Make those Colombans remember

By Lalin Fernando

The presidential election was not about who won the war but who bore the brunt and paid the price of war that brought in peace. Those wonderful and great people have given their verdict. They were supported by all others who shared their pain, supported them in their grief and identified with them in every way, both in the North and South, in no unmistakable way. The cost of the 30-year terrorist war which will never be properly assessed must have been no less than 100,000 dead, double that wounded -- of them at least 10% disabled and over one million displaced. According to Lankaenews, Gen Fonseka had said amongst other things in Washington on 27th October 2009 that 5,000 soldiers died in the last 10 days of the war. This has not been challenged or denied. The people in the villages know the truth however much anyone may have hidden or magnified the count. They voted for the President.

Helpless terror

We have had enough of blood letting. If anyone wants to start war, the people will not easily be misled again.
Nineteenth May, 2009, brought to an end for millions in the villages of the north and south, 30 years of appalling strife, helpless terror, sudden death, debilitating injury and wide spread mayhem. Village families sent their young men to the war year after year, to fight for the country. Death came to the villages in the form of terrorist murder by axe, sword, iron bars, knife, bullet, bombs etc. The vaccums left in the families as a result are only evident to those that suffered.
Those wounds are not easily healed even if the Colombites and politicians who travel in Pajeros, Monteros, BMWs and Mercedes cars who never suffered, lost no one dear to them, spoke only evil about our troops and their commanders, visited no homes of the affected to offer solace or help in any way --- or never visited the wounded in hospital. Instead, these privileged people sneered as they saw the trucks carrying dead bodies parked at the undertakers, and surreptitiously spread concocted casualty rates of soldiers killed, and fantasies about military reverses with grievous intent to create despondency, fear and alarm. To them the war was as far removed as Hambantota is from Jaffna. But they did affix smart Poppy wreaths on their cars, to advertise their ‘affinity’ to the forces in order to get through the check points.
They spent the last three years of the war undermining the effort of the Government simply because it was not UNP. While making money as never before, stashing foreign currency away in foreign lands where their children were being educated, they bought luxury apartments and estates in SL and abroad while holidaying abroad, gambling in casinos or spending their money wining and dining in 5 star hotels...
They were united in cursing the rural born, bred and dressed Rajapaksas for competing with them --- when their beloved Golden Key/Ceylinco bubble burst blocking their black billions. They firmly believed that pots of money to enjoy la dolce vita would be theirs if only there was a change in the political landscape. They dreamed of a coalition win and suddenly forgot all the evil they had spoken about the General before.
They hadn’t cared a damn for the poor or the rising cost of living before but were now galvanized by both. They thundered along the flyovers while fulminating over how many their friends and relatives were deprived by not getting the contracts tfor these. They got their cheap thrills by inventing and spreading rumours until they were totally out of touch with reality.
They despite their education were the ones when the ‘war’ began that said ‘the only good (T) was a dead (T),’ especially during and after the 1983 communal riots when the UNP was in power. Nazis again.
They were the first to support the General. They looked to the West for inspiration and support and painfully tried to slavishly imitate it. They did not turn a hair when the JVP that covertly espouses fascist ideology and were ever ready to restart their unrepentant murderous activities which left 60,000 Sinhalese dead in one year (1988) again, joined them. These are the chosen people of SL and they care little who they follow.
The mental scars and wounds of the people who had to bear the brunt of war did not heal with its ending. They remembered and they voted. They did not lose sight of reality. They did not want to revert to war in their lifetime. They wanted not only to show their gratitude for the uncompromising man who brought them peace, tranquility, a promise for the future by standing upto to the not inconsiderable power of the West when it tried to intercede on behalf of the terrorists when they were on the brink of defeat.
Colombites while circulating wild and exaggerated details about corruption and nepotism, which is not new to SL, were stoking the fires of separatism again by joining with the agents of communal terror, their co signatories and the unrepentant murderers of 60,000 Sinhalese. They hoped the country had forgotten their past. The people were not fooled.

