An accolade for authentic leadership: Exemplary response for Easter tragedy

 Monday, 6 May 2019

I live in Negombo and know many who lost their lives in the Easter tragedy that engulfed serene Sri Lanka. There was surely no repetition of ‘black July’ or ‘dark Digana’. It is amazing to see the restrained response of affected masses withgrief and sorrow on one hand yet the compassion and care on the other hand. Today’s column is a reflection on authentic leadership in the aftermath of recent crisis with the due emphasis of the presence and absence of it.

Overview

Many have commented on the lapses of execution related to intelligence alerts. Also, there is still finger pointing with the typical blame game of actions, inactions and reactions. As a learner and practitioner of management, I simply see it as a leadership crisis. Heavy price had to be paid for the hefty lethargy of the so-called important yet incompetent individuals. One ray of hope emerged is the authentic leadership aptly demonstrated by his eminence, Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, the Archbishop of Colombo with the blessings of other religious dignitaries.

My intention is not to instil personal glory to an individual, but to showcase the fulfilment of a timely need in avoiding an inter-religious or inter-racial conflict. It was authentic leadership much in evidence, in the context of key political leaders showing the absence of it.

Authentic leaders in dire need 

Leadership literature is full of fancy jargon and multitude of packaging as well as re-packaging. One significant trend in recent past in the east and west alike is the focus on authentic leaders. In essence, leadership is all about inspiring, influencing and initiating. It is more than positions and titles as it involves decisions and actions. Authentic leaders had always been there in the world. All great religious leaders are obviously authentic. From Thripitaka, Bible, Koran and Hindu texts, many such examples could be found.

How would an authentic leader differ from the rest? Forbes magazine gives the following four reasons:


1. Authentic leaders are self-aware and genuine. Authentic leaders are aware of their strengths, their limitations, and their emotions. They also show their real selves to their teams. They do not act one way in private and another in public; they don’t hide their mistakes or weaknesses out of fear of looking weak. They also realise that knowing themselves better is an endless journey, never complete.

2. Authentic leaders are mission driven and focused on results. They are able to put the mission and the goals of the organisation ahead of their own self-interest. They do the job in pursuit of results, not for their own power, money or ego.

3. Authentic leaders lead with their heart, not just their minds. They are not afraid to show their emotions, their vulnerability and to connect with their employees. This does not mean authentic leaders are ‘soft’. In fact, communicating in a direct manner is critical to successful outcomes, but it’s done with empathy; directness without empathy is cruel.

4. Authentic leaders focus on the long-term.From a business point of view, corporate leaders are focused on long-term shareholder value, not in just beating quarterly estimates. From a socio-cultural point of view, it highlights the need to go beyond petty politics of wooing the voters to commit towards long term wellbeing of all.

The way His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, in collaboration with other religious leaders as an inter-religious front, guided the Catholic Church in Sri Lanka demonstrated all the above four. Despite numerous criticisms about his previous standpoints on various issues, this was a solid testimony of authentic leadership in action. As a true servant of God, he is showing the power of serving, setting an example to the so-called leaders in power.

Leaders serve and laggards survive 

When you consider the 550 Jathaka stories, more than 50% of the time, Bodhisathva is portrayed as a leader. In some cases, as one who serve others. In brief, a servant leader is a servant first. The simple motto is service first. Jesus Christ washed the feet of his disciples and requested them to do so for the others. It is a true demonstration of servant leadership. There are instances from Prophet Mohamed’s life too where the servant leadership characteristics could be found.

Robert Greenleaf describes the servant dimension of an authentic leader as follows: “The servant-leader is servant first. Becoming a servant-leader begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one who is leader first. The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant first to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and the most difficult to administer, is this: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants?”

We, in fact saw this in abundance in hundreds of Catholic priests who were with affected families in Katuwapitiya and Kochhikade. Instead of shouting slogans andholding placards, they carried the coffins of the departed ones whilst consoling the surviving relatives. It was a rare case of breeding authentic leadership in transforming followers to empowered leaders.

Leader needs a team in order to move towards a shared dream. It is not being autocratic but democratic, not being coercive but collaborative. World of sports have many such examples where leader harnesses a winning team. Authentic leaders have to awaken the team spirit in fostering synergy. Leveraging on strengths of each team member, the leader can collectively do more. What Mahathma Gandhi demonstrated in rallying a nation with non-violence against a forceful empire is this reality. He was a true synergist and the community, even while he was in jail practiced what he preached. What we are witnessing in the aftermath of Easter tragedy also show the rays of hope with authentic leadership in action.

Serving leaders and subservient laggards

When authentic leadership was demonstrated in religious fronts, the opposite was seen in the political fronts. Instead of servant leaders, subservient laggards accusing one another, engaging in the typical blame game can still be seen. Thanks to media, both leaders and laggards in the current Sri Lankan context were amply exposed with their words and deeds.

Social media, re-allowed again, are full of bouquets towards emergence of authentic leadership from religious fronts whilst throwing brickbats at the opportunistic politicians. The sarcasm is seen at its highest with regards to the accusations of inactivity and incompetence. As there is no smoke without fire, it invites for a sincere sole searching by all political leaders at least to learn what authentic leadership is all about.

St. Mother Theresa of Calcutta demonstrated her authentic leadership through what she did with destitute street children. We have reached a time where there is a dire need to heal the wounded hearts and minds through close association, caring communication and core counselling where needed.Religious and laity alike can show their authenticity in rising to the occasion as committed leaders.

The way his eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith conducted himself during the aftermath of the Easter Tragedy is not only a demonstration of leading from the front but also breeding empowered leaders who would silently do the needful.Sowing love where hatred was rampant, and guiding the flock towards peaceful behaviour were much evident in the past few days. He lived the Gospel values not only in being a ‘sheep among the wolves’, but also ‘wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove’.

Catholic Church worldwide, despite issues, scandals and controversies, has sustained itself for more than 2,000 years. With its clear mission with heaven in mind, it will move along, with sustained spirit of loving one another. We in Sri Lanka with 7% Catholic population can look forward to a meaningful engagement with all other religions in collectively contributing to the nation re-building. Authentic leadership demonstrated by our beloved Archbishop has already become a ray of hope for such an enormous endeavour. Subservient laggards may continue to do the contrary. In fact, we ourselves have to be blamed, as we deserve the results from who we have elected with much hope. Rather than worshiping politicians, working smart as professionals with competence and commitment is what is required for a rapid bouncing back. With an electoral system where a major political party has to bow down to small parties of ethnic origin to obtain the needed majority, controversies of conniving for selfish gains also will be a recurrent reality.

