Salawa: Story of a military disaster

It was just a week ago that a major fire and a chain of massive blasts rocked several areas around the Salawa Army camp, at Kosgama, a residential area near Avissawella in the densely populated Western Province.

Although the death toll and the number of casualties of the incident remained low, the incident, as a whole, plunged the Army into a serious crisis on many a front.

On the logistics front, the Sri Lanka Army, which militarily crushed the one of the biggest terrorist outfits in the world, a mere seven years ago, has lost one of its biggest ammunition dumps. According to highly placed military sources, the Army is still carrying out investigations to ascertain the exact amount of damage caused by the fire where logistics are concerned.

On the other hand, the issue, quite obviously, has given rise to some serious controversies within the Army.

In the aftermath of the incident, a blame-game has started among the military top-brass and fingers have been pointed in various directions.

Meanwhile, different schools of thought prevail among top-tier officers of the Army over the ‘cause’ behind the fire. Three parties have already launched investigations into the incident and the possibility of an act of sabotage has not been ruled out entirely.

Vol Force headquarters

In addition to such losses, there are serious non-financial and non-recoverable losses that might create far-reaching problems for the defence establishment in the future.

Law and Order Minister Sagala Ratnayake makes a point at the press conference. Minister Ravi Karunanayake and State Minister Ruwan Wijewardene look on. Pic: Gayan Pushpika

Certain online publications, on Monday night, reported that around 70,000 files of the Sri Lanka Army Volunteer Force were destroyed in the fire. The headquarters of the Army Volunteer Force was also at the Salawa camp and there are serious doubts about the recovery of those documents.

Apart from the consequences of the fire and subsequent blasts, the Army has to now deal with a serious civilian issue. Following the explosion and fire, utter chaos reigned as shrapnel from the blast fell as far as ten kilometres from the area, while thick clouds of smoke swirled above the camp. For a few hours, those who lived in areas around the Army camp felt they were trapped in a war zone.

Residents living within a six km radius of the Army camp were asked to leave the area as soon as possible.

The majority of residents refused to leave, initially, as they were concerned about the safety of their properties. They finally agreed to leave after the government assured that the law enforcement authorities, including the Army and the Police, would ensure security for their personal properties.

At the same time, thousands of people were stranded on the roads, as they did not have transport facilities to evacuate swiftly. Heavy traffic was reported along roads adjacent to the Army camp.

Amidst this chaos, authorities had to take measures to close the Colombo–Avissawella road as shrapnel fell on the road, posing a severe risk to civilian safety.

Several hours after the incident, the civilians who left the area were asked to return to their houses with the ‘no-go zone’ being reduced to 1 km. Two days later, the ‘no-go zone’ was further reduced to 500 metres.

However, when they returned to the area, it was like a ‘ghost city’. Some of the houses and shops had been completely destroyed and the area around the camp resembled a ‘war zone’ that characterized the North, before May, 2009.

Protest

While cleaning up the camp, the military launched a parallel operation to remove shrapnel from houses in the area. However, two days after the incident, some civilians staged a protest alleging their houses had not been cleaned properly by the security forces and it posed a threat to their safety.

The protest created tension between the residents and the security forces. Some residents also charged that certain members of the security forces were involved in looting, in the aftermath of the incident. Such allegations, however, were flatly denied by the Army.

The Army, however, has taken over the responsibility to restore normalcy in the area. Army Commander Lt. Gen. Chrishantha de Silva attended a meeting at the Seethawaka Divisional Secretariat, on Friday, to look into the progress of reconstruction work.

Science, Technology and Research Minister Susil Premajayantha presided over the meeting. They had received information that over 380 houses in the area had been damaged due to the incident.

The Army Commander said twelve service centres would be set up to provide relief to people in the 12 Grama Niladhari Divisions affected by the incident. He also added that 50,000 soldiers would be deployed, if necessary, to restore normal civilian life in the area.

The Army Commander, addressing the meeting on behalf of the Army, also apologized to the affected people for the “unforeseen tragedy.”

