by Wakeley Paul; published April 6, 2004
Nostradamus, in a brilliant two part article in The Island in February, has exhibited outstanding insight into the long term future of Sri Lanka. His knowledge, analysis and perspicacity are almost impossible to emulate. In this article, I, by contrast consider what¹s in store for us in the immediate aftermath of the election.
The LTTE has the almost unanimous support of the people in the NorthEast, judging from the sweeping victory by the TNA. Above all, this has confirmed Tamil Unity. That unity signifies that the Tamil expectations and hopes in this election were centered on four factors: [a] That the peace talks would continue where they left off [b] That a federal constitution would become an emerging possibility, with autonomy in an interim arrangement a near-term step along that path [c] That there would be an immediate concentration on relief and rehabilitation and [c] that war would recede into the background and be replaced by an era of peace and upliftment of the northeastern economy.
The Sinhalese voters, on the other hand, have voted for [a] Sinhala Buddhist supremacy [b] A desire to keep Tamils subordinate to that supremacy and [c] a fatuous hope that the cost of living will decline under the rule of a new regime [see later analysis of the significance of this factor].
What this portends to the international world, is that the country is hopelessly divided between the Tamils in the Northeast and the Sinhalese elsewhere. Their goals and aspirations collide and seem incapable of any possible fruitful reconciliation. Peace talks and discussions between them, whether monitored or otherwise, will appear to be a dead letter.
How then does the new government cope with this dilemma, or does it intend to? The President in a last minute bid to woo moderates in the Sinhalese community, switched policies by stating that the talks would continue without conditions, having previously proclaimed that the UNF government had been much too conciliatory toward the Tamils. The JVP, a significant portion of her coalition government, have made it abundantly clear that they disavow federalism and are guarded about Devolution, because their instincts cry for Sinhala Buddhist Supremacy and Tamil subordination to the Sinhala will at all times under the name of ‘unity.’ This intractable Sinhala attitude divides the two people and separates them with a seal of finality. Now that the President has won the election, she still insists that she will continue with the peace talks. The question is whether this is anything more than a soft-gummed offer which will dissolve with the first exchange of views on what the talks should focus on.
The President will also be confronted with a clash of views within her cabinet as to what the government’s positions should be on the ethnic and economic fronts. The Ministers will vary from rabid supremacists and avid socialists to moderates on both fronts. These are a few of the gnawing dilemmas that will chew at her heels whereever she turns. The euphoria of victory resulting from a coalition of convenience can lead to a tangle of headaches which will multiply like mosquitoes with time.
The major disillusionment among the Sinhalese voters will be the expectation and hope that the COL will be drummed down by those they voted into power. This is where their faith in their monks and their muddle-headed, insular socialist economists to clear up the economic mess, will sour more quickly than one can imagine. If these economists prevail on the President rather than those who advised her from 1994 to 2000, the expected magic of a reversal of economic fortunes will vanish like lightning for two reasons [a] The economic hurdle is higher than they realize and [b] Socialist economics will strangle, rather than spur, development.
America and its European counterparts will find any retreat into socialist economics distasteful and dangerous. The question then is whether the massive quotas of aid proposed for the rehabilitation and revitalization of all segments of this island will be readily forthcoming without stringent conditions attached. Will the aid-givers, as they have in the past, ignore what they perceive as an inevitable downfall in the economy and help to prop it up at any cost, or will they let it collapse of its own accord? In the interests of trade and international economic stability, a certain degree of propping up to prevent the country from keeling over will be inevitable. Beyond that, will the further massive aid ear-marked for the country at the Tokyo conference be conditioned on the JVP, the Buddhist monks and their inward-looking economists having to yield to the business communities’ insistence on the importance of supporting private enterprise? The chances are pretty high that these could be made mandatory conditions upon which aid will be forthcoming, accompanied by a corresponding need to rehabilitate and revitalize the northeast, with its own nascent economic potential. Will the sloppy-headed extremists yield to such pressure or insist on believing that they are a power unto themselves, free of external influences? One cannot forget that, with the end of the cold war, the alienation of the west does not give them anywhere else to turn to for help. Both the Americans and Western Europeans are fully alive to that reality.
