Sri Lanka joins the Open Government Partnership (OGP)

By Harim Peiris

(Published in the Island of 26^th October 2016)

Earlier this month, the Cabinet of Ministers approved the National Action Plan for the Open Government Partnership (OGP). The Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a multi-lateral forum of seventy member countries. OGP is a relatively new kid on the block, in the international cooperation and partnership scene, having been launched only in 2011, largely as an initiative of the Obama Administration and would be one of its foreign policy success stories and legacies to the international community. OGP seeks to provide an international platform for domestic reformers committed to making governments more open, accountable, and responsive to its citizens, improving governance, strengthening democracy and making societies more open.

The current Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration was elected on a policy platform in which good governance and anti-corruption are foundational. It is noteworthy that in late 2014, as signs of an early election were emanating from the then Rajapaksa Administration and when civil society organizations and movements were beginning to raise their voice over governance and corruption issues, Rajapaksa advisors and acolytes were claiming that good governance and anti-corruption are not issues of mass mobilization and regime change catalysts.  However, the twin elections of 2015 proved that together with anti-incumbency tendencies, that in Sri Lanka as elsewhere, that governance and anti-corruption are issues that matter with voters. In Sri Lanka, especially the Sinhala electorate is very invested in the Sri Lankan state and punish at the polls, those who are thought to have abused state or political power.

There is great interest in the international community regarding Sri Lanka’s new policy trajectory, since it is so vastly different to its predecessor. The change that Sri Lanka peacefully and democratically brought about is stunning, when viewed from overseas, even more than it is when viewed locally. Especially in the area of foreign policy, Sri Lanka moved from an era of increasing isolation through self-imposed walls of non-engagement and a siege mentality, especially during the Rajapaksa second term, to a situation where as Foreign Minister Samarweera so often describes as “tearing down the dividing walls and building bridges of friendship” to not just the East but also the West.  Accordingly, there is keen interest on the progress of Sri Lanka’s reform process in general and good governance initiatives in particular. President Sirisena was a special guest at the Anti-Corruption Summit in London earlier this year and his presence is also sought for a similar event in France towards the year end.

Membership in the OGP is by invitation only and Sri Lankan can be justifiably proud that last year, Sri Lanka’s then new government was invited to join the OGP, the first South Asian nation to have qualified and to have joined the OGP. Accordingly, by invitation, in October last year, Sri Lanka endorsed the OGP declaration and committing to its objectives and but became a fully participating country of the OGP, through the adoption of its national action plan. Through the endorsement of the OGP declaration, member countries commit, essentially to foster a domestic culture of open which empowers a country’s citizens and delivers better governance for them.

OGP promotes and advances the ideals of open and participatory 21st century government. Members of the Open Government Partnership commit to the principles enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN Convention against Corruption, and other international agreements in regard to human rights and good governance. The Implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, more popularly known as the sustainable development goals, is a key platform of the OGP framework.

The key instrument for the implementation of open governance in Sri Lanka is the OGP, National Action Plan (NAP). Sri Lanka’s first ever OGP, National Action Plan was carefully prepared through an inclusive consultative process, which witnessed community based dialogues in all nine provinces of the country. The National Action Plan contains policy reform commitments in about nine different thematic areas of governance including but not limited to education, health, environment, ICT, right to information and women’s affairs.

Implement Sri Lanka’s OGP commitment through its National Action Plan, is the key requirement in the National Action Plan (NAP) framework.  Sri Lanka is not short on good policy programs and action plans. However it does have a very poor track record on policy and plan implementation. Sri Lanka has very many good laws in place, but which are sadly and all too often a dead letter in implementation.  From human rights, to witness protection to anti-torture, anti-ragging, and anti-corruption, Sri Lanka has sound laws and good policies and plans in place. However, our human rights track record is abysmal, our witnesses in judicial proceedings are not protected, torture is rampant in our criminal justice system and ragging is endemic in our institutions of higher learning while anti-corruption measures are still weak in both enforcement and prevention.

The real challenge facing the government is to ensure, that its international commitments on good governance, through the Open Government Partnership (OGP) framework does not go the same way as many other fine plans that Sri Lanka has, but does not really implement. The real challenge then is to implement, our own good intentions of good governance and domestic policy reforms.

Reflections on gender Issues in reconciliation

By Harim Peiris

(Published in the Island on 21^st Oct 2016)

The Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration is committed to reconciliation, reiterated most recently at the UN General Assembly in New York. But reconciliation is about the real lives of real people and many of the victims of the war, the scared survivors are women. The following are some perspectives on women’s issues in the post war regions, in the context of the ongoing reconciliation efforts.

