Mahinda faces national and international dilemmas

Sinhala patriotism opposed to devolution

by Vickramabahu Karunaratne

(June 19, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Those political writers who believed that Mahinda is independent of the global capitalist system are now crying and wailing. Suddenly the Sinhala giant, the modern Vijaya Bahu has become a boot licker of western powers. Sorry, it is worse; he has proved to be a puppet of Delhi Arya Brahmins. The tragedy is that with the new arrangement of Obama, the Regina of India is the regional power supervising the area on behalf of the global capital. It was so for a long period but now Delhi has become a real centre of modern capitalism. So, India could become an equal partner in the global set up. Hence in matters limited to the region, all other powers will wait for India to take up the discussion. It started with the agreement signed by the foreign minister when we he visited the Indian capital. In order to survive within the so called liberal democratic international set up Mahinda had no choice. He has already fallen into the debt trap. War has done the job. He gambled with the war of Sinhala patriotism. He believed that war at any cost is the sure way to survive as the hero of the Sinhala people. But the power of international capital is such that it could shift the power base with a small note sent by the IMF. Mahinda blindly opened a front with the working class. The class that did not exist according the modern pundits, suddenly marched in and chased away the state machinery of Mahinda regime form factory areas. In1980 JR killed a worker and later faced a general strike. After 31 years MR killed a worker and is facing the wrath of the proletariat of this generation. Unfortunately for MR, at a time the international bourgeoisie is demanding “liberal democracy” from Mahinda, the forgotten class is also demanding democracy. Workers were aroused by purely economic issues but the repression of the regime brought in the issue of democracy to the work place. I participated in a picket of workers in Colombo, opposite Fort railway station. Young workers, probably more than one generation below me, came to meet me and said “if they treat us like this here, how they treated the Tamils in the north is very clear.”

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Changing reality

I was called an agent of the LTTE, a traitor to the Sinhala nation who should be stoned to death. They announced that over television, radio and all general media. Now I am within striking workers as a comrade and a leader with the ability to for see the changing reality. On the other hand, Mahinda is flirting with the idea of devolution with police and land powers. I thought this was part of my chinthanaya, the ideology of traitors! Sinhala patriotism was directed exactly against the idea of devolution. They interpreted giving any autonomy to the Tamils means the betrayal of the great chronicle Mahawansa. Now Mahinda will need new pundits to explain that autonomy of Tamil homeland is according to the tradition of Mahawansa. Of course I will happily participate in the new devolutionist mission of Mahinda in my own way. But he will have to explain to his loyal supporters why he has to drop his so called patriotic mission. I saw one his loyalist screaming in his column “All this war-crimes stuff is rubbish, we know this. Mahinda should know that those who benefit from these moves will not thank him with a single vote anyway. He is free to choose his friends, but he cannot expect us to fall in love with the enemies of our country. If he wants to hang himself, fine. He cannot hang us.” I am sure Gunadasa Amarasekara, Nalin Silva, Susanhta Gunathilaka et al will certainly go along with the spirit of the above statement. I can see the agony in that camp. How can they face the poor Sinhala masses? Latter lost nearly thirty thousand soldiers killed in the battle. There are over 50 000 disabled, and so many bereaved widows and mothers crying. Having made that sacrifice for the liberation of Sinhala nation, the country is under the thumb of global capital. The Sinhala hero proved to be a puppet of global masters. For my tribe of leftists this is a moment of sordid joy. Because even the devil can do good things for his own satanic reasons. After all it was British imperialists who allowed Colonel Olcott and others to build my old school, Ananda collage 125 years ago. So what are these Sinhala nationalist going to do? As it is it will be difficult for them to mobilize the service of the JVP, as they did in 88/89 period. But they could try to organise a military coup with the help of dissatisfied military men within the security forces. Anyway they will have to face the challenge of the working class.