Way forward

Living with authentic leaders on one front and awful laggards on another front is not comfortable. Yet, it is the reality. Transforming laggards to leaders is not so easy. Yet, it is necessary. His eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith has shown us the way of challenging incompetent laggards with insightful thoughts and inspirational actions. Time has come for Sri Lankans to show their resilience in bouncing back with vigour and valour in embracing authentic leadership though words and deeds.
(Prof. Ajantha Dharmasiri can be reached through director@pim.sjp.ac.lk, ajantha@ou.edu or www.ajanthadharmasiri.info.)

From casualty to catastrophe

Photo by Asanka Brendon Ratnayake for The Washington Post

PROF. QADRI ISMAIL-05/05/2019

We hadn’t seen him in years, ever since he left to work abroad. So, on the day of his return, his mother invited the extended family to lunch. As he walked through the door we reacted collectively, gasped audibly. He wore a sharp suit but sported one of those long, unkempt, rowdy beards. Perhaps, I thought, there are no barbers in Saudi Arabia. (You never know, it’s a weird place).

Then one of my aunts, his senior by a good thirty years, got up, arms extended – to give him a hug. He clumsily sidestepped her embrace. Oh fuck. It seemed he now followed a dogmatic (a term I prefer to fundamentalist) interpretation of Islam, which forbids men from touching women they could marry. To this day, the Sri Lankan Muslims I know routinely ignore the injunction. But, once upon a time an eating-drinking person like the rest of us, he had become one of them. A son of Galle, a town with ramparts, he had circumvallated himself, literally refused to be touched by the outside.

What god would order his followers to reject love? What human would submit to such a god?

*

He may have been an anomaly then, but the beard and burqa are ubiquitous now. The object of scorn, sniggers from secular types like me. On the other hand, they probably console themselves with righteousness, faith, a guaranteed ticket to heaven, where real, eternal life begins.

So, Sri Lankan Muslims today fall into two camps: us and them, secular/dogmatist, those who believe and tolerate versus those who believe and dominate? (I don’t pretend to portray them fairly.) Yes and no.

We invite them to our functions. They come. Dressed to alienate, perhaps, but they come. We go to their homes – where they immediately harim the women. Behave to alienate, perhaps, but we keep going. Both sides, if they constitute two sides, say insha-allah, alhamdulillah when appropriate. Begin emails with SA. Even top recipes with 786. (Google if you don’t get it.) Both pray five times a day, fast during Ramazan, perform Haj if possible. Observe the rules of haram even as they contest its specifics. (Do I dare eat a crab?)

I do not argue a lack of distinction between fun-dos and fun-don’ts, Sufis and Salafis. Just that the delineating line keeps moving. Sometimes, like when the US invades Iraq, or the yellow-robed monsters organize carnage upon Muslims in Aluthgama and Digana, we merge with them and they, us. Fear disappears the border.

*

Thus the significance of the first known attack by a militant Islamist group in Sri Lanka on another religion: the defacement of Buddha statues in Mawanella last year. If tactically puerile – it achieved nothing for the cause – it identified the enemy as Sinhala Buddhist majoritarianism. If ethically specious, it makes political sense, at least in the short term, for a Sri Lanka-driven radical Muslim outfit. You hit us, we’ll hurt you. A politics of reaction, revenge consolidates a Muslim we, as victim, against the Sinhala Buddhist state and its mobs.
But, reoriented by ISIS, this group – whether National Thouheed Jama’ath or a splinter – changed its target. Butchered Tamil and Sinhala Christians who, as Christians, have not displayed organized animus towards Muslims. Ethically untenable, it makes no political sense, either. At least, not within a Sri Lankan frame.

The bombings startle those who confuse events in Sri Lanka with Sri Lankan events. Its proper political frame is global. (In his latest video, ISIS leader Abu-Bakr al-Baghdadi rants against “the savagery, brutality and ill intentions of the Christians [worldwide] towards the Muslim community.”) Nevertheless, it inevitably had national impact. Within Sri Lanka, it turned the Muslim, suddenly, shockingly, from victim to aggressor, casualty to catastrophe.

*

How does one react to catastrophe?

“They are broken,” said my friend from Negombo, now living in the US. Growing up, she attended St Sebastian’s church. She speaks of, weeps for her clan, classmates, still members of the congregation: “My cousins went to midnight mass, so they missed the bomb…They are not angry, they are sad…There are empty cars waiting in the church parking lot. Houses that remain closed because the entire family died. My friend lost her husband, who was carrying their child when the bomb went off. Somehow, the baby survived. It’s a miracle. But what is my friend going to do now?”

Dogmatic Islam doesn’t care. But as we condemn its ruthlessness, mourn with its survivors, let’s restrain our hyperbole. Despite the narrative of the media, the assertions of politicians, the event bears precedence. Our president-in-waiting, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, holds responsibility for the deaths, albeit out of sight of tv cameras, of 40,000 Tamil civilians in the last months of the war. Not to mention hand-picked targets in the south, his critics: Lasantha Wickrematunge, Prageeth Eknaligoda. Those who would call Zahran Hashim (Casim?) dastardly, barbaric, unIslamic, even animal, would be on firmer ethical ground if they posed analogous insults, questions to Rajapaksa: is it Buddhist to slaughter without discretion? Is it Buddhist to kill even a single living creature? Did the Buddha preach violence? Command an army?

*

How does one react to catastrophe?

In the days since the bombings, Muslims stayed indoors wherever possible. Shuddered at any knock on the door. Small Sinhalese mobs looted a Muslim-owned store here, damaged a mosque there. Subaltern Sinhalese harassed Muslims on the street, with covered women, hyper-visible, taking an unequal share of the torment. Two steps up the socio-economic ladder, Uber-drivers cancelled bookings upon seeing Muslim names. Sinhalese nationalist trolls made every Muslim check Twitter with trepidation.

The president reacted by banning: Twitter, then the NTJ, then – bizarrely enough – the burqa. Suddenly, shockingly, a single piece of cloth got transformed into a signifier, if not agent of terror. I sincerely hold this garment, and its extended family, a patriarchal, Wahhabi imposition, restriction on women. But one individual – whether president, parent, partner – or group has no authority to interfere with a woman’s right to choose her habit. (Before deciding, Sirisena consulted a single Muslim organization, the all-male ACJU, which has as one of its primary, self-appointed tasks the policing of female bodies, behavior).

In any case, burqa-wearing women have not been identified as a threat to national security. I checked and rechecked: every single bomber was male. I scoured the web, tooth-combed the papers, asked everyone who might know: they remained male. The women-in-black are a threat, solely, to the Sinhala nationalists’ belief that they, and they alone, get to arbiter the appearance of the Sri Lankan everyday. They see red when they see black.

Seeing yellow, being yellow, Rajapaksa reacted by launching his campaign for president. He promised the elimination of radical Islam. He meant the pacification – Tamilification, if you like – of Muslims.

*

How does one react to being a catastrophe?