War was hard, but the economic burdens seem harder,” says Kalaimagal Ponnambalam, a thirty-eight-year-old female shop owner in the North.

A report published by the London-based Minority Rights Group (MRG) revealed that the North and East combined were home to a shattering eighty-nine thousand (89,000) widows (based on a 2010 government estimate) at the end of the 26 -year old civil war that ended in 2009. Now crippled with a burden that traditionally is not theirs to bear, the darkness of poverty prevails leaving these women particularly vulnerable to the dangers of sexual harassment and exploitation. Six years after the end of the war, Sri Lanka has estimated the number of women-headed households in the island’s North to be a staggering 50,000. With more women having to step up as the breadwinners in their homes’ Sri Lanka’s former war zone is recording an increase in women turning to survival sex.

Now carrying the load that was once their husbands’, fathers’ or brothers’, poverty and lack of options are driving women to adopt commercial sex as an income generator. Community-based organizations claim, that these women, despite the enormous economic responsibilities they bear, do not possess the skills and the financial resources to support their families, making them vulnerable to exploitation.

In a survey being carried out by these community- based organizations, from 2010 to this date (the survey is being finalized) 1,500 female-headed households in the north, claimed there is reason to believe the sex trade is “slowly taking root in a region that boasts of tradition and culture”.

It is happening and therefore a need has risen for better livelihood support initiatives in the post conflict region.  “The great economic divide was increased by long years of war. It needs continuous and committed work “, said D.M. Swaminathan, Minister of Resettlement of Reconstruction.

The still “strong” military presence in the north, increase in domestic tourism, along with men from other parts of the island being based in the areas for work are somewhat regular reasons for an increase in commercial sex.

In addition, an increased number of Sri Lankan-born Tamils from the diaspora visiting their places of origin since fighting ended four years ago, has also increased demand for commercial sex, Shanthini Vairamuttu, a community worker from the district of Jaffna, said. With the increasing presence of Tamil diaspora in their home towns (places of origin), community women have often told that their daughters are often being viewed as sexual objects and in some cases, been sexually assaulted. Sexuality is largely considered offensive in the north, where caste and class are still decisive factors.

We may not know the level of the problem. In a country where commercial sex is illegal, the chances of finding the numbers would be difficult without substantial studies. However, this has now become a pressing issue and it deserves due attention and action thereafter. The MRG report called on the police to create Tamil-speaking desks in all police stations in former conflict zones, boost female representation among government officials in the north and east, as well as prosecute perpetrators.

Violence against women in Sri Lanka is too common an occurrence, gender equality is only a distant dream, and behind the closed doors of their homes, women across the island silently suffer the horrors of domestic violence.

As is sadly common in societies that has experienced so much violence for extended periods of time, spanning decades, it has left Sri Lankan society, with long term scars desensitizing the people. While there is uproar in the western world on issues such as these, here in Sri Lanka there is generally an under appreciation of and lack of awareness about crimes against women and as well as mental health issues arising from and consequent to the decades long civil conflict.

The surveys and studies reveal that both gender issues and economic hardships are indeed correlated and therefore go hand in hand. These issues require continuous and committed work towards sustained economic support, especially for women who are now responsible for their families and find themselves having several mouths to feed. These analyses suggest that, the time has now come to ameliorate grass root level issues for economic development and ethnic reconciliation in Sri Lanka.

The progress on Sri Lanka’s reconciliation process, while perhaps slower than what many might have hoped are on a steady track, with fast paced progress on the new constitution, the passage of the Office of Missing Persons (OMP) Act and public consultations progressing on finalizing reparations and establishing a truth seeking mechanism. But especially for the most vulnerable sections of the victims, the women and children affect by the conflict, their livelihood needs, the very real day to day needs to re-establish their lives and provide hope and a better future for the younger generations, must continue to be a priority and be a genuine partnership between the community, civil society, donors and government policy makers.