“The people affected by the incident would be provided relief without considering any political or other differences. Those who lost moveable and immovable properties will be compensated, but the process would take some time. Those who lost their commercial establishments would be paid a monthly allowance of Rs 50,000 until the restoration of their properties,” Minister Premajayantha said.

“Valuation officers would visit the area from today onwards. The interests of employees of business ventures who lost employment would also be looked into. We are aware that 125 out of 750 places destroyed were business places. The needs of schoolchildren, such as books, stationery and uniforms would also be provided,” he said.

Investigations

Soon after the fire broke out, Law and Order Minister Sagala Ratnayaka, who visited the area with several other ministers, said the Criminal Investigations Department would launch an inquiry into the matter.

The move to entrust the CID, the task of handling the inquiry showed that the government wanted to conduct an independent inquiry into the fire and subsequent explosions.

Some naively assumed that the Army intelligence wing would be given full authority to probe into the matter. However, the government’s line of thinking was different.

The government believed that assigning one section of the Army to conduct an inquiry into another section would not ensure a transparent inquiry process. On the other hand, the intelligence wing was under fire from various quarters, in the recent past, for executing orders given by the political authorities who seamlessly controlled the country’s defence apparatus.

Strong links

The majority of suspects who were arrested in connection with Prageeth Eknaligoda and Nadaraja Raviraj investigations had strong links with the intelligence wing. As a result of this seemingly poor track record, the public-at-large is not in a position to trust the military intelligence wing, whole-heartedly.

Understandably, some sections of the Army were dissatisfied with the government’s move to assign the CID to handle the investigation. Some genuinely thought the CID taking an upper hand in the investigations would cause an embarrassment to the Army.

Some were afraid that the CID would unravel the mystery surrounding the fire, without leaving any room for the military authorities to ‘massage’ the outcome of the inquiry.

It was common knowledge that there was a tug-of-war between the Army and the CID over the Prageeth Eknaligoda investigation. The CID, at one point, informed the Magistrate that the Army was reluctant to share details with regard to the investigation.

There were also allegations that a senior officer in the defence establishment was involved in various backroom operations to remove Senior State Counsel Dileepa Pieris, who represented the Attorney General’s Department in the Eknaligoda case. In this context, placing the investigation into the Salawa fire under the CID was a tough decision for the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government.

Under these trying circumstances, the Army Commander acted in a highly professional manner and instructed all authorities at the Salawa army camp to cooperate with the CID officers conducting investigations.

Army media spokesman Brigadier Jayanath Jayaweera told the Sunday Observer that every measure had been taken by the Army to facilitate investigations.

He stressed that the Army would act in a professional and transparent as far as the investigations were concerned.

The CID, on Friday afternoon, officially announced that it had commenced investigations into the fire at the Salawa Army camp.

A senior officer of the CID told the Sunday Observer that the department obtained statements from nearly 30 soldiers who were present at the camp when the fire broke out. The CID will also record statements from the residents in the area, as part of their initial inquiries.

“The CID inquiry will be a comprehensive one. We will analyse video footage, documents and other background information relating to the fire. We will also record statements from third parties over the incident. It is still too early to make predictions about the time-frame of the investigation,” a highly placed Police source told the Sunday Observer, on Friday.

Two senior officers from the Government Analyst’s Department also visited the Salawa area, on Friday to assist the Police investigation.

In addition to the CID investigation, the Army has set up a Court of Inquiry to look into the matter. The Army spokesman said the Court of Inquiry was appointed by the Army Commander on Wednesday. However, he refused to disclose the names of the members of the Court.

“If we disclose the names of the members, it will affect the independence and transparency of the whole process. Various people will attempt to personally contact the officers handling the investigation,” Brigadier Jayaweera said.

Suspicions

Meanwhile, suspicions have now been raised whether the fire at the Salawa Army camp had any connection with the weapons audit initiated by the government in the light of the Avant Garde controversy.

Following the controversy surrounding the floating armoury maintained by the private security firm, Avant Garde, the government felt the need for a comprehensive audit into all the weapons stored at armouries belonging to the security forces.