In the days since the bombings, Sri Lankan Muslim intellectuals – almost universally male – contorted themselves insisting on the peacefulness of the religion. (Islam could mean peace – or submission.) Some quote a Quranic verse: “killing a single innocent person is tantamount to killing the whole of mankind.” But the Prophet led an army, a military that, from a city in the Hejaz, conquered the Arabian peninsula.

In the same period, Muslim leaders fought each other for the privilege of kissing the posteriors of Sinhala nationalist politicians with even greater passion than they’ve displayed before. This didn’t stop Aluthgama and Digana. And will only embolden Rajapaksa.

Whatever their private beliefs, none of these leaders found the courage to publicly condemn Saudi influence amongst Muslims, now going back decades. As they wouldn’t publicly condemn, for instance, the state-sanctioned murder, not too long ago, of Rizana Nafeek, in the only country on earth named after a family. Remember her?

*

How does one react to being a catastrophe?

Ask any Tamil who’s lived in the country since at least July 1983. We’ll now have to learn to survive like them. We might as well start training. (Put those madrasas, and Saudi funding, to more practical use.) But we haven’t demonstrated much sympathy for their predicament, have we? And yet we dare ask others to feel our pain.

*

There isn’t now and never has been a terrorist or national security problem in Sri Lanka. And we’ve faced just one catastrophe: Sinhala Buddhist nationalism.

Sri Lanka police arrest two in clashes as schools reopen to near-empty classes

A student's bag is searched by a parent as he arrives at his school which opened days after a string of suicide bomb attacks across the island on Easter Sunday, in Batticaloa, Sri Lanka, May 6, 2019. REUTERS/Danish Siddiqui

Shihar Aneez, Waruna Karunatilake-MAY 6, 2019 

NEGOMBO, Sri Lanka/COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka police arrested two men after a personal feud led to clashes between two sectarian groups in a beachside resort north of the capital, the site of one of the deadliest Easter Sunday suicide bombings, as schools reopened to near-empty classes.

Two weeks after 257 people were killed by Islamist militants in hotels and churches across the country, police were hunting plotters on the loose as fears grew of ethnic clashes targeting Muslims.

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the bombings.

Police spokesman Ruwan Gunasekera said a clash on Sunday between two individuals in Negombo, where 102 people attending an Easter service were killed on April 21, quickly escalated.

Government sources told Reuters that some Catholics and Muslims clashed, prompting an overnight curfew in Negombo.

A Reuters witness saw at least one shop, an office, three motorbikes and three three-wheel taxis had been damaged. Gunesekera said there were no reports of any serious injuries.

Archbishop of Colombo Malcolm Ranjith and some Muslim religious leaders visited the area to try to defuse the tension and asked liquor shops to be closed.

Sri Lanka’s 22 million population is mostly Buddhist but includes minority Christians, Muslims and Hindus.

A brief ban on social media platforms imposed during the clash was lifted, but authorities said they would stay alert for threats against Muslims.

Security remained tight across the country as state schools resumed classes on Monday, but many anxious parents kept their children at home.

Mid-to-upper stream classes resumed on Monday, a day after soldiers conducted a security sweep of schools. Lower grades are expected to resume on May 13.

Despite the tight security and military patrols, most classrooms were near empty. Private schools, including Catholic institutions, remained closed.

“I have decided not to send my son to school until the country returns to normal,” said Sujeeva Dissanayake, whose son goes to the state-run Asoka College in Colombo.

Security forces are on high alert after intelligence reports indicated militants could strike before the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which is due to begin on Monday.

Muslim schools will be closed for the holidays.

Archbishop Ranjith, who has criticized the government’s handling of security around key establishments, has asked for Catholic schools in the Western Province, which includes Colombo and its suburbs, to close this week.

POWER OF PEACE

Prof. Robert Tellander-Tuesday, May 7, 2019

As a professor of Sociology at Sonoma State University in northern California, USA, I enjoyed teaching a course entitled, “The Politics of Religion.” The simple and crude hypothesis focused on the presumption that how a particular religion made decisions, that affected the whole community of faith (“politics”), determined what adherents believed. In field testing this presumption by my students in churches, synagogues, and mosques, this premise proved to be a highly relevant insight.

When on sabbatical in Bandung, Java, Indonesia, I was asked by the members of the Rotary Club to speak to them on “Why the USA invaded Iraq after Iraq invaded Kuwait.” I confessed that I had no idea why, but suspected that it had something to do with oil. Instead, I offered to talk on what a “Muslim Peace” might look like. They wondered, with interest, what I meant. “Give me twenty minutes at your next meeting and I’ll explain.” They agreed and I spoke.

The presentation evolved from my course on religious decision-making, but the model in Islam had never been articulated. Drawing upon two of the pillars of Islam, Charity and the Hajj, I outlined a behavioural path that creates Islam. As a community of faith, an aggregate of individual Muslims, responding to the Qur’an becomes Islam.

Origins of Islam

Unlike other major religions, Sunni Muslims, the dominant majority of Muslims, do not have clergy priests or a theological hierarchy. Consequently, they rely on individual Muslims to act out their understanding of the Qur’an. The hadith, the comments and the behaviours of the Prophet Muhammad, serves as a behavioural prompt for believers. Much of it has been written down, some confirmed by the earliest companions of the Prophet, Others have been manufactured by latter-day zealots who, otherwise, had no authority to speak on the topic. (In Christianity, the populist assertion, “What would Jesus do?” serves this same latter function.) The Qur’an, however, stands alone as the revealed word of The God (Allah) and cannot be denigrated by false assumptions. As a result, the practices of the faithful in aggregate make manifest a tentative, contemporary meaning of Islam.

Thus, as a living faith, Islam exists as a behavioural witness of those who submit to the One God and act to make it manifest in the world. Islam in our world becomes a social plasma of human interpretations that, like the null hypothesis in science, evokes new insights but lacks the reassuring validation of being isomorphic with the teachings in the Qur’an. Consequently, four schools of hypothesizers have emerged to justify which behaviours can claim the greatest legitimacy. Without further revelations, they presume but do not even attain the level of law. The contradictions between the four schools serve to affirm that their interpretations remain inferences. They lack the authority of anything like canon law in Christianity.

Sunni Muslims hold that a Muslim must adhere to the Revelation in the Qur’an and not to interpret it to accommodate local circumstances. How then does one know what constitutes good Muslim behaviour in all circumstances? Islam itself split on this issue.

The Shia Muslims distrusted adhocracy and wanted more continuity and balance in the interpretation of the Qur’an after the death of the Prophet. They sought to give the power of hadith, to the practices of those who were descended from the Prophet.

When the two interpretations clashed, a war broke out with the Sunni Umayyad Dynasty in Damascus and the Meccans allied with the Caliph Ali, a cousin of the Prophet, who married Fatima, the daughter of the Prophet, and produced two sons, Hassan and Hussain.

