Young Koreans Are Winning Their Generational War

South Koreans are angry about jobs and elite corruption - but that's driven them left, not right.

BY TROY STANGARONE-MAY 9, 2017

Moon Jae-in has triumphed in the South Korean presidential election with over 40 percent of the vote, according to exit polls. But the liberal leader’s solid victory can’t patch over deeper political wounds. Just as the United Kingdom’s vote to leave the European Union left British society divided and Donald Trump’s election polarized Americans, the impeachment of Park Geun-hye has split South Korea.
While more than 75 percent of South Koreans supported impeaching President Park, the process splintered conservatives into two parties and left the young, who have become increasingly politically active, divided from the elderly, who were Park’s strongest supporters.

Economic discontent widens this generational chasm. South Korea’s divided labor system has limited the job prospects of 20-somethings. Despite one of the highest levels of per capita college graduates in the world, young South Koreans face high levels of unemployment and feel constrained by an economy that has been declining and social norms that, in their opinion, are outdated.

Many 20-year-olds have come to refer to their homeland as “Hell Chosun,” a reference to the rigid social hierarchies of one of Korea’s most famous past dynasties.

Many 20-year-olds have come to refer to their homeland as “Hell Chosun,” a reference to the rigid social hierarchies of one of Korea’s most famous past dynasties.

But older South Koreans are no happier. While the Park administration expanded the social safety net for the elderly, South Korea continues to have the highest level of old-age poverty in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. And as Korean society continues to age, the financial burdens posed by the elderly will only increase, with greater costs to care for them and large questions about how to replace their labor force in the economy. The government has begun engaging with business and labor unions about adjusting the high wages that make older workers less employable to extend the lifespan of the existing workforce. Previously, many South Korean workers retired in their 50s, making way for younger workers; now the young and old feel they are in direct competition over jobs.

There’s a growing sense of crisis and discontent in South Korea. But unlike the United States or France, voters haven’t responded by moving rightward. Instead, after nearly a decade of conservative rule, the election produced a resounding victory for Moon, leader of the left-wing Democratic Party of Korea. His closest rival wasn’t a conservative, but the centrist Ahn Cheol-soo of the People’s Party. Against the background of Park’s scandals, polls suggest both politicians are viewed by supporters as trustworthy, with sincere concern for social justice. Both Moon and Ahn broke from past traditions and cast aside promises of GDP targets. Instead, they have focused more on the need to develop a more just society.

In the past, the left has been no more successful than conservatives in avoiding corruption, as scandals surrounded the relatives of both former Presidents Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun. But unlike the right, it is now seen as a potential agent of change. The left is still rooted in the democracy protests of the 1980s where many of its leaders first came of age, while conservatives are seen as tied to the system that was built up under Park Chung-hee. Moon has tried to play to these sentiments by talking about the need to address the “deep-rooted evil” in South Korea.

But older voters aren’t so keen to paint the past black. Born in the 1950s when South Korea was still a relatively poor country, they came of age during the authoritarian years of Park Chung-hee and worked to transform South Korea into the country it is today. In Park, they saw a strong leader who transformed the economy and defended the country against North Korea. In his daughter, Park Geun-hye, they found a successor to his legacy and have largely remained loyal to her as they did her father. Only half of those in their 60s favored her impeachment. In contrast, 92 percent of those under 30 wanted to see Park ousted.

In the election, those over 60 were divided. They primarily supported either Hong Joon-pyo, a fast-rising staunch conservative, or tactically supported Ahn Cheol-soo against Moon Jae-in, who they view skeptically for his allegedly soft views on North Korea. For older Koreans, the right represents stability and prosperity. Yet the system that benefited those in their 60s has led to the current struggles of the young. Economic development under authoritarian governments left a legacy of close relations between government and business. Those ties helped spur one of the most successful runs of economic growth in the 20th century but also left scandal trailing each administration and has now culminated in the impeachment of a president. While the prior scandals were related to family members or close confidants rather than the presidents themselves, Moon now faces unprecedented scrutiny and pressure to snap those ties. South Koreans rank institutional reform second only to economic reform in priorities for the next administration.

South Korea has seen slowing economic growth in recent years and rising levels of income inequality, coupled with one of the world’s lowest birth rates. The 2012 presidential campaign that Park Geun-hye ultimately won was fought on the need for economic reforms, especially around the chaebol, the large family-run conglomerates in South Korea. While the chaebol have become highly successful international companies, as they have moved abroad they have increasingly contributed less to job growth in South Korea, and many Koreans see the privileges that they enjoy as limiting the ability of other businesses to grow and flourish.

To improve the economy, the Park administration had been working on structural reforms to address overcapacity in steel, shipping, and shipbuilding. But the populist movement in Korea — as in economically depressed areas of the West — is most interested in labor market reform that could give more Koreans, especially the young, access to good jobs. South Korea currently has a two-tiered labor market of permanent workers who enjoy good pay and benefits with strong job protections and temporary workers who receive few benefits and significantly lower pay. The system limits both job growth and opportunities for workers in the temporary market.

