imperial University of Tokyo was chartered in 1887 it grew from a translation bureau. (I dwelt on this theme at some length in a lecture in June 2017 before a meeting of the National Heritage Trust. I have been advised that the lecture is available on their Blog.)

It is that calamitous fall in university education that both Elmo and HL worry about. It is that decision that the Bandaranaike government is rightly blamed for. Some faculties (Medicine, Engineering and some Departments of Science) of study saw the folly of the decision and found ways of teaching in English. Teaching the humanities and social studies never recovered. Poor learning in universities soon percolated to schools and here we are with barely literate Members of Parliament legislating for us.We are yet to elect a graduate of a university in Sri Lanka as head of state and government.

I go along with Elmo and HL (both, I am privileged to call so) that far. But, I cannot blame the pervasive dishonesty, hypocrisy and other corruption in our society to that decision. I have met far too many Sinhala school teachers who would not steal a pencil from their school for such comment to be permissible. We really don’t know why corruption, criminality and dishonesty are currency of the realm in this land. We do not know the causes of the malaise in our society.

Future of the UNP-SLFP marriage

2018-01-02

2018 should be the year Sri Lanka finally prioritises on economy and evolves a political cohesiveness that supports economic development. However, there is an acid test: the future of the UNP-SLFP unity government. The memorandum of understanding between the two parties lapsed on December 31; the SLFP says a decision will be taken after the local government elections. 

The UNP-SLFP joint arrangement during the past two years had been chaotic, yet it prevented the country from falling into a crippling political contention of a worse kind. Imagine the plight of a minority UNP government in power amidst all these daily protests and strikes. And there would also have been organised efforts of sabotage and run rings around the government. But now, should the SLFP decide to part ways, the UNP will be forced to run a minority government, that would be at the mercy of the TNA and JVP. Sri  Lanka cannot afford that political uncertainty and resultant instability. Current zigzagging of the government policy on almost everything has already made prospective investors scratching their heads. More political confusion would rob this country another couple of years of economic growth. 

Economic growth for the past year is likely to be below 4 per cent. Slow growth rates in the past three years could be compensated  for only if the government evolves a sound micro-economic base that would support a long-term holistic growth. However, good economics is bad for politics. A minority UNP government would forfeit long-term economic goals in order to somehow cling to power – this is exactly what it did by its mini-budget presented prior to the general election of 2015, which resulted in the government recurrent spending skyrocketing due to increased salaries and subsidies and worsened the balance of payment problem. 

While some ministers close to the president want to stick with the unity government, others want to get out and reorganise for the next general election. Some are disgruntled at being ignored by the UNP, others want their fingers in the honey pot, which can be best accomplished being in the government. However, the SLFP does not have numbers to form a government, which would mean, their role would be in the opposition, trying out the usual tactics of obstructionism. A minority government is more susceptible to an acute obstructionism. 

The future of the unity government will lie in the balance of political power between the UNP and the SLFP, as well as between President Sirisena and former President Mahinda Rajapaksa

The campaign for the local government elections would also strain relations between the UNP and the SLFP. Elections in this country are poisonous and despite the good intentioned effort to avoid mudslinging, old habits die hard. Mutual animosity during the election would also embolden those who want the SLFP to withdraw support from the unity government. 

The local government elections will decide not only as to who rule the local government bodies, but more importantly, who would own the SLFP. Poor performances at the election would diminish President Sirisena’s hold on the SLFP and see many MPs who have an eye on the next general election, switching loyalty to the Rajapaksa faction. That would mean the end of the unity government. 

The president has an ace up in his sleeve: the report of the Presidential Commission on the Central Bank bond scam. The report was presented to the president last week and has been sent to the Attorney General to consider legal action against those who have been implicated in the report. The report is still a closely guarded secret, and should the president decide to submit it to parliament, it would become a public document and would make quite a bit of controversy. The essence though is in the timing. If the report is made public before the local government election, it would shift the narrative against the UNP. That would also cut the SLFP losses, or even, could turn corner and win some constituencies. 