The Umayyads won the battle. All was defeated; Fatima was captured and returned, but such an abduction in Arab customs constituted statutory rape. Overwhelmed by force and humiliated as a man, Ali lost all legitimacy and Sunni Muslims in Damascus triumphed.

To remove any future Shi’a possibilities, the Syrians pursued the two grandsons of the Prophet, who with their religious teachers had fled to the East. One was captured in Iraq and the other in Iran. Both boys were martyred. The dynastic line of the Prophet thus was expunged from Islam.

The “sore losers,” nevertheless, remained as Shi’a Muslims loyal to the family of Caliph Ali and Fatima—a minority. The dominating Sunni majority celebrated their defence of the Qur’an. Both of the factions remained alienated from each other. The extremists in each faction believed they could and must purge heretics within the community by murdering them. This persists even today.

Islam today

A Muslim Peace must overcome this historical tragedy, to deserve any legitimacy. For thirteen centuries, this has not occurred. Adherents in both Muslim camps Insist that the alienation must remain.

As a non-Muslim, a Protestant Christian--Lutheran--I have also seen the same schisms in Christianity and Judaism. I have no standing among Muslims. Consequently, I claim no authority from the schools of religious law, but merely propose to show the absurdity of self-righteousness in all Semitic religions. Peace, as a reconciliation across all three major Semitic faiths, can be attained if we shift from dogma, history, and certainty to see the obvious behavioural alternatives.

Make no mistake, I focus on Islam, not as a target, but as a model that has within it the capacity to create such a universal reconciliation.

Peace is not the absence of war, but the discovery of a more abundant life worth sustaining. Hoarding the traditions as hardened norms prevent the reconciliation sought and merely preserves the status quo as superior. Unmoved by its unacknowledged failures, the orthodoxies persist in defending, not the faith, but their versions of it.

Let us begin to reveal what a Muslim Peace would look like as an attempt to liberate the Qur’an from its various captors.

The new context for recreating Islam emerges out of the community of Muslims (The name, “Muslim,” translates as “One who submits to the One God.”) Islam is the plural social manifestation of the Qur’an made manifest in the behaviour of all.

Charity

To be a good Muslim, one must give of his/her time and treasure to those in need. The poor and handicapped may respond by consoling and helping to find a solution to the need by redefining and clarifying the actual need. Others may have insight and means to answer legitimate cries for help.

To identify fraudulent prayers, all faithful responders should clarify the needs, then discover their actual wants. The proper response to those persons who plea for help, but have not addressed their actual needs, thus, is “No.” Suggest that they seek help elsewhere. The act of answering prayers of the needy makes Muslims servants of Allah, the One God. Those who deceive themselves and the servants of The God shall bear the burden of the false witness of their need.

On hearing the prayers, the rich Muslims may first react by deciding that it is too costly to come to the mosque on Friday and revert to private prayers, instead. Thus, they alienate themselves from the Family of the One God, the Plural Manifestation of Islam--a community of faith that by its behaviour makes manifest to all the meanings in the Qur’an.

Like the poor and handicapped, they can take the steps necessary to faithfully answer the need. Charity, however, is not a token gift, but a meaningful act of giving to another in need. The benefits become shared by both the giver and the receiver. It transforms both lives to be in harmony with the Revelations in the Qur’an.

In this light, the giver becomes someone similar to the Good Samaritan (a non-Jew, non-Hebrew, and non-Israeli) who did according to the Christian Bible, what any practising good Jew should be doing.
The Hajj

Middle-Class Muslims, the majority, suffer from ritualizing their faith by making it routine. Moving beyond routine makes them uncomfortable. Responding to a real need draw them off their pedestals of faith and makes them behaviorally unique and socially beneficial.

For all who take the steps from where they are, to where they are needed become meaningfully helpful in the lives of others. They undergo a “hajj,” not The Hajj, The Pilgrimage to Mecca, but they become “pilgrims” of the faith. This small step unites all Muslims in an Islam that is One and the Same-One God-One Whole Community.

 

Behaviour-not belief alone-defines the community. Failing to act sustains disbelief, but does not damn the non-participant but leaves them isolated and inadequately defined-a Muslim in name only.
Consider, therefore, life with a beginning and an end as a journey of discovery (a hajj) and not a test of faith. A life lived in a family greater than your own immediate tribe becomes a more abundant form of life.

Having elaborated the means to create a more abundant and meaningfully real community of Islam, let us now use it as the tool to bring Peace to the world.

Peace on Earth

As a student travelling home through the Middle East, I spent several days in Teheran walking among the Iranians. To rest, I would go into a mosque, as was my practice in all Muslim-majority nations, and sit quietly.

In Teheran, a mullah approached me and asked in English, “What was I doing here?” I responded: ‘This is a house of prayer, a place of peace. I have come to rest in its shadow.” He said nothing but quietly walked away.

Like the Prophet’s home in Medina, the first mosques were “homes” for the faithful—a place to gather, socialize and pray. Here too, Islam becomes socially manifest. As the congregation of the faithful relates to each other and spills out into the larger community, the Peace of the Mosque becomes a model of peace for the larger community.

As discussed above, schisms destroy and break apart the communities of faith. The two main factions of Islam, Sunni and Shi’a--many more if you include the Sufi’s and the other Semitic religions, Judaism and Christianity--build walls of dogma and rules of behaviour to prevent the common reunion as the One Body in the One God, i.e., Allah. All should be reconciled, but we must start at the core and work out to the perimeter, starting with the reconciliation of Shi’a and Sunni Muslims.
Sunni and Shi’a Become One in a Community of Prayer

The break that separates them has been sealed with blood and violence, now is the time to heal the wounds with prayers.

If an unknown Shi’a enters a Sunni Mosque will an imam confront him/her and turn them away? From my experience, they never did that to me. (Increasingly, however, mosques in Europe ban non-Muslims from entering.) Not all Muslims on Friday come and pray together. They are kept away for lesser reasons. Why then block the path for those who come willingly?

If my Shi’a Muslim does enter and participate in the prayers, and responds to the last prayer that he/she hears, and takes the few steps in a hajj to respond to his/her fellow Muslim’s need, he/she becomes a participant in the community of Islam: One God/One Faith.

No one may brand them as heretics and raise a hand to purge them from the community. Whereas the Shi’a Ayatollahs, mullahs, and imams all use Plato’s deductive logic to interpret the meaning of the Qur’an, they do not define Islam, but merely satisfy themselves, and thus remain alienated from interacting in the wider community of faith. Therefore, do not declare them heretics, but recognize them as “alienated Muslims” who need deductive logic to fulfil their need for a faith that they can understand.

