Referendum Red Alert: Blood Tsunami, Broken Country
By Dayan Jayatilleka -October 26, 2014
Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka
It was Ceylon Today and its sister paper Mawbima which got the most important news story of the year 2014; a story which if it proves accurate, may be the one that determines the destiny of this country. With perfect editorial judgment, the Ceylon Today issue of October 24th 2014 ran the story as its page one lead. The headline read: ‘REFERENDUM IN THE OFFING?’
The operative paragraph of reporter Rashini Mendis’ story read as follows:
“After the next Presidential Election is held early January, the government could hold a referendum to extend the life of the present Parliament by a further six years, under powers vested in the Executive, Minister of Botanical Gardens and Public Recreation, Jayaratne Herath hinted. He made this observation during an event to mark the assuming of duties of Deputy Minister of Botanical Gardens and Public Recreation, V. Radhakrishnan, yesterday.”
While this could be either kite flying or whistle blowing by the Minister, it must be taken with the utmost seriousness by the citizenry. The worst, most dangerous single political decision I have witnessed in this country in my lifetime was President Jayewardene’s decision immediately after his handsome win at the Presidential election of October 1982, to hold a Referendum instead of the scheduled parliamentary election. The sheer savagery that Sri Lanka descended to for three decades, can be traced back to that single decision which shut off the safety valves of a parliamentary election and disconnected the feedback loops that operate only in a functioning electoral democracy with a parliament that accurately reflects the balance of political forces. What was done in the name of stability and security triggered decades of bloody volatility and utter insecurity.
Black July ’83 would not have reached its scale and intensity if not for the shutting down a few months earlier, of peaceful and democratic avenues of social discontent. If not for Black July, India would not have felt compelled by Tamil Nadu agitation, to covertly support Tamil armed militancy in a massive cross-border covert campaign, the LTTE would not have grown into the formidable militia it did, the war would not have taken the scale that it did with all the human suffering it entailed. Read More
