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Indian connection:A reprise ?
by 'India Watcher'Now that the hype and the hoop-la with which both sides invested the recently concluded visit to New Delhi by President Kumaratunga has had time to subside, it seems appropriate to take a fresh look at it. Only the evolving situation will reveal in due course the true and full import of it all, but one may indulge in a bit of speculation in advance of that.
The visit was originally conceived for the prosaic purpose of laying the foundation-stone for a new pilgrims' rest in Delhi, jointly by the President and Indian Prime Minister. It was to be one of several events marking our shared 50th anniversaries of independence, which would overlap between 4th February and 15th August, 1998. It was first scheduled for around April, but had to be postponed because of the Indian elections in March.
It was then belatedly elevated by the Indians into a full-blown st ate visit with all trimmings. Available evidence suggests that this was accepted by the Sri Lankans without even token demur, given that it would then become a second successive such visit from here, without an intervening reciprocal state, or even official visit from there.
More importantly, the original prosaic purpose was subsumed in the proclaimed epochal, even apogean one of hurriedly concluding and signing, exceptionally by Heads of Government, a so- called fast track free trade agreement - never mind that some awkward details have yet to be negotiated and agreed.
Dr. Jayantha Kelegama in his lucid and cogent article in THE ISLAND, and in successive lead editorials in that paper, have started a most welcome public debate on the implications of an agreement, negotiated and signed without consulting the private sector here, which President and business-oriented Foreign Minister have repeatedly proclaimed to be the engine of this country's growth.
The 'economics' of it will undoubtedly be subjected to public scrutiny in the weeks and months ahead. My purpose here is to provoke similar scrutiny and debate publicly, about the 'politics' of it. A bit of retrospection may be helpful.
There were two happenings in 1983, neither of India's own making, which nonetheless made her direct involvement in the resolution of our Tamil question inescapable. The first was the anti-Tamil violence of that July, which caused a massive exodus of Sri Lankan Tamils to South India. The second was the adoption a month or so later of the 6th Amendment to our Constitution, which effectively disfranchised the Tamil leadership, upto then accepted as the loyal Opposition notwithstanding having been elected on a separatist ticket.
Any forward movement then became impossible without the exercise of Indian good offices. Moreover, the impact of these happenings upon the Indian polity made it impossible for India to wash its hands off the matter. Then, President Jayawardene's disinclination to accept this reality led to an inevitable escalation of that Indian engagement, from good offices, through mediation to arbitration, so as to arrive at a settlement in accordance with India's bottom line: viz. a status for Sri Lankan Tamils analogous with that of Indian Tamils.
That endeavour came unstuck for various reasons, but it would be useful to recall some of its salient features, and its consequences. One was the high profile of the Indian connection - quite unavoidable in the circumstances of the time. Another was India's application of a carrot and stick policy: covertly helping 'the boys' so as to sharpen the cutting edge of Tamil negotiation, whilst talking with President Jayawardene at various levels and places. Yet another, a visibly 'imposed' arbitration award, and finally, the induction of Indian armed forces to make it stick.
The consequences were different for the two sides, of course. For India, an unacceptably large loss of Indian lives, the tarnished reputation of a previously highly regarded Army, international opprobrium over perceived hegemonism, and the deep and abiding distrust of the vast Sinhalese majority. For President Jayawardene, contempt and rejection by that Sinhalese majority, and a calumnious epitaph to an otherwise remarkable political career. That said, let us now move to the present time.
Here we have a President, elected expressly to resolve that Tamil question, now into the penultimate year of her term with the question nowhere nearer resolution. There we have a Government threatened with imminent collapse under the weight of its own contradictions, busy shoring up the dykes against a prospective resurgent dynastic tide. The incumbent Government there carries no baggage from that previous Indian connection, but if the threatening tide floods in, it will carry with it all of that baggage.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. Another apposite aphorism might be: sufficient unto the day. Might the beguiling thought have entered minds here and there, of a possible re-run of that earlier epic, on different terms of course?
So long as the Tamil question here remains unresolved, it will or can be made to impact upon both politics in Tamil Nadu and Centre-TN relations in ways which would preclude disinterest there. Nonetheless, both President and Foreign Minister here frequently propound the view that our Tamil question is exclusively an internal matter in which India neither has nor claims any concern or role. They both also frequently assert that bilateral relations have never been better. In a recent interview (with Dinesh Weerakkody in 'BUSINESS TODAY' Vol. 3 No 5 Sept. '98), the Foreign Minister explained why those relations were never better. He said:
'I would say that we have succeeded in establishing a good relationship with India because of the personal equation that the President has with Indian leaders. In a modest way I would say my own relations with the Indian leaders have been such that, behaving in a dignified way with India, presents no problem at all.'