This system works against those in their 20s. In contrast to the United States and Europe where the middle-aged feel their jobs are threatened by immigrants and the young, in South Korea the system protects middle-aged workers to the detriment of the young. It is the middle-aged workers who have secure jobs and continue to benefit from a promotion system that favors age over performance. The privilege given to children from wealthy families in access to the best jobs adds to the frustration for those in their 20s, who have already had to withstand a grueling and competitive national education system that is widely believed to produce unhappy childhoods. For those fortunate enough to get a lower-tier job with a chaebol, their personal life becomes strained from long workweeks extending to more than 50 hours, combined with a lack of prospects for advancement.

With young South Koreans struggling in a socioeconomic system set up by their parents and grandparents and the economy in need of reforms, why are they turning to the left rather than to the populist nationalism that has blossomed in other countries?

In part, it’s because South Koreans have already for the past decade tried going with conservative leaders, in hopes they would improve the economy and create jobs. Instead, the challenges for those in their 20s grew as the economy slowed. They are now turning to the left for solutions.

It helps that the backlash against immigrants that has animated the right in the West is not a major factor in South Korea. In contrast to France and the U.K., where immigrants account for more than 12 percent of the population, in South Korea they only accounted for around 4 percent. As a result, the populist movement is focused on jobs and corruption rather than a threat to national identity.

This appeals to a younger generation that, even as it largely remains conservative on security issues, tends to be progressive on social issues. On the whole, South Korea is still fairly socially conservative, and in a recent presidential debate, only Sim Sang-jung of the Justice Party expressed support for LGBT rights. While her opponents, including Moon, expressed their opposition to homosexuality, Moon later walked back his comments, saying there should be no discrimination based on sexual orientation, after backlash on social media.

After millions of people took to the streets calling for the removal of Park Geun-hye, there is a strong desire for change in South Korean society. That’s only going to leave a short window for Moon and his team to take advantage, though, as South Koreans tend to sour on their presidents fairly quickly. 

Bridging a generational chasm to meet the demands of both fresh graduates and pensioners may be an even tougher challenge than dealing with a fretful nuclear neighbor.

Photo Credit: Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images

Definitive studies of neo-populism needed

Populists shut both major parties out of French Presidency

Two leaves and a bud

by Kumar David-May 7, 2017, 10:56 am 

As you read these lines the French are voting on the run-off for the Presidency between two neo-populists, the more right wing Marine Le Pen and the upstart centrist Emmanuel Macron. The two parties that dominated French politics since the war, Republican Francois Fillon and outgoing President Francois Hollande’s Socialist Party candidate Benoit Haman did not even reach the final; both were eliminated in round one. Fillion, Prime Minister under President Sarkosy from 20007 to 2012, was third in round one with 20% and Haman suffered the indignity of not being placed fourth; he was fifth with a mere 6.5%. As a reminder, Macron and Le Pen polled 24% and 22%, respectively, in the first round. I am not taking a risk in declaring that Macron will win because everyone else is ganging up against Le Pen who is anti-EU, ultra nationalist and too far to the right.

Still, the global neo-populist surge has been stunning – Modi, Duterte, Brexit and Trump. Its class, mass and socio-economic roots need book length treatment. The underlying factor - the destiny of global capitalism - requires more attention than many admittedly excellent studies have provided so far. Though hardly suitable for newspaper treatment I too have pontificated some half a dozen times in this column. An analogy to the populist mass, borrowed from the natural world, is a murmuring of starlings in northern summer skies. Thousands spin and turn, dart and manoeuvre with amazing agility, as though the whole flock is a single robotically steered organism. Trump’s base is a murmur of dim-witted starlings in partisan sync. After 100 days, when every other section of society including the Republican top brass is pissed off, his zealots continue to expresses 96% support. Analogies to herds and birds is well and good as analogy, but what we need is community and workplace based empirical data, investigation and analysis. A new social process is unfolding via twenty-first century populism.

We also need new analytical tools. Technology and social media have given a new edge to class, state and socio-economic factors. Unfortunately the old left and the old-new-left (sic!) are both out of depth in making any sense of the twenty-first century. ‘Old-left’, or ‘Marxist fossil’, was used for died in the wool Stalinists and for golden oldies who intoned rote-learned formulae: ‘interpenetration of opposites’ (no lewd connotation) or ‘Marx-Engels-Lenin, then add Trotsky or Mao depending on party affiliation’. Exasperated with folks like these Marx in his day declared "I am no Marxist".

An intellectually shipwrecked breed, a stressed out new-left unable to fathom neo-populism, has surfaced. For it Modi, Trump, Rodrigo Duterte, Le Pen, Nigel Farange, the whole undifferentiated bundle is fascist. Pudding heads know not fascism nor have an inkling of unfolding processes. I am not making this up, believe me I received an e-mail from an Indian "Trotskyite" saying, in all theoretical seriousness; "Modi is a Hitler". Sure one dislikes Modi’s Hindu extremism but this sort of pseudo-Marxist muddling is a symptom of a skull with much vacuous space between the ears.

