|
|
 |
 |
| Sunday, 26 October 2003 |
 |
|
 |
Editorial |  |
| News Business Features Security
|
Please forward your comments to the
Editor, Sunday Observer. E-mail: [email protected] Snail mail : Sunday Observer, 35, D.R.Wijewardana Mawatha, Colombo, Sri Lanka. Telephone : 94 1 429239 / 331181 Fax : 94 1 429230 Lessons The important Hindu festival of Deepavali has come and gone. The cloud of political tension that threatened this national celebration of faith this year did not bring the storm that initially seemed ready to mar the festivities. But this holy day for Hindus the world over did bring a lesson to all Sri Lankans: on the need for tolerance and equal treatment of all cultural identities and religions and also, for the equal right of communities linked to these various identities to live their identities and observe their faiths to the fullest. How could Sri Lanka claim to be a democratic and egalitarian society and polity if any religious community or cultural group does not have the same right and facility of other communities and groups to practise their faith? Quite unlike the largely secularised societies of the industrialised West, Sri Lanka, along with most Third World countries that make up the bulk of the world's population, is a society that actively upholds religion and faith; a society in which religion permeates many aspects of the life of most people. Secularisation has not brushed aside religious life and its priorities. Religion remains intertwined with political and public life and, Sri Lankan modernity, like modernisation in many other Third World societies, has adapted itself to these cultural-social specifics. Indeed, the inadequate recognition of some of these religio-linguistic specificities is a major cause for the on-going tensions and disharmony between the country's ethnic communities, tensions that have exploded in war whose devastation has brought the nation almost to its knees. Which is all the more reason why political action should steer clear of holy days; the holy days of all major religions and the significant community events of all major communities. Furthermore, democratic practice would require that political action, that claims to be 'national' in scope and not ethno-centric, should be inclusive and enable people of all communities to participate. This, too, is a lesson that Deepavali has taught all of us this year. It is only when all communities and all political leaderships acknowledge this crucial lesson so fundamental to the nature of our island society, that the inter-ethnic wounds will begin to heal, new political structures will gain meaning, and society will re-unite. And it is better that the lesson is learnt through public debate, however acrimonious, rather than through war. The Deepavali week was also the harbinger of a new stage in the peace process: the good news of a resumption of formal peace talks in the near future, and, most importantly, of the LTTE's readiness to offer to the world its own proposals for an interim administration in the North-East region. The temporary suspension of the Government-LTTE negotiations earlier this year did not see a collapse of the peace process and a return to fighting. In this, the current peace process is demonstrating that it is truly and significantly different from peace initiatives in the past, all of which saw a quick return to war at the moment that the negotiating process met up with serious obstacles. The current process has so far survived not only the hiatus in negotiations but also several disruptions of the Cease-fire that both sides have regarded as 'provocative' but have not allowed to push them into war. The announcements, during Deepavali week, that LTTE was ready to resume talks and that it was on the verge of submitting its own proposals, drives home the point of the relative success of the current peace process. Once the LTTE's proposals are submitted, the onus of success lies on the negotiating process. How well the LTTE, like the Government, is prepared to genuinely negotiate and reach consensus will be the measure of that organisation's ability to learn lessons. |
|
News | Business | Features
| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
