Dueling Nationalisms: JVP Role In It & U.S. Indifference To Youth 88/89 Massacre

By Daya Gamage –APRIL 13, 2021

Daya Gamage

At the height of Tamil Nationalism in the 1980s paving the path for the emergence of an armed insurrection in the north, a national debate ensued to take control of Sinhala Nationalism which was rapidly taking root within the Sinhalese race. Far from being a peaceful discourse, it developed – between the two contenders, the State Actor and the southern Sinhalese rebel ANSA – a lethal battle which finally ended in a mass massacre of Sinhala youths. The ensued episode left the administration to deal with the northern Tamil insurrection but was seen driving the majority Sinhalese race to harden its attitude against Tamil Nationalism.

An administration vastly influenced by Sinhalese Nationalism, an administration which used its state power to physically harass minority Tamils – in the latter part of 1970s and early 1980s – on four occasions even going to the extent of setting fire and destroying a historic depository of Tamil culture and scholarly works in the heart of the northern Tamil land,  faced with the emergence of Tamil Nationalism gradually owned by a northern rebel movement; simultaneously, the administration used its state machinery to brutally annihilate a wholly-Sinhalese insurgent movement which had its premier slogan and motivation – no different to that of the administration –  deeply engulfed in Sinhala Nationalism to defeat Tamil Nationalism and confront Indian Expansionism. To the extent that the southern Sinhalese rebels were seen to be successful in mobilizing national support on the basis of anti-Tamil sentiments, its competitor – the Jayewardene administration – sought to mobilize on the same basis setting in motion a spiraling dynamic of intra-ethnic group competition which unleashed state terrorism that massacred – according to credible estimates – 60,000 Sinhalese youths in the Sinhalese-majority economically-backward rural parts of Sri Lankan nation while a lethal insurrection was taking place in the Tamil north.

This particular Sinhala Nationalism was seen at play during the 2002-2004 Norwegian-brokered Peace Talks when it frustrated a major attempt to address Tamil issues associated with Tamil Nationalism.

The trajectory of both nationalism thus spilled into the new millennium taking different turns with Tamil Nationalism having a serious setback – both in the (2009) battle field and (2019/20) electoral politics  as a respected Tamil jurist-turned politician- Justice Vigneshwaran – declared as gone into hibernation . However, Sinhalese Nationalism was taking deep root in Sri Lanka’s body politic, never seen before, well mixed with national security culminating in the election of a ‘Sinhala Only President’ – admitted by the victor Gotabaya Rajapaksa himself – in 2019 never witnessed a polarization of that height in this South Asian nation’s vibrant democracy.

This was seen in the latter part of 1980s that the Sinhalese-educated-economically backward-rural youth rallying round the southern rebellion led by the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) successfully mobilizing support on the basis of anti-Tamil sentiments, while its competitor the Jayewardene-Premadasa administrations sought to mobilize on the same basis, setting in motion a spiraling dynamic of intra-ethnic competition – both factions facing their formidable foe, Tamil Nationalism.

Some leading ruling party UNP activists were noxious and malicious Tamil-baiters who were suspected of have inspired, if not to have actually organized, anti-Tamil violence. They were involved in the circumstances of the burning of the revered Jaffna library in June 1981, an incident that inflamed Tamil opinion which helped to propel it firmly in the direction of separatism.

The compulsion of the ruling UNP to seize control of the mantle of Sinhala nationalism was seen in state actions to deprive of that opportunity to the JVP during this period, and to starve the rebel movement of this potent source of political oxygen. The Jayewardene-Premadasa administrations were vigorously pursuing the war, leaving no avenues for the Tamils for any negotiations, became unassailable as the champion of Sinhalese interests under the umbrella of patriotism. The 1985 GSL-LTTE Talks in the Bhutanese capital of Thimphu in which the GSL rejected all Tamil demands, including the foremost demand of Tamil nationalism: the recognition of a Tamil Homeland. The 1987 Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement was at the behest of India.

Any hint of granting concessions to the Tamil minority (12%) was sure to energize nationalist opinion – as was seen in the 2002-2004 Talks – and would also ignite the latent anti-reform, anti-market reform economy and anti-elite sentiment very well contained within Sinhala nationalism. It would have also revived the brewing opposition to the post-1977 economic reforms, which the Jayewardene government had hitherto successfully dispersed, beaten, and into submission. The result was the administration’s extreme reluctant to take even modest steps when Tamil issues were emerging in the early stage of the conflict. Taking the ownership of Sinhala nationalism was foremost for the Jayewardene-Premadasa administrations. The government headed by Jeyewardene himself (1977-1989) was positioning itself as Sinhala nationalist encouraging chauvinism among its ranks – led and spearheaded by his closest Cabinet confidante – to suppress the radicalization of Tamil opinion. This writer witnessed this entire trajectory from the U.S. diplomatic mission in Colombo.

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