I will make an effort in this essay to deal with a factor underling the upsurge of neo-populism in the last decade. The most widely written about is anti-immigrant anger in host countries aggravated by terrorism, cultural-racial-religious prejudice, decline in income and employment opportunities usually (but sometimes incorrectly) attributed to immigrants, and a desire of communities to live as they have for centuries. This has been extensively discussed and I need say no more here. A second cause and my pet topic is the generalised decline of global capitalism such as the classic falling rate of profit thesis, collapse of manufacturing in the UK and USA, finance capital and speculation, competition from Asia and Mexico and of course the yawning wealth gap. Again I intend to say no more in this essay than these summary sentences.

The third not so often discussed driver of the social imbroglio in the West, and as crucial to understanding the explosion of neo-populism in recent decades as the decline of capitalism per se, is technology and the transformation of the global economy. This is what I am going to take up in the next few paragraphs.

Determinate objective conditions

An occupational hazard of being a Marxist is the urge to look for underlying material changes and technical factors (forces of production) and to analyse international and social factors (relations of production) as drivers of history. "Men make their own history but not as they please, but under existing circumstances already given and transmitted from the past"; you know the quote. The neo-populist surge in the second decade of the twenty-first century, mainly in the West but also in India and the Philippines, surely qualifies as historically significant. Let’s see what technology has done to some folks in the USA.

Rana Foroohar in the Financial Times of 23 April (Silicon Valley Superstars Risk a Populist Backlash) makes a point. The populist revolt is an unconscious reaction to the consequences of the spread of modern technology and it is hitting like a sledgehammer. Let me quote – much edited for length.

"In 1981, economist Sherwin Rosen argued that technological disruptions gave disproportionate power to a few players. He argued that the rise of superstars would be bad for (old industry). A spate of new US research shows that it is not trade or rapacious bankers but technology that is the primary economic driver of the most important political trend of our time — populism".

"Technological shifts have been dominant in changing labour’s share of the economy. Labour’s share of the pie is at its lowest point in half a century, but (high-tech) is enjoying a superstar effect. Research shows that 10 per cent of companies account for 80 per cent of profits, and the top quintile earns 90 per cent. What is more, those top companies are no longer capital-intensive industrial groups but tech businesses rich in intellectual property. Their platforms have delivered powerful new goods and services to consumers at lower prices, but have not made up for the decline in the workforce share of rewards".

"What is fascinating is that (technology) has escaped the populist anger that Wall Street or cheap Chinese labour has attracted because its job-disrupting effects are harder to see. Of 6m manufacturing jobs lost in the US between 1999 and 2011, only 10 per cent can be directly traced to Chinese imports — losses concentrated in just a few rust belt communities. The more subtle, dispersed nature of the changes driven by technology makes it a less obvious target for voter rage".

The moral of the story is clear. The traditional working class in advanced countries is doomed. While America, Scandinavia, New Zealand and a few others fight back with retraining and by extending IT competence and technology to the small business sector, on the whole the shift of economic power to East and South Asia is driven by unstoppable technology promotion and youthful demography*, as much as by lower wages. The story is different country by country – think Japan, Australia and Africa to get a taste of the diversity - hence I see the need for many book length studies. [*For an excellent interactive map of all countries by median age go to: http://world.bymap.org/MedianAge.html]

And in time our working class in Lanka will suffer the same impact. Do you remember the kathuru-muwath karaya trudging down the lane, do you recall our lovable old veralu amme at the school gate? How sad the passage of time. But as the old Moor declared in the 1972 Preface to the French Edition: "There is no royal road to science; only those who do not dread the fatiguing climb of its steep paths can gain its luminous summits". We must face reality since time can’t be reversed.

The working class in traditional establishments such as the harbour, industries and the garment girls will be marginalised by technical advancements in the next decade. I am not confident of progress unless ECTA and investment zones with the likes if China bloom. For that extremist nationalism and the Joint Opposition will have to be crushed first. I am also doubtful if an urban railway will ever see the light of day in Colombo, but if it does it will discipline private bus driver maniacs and decimate three-wheeler operators – good riddance. However, I cannot see technology sweeping away the big brigades of Lanka’s working class as it is hard to imagine a mechanical device to pluck the choicest of two leaves and a bud.

The Guardian view on the French election: Good luck, Mr Macron. You will need it 

Editorial

French voters have averted the catastrophe of a Marine Le Pen presidency. The task for Emmanuel Macron is to deliver change, prosperity, unity and healing

Emmanuel Macron: new French president. Photograph: Denis Charlet/AFP/Getty Images

Sunday 7 May 2017

Any other result would have been a European catastrophe and, for once, thank goodness, the opinion polls got it right. Emmanuel Macron has swept Marine Le Pen aside to become France’s next president. Mr Macron won by an even wider margin than the polls have consistently implied: 66.1% to 33.9%. It is the decisive majority against Ms Le Pen’s far-right racist challenge that France needed, and one of the biggest presidential wins in the history of the Fifth Republic, eclipsed only by Jacques Chirac’s victory over her father in 2002. It is also a decisive setback for what has sometimes been depicted as a rightwing populist tide threatening governments across the developed world in the wake of Brexit and Donald Trump’s election. The people of France have inflicted a major reverse on demagogic nationalism. Their country is safer for it. So is ours. So is Europe. We salute them for it. We wish Mr Macron every success.