 A minority government is more susceptible to an acute obstructionism

The president last week hinted that he was shifting gears in his campaign against corruption. “I am not sure who will be axed with my sword in my mission to have clean politicians,” he told a gathering of Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and other smaller groups last week. His emphasis on corruption would give the impression that he was trying to fulfil one of his main election promises, which the Yahapalana administration has so far failed to deliver. The release of the Presidential Commission report, obviously the biggest scandal that happened under his watch, may redeem some of his past failures. But, that would also ruffle feathers with the UNP. 

The future of the unity government will lie in the balance of political power between the UNP and the SLFP, as well as between President Sirisena and former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Rajapaksa coterie has an easy go when the SLFP is weaker and the president is indecisive. A stronger and forceful presidency can keep these forces in line, and also help sustain the unity government, which at the moment is a political and economic imperative. 

Follow @RangaJayasuriya on Twitter 

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Right of reply 

Russian Ambassador Yury B. Materiy has clarified to Daily Mirror regarding certain sections of our columnist Ranga Jayasuriya’s article which appeared on December 26. 

The columnist referred to “a suspect, a 22-year-old Russian named, Manokin Raufovich who has jumped bail and left the country. He has allegedly flown back to Russia in the private jet of the head of Rosoboronexport, the State-owned Russian arms exporter, Alexander Mikheev who recently visited Colombo to negotiate the sale of controversial Russian light frigate Gephard 5.1, which Sri Lanka is purchasing at a cost of Rs. 24 billion, paid by the unutilised allocations from an earlier Russian line of credit for military supplies.”  

The Russian Ambassador states that such an incident did not take place and the content is inaccurate.   

Ravi K’s critique of Central Bank: An instance of rendering the blame unto Caesar?

Blaming the Central Bank for all economic ills

 
Tuesday, 2 January 2018

Former Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake in an interview with Daily Mirror is reported to have pronounced that the Central Bank is absolutely corrupt and inefficient (available at: http://www.dailymirror.lk/article/Central-Bank-is-absolutely-corrupt-and-inefficient-Ravi-Karunanayake-142963.html). This is an important revelation since it has come from a former Finance Minister.

Ravi K’s critique of Central Bank An instance of rendering the blame unto Caesar.docx by Thavam on Scribd

Final PRECIFAC report to be presented to President today

Tuesday, January 2, 2018

The Presidential Commission of Inquiry to Inquire and Investigate into Serious Acts of Fraud and Corruption (PRECIFAC), delegated with the responsibility to investigate fraud and corruption that took place during the previous Rajapaksa regime will present its final report to President Maithripala Sirisena today.

The 1000 page report will highlight the Commission’s findings related to various cases and present recommendations on how to prevent and handle large-scale fraud and corruption in the future.

PRECIFAC Chairman, Court of Appeal Judge Preethi Padman Surasena will hand over the report to the President.

The other members, High Court judge Vikum Kaluarachchi, Piyasena Ranasinghe, Gihan Kulathunga and retired Auditor General P. A. Premathilake too will attend, Commission sources said.

The PRECIFAC during its tenure had investigated 34 major cases related to large-scale fraud and corruption at state institutions during the former regimes period. Earlier the Commission handed over 17 final reports on large-scale fraud and corruption to the President for further legal action.

The 17 reports include investigations into alleged fraud and corruption in connection to the distribution of water filters in the North Central Province, “Deyata Kirula” programme organised by the Ampara Urban Council, Port Authority- Mahapola Ship, report in connection with the Hector Kobbekaduwa Agrarian Research and Training Institution, State Pharmaceuticals Corporation, Disaster Management Centre, Polgolla Mahinda Rajapaksa Theatre, Health Ministry-Kidney Disease related equipment, report in connection with the Kandy District Hospital Director’s Office, KKS cement factory, Rupavahini Corporation, National Housing Development Authority, National Transport Board Commission, Sathosa report, National Youth Services Council, Health Services Supplier Division and Archeology Departmnet- Deegawapi Chethiya.

