posted April 09, 2005 04:22 AM
Siamese Twins We certainly do not underestimate the huge task in the South resulting from partisan state ideology, reinforced by playing on the fears of the Sinhalese. If one is clear about the lack of political substance and the political vulnerability of the LTTE, as offering the people nothing tangibly human, then how to deal with it flows naturally. But in building up the LTTE’s image as something formidable, the advocates of militarism in the South and their counterparts among the Tamils have been complementing each other. They have been jointly playing at a game of `Emperor’s New Clothes’ with the LTTE.
How the two parties need each other like Siamese twins is evident from the fact that the articles of those like Nalin de Silva who maintain that there is no Tamil problem, but only a terrorist problem, were regularly translated from the Sinhalese or the English and publicised in the LTTE controlled media. On the other hand the advocates of the ‘no Tamil problem’ position in the South cover up their bankruptcy by giving publicity to defenders of the LTTE. By covering up for the crimes of the LTTE and identifying it with Tamil aspirations, those like Kumar Ponnambalam make the cause of the Tamils who have suffered a history of state oppression look novel, absurd and utterly unreasonable.
How close the two groups of pretended adversaries are is also revealed by the fact that they agree on some key suppositions and their approach to history and interpretations of events are very similar. It is for example important for both of them to maintain that the Sinhalese and Tamils have been distinct ethnic groups from time immemorial, almost fated to be bitter adversaries in perpetuity. Each one of the two imposes an unchanging core of evil intentions to the other.
Their use of history too shows how each corners itself into a position of belligerence. There are just about two kinds of Tamils who occur in Nalin de Silva’s writings. Both are racists, with supposedly fictitious political grievances. One is of the moderate kind who seek a separate state through first getting federalism. The other kind seek it directly through violence. The drift of his mind is clear from the following taken from his recent articles in the Island:
“The Tamil racists would very much like to erase the Dutugemunu-Elara story from the history books, as it is the cornerstone of the formation of the Sinhala –Buddhist unitary state of this country.”(28.10.98)
“[Dutugemunu’s] aim was very clear. Defeat the invader completely and protect the Buddha Sasana. No so-called political solutions, no peace talks with or without conditions…” (7.10.98)
Dr. de Silva is quick to take issue with any scholar who suggests that these events of circa 100 BC were part of a feudal power game that were given an ideological twist by the Buddhist clerics who recorded them about 700 years later, so as to enhance the legitimacy of the royal line to which they were allied. More particularly, he fervently rejects any suggestion of diversity or pluralism in this country in early historic times, such as would challenge the early provenance of his monolithic Sinhalese–Buddhist unitary state. A corollary to this line of reasoning is that the Tamils can have no grievances or legitimate political claims because they were invaders or even destroyers. Legitimate rights are historical rights!
A key feature of such reasoning is `argument from silence’ – from the absence of records to the contrary. For example Nalin de Silva argues that there could have been no settled Tamil presence in this country in 100 BC because there are no records that suggest to him that there was a tribe called the Tamils anywhere in the world then. How misleading such an argument could be is not hard to see. Nothing survives of anything that was written in or about Britain before the Roman conquest in 55 BC. Moreover there were hardly any records in Britain other than in Latin - the language of the ancient Romans– until the 16th century AD. We know of nothing that is recognisably English from before the 10th century AD. But no one suggests that modern Englishmen in England should be looked upon as invaders. History is a complex phenomenon involving a constant flux people, ideas and influences.
Ideas such as those of the ancient unitary state in Sri Lanka protecting the Buddha Sasana are not just dogmatic history, but are totalitarian in character. It is similar to the ideology of England as the `New Jerusalem’ (Dhamma Dipa) conceived among the English gentry around 1650, after effectively suppressing the underclass that was clamouring for radical reform. Such ideologies are typically those of a ruling class which feels beleaguered from within.
Such lines of thinking which deny the existence of genuine political grievances among the Tamils today, have to dwell in myths, both ancient and modern, and fail to understand present issues reflecting the modern social and political reality.
Counterposed to those who stand by a cast iron Sinhalese unitary state are the mystifiers who promote the LTTE. Some of them who have scoured the early Tamil epics have come up with exciting stuff. The Tigers are said to be in effect a re-incarnation of the ancient Chera whose armies advanced to the Himalayas and the Cholas who conquered the Ganges basin. From these same sources rationalisations have also been found for suicide warriors and martial women. Just as the ancient unitary state myth has no bearing on today’s problems, these myths which tease the vanity of elite and expatriate Tamil nationalists, have no relation to what is in the mind of an ordinary LTTE cadre, or to the disposition of longsuffering Tamil people desperate for peace and a chance to live as human beings.
A more sophisticated attempt at constructing a myth was put forward in the Weekend Express (5.12.98) by E.A.V. Naganathan in response to our `A Tamil Heroine Unmourned….’ He completely evades the moral questions posed by us regarding the LTTE’s methods and implications for the peace. He suggests a parallel with Vichy France under the overlordship of Nazi Germany, with Mrs.Yogeswaran in the role of Marshal Petain. She was, one understands from Naganathan, in the role of a `collaborationist’, in a situation where` the Geneva Convention rules do not apply to belligerents on the `rebel’ side.’
These suggestions are preceded by a factual account of the violence and progressive marginalisation the Tamils had experienced from the State. It is implied that against this base systematic conspiracy by Sinhalese leaders, the `integrity and lofty gentlemanly qualities’ of the Tamil leadership were of no avail. In posing this as a question at the end (what avail?) a strong implication is left about the role of the LTTE.