No one purifies Islam by killing an alienated Muslim, but merely reduces their number and re-enforces yet another reason for them to remain alienated.

Tolerance does not weaken Islam but allows the alienated to rethink and reunite. Forgiveness equals acceptance; purging them poisons the life-giving waters. Intolerance prevents the more abundant life as one community with one God.

Similarly, what happens if a Christian – even an Israeli Jew – enters the mosque to pray? First, they do not know how to pray as a Muslim and become immediately visible. Since many mosques segregate women from men, likewise they will need to reserve space in the mosque for “People of the Book, as well.” In the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, the Tomb of John, The Baptist, a cousin of Jesus, and a sacred shrine to both Jews, Christians, and Muslims has a space reserved for it within the Great Mosque.

Who would dare come to pray with Muslims? Only the brave, adventurous and innocent. Non-conformity in the manner of praying does not equate with heresy. Consequently, tolerance within the faith makes Islam the family of the One God, Allah. It becomes obvious that in contrast to other Semitic faiths, the assertion that others are wrong and not welcome to come to pray is itself the heresy.

Given the polarization of “disbelief’s”, however, some may come with malice and hatred. In any hajj, a Christian, Jew or Muslim must be properly dressed in white robes with no pockets or possessions, i.e., as pilgrims. Outside the precincts of the mosque accommodation for “People of the Book” to change, store their possession and don the robes of the pilgrim need to be developed. Then they would be free to wash and enter the mosque.

As with all Muslims, Shi’s and Sunni, now all who come to pray, and respond to those pleas voiced in the final prayers become faithful participants within the Community of Islam. No membership card, no Baptism, no circumcision but a participant in the Family of Allah. Ali cum Salam is realized if we “Just do it!” Nike sells sports clothes with this slogan, but if all Muslims did it, we would create peace.

The Family of the One God Foundation

By establishing “Family of the One God Foundation,” it gives to those who practice their faiths, the opportunity to sustain and to re-establish as in Islam a plural rendering of their faiths. It provides a means to achieve this, first, through the sharing of their individual talents and, second, sustains it through reciprocated economic sharing. The Foundation, thus, creates a micro-finance resource that supports the answering of prayers by caring believers who act to satisfy the voiced prayers of the need expressed aloud in their unique congregations.

The Foundation establishes an economic reserve fund at the Amana Bank that charges no interest on the loans granted to those in need, on the condition that they or their friends and family will replenish the amount so that others may benefit from it as they have.

The loans thus, do not generate profit nor extort interest. but serve to answer legitimate prayers. When uttered in the mosque, church, or synagogue they become the revenue of faith. All defaults, thus, become a loss to the faith. Eventually, if the reserves erode to nothing, it serves as a warning to the faithful that Islam, Christianity, and Judaism themselves can dissolve from indifference and neglect, as well. Thus, the Foundation serves, not as a memorial gift, but as a measure of the viability of these faiths in the lives of all peoples.

The failure of one unable to restore the debt has two causes:

* No one in the community came to help, and as a last resort, the needy prolonged their lives only to default in their ability to generate the amount owed. There are no real defaults, but the only evidence of the extent of indifference in the community of faiths.

* To remain a living faith, all Semitic faiths must sustain themselves in the real world--a larger,
indifferent community--if they wish to establish the community of the One God on earth as it is in Heaven. 

Terrorism 3.0

By Charitha Herath –MAY 6, 2019

Dr Charitha Herath

The discussion of the town has changed overnight. High hopes (rather high talks) of the proposed constitutional change by the so-called yahapalana government have been thrown to the back seat. The sophisticated lives of Colombo elites seem to have changed back to the zero level of square and the members of the clubs might have started finding a guy like Premadasa or Rajapaksa to manage the filed. (As always the way that it happened, upper stage elitists of our society would not put their buddy to engage in a mess like this and would try to find a guy from the non-elite political domain). All these things are to happen (or rather are happening) due to the barbaric act of terrorism by the ISIS driven Sri Lankan group of terrorist who belonged to the Thawhid Jammal. I like to make some observations on the new situation and on the new ‘political space’ yet to be created since the 21st of April 2019.

First of all, what I like to discuss as a keyword is ‘terrorism’. Unfortunately we are going to be engaging with it in coming days, weeks, months or sometime years!

Though it was said that the last set of artilleries of the Eelam war were fired on 9 of May 2009 at the coastal strip of the Pudumathan in Mulathiv District, I think that the Easter Sunday attack might turn us into the same route that we have come across as a country. The modern meaning of the concept of terrorism, as the Key Words for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary defines, has double functions, one as the meaning of ‘use violence explosive force against an existing state’ and the other as ‘part of a military struggle for national liberation’. Since the new form of terrorism which emerged in 1980’s as a result of the ‘failure of Arab Nationalism which claimed its authority not from a political but from divine authority’. “This new form of terrorism”, is according to the key words, who’s “appearance of the divine was one of the conditions of emergence of the suicide bomber”.

The second point that I would like to address in here is that the nature of developments of the Sri Lankan practices of terrorism.

As many of us know, the first experience of terrorism that we had in Sri Lanka was related with JVP insurrections in 1971 and in 1989. I called it as the terrorism 1.0. The second phrase of terrorism in our land was brought in by the Tamil militants from 1983 onwards which ended in 2009. I called that as the terrorism 2.0. The third phrase of the terrorism that we are heading to engage with started with the Easter Sunday attack, which I called as the terrorism 3.0.

Secondly, I could differentiate these three different practices of terrorism on three conceptual bases. It is correct to argue that the JVP led two insurrections (terrorism 1.0) emerged due to economic + societal disparities where the Tamil militant driven attacks took place due to the ethno + societal disparities. It is interesting to note that the terrorism, which has emerged from the Easter Sunday attacks (which I call as the terrorism 3.0), is based neither on Economic reason NOR on ethnic reasons, but on the divine reason! As the key words suggests, “Its authority not from a political but from divine”.

As the third point I would like to bring in a very interesting historical memory on the matter and to see how we could re-conceptualize the new form of terrorism. In 1983, after the anti-communal crisis took place in Colombo (with the help of the then UNP government), Social Anthropologist the late Newton Gunasinghe argued that the politics of this country would change from the point of anti-Tamil activities that emerged in July 1983. He conceptualized that the first phrase of the post-colonial political process which was called as Class-Politics would be over in 1983 and the second phase of the process will emerge. Following the theoretical interpretation of a French Marxist, Louis Aulthusser, Dr Gunasinghe argued that the ethnic politics will ‘over-determine’ the society in this new phase and the politics based on leftist movements will move into a marginal ground. Though we don’t have Newton Gunasinghe today to access the assumption that he made, the political process of the country moved in the same way as he anticipated. It was shown to us that the ethno nationalistic politics made into the central stage of the country in the last three decades.