But his victory is more a cause for relief than celebration. The new president has been audacious in his centrist campaign based on a new movement, En Marche!. He has also been incredibly lucky in his rivals. Until this second round, he spoke for a quarter of his compatriots at best. At various stages, François Hollande, Manuel Valls, Nicolas Sarkozy, Alain Juppé, François Bayrou, Benoît Hamon, François Fillon, Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Ms Le Pen all threatened. Yet, one by one, the contenders knocked themselves out. He has a huge task of consolidation, particularly given that more than a third of French voters supported a far-right, anti-European, anti-immigrant and racist party leader, right up to the end. There is nothing to salute there.

Who is the new French president, Emmanuel Macron? – video

Almost unknown to the French public until three years ago, the former banker and – only in France – former assistant to a philosopher, portrayed himself as an outsider, not entirely convincingly. Though relatively new to politics, he is a graduate of the elite’s hothouse, the École Nationale d’Administration, a Rothschild alumnus and a former minister. Many, notably on the left, proclaimed themselves “ni patrie, ni patron” – not for Ms Le Pen and nationalism, nor Mr Macron and “the boss”. He did well to counter this with a positive message of hope and reform, of liberal values allied to social justice, and of competence – but the abstention rate was the highest since 1969, at around 25%.

It is a reminder that handling the fallout from the eve-of-poll hacking of his emails is one of his easier tasks. He must demonstrate that his tough liberalism can be an effective sell in parliamentary elections. 

Then he must prove that his “neither left nor right” stance can offer the balm, growth and reform that France craves in the face of high unemployment, fear of terrorism, social and racial antagonism and European Union ineffectiveness. In victory, he said he wanted France’s new chapter to be one “of hope, and confidence rediscovered”. But these are huge tasks, in exceptionally uncertain terrain.

He has five weeks before the first round of elections that may make him the presidential prisoner of a hostile National Assembly in a “cohabitation” France can ill afford. Under the Fifth Republic it has had little experience of coalition government, and the party system, with the exception of the extreme-right Front National, is in disarray. The far-left will need to be won round by social programmes dependent on economic growth that eluded Mr Hollande. Each time Mr Macron falters, he may increase the chances of a rematch with Ms Le Pen in 2022. She has already pledged “a profound transformation” of her party to create “a new political force”.

The EU would have struggled to survive under Ms Le Pen – hence the unconcealed relief of Angela Merkel and Donald Tusk. Mr Macron is pro-European, but also pro-reform. He wants a eurozone budget and tighter fiscal cooperation, supports common defence plans, and wants to expand cross-border professional opportunities. He needs to engage, fast, with Mrs Merkel and other allies, not least to shift the priorities of German eurozone policies. There is absolutely no reason Britain, even amid Brexit, should not want Mr Macron to be a success in all this.

In the end, his challenge is to translate campaigning into governing and slogans into actions. He leads a nation in trouble, whose public is often more anxious and angry than confident and trustful. He must make innovative centrist government work on a continent where many have despaired of it. His own future depends on him living up to his promises. Many others, here as in France itself, have an equal stake in his success.

• This article was amended on 9 May 2017 to correct the final percentage results.

India to produce record food grains in 2016/17

Workers remove dust from wheat at a wholesale grain market in Chandigarh, India April 17, 2017. REUTERS/Ajay Verma/Files

Tue May 9, 2017

India is likely to produce a record 273.38 million tonnes of food grains 2016/17, slightly higher than the previous estimate of 271.98 million tonnes, farm ministry said in a statement, as ample monsoon rains boosted crop yields.

The south Asian nation is likely to produce a record 97.44 million tonnes of wheat, higher than a previous forecast of 96.64 million tonnes, the statement said.

India's rice production is estimated at 109.15 million tonnes, while pulses output is pegged at 22.40 million tonnes.

(Reporting by Mayank Bhardwaj; Writing by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Malini Menon)

Indigenous people exposed to UK nuclear tests given healthcare aid

A British nuclear test at Maralinga, in the South Australian outback

Soldiers turn their their backs on a nuclear test at Maralinga

9 May 2017

Indigenous Australians who were exposed to radiation from British nuclear tests will receive upgraded healthcare, the Australian government has announced.

From 1952 to 1963, Britain detonated bombs at Maralinga and Emu Field in South Australia, and the Montebello Islands off Western Australia.

Although the sites were remote, many Aboriginal people were forced to move.

Those who remained were exposed to high levels of radiation, which was later linked to significant health problems.

They will now be eligible for a war veterans' Gold Card, which covers most medical costs, Veterans' Affairs Minister Dan Tehan said.

• Nuclear secrets in the Australian outback
• Distress over Aboriginal child's exhumation

"The measure will provide Gold Cards to indigenous people present at or near Maralinga, Emu Field or the Montebello Islands at the time of the British nuclear tests in the 1950s or 1960s," he said.

