SRI LANKA: Soldiers Enlisted In New Army Recruitment Drive

By Feizal Samath Reprint | | Print |

Feizal Samath

COLOMBO, Nov 25 1998 (IPS) - Sri Lankan soldiers are being asked to persuade friends and relatives to join the army in a new recruitment drive launched to beef up government forces who are fighting a long-running war against Tamil rebels.

“We have asked our soldiers to explore the possibility of getting someone they know to join the army and this scheme is working well,” Maj-Gen K.M.G. Kularatne, the army’s adjutant- general announced at a press conference here.

The army has decided to recruit 5,000 combat troops in the new drive which started a few months ago, but was kept a secret until Tuesday.

In an interview, Brig Sunil Tennakoon, spokesman for the Defence Ministry, said many soldiers have got their “pals” in the village to join. ‘These new recruits can opt to join the same regiment as their friends,” he said.

The new troops would be sent to the frontline after three months basic training in fighting and weapons’ handling, the army said. The army has been trying for the last 15 years to put down a separatist war in the island’s north and east by Tamil rebels.

Defence analysts here said the army’s decision to turn to its own men for assistance for the first time, indicated that fewer youths are volunteering to enroll.

“Youngsters are reluctant to fight a war that is being fought without a proper strategy,” commented retired airforce commander and defence analyst Harry Gunatillake. “I don’t think they will succeed in this new plan.”

Defence spokesman Kularatne however was dismissive of suggestions that earlier attempts too had been failures. “We have got the men we want but the requirement keep changing all the time depending on operational plans.”

He said the present recruitment drive was the second stage of the planned enlistment drive for the year. In the first phase, 4,776 men were recruited as privates. Last year, the army had enlisted 5,416 new soldiers.

“These men are required for strengthening and enhancing the (military ) operations in the north,” Kularatne said.

Sri Lanka’s army has swelled from 10,000 troops in 1983, when the separatist war erupted, to about 100,000 strong at present. In the mid-1990s thousands had volunteered to join the army out of a sense of patriotism.

Defence spokesman Kularatne said young men continued to join the army for reasons like fighting for their country, safeguarding the nation and because they were in need of a job – a view that is rejected by many military analysts.

According to military analyst Gunatillake, “The only attraction now is that it is a job and for many young people around struggling to survive, that is a good enough reason to join the army.”

“It is just another job that pays well. That is the only reason,” asserted another retired army commander, who declined to be named. Many army soldiers are from poor families in Sri Lanka’s villages.

A recent survey had found that farmsteads – once the pride of the country’s economy – were disintegrating due to apathy and indifference by the authorities, forcing rural youth to seek employment outside farmlands.

The island’s farm economy was being held together with remittances from Sri Lankan migrants working in the Middle East, government soldiers fighting Tamil rebels, industrialisation and poverty alleviation programmes, the Colombo-based Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) said after the survey.

Most Sri Lankans were employed either abroad or in garment factories or the army. Some 70,00 Sri Lankans work in the Middle East, mostly as housemaids or construction workers, while garment factories provide work to between 30,000 and 35,000 people.

Many of those who have joined the army were from villages in the war zone who have no other alternative employment, according to other studies. “Despite the risk … rural youths still prefer to join the forces due to reasons such as higher income and social recognition,” argued Sena Jayasena, researcher at Colombo’s Agrarian Research and Training Institute.

More than 50,000 combatants and civilians have been killed in the separatist conflict which has intensified since May 1997 when the Sri Lankan army launched a major operation to wrest the road to the northern Jaffna peninsula. At present all men and material has to be transported by air or ship to Jaffna.

Neither side is winning the protracted battle. The Tigers are the best trained guerrilla army in the world, and have been fighting hard after suffering reverses in 1996 when Jaffna town was retaken by the Sri Lankan military and the rebels forced to retreat into the jungles.

But the rising number of casualties and deserters in Sri Lankan troop ranks in the last year have proved that the rebels were able to regroup and hit back.

Last month, the government launched a massive operation to arrest some 15,000 army deserters who had failed to respond to an amnesty offer.