THE GROUP OF SINHALA MP'S AND THE SINHALAS
On the nineteenth of April, at a press conference held in Dharmayathanaya, Bauddhaloka Mawatha, with Ven. Elle Gunawansa Thero in the chair, it was formally announced that more than twenty Sinhala MPs, without party barriers, have grouped themselves to speak for the Sinhala people. At a time when the UNP, PA and even the JVP are not concentrating on the Sinhala people, it is a welcome move by this group of MPs to come forward to raise issues that are specific to the Sinhala people in the northern and the eastern provinces as well as in the other provinces. Mr. Rathnasiri Wickramanayake the former Prime Minister was also present at the press conference. Messrs. Wickramanayake, Dinesh Gunawardhane addressed the conference on general issues while Messrs. MKDS Gunawardhane, Tissa Karaliyadde, and T Thevarappuruma who represent respectively the Trincomalee, Anuradhapura and Ampara districts spoke on problems specific to their districts.
The group of Sinhala MPs emphasised that they are vehemently opposed to the deproscription of the LTTE, an interim administration in the northern and the eastern provinces and the homeland concept. They said that, unlike some ministers in the UNF government, they would not go to Vanni to meet Prabhakaran nor to Ward Place to meet the Norwegian ambassador. Mr. Wickramanayake said that the government has compromised with the sovereignty of the country and that Norway is in control now. Mr. Dinesh Gunawardhane said that Norway is on the side of the LTTE and the country is in danger of separation, and that the group would fight to retain the unitary (ekeeya or eksesath) character of the state.
Brave words coming from ex prime minister, ex minister and the other MPs. However, one would have asked them what they were doing all these years and especially during the last year. They could say that Norway had been "invited" to keep away during the latter stages of the PA government and that it was one of the reason why their government was toppled, using Mr. Rauf Hakeem who is only against those who are alleged to have got involved in killing ten Muslims but is prepared to go all the way to Vanni to meet a murderer who killed thousands of Muslims. In any event, it is clear that the PA does not have one common policy when it comes to the Tamil racist problem. The LSSP, CP, Mahajana Party, Desha Vimukthi Party are against the interests of the Sinhala people. They are not very much different from the Tamil racists and are all out to deprive Sinhalathva its rightful place in the country. The Chandrika-Mangala faction in the SLFP is still following the Mahajana Party line on the Tamil racist problem. They control the party newspaper and are trying to use the JVP to come back to power. A principled coalition between the SLFP, the MEP and the JVP to give Sinhalathva its rightful place in the country should be welcome. But it is not likely to happen immediately due to number of reasons. These parties, whatever the rhetoric on Sinhala-Tamil-Muslim equal status may be, get almost all the votes from the Sinhala people and sooner the leadership of the SLFP and the JVP realise this it will be good for them as well as for the country.
It is unfortunate that the Chandrika-Mangala faction is only interested in coming back to power and not in the cause of the Sinhala people and if and when they form a government they would start from where the UNF stops. This faction is not against having discussions with the LTTE and they are for so-called peace. We cannot forget Mr. Mangala Samaraweera and his peace propaganda, the sudu nelum and sama thavalama. One good thing about this faction is that it does not have many MPs and if not for Ms. Kumaratunga being the president of the country and the leader of both the SLFP and the PA this faction which has policies alien to the SLFP would have died a natural death. The faction has more support among the so-called enlightened ("prabuddha") journalists and other ex, retired and neo Marxists, third rate post modernists, who are essentially post opportunists, in the sense that they are opportunists who are after posts, and who do not know any post modernism but contribute to the party newspapers. However, this does not mean that they cannot change and if it is possible to make a second Dona Katherina from Ms. Chandrika Kumaratunga then we should all attempt to do so.