The government by a Gazette Notification on March 10, 2015 established the PRECIFAC.

It was delegated the responsibility to investigate fraud and corruption that took place during the period from January 10, 2010 to January 10, 2015.

A Pitiful Apologist For The UNP

By Rajiva Wijesinha –January 1, 2018

A very jolly looking man who lives in Australia, Shyamon Jayasinghe, has emerged as the leading apologist for the UNP with intellectual pretensions. Sadly his passion is not twinned with any regard for truth or facts. I suppose that is understandable in a man with what seems a commitment to a capitalist perspective, but it is regrettable that he does not also assess the contribution of his chosen standard bearers to populist politics.

For instance, in a recent article, he claims that it was the SLFP that sowed communal tensions in 1956. He forgets or ignores it was the UNP which repudiated John Kotelawala’s announcement in Jaffna that the UNP stood for parity of status for Sinhala and Tamil. At the party sessions held early in 1956 in Kelaniya, J R Jayewardene’s stronghold, the UNP declared that it stood for Sinhala only and also passed a resolution that Parliament should be dissolved straight away and the UNP seek a mandate to implement Sinhala only.

Jayasinghe claims that Bandaranaike left the UNP because he felt he was being deprived of the succession, which Jayasinghe grants was through maneuvering by D S Senanayake to have his son succeed him. But Jayasinghe’s claim that the ideology Bandaranaike developed was an afterthought is ridiculous, in that the latter had in fact earlier led the Sinhala Maha Sabha, and had only joined the UNP when he thought it would accept at least some of his policies. And in those days his championing of Sinhala was as opposed to English, which he thought deprived the majority of people in this country of a say in governance. It should not be forgotten that his Language Act of 1956 dethroned English, though it was silly of him to introduce simply a one sentence Act without thinking of how it would be implemented, and to leave out Tamil altogether.

Similar gung ho opposition to English also motivated Jayewardene, which Shyamon Jayasinghe conveniently forgets. In blaming the SLFP for getting rid of English as a medium of instruction, he ignores too, or deliberately forgets, that Kannangara’s English medium Central Colleges were destroyed by Jayewardene long before there was an SLFP government. As soon as he got into the State Council, Jayewardene proposed a motion to make Sinhala compulsorily the medium of education. After expostulations by the Congress leadership, he then added Tamil as an afterthought, and declared in his speech on the proposal that in Sri Lanka there were ‘two different nations; one nation learning Sinhalese and Tamil and speaking in Sinhalese and Tamil, and the other speaking and learning English.’

The State Council amended Jayewardene’s original proposal so as to make Sinhala or Tamil the compulsory medium only at primary level. But then in the early fifties Eddie Nugawela as Minister of Education extended this to secondary school too through a gazette notification, not a law. The only contribution of the SLFP to stopping English as a medium of education was when science stream studies were also converted into mother tongue from 1964 onward. Thus, whereas from the early fifties most children did their Ordinary Level examination in Sinhala or Tamil, from 1965 this was also the case with science stream students. Given that very few schools offered science at ordinary level in those days, this was an egalitarian move, though it would obviously have been better had the government equalized upward by making English medium available in more schools, rather than equalizing downward, an endemic disease of this country.

It took an SLFP led government to extend opportunities for English medium, though I can claim credit for this by persuading Tara de Mel to start this islandwide, and then fulfilling her request to take charge of the programme. I did so only part time since I was at the same time coordinating the new degree programme of the Sri Lanka Military Academy while acting as Dean of my Faculty at Sabaragamuwa University. But Tara obviously agreed with the view of the students of the Faculty when they came en masse asking me to take up the position of Dean, which I had resigned from some years earlier, that even a part of my time was worth more than full time work by anyone else.

