War is easier to win than peace and Rajapakse has a long battle ahead to win Tamil minds.
Now that Asia’s longest running civil war has finally come to an end, leaving at least 100,000 people dead and about 300,000 displaced, several issues stand out for the victors in Colombo to ponder on.
First, any peace that has been won after so much bloodletting cannot be cause for celebration. This they’d do well to remember because the mood of victory could well cloud the vision of what should follow next. Yes, the secessionists have been defeated, but the war had gone on for more than a quarter of a century. Without belief in the cause and popular support for it, that would not have been possible.
Second, though a physical division of Sri Lanka has been averted, a mental divide is bound to remain. If anything, as defeat sinks in and the indignity of uprooted living in squalid refugee camps diminishes the confidence level of the Tamils, that divide is likely to become deeper and sharper. Superiority and inferiority complexes will inevitably arise and a climate of mutual suspicion is bound to set in.
Third, the end of the utterly misguided LTTE war doesn’t mean the end of the Tamil cause. If the humiliation of defeat is allowed to linger for too long, if the need to give the Tamils back their self-respect is not taken seriously, anger might again erupt and take newer directions. If there’s to be a healing process, that’s what it should aim to prevent.
Fourth, in the Sri Lankan context, the return of self-respect would involve giving the Tamils a degree of self-rule — not an independent Tamil Eelam but an autonomous Tamil region, where Tamils would look after their own needs and run their own affairs without questioning the authority of the central government on matters of national concern. Without a sincere and credible move towards creating such an autonomous region, Sri Lanka won’t see the end of its Tamil problem.
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Is the Sri Lankan President, Mahinda Rajapakse, ready for such a move?
Now that his will is done, is he prepared to show the wisdom and magnanimity that such a move would call for? Having achieved his first goal, will he now proceed to the next? One can only hope, but there will be doubts. Rajapakse’s brutal cold-blooded final solution of the LTTE issue has left the world disturbed, flinching and uncomfortable. He has held world opinion in utter contempt and reduced Buddhist Sri Lanka to an uncharacteristic killing field.
NGOs have been barred access to refugees. Aid has been blocked. The International Red Cross was pushed to the brink of suspending its operations in the country. And Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, on a flying visit to the war-torn territory, looked more like an unwanted guest than someone whose authority mattered.
One thing, therefore, is quite clear. World opinion will have little to do with how Rajapakse proceeds next. Having won the war by himself, he would now like to conquer peace by himself, too. And that’s where his plans, if he has any yet, could go wrong. War is simpler. It’s about winning physical targets. If you have the weapons, the stamina and the arrogance of power, you can do it. Peace is different. It’s about winning minds, removing fears and rebuilding confidence.
Is Rajapakse’s idea of peace going to be a simple give and take—the victor dictating what he wants to give and the vanquished taking it on bended knees? It may work temporarily because losers are in no position to dictate, but it can’t be a lasting solution because the sulk will remain, and, within the ashes of discontent, anger.
Or will there be meaningful negotiation between the two sides in a spirit of mutual understanding and respect? In the light of how things have turned out for the Tamils and the deep divisions that exist in society, negotiation across the table is the best way to go. Merely giving the Tamils equal rights won’t be enough since that won’t obliterate the fact of their being a demographic minority. As long as the population is delineated by community and religion, complexes won’t disappear and suspicions will remain.
But, in a fractured society like Sri Lanka, the outcome of any negotiation will be doubtful without the presence of a neutral third party, since the vanquished can’t be expected to negotiate freely with the victor.
In his current mood and frame of mind, Rajapakse is unlikely to accept a third party in what he asserts is a purely domestic matter. He may be technically right. But if he remains inflexible, he may in the end be proven politically very wrong. Of course, that’s what we think. Perhaps he doesn’t care. Perhaps he believes he’ll always have a final solution to fall back upon.