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| Sunday, 27 July 2003 |
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Vanni: life under two regimes by Frances Bulathsinghala in Jaffna and the Vanni The A9 highway that leads from the South to Jaffna is legendary for its battles and attendant acts of heroism on either side of war. But to the traveller, even after one and a half year's of peace, it is one long experience of road hardship, and worse, the complicated procedures of crossing and re-crossing frontlines. Thirty five year old Sellaiah who has been employed as a driver for a van hiring company transporting those from the South, mostly Tamils, to Jaffna and Tamils from Jaffna to Colombo, is a worried man. The frown on his face deepens with every mile of the journey from Colombo to Jaffna. He has to serve two masters and be servile about it to avoid what he calls 'inviting terror`. "At every journey I am stopped by the Government police in Government controlled territory (the Jaffna junction, in Anuradhapura) who demands Rupees Two hundred without specifying the road rule which I have not adhered to. No receipt is given. I am forced to give the money immediately to avoid delays and unwanted visits to the police station. They find any excuse. I am told that there are too many passenger in the van and too much of luggage on the overhead racks. Finally, if I prove them wrong by inviting them to check the vehicle on close inspection, then I am told that since we use this road often that I have to pay. We cannot argue with the police", says Selva and the writer who was travelling in his vehicle along with other Tamil passengers witnessed this scene both on the way to Jaffna and back to Colombo. Cannot he demand that he see the OIC of the nearest police station ? Cannot he demand for an explanation from the police officer concerned ? Cannot he come back to Colombo and take it up with the 'authorities` in charge ? The questions are sensible, maybe in another country where corruption in the police force does not multiply like worms in a rotten coconut tree. Therefore the questions put to Selliah by me, sounds audacious and I stop in the face of several grim but cynical smiles both from the passengers, Selliah and other drivers who had stopped at a tea shop in the Mullaitivu region. Illegal money The passengers merely nod their heads and look at me with wonder because I do not know that the Sri Lankan traffic police (at the Jaffna junction in Anuradhapura) fill their pockets everyday with illegal money 'because the drivers use the A9 road everyday`. "That is the kappam. Ever since the A9 opening this has been the case", a passenger in the van enlightens me in the little Sinhalese that he can muster. "In the LTTE territory, I am fined Rupees Two hundred and fifty by the LTTE police, who insists that I have been speeding when I know that I have been travelling at a snail's pace. Later, in accordance with the LTTE tax regulations I am fined as a tax Rupees 350 for every passenger in the vehicle. The only difference is that with all LTTE charges I am given a receipt in which there is mentioned the reason why I am required to pay", says a harried Selliah. "We cannot complain. Either to the Government or to the LTTE. There is no one to fight for the rights of the ordinary Tamils. I have four children to feed. Neither the LTTE nor the Sri Lankan traffic police is going to help me to feed them. The money I earn is according to the money I bring back to the van hiring company. For a day, I travel twice to Jaffna and back and the overall sum that I give both the traffic police and the LTTE police sums up to nearly two thousand rupees`. "At least they do not accept bribes", quips one Tamil passenger. Meanwhile loud arguments could be heard ensuing between Tamils at the LTTE main checkpoint in Puliankulam, the region before entering military controlled territory in Jaffna. To the neatly clad LTTE officers both male and female, their dress identifying their rank of office and responsibility, these arguments are now an everyday occurrence, which takes place in the glass panelled cubicles which resemble an immigration office. "What is the meaning of this inspection? What are we bringing in? We can expect the military to check us like this but they were unobtrusive and pleasant. We are coming back to our motherland and you treat us with disrespect", one woman returning with her family after twenty years in England was heard indulging in an embarrassing (to the LTTE) outburst of praise of the military after one of her suitcases was misplaced in the process of the LTTE checking of luggage. As reluctant hands count the money to be given to the LTTE as tax for all imported goods brought in, hitherto murmured protests against the LTTE are now voiced aloud. However at the government military checkpoint just before entering Jaffna, harassed men and women once again unload their luggage from the racks of their vehicles and consequently made to unpack every item. Anti-peace items "We know that they are under stress. So are we. We cannot take any chances with entire consignments of weapons and anti-peace items getting into Jaffna and to Colombo. Both journeys, from Jaffna to Colombo and Colombo to Jaffna we are forced to indulge in checking akin to the days of war, said one military officer as justification of his action of insisting a young Tamil girl arriving in Jaffna to get married, to unload her entire neatly packed trousseau from a huge cardboard box. Within the civilian setting of Jaffna where the phantoms of war still live on within bullet rigged walls and war demolished buildings, normalcy is yet to come. Rehabilitators and psycho-social workers who have been given more funds for their work after the ceasefire and the Memorandum of Understanding with the Government and the LTTE are now having a struggle with reality. "They do not act as children. Their minds are distorted. Most of them have witnessed murder and rape and these acts of crime have been committed against their parents. We try to rehabilitate them but we are trying to do this task within the same framework where these crimes have been committed", says Kirumba, a forty-year-old counsellor speaking of war traumatized children she works within the North East who still live in refugee camps full phantom memories and unhygienic conditions. Kirumba born to a wealthy family in Jaffna had chosen to be trained in psycho social counselling ten years ago to flee her own traumatic experiences having been displaced during the height of confrontation between the Government and the LTTE. "We have thirty counsellors working with us. It is difficult as most of the counsellors themselves are poverty stricken and we can afford to pay them barely a travel allowance", says Fr. S. Damien speaking of his organisation, the Holistic Heath Centre in the Jafffna town. However, while international aid is supposed to be flowing to a region which despite the fact continues to be a barren land still wrapped up in the skeletons of war, there are allegations of bogus NGOs which has infested the region with the ushering of peace. In the region of Mallagam, an extreme area of poverty caused by war with sixty displaced families living in close proximity since 1990 as refugees, thirteen-year- old Sivakumara is one of the eighty children in the camp who do not attend school. "We try to persuade their parents to send them to school but it is difficult. Our organisation cannot afford to provide them food as well", says Sunitha, a thirty-year old social worker who works for a local NGO for a minimum pay. Clearly, there is much to be done to dispel rhetoric and create action to initiate a rehabilitation of every aspect concerning both living in and travelling to Jaffna. |
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