North-South And South-South Politics

By Dayan Jayatilleka -July 27, 2013

Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka

Sri Lanka’s post-war transition has resumed. That transition which was blocked by the neoconservative ‘national security’ fundamentalism has unfrozen with the imminent holding of the Northern Provincial Council election under the 13^th amendment as it stands.

If I may immediately qualify that statement, Sri Lanka is undergoing at least two transitions or a transition with two opposite tendencies, which are in a race with each other. One is that towards normalcy and structural reform (which takes the form of the reactivation of the frozen Northern Provincial Council) while the other is a radically conservative counter-reformation which takes the form of cultural and settler-colonial Occupation. The future of Sri Lanka will be determined by which tendency triumphs.

The Northern Provincial Council is an experiment that can go quite well or horribly wrong. It can wrong not only because of the obvious reason of suffocation, sabotage and eventual overthrow by the Sinhala Establishment provoked and supported by the most reactionary currents of Sinhala society, but also because of the decades-long propensity of Tamil nationalism to overshoot the mark of the strategically, structurally and socio-historically realisable.

Consider the Tamil criticisms of the 13^th amendment and their implications for the success of the Northern Provincial Council. Instead of the more obviously sensible stance of supporting the 13^th amendment and faulting the state and government, if necessary, for non-implementation or tardy implementation, Tamil nationalist discourse takes the a priori view that the 13th amendment is insufficient and therefore unworkable. When one commences with the teleology that the 13^th amendment is inherently unworkable and therefore has to be surpassed by a federal solution, then one is hardly likely to strive to make it work or develop the pragmatic patience requisite for that purpose.Read More

In The Long Run, You’ll All Be Dead: The Perspective Of A Corrupt Government!

By Emil van der Poorten -July 28, 2013

Emil van der Poorten

In the not-too-distant past, a cynical fallback for those who took a jaundiced view of the future of humanity was, “In the long run, we’ll all be dead,” more than suggesting that any attempt at improving the human condition was futile and  doomed to failure, at least insofar as the lifespan of anyone contemplating such action was concerned.

The title of this piece projects a slight change to that old adage, in that it doesn’t project cynicism on the part of the “great unwashed,” but a cynicism, bred of arrogance, of those who rule our destinies.  It suggests that our ruling junta and those like it around the world believe that time is on their side and those who might stand in opposition to them will simply disappear because what is being done – no matter how downright evil – will survive and Old Father Time will take care of those seeking a return to civility and democratic practice (if their lords and masters don’t do so themselves!)

The “united front” of politicians, regulators and businessmen involved in one of the largest financial scandals in the country’s recent history appears to prove this in spades.  One of the very large conglomerates in the country has allegedly been complicit with the very highest in our current Monarchy in extracting a larger-than-usual “commission” from a business giant/developer from across the Palk Strait.  This has apparently gone beyond the usual “carrot and stick” routine to include a serious threat of a “final solution” for one of the participants who has been painted into a hitherto unoccupied corner as “bag-man.”

What I find particularly intriguing and permitting me one of those “Didn’t I tell you so?” moments is the fact that the defenders of the head honcho of this particular business configuration have consistently insisted that he traipsed around the globe as a courtier to our New Monarch under duress and in order that his business empire survive through his supplicant conduct towards our Maximum Leader.     Read More