The SLFP and UNP Conventions and the ideology of a national government

By Harim Peiris

( published in the Island newspaper September 13, 2016 )

The Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the United National Party (UNP) held their 65^th and 70^th annual conventions recently in Kurunegala and Colombo respectively. A notable feature of the two events was that President Maithripala Sirisena was center stage at both events, at the SLFP convention as the party leader and at the UNP convention as the chief guest. Another notable commonality was former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, the architect of the remarkable political landscape we witness today. Representing the UNP at its highest level at the SLFP convention was the party general secretary and former Chairman Kabir Hashim.  This remarkable demonstration of political bon homie, is a major departure from the adversarial, zero sum game of political acrimony, so common in Sri Lanka in the past and sadly still not prevalent in many if not all of Sri Lanka’s South Asian neighbors. It would be impossible to image such bon homie between say the BJP and the Congress leaders in India, or between the two Begums in Bangladesh or the fractious leaders of Nepal’s political parties or the vitriolic politics of the Maldives or in Pakistan. But Sri Lanka’s exceptional and unique government of consensus is the reason, we have the promise of genuine reform a distinct possibility.

In listening to President Sirisena and Prime Minister Wickramasinghe speaking to their respective key constituencies of party leaders, cadres and activists, one would glean the contours of the new thinking, the politics and ideology of the national unity government and the governance of consensus rather than confrontation. It was in the UNP national convention that the clearest articulation of the new thinking was made. Besides Premier Wickramasinghe who called for a new ideology to replace the old, Minister Sajith Premadasa argued that the political marriage of President Sirisena and Prime Minister Wickramasinghe will not lead to a divorce. In what should have been the most partisan and parochial political message, the commitment to consensus, reform and a new Sri Lanka was remarkable.

Both conventions were remarkable for what they achieved. The SLFP convention was a resounding success, at least numerically compared to the “pada yathra” of the Joint Opposition. The UNP convention was amazing for its message including a frank admission of errors and mistakes of the past and a remarkable apology and a request for forgiveness by Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe. Admitting wrong and especially asking forgiveness does not come easy in our honor conscious society. It was a remarkable performance by the Prime Minister.

This same message of national unity and consensus was earlier articulated also by both the President and the Prime Minister, in the immediate aftermath of the less than successful “pada yathra” of the Joint Opposition and on the occasion of the celebrations of the first anniversary of the government, elected in August last year. Here the reiteration of the commitment of the government to serve its full term of five years in office and respect the presidential election mandate of January 2015, which saw the defeat of the Rajapaksa regime. President Sirisena did pledge to work towards the formation of a government led by the SLFP and this is a perfectly legitimate goal for any and all of the future elections due at the proper time, local sometime next year, provincial also on a staggered basis from next year, but national parliamentary elections only due in 2020.  In countries such as Germany and other mature democracies where the two major parties combine to form administrations, contesting subsequent elections independently is the norm. Post such an election, a coalition government would or could again be formed. Accordingly, there is nothing to exclude the post 2020 government to also consist of the two major parties. Now all free societies throw up political dissent, which is why democracies require a vibrant political opposition to act as a watch dog and a check and balance on the government. However, Sri Lanka current experience is that some of these checks and balances are coming from within the government.  Very informally the two major parties in the government keeping a watch on each other. On issues such as the Central Bank bond issue and the VAT increase among others, it was members within the government itself, which engages on the issue, consults, compromises and reach consensus.

Now there is some criticism of the national unity government of consensus by some of the SLFP faction which is outside the government and part of the opposition. They articulate that such a national government is a betrayal of the party. However, it is rather a commitment to a united approach to reforming the country. The acrimonious political rivalry between the two major parties was the bane of this country and one which contributed largely to preventing progress, much needed reforms and indeed completing the unfinished work of national institution building. Unity and consensus is much more culturally suitable for Sri Lanka rather than an adversarial political system.

It was my friend and colleague Dr. Ram Manikkalingam who in times past wrote that there were three inter connected conflicts in Sri Lanka, the military conflict between the State armed forces and the LTTE, the power conflict between the UNP and the SLFP led alliances and the political conflict between ethnic Sinhala and Tamil nationalisms. Sri Lanka is fortunate that the first conflict, the military one was concluded in 2009, with the destruction of the LTTE and in 2015 we were also fortunate to end the power conflict between the two parties by sharing executive power between the two major parties, enabling a remarkable constitutional reform process to be conducted through parliament, which may in the near future resolve the third and outstanding conflict of competing ethno-nationalisms through state reforms which would see the Sri Lankan state accommodate the full diversity of its society and end once and for all, what LTTE suicide victim, former Parliamentarian and lawyer Neelan Tiruchelvam described as “the anomaly of imposing a mono ethnic state on a multi ethnic polity”.