It follows a royal commission - Australia's highest form of inquiry - in the 1980s, and decades of campaigning by survivors and advocates.

The nuclear tests were conducted with support from the Australian government.

The new healthcare subsidy will form part of a A$133m ( £76m, $98m) investment in Australia's federal budget, which will be unveiled on Tuesday.

Military harasses civil society working on Mullivaikkaal commemoration efforts

08 May  2017

Over the past few days, multiple military officials have harassed a civil society worker helping memorialization efforts of Mullivaikkaal. With the help of the local community, the civil society worker has been carving the names of those who were killed in the last phase of the war onto stones which they plan to turn into a memorial for May 18th.

A civil society actor involved with the project told Tamil Guardian, "How can we talk about good governance when there isn't even space to commemorate those who were killed 8 years after the war?"

Noting that this phenomenon of repressing memorialization was nothing new he added, "people cannot be expected to participate in reconciliation processes when they still don't have the space to remember and mourn those who were killed."

Felicitation To A Friend & Resolute Marxist

By Rajan Hoole –May 8, 2017

Dr. Rajan Hoole

In the normal course of events my long friendship and brotherly regard for Sritharan, or Sugu, as he is called, and to several of his colleagues, particularly Subathiran, or Robert, would have been unusual. Those of us whose training had a professional bias and had successful careers with domestic felicity mapped out for us, often ceased to think about things that really matter.  That would normally have been perfectly all right. But when these persons also had a vicarious urge to be heroes of Tamil nationalism, they also gave their voice and tacit approval to maligning and killing as traitors, those who thought and felt for the utterly hapless plight of ordinary people, repeatedly forced into wars they never wanted.

For persons who took the road that Sugu took, life has been full of painful challenges that would have broken most of us. Sugu’s political career goes back to about the era of the 1980 general strike for very basic workers’ demands that was brutally broken up by JR’s government, using JSS thugs, whom President JR ordered to have a counter-demonstration on 24^thMay. They were used again in the 1983 communal violence. This was the last time perhaps when there was an organised workers’ movement, supported by leading figures as Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe. It was also a testing time for the Tamil nationalists. My colleague Sritharan, who was then a lecturer in Jaffna University, went with a delegation to ask the leadership of the TULF to express solidarity with the workers. They were evasive and Mr. Sivasithamparam suggested to them that it was a Sinhalese problem that did not concern the Tamils. Being the main opposition party this was irresponsible and insensitive. After what happened subsequently, I need not expatiate on the historic irony and stupidity of that position, waiting for JR to deliver.

Sritharan Thirunavukarasu

Those like Sugu, who were early members of the EPRLF, struggled both intellectually and emotionally, to start a people’s movement that would be both internationalist and rigorously dedicated to the interests of the people, going against the high tide of Tamil nationalism that brought the LTTE to the fore. It is not hard to understand why several of those who were with him, from Balakumar’s section of the EROS to Premachandran, more recently, plunged into the Tamil nationalist tide that swept people along to the horrors of Mullivaykkal.

To give a flavour of the EPRLF in the 1980s, I will do well to quote N. Pathmanathan, one of our leading civil servants, who did a term in prison under the PTA from 1983 to 1987. He was helping other PTA detainees to prepare their cases. He was astounded upon reading the charges against an EPRLF prisoner caught putting up posters in Vavuniya, which called upon Tamil and Sinhalese workers to get together and launch a united struggle to establish a workers’ state that would guarantee equality to everyone. Pathmanathan was struck by the irony of detaining on a separatist charge, a man who should have been honoured for his dedication to national unity.

Sugu, whom we felicitate today on the launch of his book, we may say belongs to the remnants of the historic workers’ movement that took a last stand on their behalf in 1980. The crushing of that movement enabled the same methods to be used against Tamils while our leaders slept. Sugu is among the rare souls who have been through decades of fury and murder and have come out with their character unblemished. What helped him along was his sound intellect, constantly renewing itself through study, interaction with the world and compassion for the suffering. It is the kind of quality intellect that would be out of place in protected academic establishments where place-hunting is the norm. A scholarly mind as Sugu’s is rooted in a large universe spanning space and time, and derives confidence and reassurance from the wisdom of the ages.

The collection of his articles titled ‘To a new generation that consecrates Humanity’ is dedicated to ‘the dead and disappeared in the struggle for the dawn of humanity’ where he quotes Bharathy’s dedication to the freedom fighters of India – ‘[May their] dreams come true’. Both Bharathy and the lines from Tagore he quotes “Where the mind is without fear…Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way…Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake”, are an indicator of the man’s heart and his aspirations.

Like the two of his mentors, Sugu is an unswerving internationalist. This comes through in his article on the US – British led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and his joy at the Arab Spring and anxiety at its delicacy. Through his sense of reality and disappointments he has faced, he tries to see things in the light of reason and the way the world works, and his emotion is characteristically restrained. As a man who placed his life on the line in search of a liberated order, his words have a poignant ring, when he describes the culture of murder that struck parents and children at unseemly hours, and abducted children to fight wars that the elite were running away from, and remarks: “For us who have adopted such abominable practices to seek franchise and recognition in the civilised world is utterly unworthy.”

