By Harim Peiris

(Published in the Daily news of  29th  March  2017)

It should have been a political bombshell of huge magnitude but it turned out not to be. It should have halted the Joint Opposition SLFP faction’s fascination with Gotabaya Rajapakse, but it did not. Recently in the course of case proceedings in the Mt.Lavinia Magistrate’s Court into the murder of Sunday Leader Editor Lasantha Wickramatunga, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), the country’s premier criminal investigative department of the Police, revealed in Court, that the Sri Lankan military’s intelligence apparatus had run a death squad operation, which was outside the military’s normal chain of command and directly overseen by the then President Rajapaksa’s brother and defense secretary Gotabaya. The next day as expected, Mr. Gotabaya Rajapakse issued the standard blanket denial, which was the hall mark of the Rajapaksa Administration, of any such role or responsibility for a military intelligence death squad. However, this piece of evidence by the CID raises serious issues for Sri Lanka and her democracy and require careful, fulsome and comprehensive public debate, which also cannot and should not be squashed through self-censorship and media manipulation.

1. It is CID evidence in court, not a political claim on a platform.

During the 2015 presidential election, the issue of the fear psychosis in Sri Lankan society, the brutality of the Rajapakse Administration, the white van syndrome, abductions, the forced disappearance culture and the allegation that the national security apparatus which had been so effective against the LTTE was now being turned against democratic political opponents of the Rajapaksa’s’ had been alleged from the political platform. But it was two years later, that the credible information available at the time of the campaign had now translated itself into evidence acceptable in a court of law, under the evidence ordinance. The CID was not merely repeating the claims made by the then Army Commander, about his intelligence wing, but had, we can safely assume, as is common in any investigation crossed checked with other witnesses, suspects and sources.

 2. The Rajapaksa’s tried to politicize the military but failed.

The Rajapaksa’s unsuccessfully sought to politicize the Sri Lankan military and use it as a political tool. By and large, Sri Lanka’s fighting forces, our best, resisted this effort and continued in the best traditions of a professional military which did not seek to bow to the illegal whims and fancies of a government of the day. In mid night attempts to use the military to suspend the results of the January 2015 election the Rajapaksa’s failed. The postal voting from places such as Jaffna district where the bulk of the Army is stationed and postal voters are mostly the military, demonstrated that the military rank and file comprehensively rejected the Rajapaksa’s. It is perhaps only in the shadowy world of military intelligence in the capital Colombo and the south, that the lethal force of the State’s national security apparatus was turned on democratic political opponents.

Civilian control of the military is an essential feature of a democracy. What the CID evidence reveals in the Wickramatunga murder was clear, that the military apparatus headed by the President’s brother operated as a law unto itself and was accountable to no one. Not only the military intelligence but from Avant Garde to Rakna Lanka, from the new Defense headquarters building fund to dalliance with violent extremist groups it is clear that the Rajapakse defense set up was accountable to no one. Not Parliament, the auditor general or any other statutory or state body. During the conflict era, maximum operational leeway needs to be given a military to conduct operations and as former President Jayawardena famously quoted the ancient Roman Empire Era’s Senator and philosopher Cicero, “in the fight of good against evil, the laws are silent”. However now, the evil threat of the LTTE to Sri Lanka was comprehensively eliminated on the banks of the Nandikadal lagoon in 2009. We cannot and must not live in peace time, like in war time. We cannot have a war psychosis, which adds to the anxiety of the populace, negates the comprehensive nature of the victory won by the armed forces and significantly reduces the normalization of society and confidence in law and order required for investment, commerce and economic prosperity. The military intelligence must be held totally accountable to Parliament. Currently the world’s most powerful military, the US military and its civilian executive leadership holds itself accountable to a variety of Congressional committees.