The second faction within the SLFP is the Mahinda Rajapaksha faction that again has no interest in the cause of the Sinhala people. They are being influenced by the so-called left parties as well as by the UNP! At the moment, the Sinhala people cannot expect this faction to speak for the Sinhalas and let to themselves they would be happy towing the UNF line with respect to so called peace talks. They would not oppose the government even to the extent the Chandrika-Mangala faction would do. They would grumble here and there against the UNF government but nothing more could be expected from them at present. As in the case of Chandrika-Mangala, an attempt should to be made to get them back to the SLFP policies.
It is in this background that the emergence of the group of Sinhala MPs has to be evaluated. This group will attract the "jathivadi" label from the so-called enlightened people and the Sinhala media presently under a virtual censorship would not give them much publicity. However, it is also possible that a "nationalist" group that is maneuvered by the government and the non national forces through their agents working within the national movement would be promoted, using the media, as the champions of the Sinhala people. The group of Sinhala MPs should be prepared to face all these obstacles as they move forward.
This group, as I understand, did not have to wait until Prabhakaran held a press conference in Vanni to realise that the so-called peace process of the government and the LTTE, planned and executed by Norway and the other western countries, would end up in creating a separate state for the Tamil terrorists. They have had discussions before the 10th of this month and had understood where the country is being led by the parties mentioned above. The Sinhala people, as a general rule, are not interested in theories and they work on a day to day basis. This may have something to do with Sinhala Buddhism (I am referring to Sinhala Buddhism as a culture and not as a religion, in case there is somebody who cannot comprehend it.) that does not encourage theories. This is in spite of having in possession a formal knowledge system such as Abidhamma. The Sinhala Buddhists though not Sauthranthikas have behaved as if there was no Abidhamma Pitaka and have been very much influenced by the Suthra Pitaka more than by any other Pitaka. The suthras though translated as discourses have nothing to do with the concept of discourse as understood by Foucault, and it is in the interests of Sinhala Buddhism, or any other Buddhism for that matter, not to use the word discourse to refer to the suthras. The suthra tradition could be found in Bharat Mathematics and it could be the main reason why Bharat Mathematics did not develop as an abstract formal system as western Mathematics.
The general "antipathy" for general theories has made Sinhala Buddhists to adopt a "wait and see" attitude. They would not like to forecast events based on a theory and that would have encouraged some people to give a try to the so-called peace process. However, one cannot accept this type of behaviour from the leaders, as to lead they should have some idea of what is in store if a particular path is followed. Unfortunately even some of the leaders of Sinhala Buddhists have had to wait till Prbhakaran spoke from Vanni to realise that the tiger has not changed its stripes. Perhaps some leaders of the Sinhala Buddhists, being non "inductionists" in general, not used to generalisations, were waiting to see a tiger that changes stripes (Sinhala Buddhists could, think of a time or wait until they would see a white crow - refer to the verse on kalu kaputa sudu vana thuru, molegahe dalu lana thuru..... that is used in wishing people long life) and when Prabhakaran appeared in his Safari kit with Solheim, they thought that they had seen a tiger that had changed its stripes. Unlike these "leaders" the group of MPs had not expected Prabhakaran to give up eelam or homeland or self determination (whether internal - confederation that would lead to a separate state or external- separate state) and have had no misgivings on the "peace process".
The group of Sinhala MPs have correctly identified the problems of the Sinhalas in the eastern and northern provinces as those that should be given priority. It is true that there are no Sinhala people in the northern province after Prabhakaran's ethnic cleansing but the displaced Sinhalas and their descendants have to be settled in the places they were living with ownership of land and compensation for any other property that they lost. However, it is not only the question of the displaced Sinhalas that the MPs have decided to look into. The more important problem that the Sinhalas, especially those in the eastern province face immediately is that arising out of the "homeland" concept. Until recently only those few Sinhalas who could grasp the "homeland" concept in the abstract took any interest in it. Now, with the "interim administration" for the northern and the eastern province to be established, if the Norwegians and the other westerners succeed in their manoeuvres and arm twisting exercises, for the Sinhalas in the eastern province the homeland concept has become a problem of life and death. It is not something that could be discussed merely in the abstract at seminars and workshops held in five star hotels with NGO funds.