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National Reconciliation Policy: Hope at last - EDITORIAL

 2017-05-09

At the historic January 2015 presidential election it was widely accepted that a huge minority community vote played a key role in the victory of Maithripala Sirisena. 

Some two and half years later at a meeting on May 2, the Cabinet approved a National Reconciliation Policy presented by President Sirisena. This policy was drafted by the Office for National Unity and Reconciliation (ONUR) chaired by former president Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. The ONUR was set up in September 2015 but there were delays or drawbacks and some analysts raise valid questions as to whether the National Government was acting now largely because the jolt it got from the record crowd that attended former president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s joint opposition May Day rally at the Galle Face Green.   
The national reconciliation policy had been finalized in September last year after a comprehensive one-year consultation process with multiple stakeholders. They included government officials, mainly those from the Ministry of National Integration and Reconciliation, the Secretariat for Coordinating Reconciliation Mechanisms, the Ministries of Justice, Education and Women’s Affairs, the Ministry of National Coexistence, Dialogue & Official Languages, provincial councils, civil society, academics, youth, women and victims’ representatives and grassroots activists.   

According to a report obtained by the Daily Mirror, the policy draws on the findings of previous national initiatives including the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) report, the Udalagama Commission report and the Paranagama Commission report.   
The policy declares it will serve as the State policy on reconciliation and provide direction to the process. It will also provide a guiding framework to all stakeholders working to achieve coherence in reconciliation initiatives.   
According to the document approved by the Cabinet, the draft policy will fill a long-standing vacuum due to the absence of a consolidated national policy on this issue. It will aim to satisfy the need of the country for an over-arching vision on reconciliation and a broad, coherent framework to steer and direct the process. In this regard, it declares that, “Acknowledging that while several reconciliation initiatives are underway, there does not exist an expressed declared policy by the Government of Sri Lanka on the subject; hence this national policy on reconciliation aims to bridge this gap.”   

President Sirisena, commenting on the document when it was first presented last year said the policy has been drawn up “in a manner that reflects that reconciliation is a whole-of-government effort and a multi-stakeholder endeavour.” It was decided that further discussions and consultations be held by ONUR and on May 2 the final revised national reconciliation policy was presented by the President with the approval of the National Coexistence, Dialogue & Official Languages Minister Mano Ganeshan. When the policy was first presented last September, Mr. Ganeshan had reportedly complained he had not been consulted though he was the Minster in charge of these vital areas. But valid questions have been asked as to why the consultations took as many as nine months.   
The final draft has laid down policy principles which it defines as a set of actionable principles and long-term goals that will form the basis for making rules and guidelines and to provide overall direction to planning and development for national reconciliation. We hope action means action and not just policies or words which we have seen to a large extent up to now.   
These hopefully action-oriented principles include equality, human rights, justice and the rule of law, transitional justice, inclusivity and diversity, sustainable development, civic consciousness and others.   

The policy has identified some critical issues -- conflict sensitivity, cross-cultural awareness, victim-centeredness, gender responsiveness, foresight and innovation, leadership and sustainability, efficiency and effectiveness, coordination and complementarity and clear and consistent communication.   
The document says the policy envisages the launching of public awareness and education campaigns with strict monitoring programmes to ensure the implementation of the policies. Nice or wise words indeed but we hope action will mean action and not just words.

RAJAPAKSA ONSLAUGHT AND OPTIONS FOR SIRISENA – RANIL GOVERNMENT – SUNANDA  DESHAPRIYA.

Image: Aerial view of the Joint Oppositions May Day- ally at the Galle Face Green;Imag Mahinda Rajapaksas official Facebook page.

08/05/2017

It was some half a century ago that we marched crying the slogan “We are going to – Galle Face; Come with us to – Galle Face.” My elder brother and I had two red shirts especially made by our mother for May Day. She wore a red saree. My father had red bush coat. That was the May Day rally and demonstration of the united left in 1963, which shook the ruling classes in the country.

N. Shanmugadasan, the leader of the Sri Lanka Communist party (Chinese wing) who penned his biography “Political Memoirs of an Unrepentant Communist” described that historic May Day thus:

“Now, in 1963, the movement for left unity gained momentum, particularly in view of the poor performance of the SLFP, and the threat of extreme reaction staging a come-back. By May Day 1963, sufficient progress had been made so that the three left parties called for a united May Day Rally. The enthusiasm of the ordinary people for left unity can be gauged from the gigantic demonstration and rally that took place on that day. Ceylon had never seen anything like that ever before, or ever since. Not only did unprecedented thousands march in the demonstration, but thousands more thronged the route, lining it several deep and occupying every vantage point, to watch this unique spectacle which to many was the realisation of their deeply cherished hopes. The Galle Face Green teemed with humanity.”

