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It is now over three years since the LTTE
was decisively defeated by the Government of Sri Lanka. Since then the
government and the international community have been grappling with the
issue of winning peace, addressing the causes which gave rise to the
deadly conflict, issues of accountability, and reconciliation. These
issues have dominated the Sri Lankan debate in the last few years.
Peace in the conflict literature is not the absence of war. There
are three kinds of violence that are defined in the literature of
conflict transformation. Johan Galtung, suggests that these three types
of violence are direct violence, i.e. deadly violence used by both
sides, structural violence, which is defined as structures which
perpetuate poverty, inequality and discrimination, and cultural
violence, defined as the denial of identity and the denial of the other.
Whilst direct violence has been used extensively by both sides in Sri
Lanka, this phase has now come to an end. However structural violence
remains, with inequality and discrimination experienced not only by the
Tamils, but also Sinhalese, Muslims, Christians and other minorities,
through discrimination due to ethnicity, caste or class.
The Tamils in
the plantations experience structural violence due to super exploitation
of their labour. Cultural violence also continues to dominate the
narrative in Sri Lanka, in different manifestations such as the denial
of identity, myths perpetuated such as the “Chosen People” narrative in
the Mahavansa, the concept of a “homeland”, which requires a separate
state, contestation as to the mythos of origins of peoples residing in
Sri Lanka. Self-fulfilling prophesies, chosen traumas fill the folklore
of the peoples living in the island. In winning peace, these narratives
,myths and ideologies have to be taken into account. It is in such a
landscape that we have to examine the role of the Lessons Learnt and
Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) as a vehicle for winning peace but also
as a symbol of contestation.
The Lessons Learn and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC)
was a response to the concerns expressed by the western powers, India
and the Tamil Diaspora in the aftermath of the war. It was to be just
another Commission, condemned to the dustbin of history, which was the
fate of so many other commissions, in the past. A distinguished panel
was appointed by the President, and its members were seen as those
favourable to the Government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa and did not
think that it would be given serious attention. In short it was seen by
the detractors of the government, as an eye wash, an attempt to cover a
multitude of sins and omissions.
It is undoubtedly the efforts of the USA and later India through
the resolution introduced in the UN. Human Rights Council that the LLRC
took centre stage.. However, Sri Lanka was defeated at the UN Human
Rights Council and it was a clear indication as to the will of the
international community.
After the defeat of Sri Lanka at the UNHRC
good sense prevailed and a strategic shift was taken by the President,
to renew relations with the USA, and the western powers and India. The
efforts of the Weeratunge Committee, and the tireless work of its
members, produced an implementation plan, provides a measuring rod with
key performance indicators on the performance of the government, where
the more contentious issues would be taken up with the proposed Parliamentary Select Committee.
Sri Lanka is now under the radar screen of the U.N. and the measuring
rod will be the government’s own home grown implementation plan. The
Tamil Diaspora would continue with its agitation calling for an
international inquiry into war crimes but its efforts to draw the
international community into this strategy would lose momentum, if the
government implements the plan. Whether the Government has taken a
strategic shift to win over the western powers upon whom Sri Lanka is
dependent for its markets or is a tactical shift to buy time is yet to
be seen.
However, India expects Sri Lanka to implement the 13th Amendment
and as a first step it requires that elections are held in the north as
soon as possible. Having elections in the North makes good sense, as it
will be a major instrument in the reconciliation process. The Tamil National Alliance and
other Tamil parties must be given the opportunity to govern the regions
where they command a majority, and checks and balances have to be
developed with regards to police and land powers. Such a step will relax
pent-up frustrations and a sense of humiliation that the peoples of the
north experience. The argument that we must wait till 2013 for the
elections is based on a wrong premise-i.e. that the North must be
developed, with infrastructure and development so that a grateful Tamil
population will vote against the TNA. This is an erroneous theory based
on fallacious arguments that the economy can shift people’s identity
through economic and infrastructure developments. Further, the delay
must not be interpreted as a way of changing the demographic balance. It
is important that we heal the wound and remove the sense of humiliation
of a beleaguered people. Humiliation is “about putting down and holding
down.” It is the “enforced lowering of any person or group by a process
of subjugation that damages their dignity.
To remove the sense of humiliation, and heal the wound, the people
and their lenders must be co-partners in building the country with a
shared vision and value for all. Here the leaders of the country, not
only the Sinhalese but also the leaders of other communities, must work
towards a process of accommodation and trust. For this to happen the
mindset of all the parties, relics of the past, must be discarded to
rebuild a new Sri Lanka. The challenge is how such a paradigm shift can
be achieved. (By Kumar Rupesinghe)
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