It is conventional wisdom elsewhere, that good relations between states rest on their respective perceived permanent national interests being acknowledged and accommodated to mutual benefit, and not on any personal chemistry between transient political leaders. Be that as it may, it raises a speculative question. Might a reprise be intended in the Indian connection based on beguilement, instead of carrot and stick pressure?
The resolution of the Tamil question here requires above all the blunting of the LTTE's military challenge to the state, and the disarming of those other Tamil groups addicted to the letter 'E' in their descriptive acronyms. The Tamil community en masse has to be enabled to address issues without being in thrall to armed Tamil terrorism. This is especially so of that 50% or so of Sri Lankan Tamils who have lived all their lives outside the north and the east in relative security and well-being, but who have run with the hare and hunted with the hounds instead of standing up and being counted on those issues.
Sri Lanka cannot achieve that on its own, especially after over three years of deeply flawed military strategy. But India can certainly help significantly in myriad ways to get us far along that road, without exposing herself embarrassingly or taking unacceptable losses in men or materials. However, India would only contemplate doing so in a two- way horse-deal, the first condition of which would be that all other external elements are excluded, and she becomes for us a one-stop-shop and not just another boutique in the shopping mall.
Earlier too, there was a horse-deal: Sri Lanka was to come up with a package deemed reasonable by India, whereupon the latter would win acceptance of it with Tamils, and help us make it stick against any challenge. But of course, then as now the crucial issue is whether or not such package addresses Sinhalese concerns too.
On this, there were two interesting comments last year by BJP personalities. Former Ambassador N. N. Jha speaking publicly here expressly stated that this problem could be resolved only by addressing both Tamil aspirations and Sinhalese concerns. In a press interview there a couple months later, BJP President Kushabahu Thakre intriguingly said that Rajiv Gandhi's efforts had created lots of difficulties, and that they (BJP) would not like to repeat the same mistakes.
For India, there might be several attractions in a horse-deal with the President, whom they regard as indispensable to a settlement here with which they could live. Covert military/intelligence support would neither carry unacceptable delivery demands nor risk domestic or international opprobrium, whilst she could continue to live with a failure to deliver by Sri Lanka.
However for Sri Lanka, any attempt to deliver on such a horse-deal without due transparency or in disregard of Sinhalese concerns would be fraught with the same disastrous consequences as President Jayawardene faced then.
So, was the Indo-Sri Lanka song and dance at the end of December just gimmickry, a beguiling Indian rope trick, rampant Sri Lankan naivete and vanity, or premature new year revelry?
Eppawela - a disaster in the making
by Nihal Fernando'There is an emptiness, too, where once the mountains of my country, the rivers and streams, the trees and birds have been. And often, it is that emptiness which connect you to me.'
-from When Memory Dies by S. Sivanandan, winner of the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for the best first published book Eurasia 1998.
This would exactly be the thoughts of the villagers of Eppawela, and that very real threat of emptiness is what has touched so many to take up their cause. The villagers will curse the Gods that gave them phosphate-rich soil under their feet. They will curse the politicians too who sold a non-renewable resource for a pittance, when it should have been considered a prized possession and used frugally. They will resist with all their might when the bulldozers come to evict them and banish them to a hostile, inhospitable, distant area to a land unwanted by all other settlers. They will feel for the jasmines in their gardens, for the herbal patch in their backyards, for the graves of their ancestors, the temples of their Gods who preach karma, for the friendship of neighbours and for the strong traditional ties that will be shattered.
So what is all this about? To most of the media and the Colombo 7 elite, it is simply a hole to be dug in Eppawela, or a hill to be decapitated. To exile, no less, and re-locate a whole traditional village cannot, after all, mean anything to those who think nothing of shifting residence in search of a better toilet. Villagers are poor people, even stupid by their reckoning, meant merely to supply food to satisfy the voracious appetites of the city- wallahs. To the politicians, as to the foreign investor, Eppawela is an unbelievably rich source of money; to the LTTE, a valuable source of kappam; to the professionals with even a basic knowledge of mining, it is, as the Dharmabandu Report notes, '... a glaringly visible fact... that the ministry is committing a blunder of colossal scale in not doing enough homework, in terms of studying alternative courses of action before carrying on with a faulty plan from the previous regime.' So, finally, this lackadaisical attitude of the Sri Lankan bureaucracy to the vast potential of Eppawela, is truly a godsend to the ruthless multinational predator. The comments of the Sri Lankan Ambassador to the United Nations, Mr. Warnasena Rasaputra, best symbolizes the lackadaisical, uncaring, even cynical attitude of the bureaucracy: 'l wouldn't worry about the protests. There are people who protest against mines in every country. The Board of Investment has already carried out studies and we only have to finalise the conditions for the investment, ' he told IPS in Washington.