At that time there were no buses bringing party supporters to the venue. No one carried photographs of the politicians, printed and provided by those politicians themselves. Every one travelled to Colombo on their own expenses. We even brought rice, pol sambol, alabadum and bala malu from home for lunch.

Today in comparison we can see similarities as well as differences. The defeated semi autocratic forces are aiming for power. It is they who fill the Galle Face on May Day. Like in 1963 the Government is limping, walking like a crab that preaches others to go straight. After the first 100 days when far reaching democratic reforms took place, the only thing the Government is doing appears to be bragging and running to foreign countries.

In 1963 the Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranayake was quick to understand the dynamism of the left unity shown by the Galle Face May Day. She understood by instinct that only way to safeguard her power lies in breaking that unity. The three left parties had formulated 21 demands and was gaining strength.   She only had to pay three ministerial posts and buy the LSSP to destroy the left unity.

Now we need to explore how dynamics of the May Day 2017 is going to create a new balance of forces and different momentums.  In a sense, the future of the January 2015 victory depends on these post May Day new developments.

Rajapaksa accepted the challenge thrown at him by the ruling politicians to fill up the Galle Face if he can. He won the challenge. He was able to gather the largest May Day crowd without even without the state power. That itself is a remarkable achievement. But at the same time one should understand that the ability to mobilise people does not always mean the correctness of political ideology. If mere popularity is a sign of political correctness, self-proclaimed murderer President Dutarte should be a great leader. History provides us with examples of a number of popular dictators. The LTTE leader Prabhakaran too could have most probably become the popular Tamil leader if he had the chance to contest in an election.

But in real politics what matters at the end is numbers. According to conservative estimates, SLFP and UNP May Day rellies together had more numbers than the Rajapaksa May Day rally. Almost all other May Day rallies held around the country too opposed Rajapaksa policies. Arithmetic as well as Algebra of the May Day 2017 numbers does not show an immediate possibility of Rajapaksa capturing power.  His forces are definitely gathering momentum while the rainbow coalition that defeated him is in disarray and is disheartened. But that is not what we hear.

Politicians belonging to Sirisena camp openly count Rajapaksa’s May Day numbers and Sirisena’s May Day numbers together saying “we all belong to SLFP”. Their argument is that if both factions come together SLFP could beat the UNP in any election in hands down.  The leading members of the Sirisena led SLFP has come out openly against the present unity between the SLFP and UNP.  Two of them even called for uniting with the Rajapaksa faction to defeat the UNP.  Most probably this trend within the SLFP will gather strength in the coming months.

UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe’s game plan of splitting the SLFP by strengthening the Rajapaksa faction is not a secret.  Wickremasinghe’s political strategy is not political campaigning but political manipulation.  When he was the Prime Minster during 2002 -2004 his strategy was to strengthen Mahinda Rajapaksa against President Kumarathunga and SLFP second in commander Anura Bandaranayake.  Although he thought the conflict he was fuelling within the SLFP will help him to regain power, Rajapaksa was able to maneuverer him out of power in 2005.

On the other hand, no one knows of any political strategy of President Sirisena. That is why politicians close to Sirisena make statement contradicting each other. Because he does not work on a political strategy, Sirisena has been unable to build a strong group of politicians around him. During the last two years he has taken virtually no political step to strengthen the party and his leadership other than attending all kinds of opening ceremonies and making impromptu speeches.

In this context, Sirisena will find it difficult to manage the shock waves generated by the Rajapaksa’s May Day rally.  Rajapaksaist Trojan horses within the SLFP will gain more ground and pressures to leave the coalition with the UNP and Wickremasinghe will increase. Already emboldened by the success of Galle Face mobilisation Rajapaksa camp has threatened to call a hartal to over throw the Government. 

Rajapaksa himself predicts serious political developments in coming weeks. Pro Rajapaksa media is overflowing with reports of heightening conflicts between the two coalition partners of the government.

To ease the conflicts within the Government, President Sirisena has appointed a committee, according to media. He knows that Rajapaksa’s re-capturing power will be fatal blow to him politically and personally and to his true associates.  But he seems to be helpless in front of Wickremasinghe’s political manipulations.

At this junction, it appears that there are a number of steps needed to off-balance Rajapaksa’s extremist political agenda.

1. Speed up investigations in to corruption and punish the perpetrators. Leading members of the Rajapaksa camp are charged with serious allegations of fraud and embezzlement. If the Government can prove those allegations there will be renewed vigour in the anti – Rajapaksa camp and loss of spirt in the Rajapaksa camp.

2. Re-invigorate the reform agenda of January 2015 change without waiting for a fully pledged new constitution. Providing a greater devolution as a solution to the ethnic issue will win back the trust of the minorities.  There are many promised reforms in waiting such as the release of political prisoners, abolishing of the Prevention of Terrorism Act and releasing military occupied land of the Tamil and Muslim people.

Start a genuine political discussion on the issues of governance and democratic reforms with civil society groups around the country breaking the monopoly of Colombo based elite smaller civil society groups. They are the real foot soldiers of the people’s campaign against Rajapaksa autocracy.