The problem has aggravated with the LTTE demanding the control of the internal administration and accepting that the northern and the eastern provinces constitute the homeland of the Muslims as well. As it is, if an "interim administration" is established the LTTE, meaning Prabhakaran with Balasingham as the spokesperson, would be the sole ruler of the two provinces. The TNA has lost its soul by accepting the LTTE to be the sole representative of the Tamils. The LTTE, as transpired at the Vanni press conference of Prabhakaran (Balasingham - they are the same according to B) would allow only those parties approved by them to function in the north and the east. The TNA would not make any claims and we still do not know the position that would be adopted with respect to the SLMC of Mr. Hakeem. Incidentally, the TNA chief Mr. Sivasithamparam has told a Sunday newspaper that the TULF is no more a moderate party. He is wrong on two counts. The TULF/TNA is dead and a dead party can be neither moderate nor extreme. The ghost of a party cannot be considered as a party. In the parliament the so-called TNA members represent the LTTE and they form the parliamentary wing of the LTTE. They can only say what they are allowed to state by the fascist dictator who has physically and spiritually murdered the leaders of the TULF. Mr. Sivasithamparam has said that the "party" should not live in the past. Unfortunately for him the party had some life only in the past and at present there is no party to talk of. With respect to the past Mr. Sivasithamparam appears to say that the TULF was a moderate party. No, the TULF was never a moderate party. A party that formulated the so-called Thimpu conditions could not be called a moderate party. Since 1947 Mr. SJV Chelvanayakam's Ilankai Thamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK) that masqueraded as the Federal Party, and subsequently the TULF, had been extreme Tamil racist parties that campaigned to deprive Sinhalathva its rightful place in the country and for a separate state in the northern and the eastern provinces. The difference between the TULF and the LTTE is not one of objectives. They differ only in the methods they adopted to achieve their objectives. Prabhakaran is a creation of the ITAK (and the TULF) and it is ironical that the created has destroyed the creator.
What would be the position of the Sinhalas in the "interim administration". Even if Prabhakaran decides to have one or two token Sinhalas (he could find any amount of them, in the seminar circuits in Colombo) in the "interim administration" the Sinhalas already living in the eastern province would have a more fundamental problem. They would be living in a region that is the homeland of the Tamils and the Muslims only. The region where they live would not be recognised as their homeland but only of the others. In the other provinces this problem does not arise as those regions are not recognised as the homeland of Sinhalas or any ethnic community. All are equal in these regions as far as the "homeland" is concerned. The Indo-Lanka agreement made a blunder by recognising the northern and the eastern provinces as "historical habitats" of the Tamils. Dixit who thought that he was the viceroy then wanted only to teach a "lesson" to Mr. JR Jayawardhane. He would not have gone into the history of the Tamils in this country nor the history of the northern and eastern provinces before the words "historical habitats" were introduced into the so-called agreement. (It is to the credit of the late Dr. Neelan Thiruchelvam that he realised that the concept of a historical homeland was a mistake.) However, as long as the provincial councils established under the thirteenth amendment did not function the way that was envisaged the Sinhalas living in the eastern province did not think much about this problem. It was then an abstract problem and the Sinhalas in general are not very much sensitive to abstract formulations. However, it is no more an abstract problem and the Sinhalas living in the eastern province have begun to realise that they would be non entities in the region they live. This is a fundamental rights problem and the western world that boasts of fundamental rights is working towards a "peace" that would first discriminate against the Sinhalas living in the eastern province, and finally divide the country into pieces. The group of Sinhala MPs is aware of the problem as it consists of MPs from Trincomalee and Ampara districts. The group, I am sure, will speak for the Sinhalas in the eastern province who would either be chased out from where they live now or would become non entities who are discriminated against in their motherland.
Professor Nalin de Silva
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