3.Implications for the Thajudeen murder and other crimes

The existence of state controlled, military intelligence linked illegal armed assassins and hit squads have serious implications for the ongoing investigations into the murder of former Thomian, Havelock’s and national rugby player Wasim Thajudeen, the abduction of editor Keith Noyar, Poddala Jayantha and the disappearance of journalist Prageeth Ekneligoda. The allegation during the 2015 election, (It was unsafe to allege anything before an election campaign, because any one alleging anything against a Rajapaksa, ran the serious risk of sharing the same fate as either Keith Noyar, Poddala Jayantha or the ultimate fate of Thajudeen and Ekneligoda among others), was that these were ordered and carried out by state actors under government orders. The CID in the Lasantha Wickramatunga case, is now presenting evidence to corroborate this in court. It is in this context, that President Sirisena has stated that if he had challenged the Rajapaksa’s and lost, he would have been six feet under (killed).

Sri Lanka post the end of the war, must have a public life and social culture that is different from the national security state of the war decades. Our people demanded better in 2015 and our future generations deserve better. The CID evidence, is one more fact, which clearly reveals why Sri Lanka needs real reform, including security sector reform. Nationalist elements bristle when there is criticism of the Sri Lankan state and her institutions and through the Joint Opposition (JO) having been blocking every attempt at real reform. Military intelligence death squads unleased against democratic political opposition in post war peace times, demonstrates exactly why Sri Lanka needs national reconciliation and deep social healing.

(The writer is Advisor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The views expressed are personal)

By Harim Peiris

(Published in the Daily news of  21st  March  2017)

The ongoing sessions of the UN Human Rights Council, has seen heightened public interest and escalating rhetoric with regard to both the state reforms and reconciliation processes. The Joint Opposition (JO), basically the political grouping supporting defeated President Mahinda Rajapakse has been ratcheting up its anti-reform and anti-reconciliation rhetoric in to overdrive. The political heat generated though creates more confusion rather than throwing light on the relevant facts, which should be considered with due seriousness and careful consideration.

The national unity approach in Geneva

The foreign (& indeed domestic) policy approach of the National Unity Government formed in 2015, is at considerable variance with that followed by its predecessor. Indeed, it should be so, since the Rajapakse approach, post the end of the war, failed to maintain our international friends, all of whom had supported Sri Lanka’s battle against the LTTE, isolated Sri Lanka, damaged our relations with trading partners and resulted in a growing self-imposed isolation from the world. Rather than building bridges and engaging the world, which is what is required for a strategically placed, island nation.

Co-sponsoring the resolution in Geneva, was and is the right thing to do, as it clearly states to the world, that Sri Lanka as a sovereign state, takes responsibility for its own actions and is ready to be accountable for compliance with its international obligations, as a free and equal member of the international community of nations. Our robust engagement with the world, enhances and promote rather than detracts from our national interest. Our national interests, whether security, economic or socio-cultural are not served by becoming a pariah state.

Much ado about foreign judges

The joint opposition of the defeated Rajapakse regime, makes much ado and seeks to create some hysteria about the sections of the resolution which talk of foreign participation in accountability processes including judges, prosecutors etc. However, it must be noted that it was the very act of the Rajapakse regime in summarily sacking former Chief Justice Shiranie Bandaranaike and imposing an interloper at the apex of Sri Lanka’s judiciary, which severely eroded international and indeed domestic confidence in Sri Lanka’s judiciary, the Bar Association leading the opposition to the impugned removal of Chief Justice Bandaranaike. The restoration of the independence of the judiciary, best symbolized by the restoration of Chief Justice Bandaranaike after the 2015 presidential election, was the first step in restoring confidence in Sri Lanka’s judiciary.

Firstly, it was the Rajapakse Administration which introduced foreign jurists into Sri Lanka’s transitional justice mechanisms, when President Rajapaksa’s Special Presidential Commission on Grave Human Rights Abuses also comprised of the International Group of Eminent Persons (IGEP) led by former Indian Chief Justice Bhagwatti and aided by foreign legal experts in prosecutions and forensics. Moreover, the subsequent Rajapakse Administration creation of the Paranagama Commission was also assisted by a foreign judge and lawyers. Moreover, all Sri Lankans are no doubt proud that eminent Sri Lankan judges serve on both foreign national judiciaries and international legal tribunals, late Justice Weeramantry being the best-known example. But other Sri Lankan judges have also served in Fiji, Botswana and several other countries.