If Sirisena – Wickremasinghe coalition fails to implement such a course of action, it may be difficult to stop Rajapaksa clan capturing the power and establishing Rajapaksa kingship. Such a scenario could have deadly repercussions for the President Sirisena and his associates. Wickremasinhe will be happy to get back his coveted post of leader of the opposition.

Standing Up For The Gay Politician: Mangala Samaraweera On Right Track?

By Chamindra Weerawardhana –May 8, 2017

Dr. Chamindra Weerawardhana

At a parliamentary debate on 5 May 2017, a less than pleasant verbal exchange occurred between Mangala Samaraweera MP, the Minister of External Affairs, and the opposition benches, especially with Wimal Weerawansa MP of the Jathika Nidhahas Peramuna. The former was accusing the latter of corrupt practices during the Rajapaksa administration, providing evidence of specific cases. One such case included financial malpractice (and diplomatic misdemeanour) in relation to a foreign trip on state business. The External Affairs Minister was clearly seeking to make a political statement, and so was Weerawansa, who found an opportunity to slam Samaraweera. At one point, a statement came from the opposition benches that the incumbent government was composed of ‘ponnayas’, a highly pejorative term that implies a discriminatory and downgrading attitude towards non-cisnormativity. This term is also widely used as a homophobic slur, and this was the intention of the MP who used this word to refer to the yahapalana government.

An LGBTQI-friendly government? OR NOT?

A number of non-heterosexual politicians occupy high-profile posts in the yahapalana government. However, none of them have ever risen in the chamber to stand openly for Sri Lanka’s LGBTQI community. When President Sirisena openly affirmed “Samalingika yojanava visikalé mamai” earlier this year, each and every one of the cis gay MPs and ministers [and those in ‘even higher’ office] maintained pin-drop silence. At election campaigns and in their day-to-day lives, the majority of cis gay MPs present themselves as ‘heterosexual’ – being legally married to cis women. In sum, present-day Sri Lanka does have a segment of the political class that is non-heteronormative, but it is composed of individuals who are cautious to NEVER affirm their non-heteronormativity in public.

Samaraweera as the exception?

In this context, Samaraweera has been the exception. A cabinet minister since 1994 (with a number of interruptions in between spent in the opposition benches), Samaraweera has never sought to hide his sexual orientation behind a cis-heteronormative marriage. In 2016, under his purview, Sri Lanka made the exemplary decision of voting in favour of the appointment of the UN’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity/Expression (SOGIE) Special Expert. Sri Lanka was also the only country in the South Asian region to vote in favour of the Special Expert. This decision is extremely important, as Sri Lanka’s foreign policy apparatus has a long-standing habit of brushing SOGIE issues directly under the carpet. They did so with skill, for example, at the 2013 Commonwealth summit, making sure that no SOGIE issues were openly raised during the summit proceedings held in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka’s endorsement of the SOGIE Expert is therefore a crucial and highly significant foreign policy decision, which ought to preferably mark the development of a stronger emphasis on fundamental rights, with a strong SOGIE component. That the Special Expert who was eventually appointed, Professor Vitit Muntarbhorn, is a distinguished academic and a citizen of the Kingdom of Thailand, a country with which Sri Lanka shares centuries-long ties of kinship, shared sociocultural, artistic and religious traditions, is also of tremendous significance.

Problematic elements of Yahapalana Foreign policy?

The exemplary nature of the SOGIE vote, however, does not transpire in many other foreign policy decisions of the yahapalana government. As this writer has noted in previous writing to the press, foreign policy under Ranil Wickremesinghe and Mangala Samaraweera leaves a great deal to be desired. Some aspects of foreign policy management involve a bleak understanding of strategic priorities, and a lack of thinking ‘beyond the box’ of conventional foreign policy trends of a bygone era. The effort to produce the polar opposite of the previous administration is yet another pitfall. The continuity of an external affairs budget-burden to sustain a ‘white-elephant-foreign-affairs-structure’ that Sri Lanka simply cannot afford is an issue that is largely overlooked. Deeper problems remain when negotiating the fine balance between national sovereignty, regional cooperation and global priorities, in one of the least supra-nationally integrated regions of the world.

However, and despite all these issues and more, a mere cursory glance suffices to admit the fact that the present foreign policy approach is much more disciplined and dignified than what preceded, especially during President Rajapaksa’s second mandate (2010-08/01/2015). In this sense, the Samaraweera-Wickremesinghe duo deserve a word of commendation in carrying themselves with a decedent level of decorum on the world stage.

Samaraweera’s response in Parliament, 5 May 2017

Returning to the above-mentioned parliamentary debate, Samaraweera marked himself out in an exemplary manner when the word ‘ponnaya’ was thrown at him. He immediately responded that he is happier to be a ‘ponnaya’ than a thug, thief or a murderer. The parliament of Sri Lanka, with a highly disproportionate number of cis-hetero-normative men, is an extremely homophobic and transphobic, and indeed heavily [cis and trans]misogynist place. In a context of that nature, making a statement that ‘assumes’ one’s non-hetero-normativity from the frontbench is a brave and laudable feet indeed.

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