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| Sunday, 26 February 2006 |
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A dim light at the end of the tunnel Sunday Essay by Ajith Samaranayake Sri Lanka's national agony has taken such complex and convoluted paths that the business of political forecasting is a risky enterprise. The late Lalith Athulathmudali who as Minister of National Security was always in the eye of the storm and was never one to be backward on the uptake had a standard riposte for those scribes who used inevitably to ask "What next?" "I am not a soothsayer", he used to deadpan. Since the ascendancy of President Mahinda Rajapakse there has been no dearth of cassandras. The oracles ominously wagged their heads in the public print, bar parlours and other such enclaves and engaged in their doomsday scenarios. A Sinhala hardliner had come to power in Colombo, they chorussed, and President Rajapakse's electoral allies, the JVP and the JHU, were convenient butts for all the government's critics. Taking place as they did against such a backcloth the talks in Geneva between the Sri Lanka Government and the LTTE on the fragile ceasefire can be said to have confounded the prophets of doom. The wish being father to the thought some imaginative sub editors gazed longingly at the somewhat dim Swiss scenario and perceived 'a clash of Chintanayas'. A wire service spoke of an imminent walk-out by the LTTE delegation and of the government having to eat humble pie in a ritual nod to the most hackneyed of clich‚s. It was almost as if these people were taking a sadistic delight in seeing a sovereign country humbled by its own compatriots. However, what the encounter between the government and the LTTE in the Swiss chateau has proved is that both the Tamils and the Sinhalese are still one people. They can agree to disagree. Nobody possesses a magic wand with which we can undo our collective past. We have deepseated differences. But we are not about to rock the national boat in stormy seas either. The whole rationale of a negotiating process is that both sides have to make concessions. It is only petty minds which will revel in the government having 'to eat humble pie', while no major revision of the ceasefire has taken place both sides are pledged to the strict upholding of the truce. While a wire service made a pettifogging point about 'ceasefire' and 'ceasefire agreement' what is crucial is that the truce is holding. The government has not taken a gung-ho attitude and the LTTE has agreed to allow the truce monitors full access to its activities. It has also agreed to a separate Muslim delegation when it comes to discussing that community's interests. Given the dismal doomsday scenarios which preceded the talks these are indeed positive development. The vicious circle of fratricidal violence will be broken and the dates for the next round of talks has been agreed upon. Dare we hope then that the winter of our discontent is about to end? Even here there are positive signs. One of the most welcome developments is the recognition on the part of the JVP of the multicultural nature of the Sri Lankan polity. This should go a long way towards dissipating the criticism against that party. Similarly the JHU is on record as being prepared to consider the Indian model of federalism. Given goodwill on all sides therefore there is no reason while Tamil and Sinhala patriotism can not bear rich collective fruit and why we can not recapture the moral ground of our collective life-giving tradition, the true philosophia perennis. Tailpiece: Further to our column last week a well-informed friend tells us that Anton Balasingham had broken into tears at the death of Sugathapala de Silva. The reason was that both of them had worked together at the British High Commission in those halcyon days. |
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