Secondly, the UNHRC Resolution categorically states that the accountability process and the institutions or mechanisms created would be a domestic (Sri Lankan) process. Clearly a Sri Lankan process, would be Sri Lankan led and managed with such expertise, assistance and support as required to ensure, a credible process, whose outcome everybody can trust.

Focus on reconciliation

The real problem with the current tone, tenor and content of the political debate, especially as defined by the Joint Opposition (JO) is that it completely ignores the reality and the national need for what President Sirisena has frequently defined as “Sanhindiyawa” or reconciliation, which is dealing with the effects and the causes of our near three decades of civil conflict. Which Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera, so aptly refers to as “addressing the failures of dealing with our diversity”, which has cost our nation dearly. We owe it to our future generations of Sri Lankans that we do not bequeath them a nation, which is ethnically polarized, with simmering communal tensions and a sub optimal economy, where the national past time of the young and not so young, including mothers, is to leave the country.

Sri Lanka like any country requires reform and the National Unity Administration of President Sirisena and Prime Minster Wickramasinghe was elected on a platform of reform, economic development and reconciliation. The quick, easy wins in that process was achieved during the one hundred (100) day program in 2015. Much of the ground work for the harder more substantial measures on reforms, economic development and reconciliation was done last year in 2016 and the current year should be the one which sees some of the fruition of those efforts. To oppose such reforms due to focusing on mid-term local government and provincial elections is extremely short sighted and definitely not in the national interest.

A political opposition in a democratic society does have a crucial role to play as a watch dog and a constructive critic, holding a government accountable. However, the current political rhetoric and the consequent social tensions generated is more polarizing and divisive than constructive. A national reform process, must indeed be inclusive and this includes not only the majority monoethnic JO but also accommodate and include the ethnic minority and other smaller parties, to ensure that the reformed institutions of the Sri Lankan state, accommodates the full diversity of our nation’s multi ethnic and multi religious society.

(The writer is Advisor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The views expressed are personal)

By Harim Peiris

(Published in Groundviews on 27^th Feb 2017)

Earlier this week, Parliament debated, on an adjournment motion by the TNA, the unresolved issues of the North and East, namely dealing with the effects and the causes of the war. The former requiring specific reconciliation measures and the latter reforms of the Sri Lankan state which enables the state to accommodate the full diversity of her society. The attention of the Sri Lankan polity will also be focused internationally at the UNHRC in Geneva, where at its general sessions the resolution on Sri Lanka, dealing with our reconciliation and democratization processes, would be on the agenda. Various reports in the popular press have a range of views on the reconciliation process and the current state of play, which broadly divide into two camps. In the south, opposition forces are agitating that the proposed reforms are a sell out and have consequently largely resigned from the steering committee of the Constitutional Assembly, but after having served on the sub committees during deliberations and the submission of their reports. In the North, opposition to the TNA leadership, paradoxically, largely from within its own ranks would claim that little or no progress on reconciliation has occurred.

The context for the current state of play, is the momentous elections of 2015, which abruptly ended what had seemed an invincible Rajapakse Administration and its policy direction of creeping authoritarianism and an entrenching of social divisions and ethnic polarizations. The elections of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe, opened a new chapter, in post war Sri Lanka, a government committed to the three pillars of democratization, reconciliation and sustainable economic development. The one hundred (100) day program of the new government succeeded in achieving the early wins and the easy tasks and the 19^th amendment to the constitution, was the landmark achievement of that first flush of victory. The current tasks and challenges are now the harder tasks of state reform and it is important to bear in mind, why we should reform.

Earlier in this month of February, we celebrated our 69^th anniversary of independence and casting our minds back to 1948, Ceylon as we were then called was a land of rich promise. Looking back nearly seven decades later, we realize that our inability to deal with our diversity led us spending about three decades fighting a ruinous civil war, which eroded our democracy, polarized our society, stunted our economic growth and warped our social progress. It is not in the interest of any section of Sri Lankan society, that we live our next three decades, like we did in the last three.