It would appear that the LTTE will have to sit and await the results of this mounting Sinhalese fiasco with monumental patience. War is hardly a worthwhile or desired solution unless the Sinhalese spark it off, at the urging of their armed forces, Then, of course, war would be inevitable. Here the President may have a conflict between the army that supported her through thick and thin and plunging the nation into an economic abyss. It can only be hoped that the power-thirsty armed forces can be quelled and kept in their place. It is clear that no segment of the Sinhala supremacists will favor army domination of their fate. Sinhala Buddhists will not yield power to any but themselves. The armed forces will have to be content to be their agents, not their rulers.
The economic chaos that will result from a new surge of socialism can and will lead to internal unrest, which has so far been borne by the Sinhalese poor with resignation. That resignation has been sustained over many decades since independence. The BBC, while questioning a small sampling of potential voters on the eve of the election, discerned a strong sense of disillusionment with both ruling elites, neither of whom the people felt had their lowly interests at heart. There seemed to be an implication that the elites of both parties were more concerned with the interests of the affluent classes to which they belonged, than they were with the lower economic orders.
Some attribute the popularity of the Buddhist monks to this feeling of alienation from the more affluent ruling classes. I disagree, because it is well known among the Sinhala poor that the monks are an integral part of the powerful and affluent few, despite their religious commitment to poverty. I read their attachment to the monks as one connected to the philosophy of the need to continue with the right to Sinhala Buddhist supremacy more than anything else.
A very astute friend of mine, a former I.M.F.executive, is of the view that the COL has no bearing on the elections whatsoever. It is, he insists, a major cause for complaint among the more articulate wage-earners which includes the urban working classes, but not the vast majority of the rural poor, the peasantry, who are resigned to accepting poverty as part of their fate. I don’t know how much resignation there can be when politicians in the opposition drum it into their heads that whichever government is in power is washing their fortunes down the nearest stream or river.
What is deeply disturbing about this sense of economic alienation among the average Sinhalese citizens is the effort that these tin pot socialist economists may take to assuage this underlying feeling of frustration. As a sugar-coated antidote, to appeal to the lustful instincts of the deprived, they may be tempted to seize capital assets and seal the incomes of the affluent. Taking from the rich to feed the poor is an attractive romantic symbol associated with Robin Hood and his merry men in Sherwood forest or with the more local Sardiel, but it does not amount to sound economics. For one thing, whatever is seized will not land on the tables of the poor. For another, this will cripple investment, traumatize the business sector and bring the economy down to its knees.
What the Americans and their European counterparts will do in that event, in an effort to stabilize the economic structure of the nation, is not quite certain. In the past, when there were two superpower blocks the capitalists had to smile and look on benignly as the ship of disaster went sailing by. Now, however, they are not constrained by such restraints and are in a much more advantageous situation to intervene economically. It does not require an invasion to control and steer an economy in a particular direction.
A major concern will be whether the economic morass can trigger a violent upheaval by the people. In the past, the riots of ’56,’58,’77,’81,’83 were not the product of popular discontent. Even the ’53 riot against the cutting of the rice ration was sponsored by politicians. It is the well-fed government thugs and vagrants, inspired by liquor, who at government instigation, who have been aroused to take it out against the minorities. The battle cry has been that it is the non cooperation of the objecting minorities that has been the root cause of the malaise of the majority. It is not past a desperate bunch of politicians to once again blame the minorities for the economic turmoil of the Sinhalese. This can once again spark the much feared racial riots.
The only deterrent against the government’s resorting to this tactic to divert attention from their own failures, is that riots get out of hand and have to be contained at some point. This will involve withdrawing troops from the Northeast to contain the insurgency in the south. That will mean yielding control of the Northeast to the Tamils.
What do the Tamils in the Northeast do in the event of a staged insurgency, sympathize and give succor to the victims of these massacres or take advantage of the diversion of Sinhala troops to reestablish power in the peninsula? Possibly both.
This is where Nostradamus and his perspicacious predictions will come into play. I may just add one other new phenomenon that supports his contentions. The new alliance between India, Japan and the U.S to form a defensive shield against possible I.C.B.M attacks from North Korea and China, will give them further incentive to have a naval base like Trincomallee from which to operate this shield. Unlike other nations with Muslim populations, Sri Lanka’s Muslims are not connected to the international Jihadist movements. Sri Lanka provides a safe haven from which to operate [a] to dismantle international terror cells in Afghanistan, Malaysia and Indonesia as well as [b] to provide a base from which to maintain international stability in the near and far east.