'The solutions should come from the suffering, silent majority'

A process towards lasting peace:

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Prof.Karunaratne Hangawatte is attached to the Criminal Justice Department of the University of Las Vegas in Nevada. He has specialised in Law and Society, Adminstration of Criminal Justice, Legal method and process and Terrorism and Political Violence. He was an Attorney-at-law of Sri Lanka, and had served as a Consultant to the United Nations.

This is an interview he did with the Sunday Observer giving his point of view on the current terrorist problem in Sri Lanka.

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by Lakmal Welabada

Question - What is your General point of view regarding Sri Lanka?

Prof.Hangawatte - LTTE organisation might have begun with a cause of their own ethnical racial strategy and started as a guerrilla movement. We can't deny that they didn't have a cause, but that was at the beginning. Later they (the LTTE) transformed to a terrorist organisation.

They used terror acts against innocent people and ethnic cleansing by using weapons to achieve a separate state. There's a difference between 'terrorism' and 'rebellious guerilla activities'.

Guerilla warfare is different, my opinion is legitimate and can be justified because its sole casualties are government agents and government installations and economic structure that the guerilla movement sees as obstacles in their path to destabilise a regime to achieve its objectives.

Guerilla won't attack civilians and won't kill innocent men, woman and children attending religious activities. But the LTTE attacked devotees at Anuradhapura Sri Maha Bodhiya, Dalada Maligawa, prayers at Mosque at Kaththankudy, and placed bombs at the bus stations killing hundreds of civilians.

They merely do so to gain publicity. May be also to put the public at large in fear. These would make them appear in the evening news, big TV coverage and with huge head lines in the newspapers. Terrorists have no particular target, and won't necessarily attack appropriate targets.

But LTTE was quite successful with their propaganda to create impression around the world and even here, in the country as a rebellion group or a freedom party. And that what I often see in the foreign press and even here, sometimes in the local media. What I cannot understand is why the media give such importance to them. You have to call them what they are and what they are not.

According to the international law, any war whose ultimate objective is peace is a legitimate war. Terrorist war is more a fantasy war as it is in 'their' mind only and is illegitimate.

Q -How do you suppress the activities of a terrorist group?

Prof. - Terrorists have to be fought mainly with four fronts ; militarily, domestic policies, foreign policies and imposing specific law. All these have to be done simultaneously, and not one after the other or one or the other.

Q -What do you think about the military objectives carrying on at present? Are they on a satisfactory level?

Prof. - Military wise, the present administration here has done pretty well. Military prosecution is quite successful. But may I stress something. I have heard many peace and human rights activists even in this country keep saying - "We want 'Peace' and not 'War'.. " It is not the war that is the proposition.

The objective of war is 'Peace'... Every soldier knows that anywhere in the world, and they are participating in a war of which the ultimate objective is 'Peace'. You can have 'War and Peace' instead of 'War or Peace'.. Many intelligent people here create the impression - 'War or Peace'.

I know they honestly believe what they say, and don't misunderstand me, I don't doubt their intention or intellectual levels.. I know it heads towards 'Peace'. Even Leo Tolstoy said 'War and Peace' and not 'War or Peace'...

Q -Can you explain it more?

Prof. - Yes. Well there's one additional point why we do prosecute war as the beginning of the process that we might address to the future. In other words, let's say if tomorrow we win the war, what next?

You must have a conscience for proper socio-political address or a program for the future. We can learn from the world. For this we can learn from world history such as of Lenin, Mao Zedong, Russian Revolution or American Revolution.

Q -Haven't we tried many solutions earlier as well?

Prof. - True. Many politicians and intellectual people have been trying to find solutions, and were unsuccessful. All this time we have been in a 'Box' and searching for a solutions with in that frame. What we should do now is to find a solution from 'outside of this Box'...

British gave us Westminster style of democracy which we still follow. How Westminster style was introduced was also interesting. In England, public became uneasy and dissatisfied about the rule of the King. As a result, the Westminster style of government where the people get the access to re-elect the government was introduced.

But what has happened is instead of the King, the same aristocratic upper class has still been ruling. They are the ones who are re-elected and govern constantly, and not the commoners... Hardly any difference.

The same thing took place here. I would call the aristocracy here as 'elite'. And the Sri Lankans call them 'Kurunduwatte crowd'. This elite class has been ruling this country all this time suppressing the majority. I won't clasify them as Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, Burgers, Christian, Catholics or Buddhists, but would like to call all of them - ordinary people (the majority) who live in villages, urban, slums and all over island.. They have never taken part in the ruling process. The power of the State has been exercised by the elite class since the Independence in 1948.

I do not belong to any particular political party. Politics is not my game. I'm just making my observations through what I see... However, I see that, in the last Presidential Election a 'quiet revolution' took place at the ballot box. That revolution was put in place by the silent majority of this country.

That's important! And this majority of ordinary people have been ruled and oppressed, and were suffering silently. Silently they suffered! And from time to time there were certain groups who came forward with political interests. But they represented the minority groups, and not the majority.

And when you look at the case of the ballot it was the people who came on their feet, bicycles, bullock carts and buses who elected this President more than the elite. It's quite visible. Although he has also been coming from a Southern aristocratic family background he was a person who was brought up and had grown up to keep his feet on the ground. Everybody knows that. He is among the commoners.

Q -What would be the solutions you advocate?

Prof. - Everybody is talking about devolution of power. I too agree that there should be devolution of power, but not the way that they talk about. People talk about devolution of power - by giving in to LTTE, Tamils, Muslims, Provincial Councils, Federal state of government or what else? But all those solutions have come from 'inside of the box'.