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Sri Lanka: Latest ISIS Hideout?

Lankan Muslims have backed the Government’s crackdown methods against the Islamists in the wake of the Easter blasts, but the success of the efforts hinges on the narrative the Lankan Govt is able to construct

 

by Swarn Kumar Anand-2019-05-05

 

The Easter Sunday fidayeen attacks in Sri Lanka are unique for three reasons. First, the island nation — unlike its neighbours: India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh — had not seen till then any terror act by proclaimed Islamist forces. Second, the perpetrator ISIS, despite being badly battered and ousted from the land of its Caliphate just a month before, has told the world loud and clear that it still has potential to surprise new territories with its lethal action.

 

Third, the curious selection of the island nation for the suicide blasts by ISIS, in connivance with Lankan-based National Thowheeth Jamaath, raises a pertinent question: Whether the erstwhile ethnic divide in Sri Lanka was reborn in religious radicalisation?

 

However as there has never been any systemic discrimination against Muslims in Sri Lanka — an essential ingredient for the breeding of religious radicals — this question warrants special attention, also because experience shows that Islamist forces, particularly ISIS, have flourished only in those regions which are afflicted with pre-existing conflicts - sectarian, ethnic, or religious.

 

Despite local and global Intelligence reports suggesting that National Thowheeth Jamaath and its south Indian cohorts have been in touch with ISIS for long, the choice of Sri Lanka for the revolting attacks is more to do with the peaceful island nation being a safe target for ISIS, which is desperate to stay in the reckoning for global Islamist terror leadership. ISIS, which wielded enormous control over huge area stretching from eastern Iraq to western Syria till March this year, is straining every nerve to peddle a global narrative that its loss of 88,000km territory doesn’t mean that ISIS has lost its Islamist appeal for global jihad. And here it needed a solid platform to announce the same.

 

Seen in this context, the reclusive ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi made the first appearance in five years, before the global media in a video message to readily claim the responsibility for the Lankan terror attacks. He used the occasion to outline the crumbling outfit’s vision, calling for jehad via war of attrition, and insisting on its propaganda of robust presence in South-east Asia, including the Philippines.

 

Baghdadi also exhorted the “believers” for hijrah (migration) to the Afghanistan-Pakistan region for recruitment of jihadis. The ramifications can be found in Sri Lanka Army Commander Lieutenant General Mahesh Senanayake’s interview to the BBC in which he claimed that some of the “suicide bombers visited Kashmir and Kerala for some sorts of training or to make some more links with other foreign outfits”. Maybe this explains why Sri Lanka became the sure-shot target for homeless Baghdadi, who has lost his last redoubt in Syria.

 

Although Baghdadi claims caliphate is not bound by the geography, he is raring to gain lost ground in Iraq and Syria. ISIS already has a covert network in Iraq. Therefore, it is essential that the coalition forces should maintain its hold in the areas of ISIS caliphate till it destroys the outfit’s raison d’être.

 

As for Sri Lanka, the island nation needs to ensure ISIS doesn’t succeed in having local franchises there. Considering the sophistication of the highly coordinated attacks all by Lankan nationals, the bigger riddle for Colombo is to unravel whether any of its citizen ever fought for ISIS outside the country, and, more specifically, to ensure, if they did, they land in prison.

 

Although Sri Lankan Muslims have supported the Government’s crackdown methods against the Islamists in the wake of the Easter bombings, the success of the efforts hinges on the narrative the Government is able to construct. Any ostentatious action against religious-cultural symbol is fraught with the danger of spawning more radicals born out of the narrative of the State operation. Therefore, the burqa (face veil) ban may be a pragmatic decision — considering the facts that some of women accomplices of the suicide bombers had fled the scene in burqa — for the time being till the raids and investigation are over, the ban should be lifted as soon as possible before Islamist outfits can exploit the situation with newfound purpose and energy.

 

(The writer is Associate Editor & News Editor, The Pioneer)

Dharmaloka: A school, and a lesson

“What have they planned for us?” the boy next to me asked, bewildered, as the van we all were in drove up past the gates. He got the answer immediately: a procession of students lined up before a budhu medura, boys on one side, girls on the other. It was charming, but perhaps a little too much to take in, since nothing I, or we, had done had warranted a retinue which had obviously been arranged for us. We got down clumsily, some so confused that they’d forgotten to put on their school ties, and stared. Then the bell rang, the principal and the teachers came, and there was a call to worship. Hastily putting our hands together, we obliged and prayed with them.  

7 May 2019 

In most rural Sinhala villages, particularly in far-flung outposts, Buddhism is firmly linked with the education of children. There’s one school in Colombo that’s gained a reputation for its budhu medura, but elsewhere it’s a norm: a school must have a shrine, and students pray before it every morning. For schoolboys from multicultural – and in my case, secular – establishments, it’s hard to come to terms with this reality, because we’re taught a very different gospel in our classrooms. The boys beside me knew their gathas and sutras, certainly more than me, but this kind of communal worship was, I could see, outside their experience: for them faith is personal, never to be invoked out loud. Here, however, one cannot whisper. One has to raise one’s voice.  

Through Ratnapura, Rakwana connects Colombo to Embilipitiya, which is where the Sabaragamuwa meets the Dakuna (South). Pelmadulla lies between the two, and we were at present in a school there. To keep a long story short, I had written an article on a set of boys who had organised a Book Fair at their school in Colombo; their leader, who had attended the school we were at until Fifth Grade, had been asked to come with them, and me, to an otherwise innocuous ceremony: the opening of a new library.  

Dharmaloka is in that sense an indictment on this dilemma: whereas the big schools have 10 or 15 students studying the subject for their A/Levels, here there are more than 40

It’s a little difficult to explain the sociological undercurrents of this phenomenon: the telescoping of mundane ceremonies to the status of profoundly significant events. But it’s a reality that’s only too pervasive outside Colombo. And in any case, it wasn’t just the library we were occupied with: the boy was being “celebrated” because he’d made it to the news years after he had aced that ultimate symbol of educational mobility, the pahe shishyathwaya (Grade 5 ). We were being celebrated with him, and also thanked for having contributed, in some small way at least, to his ascent.  

The school we were at, Dharmaloka Vidyalaya, is not small, but then I realised that this was precisely the point: it’s the kind of intermediate institution which churns out most of the scholarship wallahs who end up at Royal and Ananda and Dharmaraja and Richmond. In this boy and his colleagues, who had also gone to Colombo through the shishyathwaya (scholarship), the staff and the principal had thus vindicated themselves.  