Even a cursory glance at the Agreement will reveal the magnitude of what we are letting ourselves in for. As is usual with all contracts involving U.S. multinationals, the 'Claims' packages providing for default or breach of its provisions often far exceed the built-in profit margins encased in the contracts. The Freeport McMoran Agreement on Eppawela is no different and includes an equally crippling 'claims' package. Hastily signed contracts have in recent times brought financial disaster to impoverished countries like ours, the most recent being the Evans deal for the rehabilitation of Colombo Fort. The government will have to pay Rs. 250,000,000 on that reneged contract; another 150,000,000 US Dollar payout on a similarly reneged charcoal contract; the infamous Dilinger deal where the government had to pay an enormous sum of money, eventually paid in part by USAID out of sympathy for our plight.
As that lovely song has it, 'When will they ever learn?'
The Freeport McMoran deal provides for the rock phosphate mined in Eppawela to be processed in Trincomalee. 750 acres of land adjoining Trincomalee's Clappenburg Bay have been earmarked for this purpose. Phosphogypsum is one of the highly toxic by-products of phosphate processing - '...for every pound of phosphate produced for the fertilizer stack, five pounds of gypsum are produced for the waste stack...' (Biosphere, Vol. 14 No. 1, March 1998, p. 4). This huge mountain of radioactive waste, a proven carcinogenic, or cancer-inducing, agent will be dumped in Trincomalee Bay, affecting marine ecosystems and rendering inedible - indeed highly dangerous - all the fish populations in the sea round the whole island.
The Ceylon Mercantile Union, which is openly opposed to the Eppawela joint venture project with the multinational Freeport McMoran, has this to say: 'About 11,780 innocent farmers who live in the villages of Eppawela, Konwewa, Kandegama, Kadurugaswewa, Eliyadivulwewa, Amunukele, Thalawewa, Kiralegama, Sandaresgama, Katugahagana, Dikwewa, Kaduruwewa, Kiriwelihinna, Aliyawetunawewa, Rotawewa, Kudagama, Palugaswewa and Katugahagama are going to be the victims of this destructive fate. [these people will be rendered homeless and destitute due to the loss of their homes land and traditional means of livelihood!. Furthermore even the very valuable physical resources as well as national resources spread out all over these villages will be exposed to a grave threat on account of the proposed project Accordingly, 28 villages, 2,602 houses, 01 National school, 01 Maha Vidyalaya, 04 schools, 01 Pirivena, 05 Viharas, 02 Churches, 01 Nursery, 06 Government buildings, 12 Community halls and 06 Co-operative buildings as well as the towns of Eppawela and Talawa are to be swallowed up by this destructive project. Almost 40,000 other people are also exposed to this threat. Environmental experts have warned that this entire area will turn into a crater by carrying out mining operations in these deposits which are 400 feet deep, according to the proposed agreement. This entire area will become prey to grave environmental pollution as a result of stagnant, impure water that causes various diseases and epidemics and the release of various chemical substances to water, land and air.' The CMU statement concludes: 'Thus a very important and historic struggle lies ahead for the working class. That is to join hands with the peasants who have risen against this so- called sale which is really a sell out of an important national asset. It is by extending the hand of solidarity and fraternity of the organised working class that we can ensure the victory of this heroic struggle of the people of Eppawela.'
Whatever happened, I wonder, to the idea that in a democratically elected Parliament each Member is required to mirror the views of the People who make up his 'constituency' - in other words, that an MP represents the collective voice of his voters? Most MPs have a tendency to remember that only when the next election is round the corner, and most People seem to forget that the vote is a most potent weapon; to those readers who feel strongly about the prudent use of the national treasure that is Eppawela, thus ensuring that it is passed on to our children and our children's children, I say: contact your MP and make sure he knows your views. Make him speak up for you in Parliament, or else...
Janaka Dharmabandu, a highly qualified mining engineer, notes: 'We are about to sign an agreement teat, in its extent of deceit, is second only to the agreement that King Dharma Parakramabahu of Kotte signed with the Portuguese, allowing them to have a piece of land the size of a cattle-skin, which they said was to make a box inside. A box they did make.'
