TRUE NATIONALISTS, this is your moment

Dr Vickramabahu Karunaratne-JAN 02 2016

When we discuss Tamil national problem many intellectuals clarify various connected matters, however leaving what I believe as the main matter of controversy. Of course all democratic minded people agree that a political arrangement for the North and the East is a necessity to avoid possible future flare-ups between the two major national communities. But certainly I do not agree with those who consider that protecting the economic and political sovereignty of this Lankan nation is primarily a job for the Sinhala Buddhist nationality. They argue, “after all, these progressive Sinhala Buddhist Nationalists ended the war, and stopped the seepage to the US and other global powers of our dollars, to buy our arms needs! Does anybody think that there was any other way of stopping the war with the terrorist LTTE?”

There are many things that I could dispute in this short paragraph. Firstly there is no ethnic or racial problem in this country. Europeans assume that they have left ethnic rivalries long ago and their conflicts are national problems. Rivalry between English and Irish is considered to be a national problem. However Tamils and Sinhala both, left tribalism long time back, may be in the 5th century before Christ. But we are told that we have an ethnic problem. From the time of megalithic culture in southern India we have lived together nearly 3000 years. We dropped idol worship behind and Hindu, and subsequently, Buddhist philosophies fashioned our thinking, before Mohamed’s wisdom arrived here in the tenth century.

In fact Buddhist rationalism contested the concept of creation and advocated a rationalist view point in all these years. In this manner we lived in this island over 2000 years. But still Tamil-Sinhala clashes are discussed by the imperialists and westernized intellectuals, in the framework of ethnic and tribal conflicts. So, first of all, let us get out of this imperialist bid to keep us in the domain of tribalism and let us go forward to put the problem in the proper framework.

If we leave out real minority groups such as Vedda, we are two nations or nationalities though we are same people lived such a long time in this country.

Human rights violations

To put it in simple words we are of the same blood and flesh, but we are different in language, religion and culture and these are seeped in ancient traditions. Thus we have a national problem which could be much deeper than any European nationality problem. Secondly, there is no fascist problem here as Tamil nationality is economically as underdeveloped as the Sinhala nationality or more so.

LTTE did not express the expansionism of the great Dravidian nation as there was no such thing but only a ferocious hatred of a small nation oppressed for decades. LTTE was the guerilla expression of the Tamil struggle for freedom and equality. On other hand Sinhala Buddhists have the majoritist mentality and always considered Vijaya is an Aryan hero who conquered the land of Yakka people. Thirdly so called ‘progressive’ nationalist did not end the war, but it was transformed into an international political campaign against Sinhala nationality.

What does the LLRC and other local reports say? These say, the war was contaminated with criminality and human rights violations. Also those admit the Tamil national problem and recommends Tamils should be given autonomy and democratic freedom. Fourthly, they think that the problem is solved where as the problem has become tenfold with all kinds of attacks aimed at Lanka. We could have solved the problem if a true autonomy was given to the Tamil homeland. If such powers were granted the LTTE would have died a natural death if it did not accept a reasonable solution; because Tamils would have defended the autonomy against any extremism. Also the Lankan Tamils do not want to lose their first citizenship in Lanka.

Tamil national problem

Trouble with Sinhala Buddhist ‘progressives’ who think in this manner, is that, in the first place they do not understand the Tamil national problem. Or more correctly they do not want to understand the problem. Otherwise how could one say that the LTTE acted like a fascist organization and it was wrong to sign a peace agreement with Prabhakaran? How could a nation of three million peasants and fishers living in misery create a fascist movement? If at least the Indian state was run by Siva Sena and that backed the LTTE one could talk in terms of Hindu fascism. We can think of a situation similar to Cyprus. But in this case it was Indian rulers who wanted the heads of the LTTE leaders. General Fonseka said that once armed forces were put in order the rig rag army of the LTTE had no options but to runaway leaving one city after the other, into jungle marshy areas pleading international forces to save them.

The truth is this war of Mahinda backed by India and others, was not a necessity nor it was a war against a fascist take over. It was a war conducted in the model of ‘war against terror” of US and other global powers. It has given the opportunity to the imperialist Establishment to grab our land, water and earth resources while aggravating the Tamil national problem. Fortunately peace loving leaders won the elections in the last year and we escaped disaster. If not, we could have been more in the clutches of the Establishment today, than we were before the war. True nationalist should now come forward mobilize all communities against the establishment to protect the national economy.