Dharmaloka is special, and stands out, for a reason: for the last few years and decades, the school has clinched nearly every category at national art competitions. At last year’s Interschool Art Competition, for instance, 15 of the 16 participants won awards and certificates, coming first in three categories, second in three, and third in one, with two consolation prizes.When it comes to ART or chitra kalawa another problem persists. With each passing generation, fewer and fewer children tend to paint. It’s not just that they don’t want to draw; the truth is that they CAN’T draw. Dharmaloka is in that sense an indictment on this dilemma: whereas the big schools have 10 or 15 students studying the subject for their A/Levels, here there are more than 40. Yet even among the 40 there is an issue: most of them prefer graphic design (mosthara) to expressive art (prakashana); digital commercial art has, sadly, gained over the hand-drawn variety.  

Pix by Manusha Lakshan

Gamini Muhandiram, Art teacher at Dharmaloka, cogently highlighted a related problem: “There is an urban-rural gap when it comes to students who settle for this subject. Many of those who select it from these parts of the country do so because they can genuinely draw. 

Unfortunately, they don’t have financial strength. We have to provide for them and we have to make up for their shortfalls.” In that sense he feels that State-sponsored art festivals are to be welcomed: “The National Art Competition achieves what it aims at. Among other things, the prize money the students win goes a long way in meeting certain urgent needs.” Not that this solves the problem: the truth remains that the more talented you are, the more indigent you tend to be.  

Dharmaloka is special, and stands out, for a reason: for the last few years and decades, the school has clinched nearly every category at national art competitions

Dharmaloka has gone a long way in addressing these issues. If the students have anyone to thank for that, it’s their teacher. And he hasn’t gone unnoticed: last year, for instance, “Gamini sir” won the Teacher of the Year Award at the International Forum for Teachers organised by Gateway Graduate School. There were four other finalists, from Dehiaththakandiya, Galgamuwa, Puttalam and Nuwara Eliya as well.  

The author can be reached on UDAKDEV1@GMAIL.COM     

Economy is not in proper shape in the paradise island

Central Bank Governor Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy presenting the Annual Report 2018 to Minister of Finance Mangala Samaraweera end April. State Minister of Finance Eran Wickramaratne, Ministry of Finance Secretary and Monetary Board ex-officio member Dr. R.H.S. Samaratunga, Senior Deputy Governor Dr. P. Nandalal Weerasinghe, Assistant Governor Swarna Gunaratne, Central Bank Acting Director Economic Research Dr. Chandranath Amarasekara and Additional Director of Economic Research Dr. P.K.G. Harischandra are also present

Converting hard labour to fruition

Monday, 6 May 2019

The Annual Report of the Central Bank for 2018 analysing in minute detail the state of the country’s economy today and outlining the prospects for the next five years has just been released (available at: https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/en/publications/economic-and-financial-reports/annual-reports/annual-report-2018).

It is a report of the Monetary Board, the legal body that manages the Central Bank, presented to the public through the Minister of Finance. But, it is crafted by a technical team working under the bank’s Director of Economic Research incorporating numerous inputs contributed by the other departments of the bank as well. It is customary for this technical team to work day and night, especially during the first three months of the year, to bring this report to fruition.


Use of graphical pictures to illustrate key points

Improving the presentation style significantly, this year’s Annual Report has liberally used graphic pictures to synthesise the main messages presented in different chapters of the report.

An eye-catching graphic presentation has been the snapshot of national output, expenditure and income 2018, appearing on page 48 of the report. Dissecting the national output by sources and causes, this graphic figure presents the whole story about the country’s total output by means of a single picture. Anyone desirous of understanding the structure of the economy and numerous interconnections involved should carefully study this single graphic presentation. Hence, the bank’s technical staff that has laboured to produce this report should deserve commendation by all.

Alarmingly declining growth rates

However, an important line graph which has been obscured by other colourful presentations has depicted the sad story of Sri Lanka’s economic performance during the last four-year period. Showing the annual real economic growth rate during the reign of the present Government, it has drawn a downward spiralling staircase with a growth of 5% in 2015 but falling continuously since then to reach the lowest stair of 3.2% in 2018.

On average, the annual growth during this period has been at 4% and when it is adjusted for an annual population growth of about 1%, the real income per person, known as the Per Capita Income or PCI, has increased only by 3%, a rate much below the planned growth rate of 8% needed to become a rich country within a generation.

Thus, as I have argued previously, it is four wasted years which cannot be recovered by Sri Lanka now (available at: http://www.ft.lk/columns/Sri-Lanka-s-deep-economic-crisis-Wasted-four-years-and-a-wasting-election-year/4-670265).

Need for quick recovery measures

Hence, what the Government, whether it is this government or any other government that would come to power in the future, should do is to plan for a quick economic recovery in the next few years and lay foundation for a firm and consistent high economic growth in the subsequent 20- to 30-year period.

The strategies for economic recovery during the next few years is essential since the Central Bank itself has painted a gloomy economic picture for the country in the years to come. According to its predictions, growth will slightly recover in 2019 to 4% and move upward sluggishly to about 5% during 2021 to 2023. This is a little higher than what the international agencies like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank have predicted for Sri Lanka which is on average below 4% per annum.

Even that higher prediction of the Central Bank is, still on average, below 5%, a growth rate woefully inadequate to deliver prosperity to Sri Lankans. This is a warning signal that cannot be ignored by the Government.

What the Government, whether it is this government or any other government that would come to power in the future, should do is to plan for a quick economic recovery in the next few years and lay foundation for a firm and consistent high economic growth in the subsequent 20- to 30-year period. The strategies for economic recovery during the next few years is essential since the Central Bank itself has painted a gloomy economic picture for the country in the years to come. According to its predictions, growth will slightly recover in 2019 to 4% and move upward sluggishly to about 5% during 2021 to 2023. This is a little higher than what the international agencies like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank have predicted for Sri Lanka which is on average below 4% per annum. Even that higher prediction of the Central Bank is, still on average, below 5%, a growth rate woefully inadequate to deliver prosperity to Sri Lankans. This is a warning signal that cannot be ignored by the Government

Synthesis presented in Chapter 1
Chapter 1 of the bank’s Annual Report is a prerogative of its Director of Economic Research, the officer historically known as the brain of the bank. Synthesising the detailed analysis made in the rest of the report, the Director usually presents a summary of the behaviour of the key sectors in the economy.

On top of this, he or she presents a prediction of its performance in the next five-year period in the light of the expected developments in the global economy which has serious bearing on Sri Lanka. This is then followed by an outline of the policy to be followed by the Government if it is desirous of supporting economic recovery on a sustainable basis.

Gloomy forecast and essential economic reforms

Since the predictions made for the next five years are gloomy, this year’s Annual Report has come up with a set of essential economic reforms that have to be implemented by the Government on a priority basis.

In my view, the policy package in the present Annual Report highlighting ‘what the Government should do’ and ‘what it should not to do’ is a comprehensive set dealing with the policy reforms needed in all the areas. If any political party contesting the next election is interested in mapping out its economic strategy for sustained high growth, this section surely provides the base for it.

