The Fluid Prejudice In Writing History
Sarath De Alwis
“I can’t understand why they had to fight a conventional war. Prabhakaran could have gone underground. If I was the leader of the LTTE, I would have gone underground and I would have been in the jungles – fighting a guerrilla fight.” – Mahinda Rajapaksa in Interview by Editor of the ‘Hindu’8th July 2009
Prabhakaran died on 19th May 2009. The day after on 20th May, a triumphant President Mahinda Rajapaksa affixed his signature on a new one thousand rupees currency note portraying his mustachioed, shawl draped self, with both arms raised high in symbolic acknowledgment of the gratitude of the nation. The Central Bank then confirmed that the “decision to issue such a commemorative note was taken immediately after the completion of the humanitarian operations on 19th May, 2009.”
Thus commenced the single most successful political hoax in our history – the making of a parvenu patriot. His remarkable political success was due to his phenomenal ability to silence dissent by methods both good bad and absolutely ugly.
The caption of this article is inspired by Ambrose Bierce’s Devils Dictionary definition of history. “History is an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.”
On Friday 17th July 2015 the ex-president launched his return bid with the theme: “a new life to the country and a new beginning.”
Lest we forget, we who did not agree with the affable autocrat, lived in fear. We collectively surrendered our capacity for analysis of events. Fear paralyzed our will to resist. Until 8th January denial was mandatory. It is only in the past six months that we dared to speak of what frightens us.
With the looming threat of a return of the brutal ‘Bodhisatva’ it is high time that we dismantle false history.