Shyamon Jayasinghe, so enthusiastic about English medium, does not ask why Jayewardene did not reintroduce it along with the open economy in 1977. And he totally ignores Ranil’s efforts when he was Prime Minister to sabotage English medium, telling Karunasena Kodituwakku (who proved a tower of strength in this regard) that he should stop it. His mother – whose property another Ranil acolyte accuses me of weaseling out of her, obviously not understanding the limits of Wijewardene wealth – used, my father told me, to complain that I was obsessed with English medium whereas both Ranil and I, who had studied in Sinhala medium, had excellent English.

Her assumption that all others straitjacketed in Sinhala or Tamil medium could achieve the same, whatever their family background, was symptomatic of a utterly insensitive aristocracy. Worse, she had forgotten how her youngest son could barely function in English, and only achieved fluency when his father sent him to England to study printing so that he could take over his father’s firm. That son Channa was over the moon that his son, a delightful youngster now, was selected for English medium at Royal College in 2003, but then six months later began belabouring me to tell his brother that English medium was collapsing.

That had happened because Ranil had stopped Kodituwakku from extending my contract. Kodituwakku had hastened to assure me, when explaining why the extension he had requested had been denied, that it was nothing personal, but that Ranil had said he should get someone fulltime. But even the Cabinet Secretary Mr Weragoda smiled wryly when giving me this excuse, and admitted that, after my contract expired, they had not bothered to find anyone to replace me fulltime.

So, hearing from elsewhere too how the programme was suffering, I succumbed on October 2^nd 2003 when Channa pleaded with me yet again, obviously unwilling to speak to Ranil himself. But when I spoke to Ranil, he told me that he had told Karunasena not to start, and he would now have to stop. When I asked him whether he was opposed to English medium, he said no, but he had no time to attend to this himself, since he was concentrating on the economy. He claimed that no one else was capable of doing it, except possibly for his first Permanent Secretary at Education, Eric de Silva, but he had refused to take on any position.

Why then he got rid of me, when obviously I had been doing a good job, was not something I thought to ask him. But I did ask Tara to arrange for me to speak to Chandrika, and after a long rambling but delightful conversation, she promised to act and indeed convened a meeting on education at President’s house. The consensus in favour of English medium, including Cabinet Ministers, I think overwhelmed Ranil, and English medium was saved, to be made better functional after Ranil lost the 2004 election.

Sometimes I think Ranil’s opposition to English medium springs from his adulation of J R Jayewardene, though I should note that in some respects he has thrown Jayewardene’s less full-blooded approach to capitalism to the winds. In that regard I find Jayasinghe’s account simplistic. His headlong attack on socialism is understandable, and one cannot expect him to make allowance for the need to promote equity, though certainly there was much mismanagement and cronyism in state institutions meant to serve the people, instead serving politicians. But he fails to explain why his hero Jayewardene in 1977, when introducing an open economy, kept so much in state hands and further entrenched cronyism.

Jayasinghe criticizes Jayewardene for entrenching socialism by renaming us the Democratic Socialism republic, but fails to assess why he instead extended cronyism also to the private sector, with his daughter in law for instance and his Secretary’s son getting lucrative contracts. In that regard Ranil has gone even further. Arjuna Mahendran as Governor of the Central Bank, kept on despite obvious misdemeanours, Aruni Wijewardene as High Commissioner in London, Suren Ratwatte as CEO of Sri Lankan Airlines, are all examples of friends and relations in high places that require professional input and cutting edge capacity.

Jayasinghe is incapable of, or unwilling, to look into these matters. But in presenting half truths, he helps us to understand the extent of sanctimonious hypocrisy in an elite that still thinks the UNP the only acceptable party of governance. His article concludes with an attack on President Sirisena, for accepting crossovers, which Jayasinghe declares celebrates ‘opportunism, incompetence and an implied element of promised corruption’.

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