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by Jayatilleke de Silva

Many a prophet of doom and gloom was laid to rest with the Maveerar Day Speech of LTTE Leader Velupillai Pirapaharan. Throughout the election campaign the UNP was constantly warning the people that a Rajapakse victory would bring back war. Only Ranil was an apostle of peace, they said.

Of course they were pointing to the JVP and the JHU presence in the Rajapakse campaign as the basis of their prediction. Both the JVP and the JHU had taken somewhat intransigent attitudes on the National Question. However, the people were not carried away by their propaganda. This is not to say that they welcomed war. On the contrary, they saw in Rajapakse a democratic leader who would be able to harness a broad consensus for peace.

The prophets of doom were not deterred by the electoral defeat of the UNP. They pinned their hopes on the LTTE. Pirapaharan would make a unilateral declaration of independence and usher in Thamil Elaam, they vouched. Once again they were proved wrong.

Pirapaharan in his Maveerar address while expounding Thamil aspirations for Elaam nevertheless reciprocated President Rajapakse's call for talks. Labelling Rajapakse as a "realist committed to pragmatic politics", the LTTE declared its readiness to wait and see, to give the new Government a chance. "The new government should come forward soon with a reasonable political framework that will satisfy the political aspirations of the Thamil people. This is our urgent and fervent appeal", Pirapaharan said.

Even then our "prophets" would not give up. They say war would break out next year. Now they have got hold of the following sentence (actually the last one) in Pirapaharan's speech: "If the new government rejects our urgent appeal, we will, next year, in solidarity with our people, intensify our struggle for self-determination, our struggle for national liberation to establish self-government in our homeland."

Of course, this is nothing new. This has been their consistent stand. The same sentiments were found in the Maveerar speeches last year and the year before. Just look at what Pirapaharan said last year; ""If the Government of Sri Lanka rejects our urgent appeal and adopts delaying tactics, perpetuating the suffering of our people, we have no alternative other than to advance the freedom struggle of our nation."

Nor had the LTTE changed its stand during the Ranil Wickremesinghe administration. In 2003 Pirapaharan said in his Maveerar speech thus:" ..if the Sinhala chauvinistic ruling elites continue to deny the rights of our people and oppose reconciliation and if the conditions of oppression continue, we have no alternative other than to secede and form an independent state invoking the right to self-determination of our people."

Yes, Pirapaharan promises to intensify the struggle for self-determination. Struggle does not mean war. War is only one form of struggle. What he means is the popular struggle or the mass struggle. This type of agitation had been conducted even earlier calling for the removal of military bases in the North etc.

One has to take Pirapaharan also as a pragmatist. He knows that in the post-9/11 world he will have little room to resume war. This is especially so since the people in the North and East have seen the fruits of even a temporary lull in the war. They would not like the reconstructed life to go up in ashes again. Added to all these factors is the fall out from the internal split in the LTTE caused by Karuna. A low intensity guerilla war is being waged by Karuna against the LTTE.

For the LTTE the best chance of winning their objectives still lies in mass struggle and negotiations. The military option has receded. It is the military stalemate between the two sides that led to the unilateral declaration of the ceasefire by the LTTE in December 2003. Nothing that happened since then indicates a shift of the military balance in their favour.

We have a new President. He has the support of a very broad coalition of parties in the South. Besides the parties in the Opposition including the UNP are also for a negotiated solution to the National Question.

Therefore, we have the best chance to forge a Southern consensus, a thing called for even by the LTTE. Even the JVP and the JHU, which had taken hard line positions earlier, have opted for devolution. Of course, they insist on the unitary nature of the state. Similarly the LTTE is for a federal structure. If both sides are not ready to compromise a solution will not emerge.

However, in the present day there are no hundred percent federal states or hundred percent unitary states. Even at present Sri Lanka has acquired federal features due to the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution.

Best then would be to put aside all stereotyped and dogmatic preferences to controversial concepts and negotiate on the basis of meeting the different aspirations of different communities. It is necessary to identify what is common in these aspirations and proceed along a pragmatic path. We have also to build on what has been achieved as well as on what has been legally achieved but not practically implemented.

As far as devolution is concerned our task is not to follow a foreign model. It is not the Indian model or the British model or the Swiss model we want. We must develop a Sri Lankan model that is unique to our history and socio-economic conditions.

The President's decision to start talks with the Southern parties is welcome. While they are proceeding the government could initiate the mechanism to revive Government-LTTE talks. As the President had stated parallel discussions could be held - one on ways and means of strengthening the ceasefire, making all its clauses operative, guaranteeing human rights etc. and the other on existential and substantial political issues.

It is also pragmatic that we make use of the Norwegian facilitation process. As a responsible government Norwegian facilitation cannot be done away with unilaterally. That would amount to breaching the Ceasefire Agreement.

Those who clamour for the expulsion of Norway should understand the complications it would cause in our external relations. The best way to sideline the Norwegians is to build confidence between the two parties so that external facilitation would be redundant or superfluous.

In the meantime the Co-Chairs and other international friends could be appraised of developments in the peace front so that they would guarantee against any adverse effects on the Sri Lankan state by any Norwegian partiality. We must be fair by the Norwegians too. There is also a new government in Oslo. It would have taken into account concerns expressed by the government on past experience.

While negotiations require much diplomacy and negotiating skill it is also necessary to stop the rhetoric and cheap propaganda ploys by both parties to please extreme elements.

One has to learn from the mistakes of the Ranil Wickremesinghe administration in conducting peace negotiations. The negotiations were conducted highly secretively and there were no formal recordings of the discussions, except for brief communiqu‚s at the end of each session by the Royal Norwegian government. People were never taken into confidence. Not even members of the Cabinet or the Head of State knew what was going on. As someone commented it was a huge circus on a stage that shifted from destination to destination across Europe and Asia.

Government while engaging political parties and foreign governments on the peace issue should also educate the public on the need for peace and the issues involved. It would also be useful to mobilise mass support for the government's peace initiative on the broadest possible basis depending on consensus reached between political parties and groups in and out of Parliament. As the President had stressed all stakeholders should be consulted and listened to in the peace effort. As far as possible we have to desist from taking apriori decisions and conclusions.

We have to learn from history. The National Question would not have developed to generate a fratricidal war had wiser counsel prevailed earlier. We have been unable to solve it during 47 years after independence. The failure to accept the existence of genuine grievances of the Thamil people and the attempt to suppress their struggle through violent means including racist pogroms (as in 1983 Black July) have only resulted in the intensification of the struggle for a separate homeland by the Thamils.

Now an opening for peace has been created with the election of a new President and the reciprocal gesture of the LTTE to the President's call for a negotiated settlement.. Let us not waste this opportunity. Let us grab it hard and pursue peace in earnest so that future generations could live in peace and we could bequeath for them n a land fit to live in.

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