Corrupt

This was a country about which Transparency International had said that all the bits and pieces of the civil society (public and private) in SL were absolutely corrupt for decades. The fog horn speakers formerly of a Colombo 7 government (free) school, are fully aware that parents religiously coach their 4-6 years old children to lie blatantly at admission interviews to get them into that school. There are thus generations of dishonest boys encouraged by their parents to lie in the premier government (free) school of SL. That type of corruption prevails elsewhere too beginning with those who daily bribe public servants from constables to court and land clerks to CEOs of private companies. Read the COPE and Auditor General’s reports for details of free falling massive corruption.
As for nepotism one has only to look at the way SL society looks after itself. One army commander (not Hakirat W Singh) had 20 close relatives in the army to monitor not the business of the army but his personal interests. The UNP was well known to be the Uncle Nephew Party and its vestiges are still there for everyone to see. Nepotism was the game for which the sophisticated demanded to have an unchallenged licence. Envy is their basic motivation, never altruism.
While both nepotism and corruption must be roundly condemned it is best done and corrected by those who are not tainted themselves. It must not be motivated by jealousy and greed as was apparent in those who shouted themselves hoarse. All they wanted was another better planned crack at the loot themselves. Nor should the saviours be those who advocate slitting throats even as they do not admit it is murder!
Maybe some one could enlighten the people why amongst others the officer who was responsible for the massacre of Tamils in Kokkadichcholai in the 1990s, and another who was dismissed from the army accused of being an extortionist, were working in the General’s office. Generals who were charged before the Bribery commission and gifted weapons to the LTTE got on stage with him. Is this a country that is deaf only to murder and treason?
How could the state achieve reconciliation with the Tamils if it had accepted the former army commander’s recommendation to increase the army by 100,000 (50%) for garrison duties (army of occupation...) in the Wanni after the war? Why doesn’t Jehan Perera the man who jubilantly quoted three-wheel drivers as to how the silent vote and ‘kata katha’ (shades of JVP’s chit instructions of 1989) was going to usher in a Messiah, write about the oppositions plans to win the peace instead of giving the government endless lists of points for consideration? He should have known that three-wheel drivers of Colombo are better able to speak about all the devilish vice that thrives in Colombo than politics. He must also stop making oblique references to Buddhism, opposition to which is also the bonding glue of the SLMC and the TNA.
Meanwhile, Sampandan wants revenge not reconciliation and believes the international community cheated his beloved LTTE. He incites North bound popular rancour but offers no way forward. Acting not unlike a fool he speaks of a Tamil/Muslim alliance when every Tamil has said that it was the Muslims who let them down in their ‘struggle’ by saying they had nothing in common with each other. It is unlikely that the Tamils will forget although Sambandan still looks forward to whip up agitation. Huckhim with a hot-potato-in-the-mouth veneer of sophistication and enlightenment for the western media’s benefit, is unable to hide rank communalism every time he speaks especially when he gave Fonseka a free certificate on the subject. People must remember that at the foundation stone laying ceremony for the Oluvil Hospital he could not resist asking as to what was wrong with having a (government) hospital only for Muslims! After all the people know which way Huckhim turns, according to the day’s weather vane. It is for the benefit unfortunately not for the Muslims or the Tamils but for Huckhim --- who with considerable talent also condones pole vaulting in politics to suit his own escapades.

The South

The people in the South and the North cannot be fooled again.
The South is determined never to have to bear the cost of war again. Let not those errant leaders of the North, who believe that the cost of war could be justified if only the result could be reversed, mislead the Tamils again. There are wounds to heal in Sri Lanka. Militarization is the last thing Sri Lanka needs and a retired General is the last person needed to secure reconciliation, fast forward rehabilitation, sustain peace and usher in a better life especially for those who bore the cost of war, who are the people who matter most now.
This is the verdict of the people after 30 years of brutal war that left 100,000 dead in a country with just 17 million people. Let peace endure. Let us not forget the price that was paid.
“ It is an issue that can only be settled by war and decided by victory.
I may be beaten, the casualties are astronomical.... But I will do whatever is necessary to save the nation” - Abraham Lincoln - during the American Civil War