Stand up and fight to drive the vultures away

By Vickramabahu Karuanaratna

(February 15, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) There was an interesting event in Kundasale on February 4 organised on behalf of Platform for Freedom. Ranil Wickremesinghe, Rauf Hakeem, I and several others were the speakers. In my opinion this event did not get its due publicity. In my speech I made the following important points.

“As a present day leader of the Sama Samajist movement which made a special contribution to the independence struggle, I have neither shame nor fear to step onto this stage to speak for freedom. At this time there is a celebration in Colombo, where the ruling group led by President Mahinda is using the lion flag, the pride of Sinhala for 3000 years, as a loin cloth to cover up their nakedness.

This is a time for weeping. From Point Pedro to Devundara, the island is soaked in blood and tears. Pardon me, Hakim and Tamil leaders, for talking only of the Sinhala youth killed in a distant unknown land, a deserted land. Buried without much ceremony in other peoples’ land. Thousands died while tens of thousand are suffering in crowded hospitals. The Colombo ceremony is to cover up all of these. We are told that by killing and destroying, bombing and blasting, the Tamil struggle is brought to an end. At the same time we know that those who challenged and criticised this operation are classified as traitors and punished. Such media men are killed or wounded and others are driven out of the island. Some media houses are burned and crushed. We do not see an end to the problem, but we do see it being pushed underground here, while being planted in Tamil Nadu and in all cosmopolitan cities of the world. At this moment there is a hartal in Tamil Nadu and massive demonstrations are taking place in all the big cities of the world. Effigies of President Mahinda are being carried and burned, while slogans against killings, corruptions and plunder are being shouted out. All Lankan embassies are given special protection while ambassadors live in fear. These protest acts are carried out with the support of Left and democratic forces in the respective countries. The war has created more hatred, and in the coming generations we can harvest the produce in several folds.

Political solution

Bandaranaike signed a pact with the Tamil leader Chelvanayagam and wanted to solve the problem by devolution of power. Then Dudley tried to go further and after a similar pact, took Tamil leaders into the cabinet whilst planning devolution.

President Jayewardene called an all party conference and tried to devolve power by the system of provincial councils. In this endeavour he was supported by Colvin, Bernard, Vijaya and other Left leaders. I myself was among them. At least a nominal provincial council for the Tamil homeland was established and for the first time in history, after Sankili, Tamils had a Tamil ruler for the Tamil land. Finally, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe arrived at a ceasefire agreement with the LTTE leader Prabhakaran and wanted to go for a serious political solution. All these leaders, from Bandaranaike upto Wickremesinghe, and the Left leaders who supported them, were educated at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, MIT, etc with massive libraries for reference, and were supposed to be guided by the principles of kindness and mercy. Were they all fools and frightened imbeciles? Are they all traitors who wanted to deal with the foreign masters behind Tamil terrorism? On the other hand, is the ‘fearless leader’ who smashed and killed, silenced critiques and poisoned Sinhala people with chauvinism and hate, the hero?

Each time since the time of Bandaranaike, when an attempt was made to arrive at a solution on the basis of power sharing among all communities, the terror of Sinhala chauvinism was unleashed and barbarism ruled the streets. When President Jayewardene devolved power under the 13th Amendment to the North Eastern province, Sinhala chauvinist terror was unleashed on everyone associated with devolution of power. The killers did not come from Mars or the moon. The chauvinist gangs of Champika, the gangs of Mahinda and gangs of Weerawansa under the name of patriotism attacked and killed. They killed 23 of my party. I got a bullet that passed through my body leaving a hole of 3 inches [diameter] in my back. I survived only by sheer luck after suffering in hospital for months. Nearly a 1000 other Leftists became victims while nearly 8000 UNP members and supporters were killed. Most of them were unarmed ordinary people loyal to old UNP leaders. In addition these ‘patriots’ wounded tens of thousands and burned hundreds of houses.

Sinhala chauvinist

When Prime Minister Wickremesinghe signed a pact with the LTTE, once again Sinhala chauvinists did everything to sabotage the attempt for a solution.

We of the Left appreciate the attempt to bring a settlement to this human issue of language and nationalities. But we differed on other issues with these rulers. I have fought on such issues that affect workers and peasants, and languished in the prisons of Bandaranaike, Jayewardene and Wickremesinghe. Nevertheless I have come here today to respect the commitment of the UNP leader Wickremesinghe to communal harmony and democracy. Resolving national and communal problems needs mercy and kindness. All religions, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and Christianity, advocate kindness and compassion for human existence and to dispel barbarism. When Marx spoke of opium of the masses he did not mean the basic ethics of human existence. But the war mongering Sinhala chauvinist campaign is definitely opium to the masses. Mahinda uses this opium to drug the masses to forget hunger and misery and to dance naked waving lion flags. Thus he has taken the country towards barbarism. At this hour the vultures are roaming. We have come together to stand up and fight for freedom for the second time.

-Sri Lanka Guardian