Nationalism, multi-dimensional

By Rajpal Abeynayake

(December 02, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) It’s now being said that the cat should not have been set among the pigeons, that Sarath Fonseka and the president should have never fallen out, and that the ugly mud slinging that would follow — - with charges and counter charges about how the war was conducted —- all should have been avoided. Yeah right, and night should not have followed day?

It’s saccharine wishfulness; his candidature is a fait accompli, and moreover, the estrangement of Fonseka is also due to personal frailties on both sides, which means that the crucial nationally germane decisions our elected rulers make for us, can also be flawed, due to these same personal frailties.

Fonseka’s coming forward as a common candidate of the opposition is now inevitable. Talking about what might have been is therefore a waste of time.

In the context of this reality, it’s imperative that we look on the bright side.

There is a bright side. As Dayapala Thiranagama has opined, Sri Lanka’s period of violent politics is over. In other words, the anti national forces that tried to sow violence and mayhem in the country through paranoid maniacs such as Wijeweera and Prabhakaran do not enjoy the same leverage any more.

The damage that anti national forces can do is limited, therefore — their firepower sans Prabhakaran is severely truncated.

I am still looking at the bright side of course.

Well, there is also the little thing about the ying and the yang.

The human system needs to be in balance, for healthy upkeep of body and mind - mens sana in corpore sano, the Romans said.

There is some transference of ying-and yang, it seems, to matters of society and polity as well.

There needs to be a balance between disparate forces, and sometimes, cyclic change between liberal and conservative, between supply side and Keynesian - whatever — works towards socio-economic eqiuity.

Not only does the pendulum swing, it’s also that pendulum swings are the necessary stuff of socio-political equilibrium, and indeed stability - - and indeed sometimes, the necessary stuff of economic progress.

Look on the bright side, and after the war, there is a need for a catharsis, for the forces representing minority to be embraced by the mainstream, and for the demons of war to be exorcised.

An ugly exchange of charges and counter charges between Sarath Fonseka and Mahinda Rajapaksa and their respective hit-men and demolition squads may be a less than called for spectacle in the aftermath of a successful war, but might just offer a necessary catharsis after the fight.

It just might bring everything into the open, and offer a welcome release of pent-up inner aggression.

Confidence for minorities

After that, presumably things will subside, whoever wins, and even though it would always be said that the racist enemy and the anti national enemy will salivate at the mud being thrown by the two war heroes at each other, it is unlikely that they would be able to make much substantial use of that dirt.

So, to shine a light on the bright side again - - a post war catharsis just might restore balance, bring about real closure after the trauma of the war, and also offer more confidence for minorities, who would feel that they are not ignored any more, but are in a position to offer some substantial heft as a community, for progressive change in the polity.

There has been a recent national narrative of such “restoration.’’

In 1987, President Ranasinghe Premadasa defeated the brutal JVP putsch, and we don’t even have to remind ourselves just how. Sri Lanka was set alight from Point Pedro to Dondra Head, and the body count alone was mind-numbing.

When Premadasa was subsequently assassinated — no doubt by the LTTE - - crackers were lit in many parts of the country.

I daresay that most of those who indulged in such behaviour were not necessarily unhappy that Premadas put down the putsch, with whatever means at his disposal.

But yet, the demon that the system threw up for its own salvation at that moment, needed to be exorcised for a necessary restoration of national stability.

The death of Premadasa brought in Wijetunge, and that led to a series of events that brought down the dreaded, and by now dangerously over the top UNP, without doubt a very positive change.

Rajapaksa is not demonised to the degree Premadasa was, partly because some of those who he had to kill in the necessary war were not Sinhalese, as in the case of Premadasa’s fightback against the JVP.

But the system nevertheless may benefit from a post 1989 type restorative resistance, after the traumatic but successful war against the LTTE.

Hold his own

To many ears, this may sound anti nationalist bunkum, but yet, Sarath Fonseka one must not forget, belongs to the nationalist side of the continuum.

My guess is, he can more than hold his own against the anti nationalist horde.

In fact those such as Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu who are now crying that the advent of Fonseka is not necessarily going to restore “democracy’’ and good governance etc., are shedding these tears for themselves.

They are just sorry that the horse they have backed and have been raving over for quite some time now, Ranil Wickremesighe, is being marginalised, which means that there will be nobody to dole out posts and perks to them once the opposition wins.

That’s a good sign that the anti national forces can still be thwarted, if Fonseka plays his cards right, in the event he wins.

In the event Rajapaksa wins, the nationalist forces have nothing to worry about.
But whoever wins, it’s not wise to look at Fonseka and the opposition’s resistance one dimensionally. It definitely has its positive facets.

It has already restored the government, and Mahinda Rajapaksa, to an even keel. No more calling themselves King. It’s as if a fairly high-voltage electric current jolted them back to a right posture from a grotesquely twisted hunchbacked one.

That was necessary. They were fast going over the top. There was and is also a need to reassure the minorities, the Tamil minority in particular, and one way of doing this is probably to empower them, making them feel inclusive by making them perhaps the true arbiters in this upcoming presidential vote.

They may just as well decide who ends up as president. What more revalidation for a community that allegedly feels marginalized, allegedly even ignored?

If it’s Fonseka’s good luck to emerge victorious in the coming contest, the country’s future depends a great deal on how he plays his cards.

If he is a man who can outmanoeuvre and checkmate Prabhakaran - - albeit not on his own but with substantial support from all quarters - - I do not think the anti national forces can count on taking him for a ride.

I am almost assured he will checkmate them if the need arises, and that society will be well served.

We shall not forget the great plus in this seeming unnecessary cacophony of needless animosity between the war heroes.

One great plus is that the over the top Rajapaksas have already been brought to heel or at least to a more even-keel. The other is that this current process offers a chance for redressing of balance, a more open society, and for some of the reasons cited above - - of reassuring the Tamils about their role in the national polity, no matter who wins the Presidency in the end, Fonseka or Rajapaksa.

It’s called democratic practise, and is nothing to be frightened about.

-Sri Lanka Guardian