To ensure the transparency of the process, the government decided that the Auditor General’s Department should handle the process, under ‘civil procedures’. The government was of the view that such an audit would unravel a lot of mysteries surrounding the ‘floating’ and other armouries maintained by certain parties which operated under the blessings of the top echelons of the previous administration.

The fire at the Salawa camp, needless to say, has now hampered the ‘audit attempt’, planned by the government.

The government and the department are now in a dilemma as to how it could conduct the audit without the biggest armoury belonging to the Army.

There were suspicions whether a party that was not in favour of this ‘weapons audit’ was behind the incident. However, the investigative teams have not found any evidence to corroborate such suspicions. That is, however, one area the investigators are examining at present.

Warnings

Be that as it may, the Salawa army camp, over the past few years, faced the risk of running into a disaster of this nature.

In 2012, a senior officer overlooking the army camp had sent a detailed report to the then Army Commander, Lt. General Daya Ratnayake, making him aware of the imminent security threat.

In his report, he warned that the corroded weapons and ammunition could pose a threat to the safety of the camp and the surrounding area. He pointed out there should be a comprehensive plan to remove corroded weapons and ammunition.

The senior officer’s views were fully endorsed by the then Logistics Commander of the Army.

However, such information fell on deaf ears, as the top-brass members of the defence establishment had other priorities. Instead of relocating the armoury, they further increased the volume of the ammunition dump, turning a blind eye to warnings given by senior officers.

After the incident, however, Lt. Gen de Silva revealed that the Army had “other plans” for the Salawa ammunition dump.

“We have had an excess of ammuniwtion stored here after the war, this should have been dealt with in 2010,” the Army Commander said, addressing a press conference in Kosgama, on Friday afternoon.

The Commander who addressed the media from the outskirts of the burnt camp stressed that this excess of ammunition as per international norm, should have been returned to the suppliers when not in use.

“We should have kept what we needed and returned the rest,” he said.

He explained that the army had been asking for the removal of this ammunition for a considerable period of time.

‘As soon as I became Army Commander, I explained to the President the need to reduce our excess stocks. He approved it immediately and we started the process of reducing the ammunition stored here,” he said.

Lt. General de Silva assumed duties as Army Commander on February 20 last year, nearly a month after the new government’s ascension to power.

According to the Commander, a Cabinet paper seeking permission to reduce excess ammunition stocks and to move the armoury from Kosgama was put to the Cabinet early last year. Therefore, the Commander said the Army was in the process of reducing ammunition stocks.

However, it should also be noted that the Army is not in a position to wash its hands off, saying there were plans to reduce ammunition stocks at the camp.

The chain of events involving the Salawa Army camp calls for a stronger ‘accountability mechanism’ in the Army, as far as its functioning is concerned.

For instance, following the island-wide power breakdown, a few months ago, the CEB Chairman tendered his letter of resignation, accepting responsibility for the failure.

Many political observers opined that the current Army Commander too should resort to such an action as the incident occurred due to an ‘administrative failure’ in the Army. The Army did not make the right decisions at the right time to prevent the possibility of a serious accident of this nature.

Although it is a problem that developed over the years, the final responsibility, quite obviously, lies with the serving Army Commander. Ironically, the current Lt. Gen de Silva is from the Field Engineers Regiment Corps of the Sri Lanka Army.

It is also important to understand that all Army commanders who led the Army after the end of war should take the blame for the accident. They cannot distance themselves from the problem, turning the incumbent Army commander into a scapegoat.

The same ‘accountability’ should be applied to former Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, who single-handedly controlled the country’s defence apparatus after the war ended in 2009.

The controversy involving the Salawa Army camp suggests that the relevant authorities had not taken measures to ensure internationally accepted safety standards. This, needless to say, is a problem faced by many nations across the world.

This incident pushes the government to adopt strong measures on the weapon and ammunition management front to prevent such incidents in the future.

While addressing ‘conspiracy fears’, the ongoing investigations should also exert pressure on the government and its security forces to comply with international standards when dealing with ammunition dumps.