My opinion is that we have to think of a way of devolving the power to people irrespective of their communal, racial and class differences. As I argued earlier power has been exercised in this country by a minority (the elite). There's a clear need to transfer power to 'people'. That is democracy.

Still many politicians and intellectuals here are quite confused over the terms of 'Power' and 'Authority'. Both look similar, but are two different terms. Power is not Authority, and Authority is not Power. I'm not talking of devolution of Authority, but devolution of Power.

The 'Power' can be bestowed with the people, and the 'Authority' should be with the government. The 'Power' is a capacity to make decision by a large number of people. Right now both power and authority lie with the politicians. That's why people are after politicians asking for peace and jobs, which also lead to corruption as well. Authority can be levelled in many official ways as a form what the country wishes.

There's an Indian story. Once a King had a consultant who would go everywhere he went. But he was not in uniform. There was a palace guard whose job was to catch flies. The fly catcher got a uniform, and not the consultant.

Whenever the fly catcher was walking around, villagers who recognised him by his uniform used to respect him. But the consultant who was not in an uniform was not recognised in that sense. But, really speaking who has 'Power'? Fly catcher has Authority (along with his uniform), but the consultant has Power.

The king seeks assistance from the consultant to maintain his position. In that sense, consultant is more 'powerful'. The ruling party needs power. So when the power lies with people, the ruler has no way of 'neglecting' them and have to listen to them, their problems, their agonies so on.

Q -How do you devolve power to people, and what's the method we should use?

Prof. - Everybody in Sri Lanka talk about an 'end product' - of a Federal State, separate state so on... But none talk about the 'Process'. Before we access to an 'end product', we must create a 'process' for that which the people also can participate in.

Transferring power to people is completely a new thought process. Well, people will have a hard time to envision it. It's going to be a silent revolution and not a blood shedding revolution. We have to 'process' right now. I think it's too late already. I even told this to the President Rajapaksa.

How can you do it? People would ask. Let me give an example in a simplest form. The Peace Secretariat can hire a group of young Social Science graduates who are competent in social research methods and statistics for collecting the data. We can send them out to distant places so that they can rally people around them, not on mass scale, but in small groups of 25, 75 or 100, and make them talk.

Their opinions and problems that would come along with the feed back data is what would help us to form the 'end product' - or the solution, after analysing them through new scientific methods.

I'm not for a solution that comes from 'top to bottom'... We have to develop 'bottom to the top'. The solution should come from the suffering- the bottom - the 'silent majority'... As then everybody will be participating in it and have a say in it - different communities, racial groups, intellectuals, politicians so on... So the 'end product' or the 'solution' is acceptable to all of them.

Also the 'process' should have the transparency. Anything that is done behind closed doors will only raise suspicion among people. Everybody should be let to observe what's happening and what's being discussed.

This was first exercised at the US Revolution. Secondly by South Africa (SA). I prefer to talk about SA as then nobody can tell that it's only a US method. It's a constitutional revolution and not an evolution. South Africa had about 32 -38 communal groups who spoke many different languages.

They fought and killed each other for many years. When the African Congress Leader Nelson Mandela was in prison he realised that the major obstacle for achieving peace was the fear of the White man. Whites were in the minority.

The Whites had a major fear over Blacks coming to power. They thought, "Oh, My God, if the Blacks come to power, they would start massacreing us." This was because the Whites had been engaged in several heinous activities trampling the Blacks right through out.

And when Mandela and De Clerk (leader of the White government of that time) got together, Mandela agreed to allow space for 'pardoning' process once the new constitution was formed. For an example, say if I'm a White, and have killed your entire family.

Only you have survived. You have the right to take action against me. I should also get the chance to 'apologise' for what I've done.

No need of prosecution. It's a novel idea for which a lot of human right activists are against. Mandela said, "No they (the Whites) should not have fear over what they've done." So it shows that there should be a sacrifice in some way too.

We have to find qualitative solutions for qualitative issues like social problems and human impacts. No solution can be hundred per cent successful. We won't be able to sweep it off completely. Only what we can do is to control and manage it to minimise the harm caused by them.

Q -Do you think Prabhakaran and the LTTE would ever agree to this? Would people assume it as a practical solution?

Prof. - If it's the wish of the majority of Tamil people, do you think that Prabhakaran and his LTTE organisation can go against them? A person who think with in the 'box' would find it non-practicable.

Once you concentrate on the 'process' you will automatically get a good 'end product'. Once a soap factory owner called his two Managers and asked them to find a solution to increase the profit as the factory was running at a loss.

One Manager came up with an idea of changing the shape, colour and wrapper of the soap. The other Manager's proposal was to change the manufacturing process by using the same materials. In this process, the end product was 'detergent'. So what would the people buy more? It was successful. The 'process' gets the 'product'....

Q -Approximately how long would it take to process?

Prof. - South Africa who has such a vast number of different communities took two years to come to a settlement in this process, and still could end a long war.

So why not we try here, in Sri Lanka? Also, as the last point of mine may I state one fact. For all this, we must have a good State Leadership. It requires a large person with a large heart with a lot of compassion, love for the country who has the wish to have one nation.

He should be for common people like Mandela, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King. Honestly I feel President Mahinda Rajapaksa has all that, and would be the only Statesman among the present politicians in Sri Lanka for that.

If he wishes, and has the courage and will, he can do it. But the most extremely important thing is that, the people should get together and rally around this idea. If the people won't give that backing, no leader could do it? If we can think as one nation, most of the suffering we are experiencing at present would be over in no time.