SRI LANKA: Referendum Might Be Only Way For Peace

By Feizal Samath Reprint | | Print |

Feizal Samath

COLOMBO, Sep 19 1997 (IPS) - A report released this week by an unofficial body, called the Sinhala Commission, on government proposals to solve Sri Lanka’s ethnic problem is expected trigger a fresh debate on the crisis, analysts said.

“This would provoke a fresh debate on the pros and cons of the government’s proposals,” a local media commentator, who declined to be named, said Thursday.

The Sinhala Commission, appointed by the National Joint Committee (NJC) comprising 56 Buddhist organisations in Sri Lanka, in its report released on Wednesday “urged the people to reject the government’s draft constitution (which is intended to incorporate the peace proposals).”

Well-known political commentator Harry Gunatillake, who is also a retired airforce commander, said that most other Buddhist groups were expected to join the campaign opposing the government’s peace plan.

“No way can I see them (government) discussing the plan in Parliament,” he said.

Government sources said that Constitutional Affairs Minister Professor Gamini Lakshman Peiris planned to present the proposed new constitution around November, a schedule many observers believe the government is unlikely to be able to keep.

Though NJC’s member groups are regarded as chauvinistic and hardline among the Sinhalese, who are mostly Buddhists and the majority community in Sri Lanka, analysts say that once the Buddhist clergy “gets into the act” it would be difficult for the government to push through the political reforms.

Buddhist monks and Sinhalese hardliners have been the stumbling block in the settlement of the island’s ethnic crisis, voicing concerns that the Tamils, the minority community that complains of discrimination, were being offered more concessions than they were entitled to.

The government is working out a package of proposals to appease the Tamils and put an end to the 14-year-old campaign for a separate Tamil homeland. More than 50,000 people have died in fighting between government troops and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam — the only armed group leading the revolt.

The proposals, which Peiris intends presenting in Parliament through a re-worked new constitution, has won the support of most Tamil political parties and activists but its passage through the legislature is unlikely to be that easy.

The main opposition United National Party (UNP), whose support is vital in seeking parliamentary sanction to the plan, has abstained from any comment on the grounds that the government has not made public all the proposals, particularly the plans for the troubled north-east region.

On the other hand, the UNP, under whose 17-year-old rule the Tamil insurgency prospered, has been irked by President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s stated intention to hold a referendum to pass the new constitution if the ruling People’s Alliance can’t get the required majority in Parliament.

The opposition says, according to laid-down procedures, any constitutional amendment or a new constitution must be passed by a two-thirds majority of Parliament, which Kumaratunga’s party is unable to muster.

The alliance has a mere one-seat majority in Parliament but counts on the support of smaller minority groups inside.

Kumaratunga rebuts the UNP argument, saying if the people wanted it (constitution) changed then they (the people) have a right to choose the way to do so. She is pushing for a referendum.

Gunatillake, who said he was not opposed to a peaceful solution, said that what was important was for Kumaratunga’s party to mend fences with the opposition UNP and reach some agreement towards solving the country’s crisis.

“Both parties should be together in this campaign because it is a national calamity that the country is facing. Then opposition to a peaceful settlement will wither away.”

The two groups represent the bulk of Sinhalese, Tamil and other ethnic groups. But similar previous attempts to seek a consensus on this issue, have failed.

In its interim report, published in Thursday’s independent ‘Island’ daily, the Sinhala Commission said, “It is evident in our analysis that the effect of the devolution package would be not to convert Sri Lanka even into a normal type of federal state but to convert it into a very special federal state, the like of

which probably does not exist anywhere else in the world.”

“It would be a state where a so-called government has no control whatsoever over the eight or nine parts into which the country has been split.” It said the state would have full powers to conduct its affairs “in any manner it wishes to with scant regard for the effect its actions would have on other parts of the country or on the country as a whole.”

The report said that what was most alarming was that the proposed north-east council which will be a Tamil majority will be powerful with full control over internal matters like the police force.

One of the concerns is that the Tigers would turn the devolution proposals, if successful in its implementation, in their favour and run the north-east region, effectively making it an independent state of Tamil Eelam (the name of the independent homeland the rebels are seeking).

The report said that “as we pointed out earlier not even in the Federal Republic of Germany has such vast and untrammeled powers been given to the states comprising the Federation.”

It recommended that the NJC should launch a campaign to educate the people on the grave dangers of the proposals, ask people to urge their parliamentary representatives to reject the draft constitution and take steps to ensure that there is no division of the country.

The commission was appointed by the NJC last December to report on grievances faced by the Sinhalese and it comprised retired Supreme Court judges and top academics.

Hardliners say that the Sinhalese faced discrimination during British colonial rule, accusing their British rulers of favouring the Tamil minority by giving them the best jobs in the public service.

All that changed after Sri Lanka gained independence in 1948 with the Tamils complaining of being at the wrong end of the stick after the Sinhalese became the favourites for top government posts and also gaining control over education and land allocation by virtue of being the majority community.

Years of peaceful political protest turned violent when Tamil Youth took too arms, disillusioned over the way the older Tamil politicians were working towards winning the rights.

Kumaratunga says she would like to talk to the Tigers after winning a referendum on the political reforms. Her government held negotiations with the rebels once, after winning parliamentary and presidential polls in 1994, but the talks failed.

Last year, the government, divulging its devolution proposals — aimed at providing a degree of autonomy in the north and the east where most of the country’s Tamils live, said the unit of devolution would be through a regional council to be established for every province.

It said one of the regions would be constituted by re- demarcating the existing boundaries of the present north-east province. In the re-demarcation of boundaries there will be full consultation with a view to reconciling Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim interests.

Under this plan, the regional councils would exercise exclusive legislative and executive competence within the devolved sphere. The subjects and functions will be distribution between the centre and the regions, it said.