Economic reforms to address the low-growth conundrum

Economic growth in the last four years has been low by any standard but the Central Bank, apparently not willing to embarrass the Government, has chosen to call it a ‘moderate growth’. According to the bank, the reasons for this so-called moderate growth have been the postponement of the structural economic reforms which the country should have undertaken many years ago.

These reforms had been recommended by international lending organisations such as the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and the Asian Development Bank for some time. At the same time, the domestic private sector chambers too had advocated for them. Yet, all the successive governments, demonstrating their inability to manage economic policy programmes properly, had either abandoned them midway after embarking on them or not tried out at all for fear of antagonising certain quarters in society.

Ignoring the needed reforms in the past

To the top policymakers in the previous Mahinda Rajapaksa Government, ‘reforms’ had been an anathema. The present Government started its career after the general elections in August 2015 with many promises of economic reforms as pronounced by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in the first economic policy statement delivered in Parliament in November 2015.

There were promises about tax reforms, making the Central Bank independent, integrating Sri Lanka seamlessly to global trade, trade facilitating bilateral agreements with almost all the countries in the world and converting Sri Lanka’s low-tech production base to a high-tech base. To plan out these reforms, an Economic Summit was held in Colombo in January 2016 with the support from the George Soros Foundation and Harvard University’s Centre for International Development. Yet, the achievements on economic reforms during the four-year period have been less than expected.

It is ironic that now the Central Bank has to remind the Government of the need for moving into action on the country’s reform agenda if the country is to accelerate its economic growth to required levels.

Key reforms needed

The bank has identified in its Annual Report for 2018 the key areas of failure by the Government on this count. Incidentally, they had all been promised in the Government’s first economic policy statement. According to the Central Bank, these failures have been in the areas such as measures for export promotion, attraction of Foreign Direct Investments or FDIs, reduction of budget deficits and debt levels, reform of factor markets to make them more conducive for growth, strengthening of the Government’s administrative machinery, and observation of the rule of law.

The failure to undertake these structural reforms has not only contributed to the country’s low economic growth, but also made it a laggard among its peer countries. This is observable when one compares Sri Lanka with Bangladesh. While Sri Lanka’s average economic growth during 2014-18 has been at around 4%, Bangladesh had managed to maintain on average a growth rate of about 6.5% during this period despite many natural calamities, political disputes and terrorist attacks.

An important line graph which has been obscured by other colourful presentations has depicted the sad story of Sri Lanka’s economic performance during the last four-year period. Showing the annual real economic growth rate during the reign of the present Government, it has drawn a downward spiralling staircase with a growth of 5% in 2015 but falling continuously since then to reach the lowest stair of 3.2% in 2018

No more cheap labour
The bank has also noted that Sri Lanka no longer has cheap labour and a young labour force. According to estimates made by the World Bank in its Sri Lanka Development Update 2019, the country’s working age population has peaked in 2005 and begun to decline since then.

Thus, the country can no longer enjoy the luxury of moving toward labour intensive industries such as apparel industry. Hence, improvements in productivity and efficiency are a must for the country to move up from a middle income country to a rich country – a feat known as beating the middle income trap. The failure will result in trapping the country in the middle-income category forever.

Enhance value addition of exportable raw-materials via advanced technology

Sri Lanka has been exporting natural resources in raw material form and the bank in its recommendations has advocated for enhancing their value added so that the country could get not only better prices for same but also increase the overall export earnings. But, this requires the adoption of high technology to process these raw materials into value added products. High technology in the very short run had to be acquired from countries that have developed it.

Though the bank has not spelt it out, one way to acquire high technology immediately has been the attraction of global companies to the country either as joint ventures or FDIs. When the country does so, it has to choose products which have huge market potential in the future. In an era where electrical vehicles are being promoted across the globe, better and more efficient batteries will be demanded by users. If Sri Lanka goes into partnership with an international company like Tesla or Panasonic, it is possible for the country to tap this market easily.

In the medium to long run, technology can be developed within the country by engaging its universities and research institutions. In this connection, Sri Lanka can learn a lesson or two from Thailand which is presently on a move to increase its high-tech production base. To support this move, its universities are competitively getting connected to high-tech firms in China, Taiwan, Japan and South Korea, in addition to providing support services to local high-tech companies.

Wide reforms to promote trade competitiveness

The increase in the earnings from the export of merchandise goods and services will enable the country, according to the Central Bank, to meet foreign exchange liabilities more confidently in the future. For that purpose, the bank has recommended that barriers to trade have to be removed.

In this respect, the new trade policy announced by the Government has called for wide reforms in the trade sector to promote the country’s competitiveness. This includes bringing the country to a uniform tariff regime by eliminating numerous tariff measures in force and para-tariff that has been enforced. A single simple tariff system will always help exporters to sell their goods and services to foreigners.

FDIs to bring in new technology

The bank has also recommended that FDIs should be routed to more productive sectors in the economy. Sri Lanka or for that matter any emerging economy in the world cannot have the luxury of attracting every type of FDIs today.

This was the policy adopted by Sri Lanka in the initial phase of opening its economy to foreign investors. It helped Sri Lanka to establish a world class apparel industry that provided an imitation effect to local entrepreneurs. Over the years, it therefore contributed to the transmission of the export structure from predominantly agriculture-based exports to manufacturing based exports.

Now apparels are ‘on-shored’ or ‘near-shored’

However, today, it faces several challenges due to loss of cheap labour, on the one hand, and the presence of new competitor countries such as Bangladesh and Myanmar, on the other. The worst scenario has arisen due to new production systems adopted by apparel consuming Western nations. Taking advantage of robotisation and automation, both North America and Western Europe have begun to establish apparel factories on their own lands, a system known as on-shoring or re-shoring as against off-shoring that had ruled the world a few decades ago.

This has been strengthened by the need for having garments within a short delivery time like three to four days. In this context, garments produced by Sri Lanka will take about 30 days to be delivered to the market.

But the factories located close to the market in countries – now known as near-shoring – such as Turkey, Morocco in Europe and Mexico and Honduras in North America will deliver them to the markets within a short time span. Thus, Sri Lanka has no choice but to change from the present low-tech production system to high tech production systems. This has been cogently recommended by the Central Bank in its Annual Report for 2018.

Tear-free understanding of CB reports

One of the weaknesses in the Central Bank Annual Reports has been that they are presented in technical language not easily comprehensible by ordinary readers. Hence, it is necessary to write commentaries on the Annual Report to facilitate tear-free understanding.

Despite these weaknesses, they contain a wealth of information. Hence, it will not be a waste of time if the top leaders of the Government spend some time in perusing and understanding the messages that have been delivered in the report for 2018.

(W.A. Wijewardena, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com.)