EDITORIAL

High Time

Tamil expectations of a peace dividend have risen

No sooner had the negotiating teams of the Liberation Tigers and the Sri Lankan government returned home after the success of the first round of talks in Thailand last week, preparations have begun for the next meeting at the end of October. Devoid of acrimony and resulting in agreement on several issues, the talks have at the very least met, if not greatly exceeded, the expectations amongst the peoples of Sri Lanka. The international community has also been enthusiastic in its applause. But, as excitement cools, the need for tangible and immediate progress on the key agreed issues - reconstruction and rehabilitation - is starkly clear. As Erik Solheim, Special Advisor to the Norwegian Foreign Minister, explained, for confidence in the peace process to be retained "it is extremely important that what is agreed on paper is also implemented on the ground."

All actors in Sri Lanka's peace process agree on what the immediate need is: a comprehensive program of resettlement, rehabilitation and reconstruction in the war affected parts of the island. Up to a million people have been displaced by the conflict, according to a Unit-ed Nations study out this week. The overwhelming majority are in the north and east. The Tamil areas, the north in particular, has seen near total devastation in two decades of high intensity war and deliberate economic strangulation. Roads are fragile and often impassable. Many schools and hospitals are unusable. Most homes and other buildings have been destroyed or damaged: in many parts, the sight of a single intact structure draws visitors' wonder.

Expectations amongst ordinary people have risen sharply, spurred anew by the success of the talks last week. As the Chief Negotiator of the Liberation Tigers, Mr. Anton Balasingham, pointed out in his address to the opening ceremony of the talks in Thailand, "over and above the intricate questions of conflict resolution and power sharing, the people expect a peace dividend; they require immediate relief to resolve their urgent, existential problems." But it is not only that matters must improve, but there is also an expectation that the international community, which has been vociferous in its calls for peace - and insistence this will lead to prosperity - must come forward. When Mr. Balasingham argued that "the concerned international governments, who have been supporting a negotiated settlement to the Tamil national question should contribute generously for the reconstruction of the war-damaged economy of the northeast," he was reflecting an acutely felt sentiment across the Tamil areas. It is also widely felt that compared to the substantial amount of financial aid delivered to Colombo over many years - much of which indirectly supported Colombo's military campaign - the cost of rebuilding the north and east is modest.

Norway, whose peace initiative in Sri Lanka has been underway for three years, and whose envoys have visited the island several times, is equally aware of the pressing need for international assistance. When Deputy Foreign Minister Vidar Helgesen last week appealed for tangible - in other words, financial - aid, he pointed out to the assembled Bangkok diplomatic corps that peace, after all, "is about restoring normalcy in people's daily lives." But apart from the actual provision of funds, there must also be a will amongst world governments to ensure the Tamil people are able to determine the process, prioritising their own needs and shaping their homeland's return to normalcy. It is therefore incumbent on the international community to work closely with the Liberation Tigers in drawing up and implementing a sustained campaign of reconstruction and rehabilitation in the north and east.

As Mr. Balasingham pointed out at the opening ceremony in Thailand, the LTTE has shared the living conditions of the Tamil people for the past two decades and thereby has "a comprehensive knowledge of the socio-economic needs confronting the Tamil people." The movement's resultant expectation of a 'leading and pivotal' role in the economic development of the north and east is one shared by the Tamil community.The creation of a Joint Task for Humanitarian and Reconstruction Activities is meant as a first step in this regard - but care must be taken to ensure this structure does not suffer the fate which routinely befalls other committees in Sri Lanka: bureaucratic lethargy and ultimate stagnation.

Colombo’s Circus

Kumaratunga is patently unfit to govern

Amid the excitement of the peace talks in Thailand last week, the tabling in Sri Lanka's Parliament of the 19th amendment to the constitution on Thursday almost went unnoticed. The United National Front (UNF) government of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe expects to debate the matter in Parliament in a few weeks. In the meantime, the horse-trading is underway in earnest as the UNF seeks support from dissenters in the main opposition People's Alliance (PA) to reach the two-thirds majority required to pass the amendment. President Chandrika Kumaratunga's response to government move was typical. At an address in Kandy this weekend she vowed to fight the amendment. As ever, it was her colourful turn of phrase that drew justifiable press attention, even though Kumaratunga's vitriolic hectoring has been a hallmark of her term in office. Never hesitating to stoop to new levels of uncouthness, she hurls accusations of the gravest nature about without a care for the consequences - not least her country's image abroad.

The President this weekend claimed the Prime Minister of conspiring to assassinate her. She then vowed to take 500 - no less- of 'them' with her, were an attempt to be made on her life. Recently, she suggested the cabinet meeting room was the UNF's proposed ambush site - although at the time she was more conservative, suggesting she'd kill a mere ten of the UNF ministers before she succumbed. Whilst the international community might hail Sri Lanka as a democracy, its head of state makes a mockery of good governance. The Tamil community has not forgotten how Kumaratunga was hailed by the international community as the paragon of liberal virtue - even when she embarked on the most savage program of military repression in the ethnic conflict's hi-story. We also remember the praise international human rights groups - now conspicuously silent - heaped on her as torture, rape and disappearance became routine under her rule.

From a Tamil perspective, however, the most important aspect of the circus in Colombo is the utter helplessness today of the Sinhala people who voted Kumaratunga into power eight years ago. Despite her manifest unsuitability to govern, the evident moral decay during her administration and the sweeping mandate for peace the UNF received from the Sinhala people, the government is unable to marginalize the President, contenting itself with merely protecting Parliament from her increasingly unpredictable and irrational whim. Little wonder that Sri Lanka languishes in the economic doldrums while its peers have gone ahead. But the island's woes cannot be blamed on the ethnic conflict alone. Good governance must be sought to be received.