The end of the war and the destruction of the armed capability of the LTTE in 2009, provided a unique second chance for us to recreate a united and tolerant Sri Lanka, accommodative of diversity and fulfilling the aspirations of all her peoples. Unfortunately, the Rajapakse Administration, which had provided the political oversight for the military’s defeat of the LTTE, seemed both unwilling and unable to chart a new course to provide either a peace dividend or a sustainable peace. It was amazing that in a short span of four to five years, it moved from an overwhelming victory to an ignominious defeat. The broad rainbow coalition of the “Yahapalanya” Administration was elected on a good governance and reform agenda, which would seek to utilize the window of opportunity we have for real and needed state reform.

The most important aspect of reform required by the general public is economic reform, for a dynamic and growing economy which fulfills the economic aspirations of all our peoples, including both urban and rural, young and old, professionals and entrepreneurs, the educated and the less well educated. The economic management leadership of the current administration would clearly articulate that they inherited an economy hobbled with excessive foreign debt spent on projects of dubious value at exorbitant and inflated costs, which in an unfavorable external environment has been a near insurmountable challenge to overcome. Well knowing though that the next election would all be about how economic benefits were delivered to the people.

The other aspect of needed reform is in the area of reconciliation and the government is moving in the right direction, though arguably at a pace slower than that wished by the people of the North and East and their elected representatives. However, the important fact is that the Government is on the right path, even if it has not progressed down that path, at quite the pace wishes by some. Even government leaders may well be frustrated by the pace of reform, but politics and policy reform is also the art of the possible, exploiting existing spaces complemented with comprehensive dialogue among stakeholders and such democratic processes take time and as the old adage goes, Rome was not built in a day and societies being complex, change slowly and incrementally.

Sri Lanka actually achieved a quiet people revolution through the ballot box in 2015 and started off on a new journey, which has perhaps passed its one third mark, but not yet reached even the half way stage. It must be provided the time, space and support, both locally and internationally to proceed down the path of reforms in democracy, reconciliation and sustainable economic development, to fulfil the clear mandates of the sovereign people of Sri Lanka given in January and August 2015.

(Published in the Daily News of 27^th Jan 2017)

Dear Duminda,

Consultation on Constitutional Reforms

I thought I must write to you openly when I learned through the mass media, that some SLFP seniors in government were unsupportive of serious constitutional reforms and accordingly had persuaded President Sirisena, as SLFP leader to direct that the SLFP engages in some dialogue and consultations on the proposed reforms. You may consider my views as part of this consultation and on my part, they are complimentary to my personal submissions to the LLRC during its public hearings and draws from my experience as the former Director General of Relief, Rehabilitation and Reconciliation under President Kumaratunga and more recently as Chairman of the Resettlement Authority.

1. Consider the mandate of January 2015

I believe the context for the current process of constitutional reforms is the mandate received by President Sirisena in January 2015, which is clearly a mandate for reform. Those of the SLFP who were not part of securing that mandate, but now within Government, who were corrected by the sovereign voting public of our country, should be extra careful when opposing that mandate and defining the mandate is certainly not the purview of the defeated candidate former President Rajapakse.

1. Public consultations of the constitutions have already occurred

You are no doubt aware that public consultations on the proposed constitutional reforms occurred throughout our country and there was opportunity for all stakeholders to make their submissions through this consultation process. It would be useful for the SLFP to not reinvent the wheel as it were but to study, incorporate and draw from the public consultations already held.

1. A democratic deficit

A vast majority of the period since the introduction of the first republican constitution of 1972 and continuing through the period of the current constitution of 1978, Sri Lanka has been governed under Emergency Regulations which have superseded the Constitution and thereby compromised and damaged constitutional governance and the rule of law in our land. While this situation may have been understandable in the context of our decades long civil armed conflict it becomes untenable in a period thereafter. The democratic deficit which Sri Lanka suffers from needs to be rectified through constitutional reform and the abolition of the executive presidency, the implementation of electoral reforms, the strengthening of individual and human rights, are all part of the efforts to address this democratic deficit.