The same position is shard by those like Nalin de Silva except that the actors are reversed. Should it come as any surprise that Naganathan should find the observation “Tiger terrorism is Tamil Terrorism” attributed to Kamalika Pieris, usefully `perspicuous’?
Our analysis of developments has always been that there never was, nor is, a conspiracy among either the Sinhalese masses or the Tamil masses. Political leaders on both sides made capital out of the politics of attributed conspiracy and all the people suffered in different ways. True, in a sense the politics was gentlemanly. The elite leaders on both sides for the most part had excellent personal relations and socialised in Colombo. But their politics, on both sides, acquired a vested interest in keeping the ordinary Tamil and Sinhalese people divided, while believing in the essential evilness of the other. Anyone challenging this preconception became a `traitor’ – a term popularised from gentlemanly Federal Party platforms and its propaganda sheet, the `Suthanthiran’. Coming from this frame of mind, Naganathan’s feelings about the Tigers are logical. The politics of the Tigers is a continuation of the same, even after the consequences of the TC-FP-TULF legacy have become repellingly evident.
The experiences over the last fifteen years involving the Muslims who were chased out of the North en-masse at four hours notice, the massacres of Muslim and Sinhalese civilians, and thousands of Tamil youths imprisoned and tortured to death by their fellows, also have an important impact on the present political dynamism. But these tragedies and the character of the politics which perpetuates these crimes, evade these gentlemen whose consciences are frozen and suffer from selective amnesia, as do their counterparts among the Sinhalese.
In order to deceive the children of others and send them into horrifying deaths, the Tamil establishment and their media need to constantly falsify the true disposition of the Sinhalese people, turn them into ogres and continually belittle Sinhalese individuals whose public role offers hope.
The parallel with Vichy France is utterly inappropriate. To begin with it would suggest that the relationship of Sarojini Yogeswaran to Chandrika Kumartunga was similar to that between Petain and Adolf Hiltler. It shows how absurd parallels are drawn to justify cast iron preconceptions and turn a blind eye to where the LTTE is leading the people. An analysis to the effect that the communalism of the Sri Lankan State caused the problem and that there is little hope in the Southern polity solving the problem, is defensible. Few would contest the first proposition. The second may be treated as a debatable proposition or a challenge for political action. But from this one cannot jump to the conclusion that the LTTE is the answer or that any responsible Tamil could take a morally neutral position as regards the LTTE.
Vichy France too had its rationalisations, which implied moral compromises. The latter included throwing French Jews to the Nazi wolves. The situation has some resemblance to Jaffna under LTTE rule when dissidents were rounded up by the thousands, and many of whom were killed. Whenever the state forces were responsible for violations, the people were not forced into such abject and far-reaching moral compromises.
Here again we encounter the deviousness of the LTTE as a social phenomenon. The LTTE would not own up to killing Sarojini Yogeswaran, and if pressed, is likely to deny it. But then several Tamils feel impelled to come forward and explain or justify the killing – even while rhetorically disapproving it - on the presumption that the LTTE was the culprit. In this climate of evasion, the international organisations, which operate within a rigid legal framework, fail to put their finger on anything tangible where the LTTE is concerned.
The concept of a Tamil traditional homeland is another topic now being debated with much vigour. To us the present argument over history is largely meaningless. What is meaningful is to understand and remedy recent historical trends which created conditions for a section of the people to feel that the North – East is their homeland. Anyone studying the modern history with an objective mind will easily understand how the Tamils began to feel and to cling on to the North-East as their homeland as a place where they could be free of violence to say the least. The political process which reflected and harnessed that fear and insecurity took the form of the Tamil nationalist struggle. This in turn led to various arguments and agendas, and also created myths and new political concepts. In Tamil society too there are no doubt various formations, regional differences and interests. But it is the overwhelming strength of the perceived threat from the Sri Lankan State which gave vitality to the homeland concept in the political agenda. It will no doubt lose its importance when there are concrete moves towards peace through removing that fear. This would also involve transforming the political landscape and the character of the State to address the present reality.
The formation of a nation could therefore happen for reasons quite apart from demands for the intrinsic rights of a pre-existing group. Group feeling and solidarity are themselves dynamic phenomena – often a response to perceived collective oppression. There may be certain conditions conducive for the formation of a nation without necessarily leading to separate nationhood. We pointed out earlier the internal factors which created conditions for the Tamils to slowly and steadily fall back on nationalist ideology. Often there are external factors such as happened in Bangladesh, where the involvement India solidified certain demands rendering them achievable. On the other hand the politics of Tamil society has shown its inability to rise above differences, marshal a common programme, and so unify the Tamil nationalist struggle into a coherent form. What we continue to see on both sides are the same destructive tendencies after decades of repeated failure. The LTTE which time and again made the same blunders is still able to hold the Tamil people as hostages only due to the same unimaginative blunders being made by the State and the Southern polity.
Without understanding the dynamism of concepts such as nationhood and the basis for their vitality, if we merely attack them, treating them as static or historically defined concepts, we only end up enhancing them. Hence whether Eelam becomes a reality or not, depends very much on the ability of the Southern political establishment to rise up to the occasion and deal with the problem more creatively
What extremists on both sides are doing to confuse issues by painting the other ethnic group as uniformly subhuman, and amenable only to brute force. Both continue to play their role in assuring the LTTE with long life, while destroying the social and moral fabric of this country. They are both enemies of peace and sanity and must be exposed as such.
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posted April 09, 2005 04:22 AM
