A Perverted Peace
Rumour has it that there is a saying among the foreign diplomats in Colombo that “Sri Lanka never looses an opportunity to loose an opportunity”. This is profoundly true of the end of the war five years ago. The military defeat of the LTTE was an opportunity like no other since independence to bring together island’s different ethnic and religious groups in one forward looking nation, all groups striving to build a happy and prosperous society for all. Two simple steps would have been sufficient to ensure reconciliation and thereby lay the foundation for a rational, modern nation. These were: (1) providing immediate relief to the affected people and, (2) a democratically based plan for power sharing so that the causes that led to the war are eliminated.
That these were not forthcoming was made clear almost the instant the war ended, when in his “victory speech”, the president declared that there were henceforth no minorities in Sri Lanka but only patriots and those who were not. Large numbers of war displaced Tamil citizens were in effect incarcerated in virtual concentration camps euphemistically called “welfare villages”, ostensibly for purposes of national security, when in fact the cause of national security would have been better served if those citizens were allowed to go back to their homes and livelihoods, and given social, economic, and emotional support. The Rajapaksa regime was unable to summon the vision and magnanimity needed to take these two steps. Instead, what followed was an orgy of triumphalism that persists in different guises until now, and will be on its gaudy display at the commemorative celebrations in Matara later this week. Read More