1. Creating an inclusive state

It was former member of Parliament and LTTE suicide bomb victim late Dr. Neelen Tiruchelvam, who perhaps best explained the rationale for constitutional reforms nearly twenty-five years ago, when he stated that we should rectify “the anomaly of having imposed a mono ethnic state on a multi ethnic polity”. It is patently clear to all but the willfully blind, that Sri Lanka is a society polarized on ethnic lines, with state institutions and structures of governance that are non-inclusive and intolerant. The virulent demagogy surrounding the singing of the national anthem also in Tamil at last year’s national day celebrations, demonstrates both the mono ethno-lingual nature of state festivals in the past and how much we need to reform to be inclusive and tolerant. If the SLFP position is that the 13^th amendment should first be implemented fully, then there is no impediment to the executive decisions of immediately gazetting those provisions of the constitution not yet implemented.

1. Examine prior SLFP positions on devolution under President Kumaratunga and President Rajapaksa

The SLFP has had a rich tradition of seeking political solutions of inclusivity, diversity and tolerance going back to the Bandaranaike – Chelvanyagam pact more than half a century ago. More usefully and practically, it is incumbent upon the SLFP to learn from and incorporate the policies, politics and thinking of both the SLFP led PA and UPFA governments of President Kumaratunga and President Rajapakse. Especially relevant in this regard are the various work, recommendations and policies of President Rajapakse under his initiatives of the All Part Representative Committee (APRC) and its various working groups, all ably headed and led in the past by the old left leaders of DEW Gunasekera and Prof.Tissa Vitharane. If former President Rajapakse is not standing by prior SLFP government positions on devolution including those of his own Administration, then such policy changes may well be construed as opportunistic and parochially motivated for extraneous reasons of temporary political self-interest by a person who promises to topple the government during the calendar year and need not be taken seriously.

1. Seriously examine Rajapakse Administration mistakes and avoid a return to the past

I would respectfully submit that a key requirement for the SLFP, before the next general elections due in mid-2020, is an open and honest examination of what went so badly wrong, especially during the second Rajapakse term and seek not only remedial measures but also to chart a new course for the future rather than advocate a return to the past. The public perception and allegations of rampant corruption, mismanagement of the economy especially in mounting public debt on grandiose and ill-conceived projects, ruining our foreign relations with all our key trading partners, violating and abusing human rights with impunity, including press freedom, centralizing power in the executive presidency, subverting the judiciary and institutionalizing nepotism all contributed to ending the Rajapakse presidency, sooner rather than later.

Finally, I admired your courageous and principled stand in supporting then common candidate Maithripala Sirisena during the presidential election of 2015. Your political foresight and maturity is a tribute to your late father and I can think of no younger leader better suited to hold the responsible position of SLFP General Secretary.

As you are aware, I currently serve as Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, but please consider these submissions as done in my personal capacity.

I take this opportunity to wish you every success in your endeavors.

With best regards,

Harim Peiris

By Harim Peiris

(Published in the daily news of 9th January 2017)

When Sri Lanka ended its civil war in 2009, we had been fighting our internal conflict for close upon half our post-independence period of sixty-one years. That our most significant political engagements were not through dialogue and discourse but through armed conflict speaks volumes about the political weaknesses and fragility of South Asia’s oldest democracy.

We ended our civil war as a deeply divided nation. Polarized on ethno-religious grounds, with badly wounded democratic and governance institutions and a sub optimized economy which has made going abroad, for employment or migration Sri Lanka’s most popular occupational ambition, for both women and young people.  Sri Lanka has had in the past three decades, three conflicts, the military conflict between the State Security forces and the LTTE, the political power contest between the UNP and the SLFP and the ethnic problem between the Southern Sinhala polity and the Northern and Eastern based Tamil polity.  These three conflicts were interlocking and influencing each other, addressing one conflict meant dealing with the other two power struggles as well.

The end of the war in 2009, not only ended the armed conflict between the State and the LTTE. The attendant change in the Tamil polity was that the leadership of the Tamil community changed from the armed and violent LTTE led by Prabakaran and Pottu Amman to the democratic and relatively moderate TNA led by the R. Sambanthan and M.A.Sumanthiran. It is in this context that Sri Lanka headed into the 2010 presidential election, witnessing the re-election of Mahinda Rajapakse. The most charitable understatement which can be said about the Rajapakse second term, is that it was a wasted opportunity, which took Sri Lanka rapidly down the wrong path and mercifully for reasons as yet undisclosed, four years into a six-year term, Mahinda Rajapakse called an election, which ended his rule and attendant dynastic ambitions.

Maithripala Sirisena and his allies within the rainbow coalition styled the Democratic National Front, a special purpose political vehicle acquired for the presidential election, campaigned on a platform of the three pillars of good governance, sustainable economic development and national reconciliation. To achieve this, they promised a national government and an entirely new political approach and policy framework. Contrary to joint opposition claims, the national government does have a popular mandate, not once but twice.

As we commemorate the second anniversary of the election of President Maithripala Sirisena, it is worth contemplating the political miracle which was wrought two years ago. In 2014, Mahinda Rajapakse seemed unassailable, funding massive projects with rather expensive Chinese loans, booking no dissent by jailing his presidential election opponent, sacking Sri Lanka’s first female Chief Justice, governing inefficiently and corruptly while openly promoting his family and relatives in government positions. The Rajapakse political project was deeply entrenched in power and seemed good for decades more to come. The snap presidential election called for January 2015 was planned to be a Rajapakse verses the West campaign, painting Rajapakse opponents as Western world lackeys, foreign funded NGO’s, Tamil Diaspora, Muslim extremists and non-patriotic traitors. It is a tribute to the political skill and sagacity of the matriarch of the founding family of the SLFP, former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, that the most remarkable political coalition of all times, comprising remarkably Sinhala nationalists and Tamil nationalists, Marxists and neo-Liberals, all parts of the feuding Muslim polity, the then  General Fonseka, civil society and professional groups all came together around a single common presidential candidate in Maithripala Sirisena, the genial, affable and soft spoken General Secretary of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party. The election campaign of January 2015, transformed itself to a Rajapakse and his miniscule allies of the UPFA verses the rest, a political dynamic which still holds true and the result, was the election of Maithripala Sirisena as the sixth executive president of Sri Lanka. With the formation of the National Government comprising both the UNP and the SLFP in 2015, the second conflict in Sri Lanka, or the political contest between the UNP and the SLFP has been halted for a term, to bring about through consensus and a unity government, the urgent state reforms, both political and economic, which Sri Lanka needs. The consequence of the 2015 elections is that Sri Lanka’s moderate political center, in both the North and the South, expanded and is in power, unlike at any time in the past three decades. Creating a real opportunity for genuine change, which albeit does come slowly.

The year 2017, will be the critical year for the Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration. The foundation for a new Sri Lanka is the work of the Constitutional Assembly, established to design a new constitution for Sri Lanka. On the occasion of the second anniversary of the Sirisena presidency, the Parliament as the constitutional assembly would be debating and deciding how to proceed with the steering committee report on the proposed new constitution. There is a consensus emerging through the constitutional assembly process.

There is political drama, on the sidelines. Defeated president Mahinda Rajapakse recently told the respected Indian journal “The Hindu” that he would topple the government in 2017. There has been some controversy amidst joint opposition hopes on a nation-wide local government election. But the real game changer, the substantive and sustainable basis for a new Sri Lanka is state reform, through constitutional reform. Sri Lanka needs a new constitution, which will strengthen democracy and through devolution of power, ensure that the Sri Lankan state, reflects and accommodates the full diversity of her society. It was LTTE suicide bombing victim, late Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam who described this need best, as “rectifying the anomaly of imposing a mono ethnic state on a multi ethnic polity”. Sri Lanka has experienced through both the 1972 and the 1978 constitutions a democratic deficit, caused by weak institutional checks and balances which significantly limited individual and human rights, resulting in internal rebellion and organized political violence. We need to rectify that situation.  Beyond any other gains of the Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration, this foundational reform, a new compact between the government and the governed, may be its most lasting legacy to Sri Lanka and her peoples.

(The writer is Advisor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The views expressed are personal)