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

National Unity Government after one year

By Harim Peiris

( published in the Daily News )

August 19^th was the first anniversary of the National Unity Government elected after the last general elections and several political issues have dominated the recent news, especially the Office of Missing Persons (OMP) Act and the recent removal by the President as SLFP leader of Joint Opposition SLFP members from their posts as party organizers. Losing their posts were JO stalwarts Kheliya Rambukwella, CB Ratnayake, Pavithra Wanniarachchi, Gamini Lokuge, Mahinda Yapa Abeywardana and Jagath Balasuriya. Dallas Allaperuma and Bandula Gunawardena have announced their intention to resign, a wise move to do so, before they are also likely removed.

The most underlying feature of the Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration is that it is a unique unity experiment between the two major political parties which have alternatively governed this country since independence the United National Party (UNP), led by Prime Minister Wickramasinghe and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) led by President Maithripala Sirisena. What this has done, is pushed the third placed Tamil National Alliance (TNA) to the official opposition position for the first time since 1977 and more importantly created a very broad based government which has over two thirds support in Parliament and consequently able to carry through on a reform agenda, as demonstrated by the unanimous decision of parliament to be a constitutional assembly which will institutionalize and codify all reforms through a constitutional for Sri Lanka.

The German Experience

The practice of the two largest parties in the country and in parliament coming together to form, what might be termed a “grand national coalition” is not an unusual, phenomena in the world and while not common, is also found in other places. The best example would be Germany, where the Christian Democrats of Chancellor Angela Merkel and the Social Democratic Party, the two largest parties in that country have been forming grand national coalitions now on several occasions and likely to do so again in federal German elections due next year. The parties govern together and then separate to contest the elections. The parties are well established with their own ideologies, the Christian Democrats essentially the conservative right of center party and the Social Democrats as their name implies are left of center. Similar experiences exist in other countries with parliamentary democracies too, mostly in Europe.

Asserting control the slow and steady way

President Maithripala Sirisena has his own style and at times challenges Machiavellian orthodoxy for achieving and increasing control. Right after the presidential elections in January 2015, a shell shocked SLFP abandoned the defeated Rajapakses and moved over to President Sirisena. The nay Sayers existed even then but President Sirisena choose the less travelled path of refraining from taking drastic action against his political detractors and as party general secretary Minister Duminda Dissanayke said recently quietly watched and slowly took action. What has been occurring has been a slow but steady process of asserting control and slowly marginalizing the SLFP faction opposing his administration and supporting the joint opposition of former President Rajapaksa.

A new political formation and local government polls

The political strategists of the Joint Opposition, who regularly vow to come to power very soon, in much the same way as the old leftist firebrands used to promise that the revolution was around the corner, in the iron curtain era gone by, are staking their hopes on a new political formation led by former President Rajapaksa and contesting the local government and perhaps some provincial polls due next year. The strategy has a few serious weaknesses. Firstly, Sri Lankan politics is very unkind to third forces in general and breakaway factions in particular.  The JVP despite a very clear and distinct leftist identity has struggled to pose a democratic regime change challenge to the government securing only seven seats at the last election. The most significant previous breakaway from a main party was the Lalith Athulathmudali and Gamini Dissanayke led breakaway from the UNP, styled the Democratic United National Front (DUNF). It contested the first provincial council polls held after it was formed and secured 13% of the popular vote nationally, a remarkable performance but nonetheless had no staying power and is no more today.

Why the JO which essentially lost two elections last year with President Rajapaksa leading the fray believe that they would be third time lucky is unclear. One definition of lunacy is to do the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. The Rajapaksa message has not changed, strident ethno-nationalism with barely disguised racism will not produce any local government victories. Local government elections are not elections which change governments and hence always difficult to generate enthusiasm for voter turnout among opposition supporter. Further the first provincial council election due is the Eastern Province in mid-2017, an election in which the generally minority bashing, strident majoritarian nationalism of the Joint Opposition does not carry any appeal. The Muslim electorate of the Eastern Province would hardly be unaware that since last year’s January 8^th election, there has not been a single act of mob violence against mosques or places of minority religious worship. From a perspective of political violence, it also demonstrates remarkable command and control over violence, that an election result could stop political violence in its tracks. Sri Lankan democracy has been the winner, one year on for the national unity government.

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

Pada Yathra in retrospect

By Harim Peiris

(Published in the Daily News on 12/08/16)

The much heralded Pada Yathra or protest march by the Joint Opposition is now over and with the dust settling, the political impact and more lasting impact of the march on Sri Lanka’s political process should be accessed. Billed as the major initiative of the Joint Opposition for the mid-year, its organizers and JO theoreticians never meant it to be a regime changer of the Arab Spring variety, but rather as former President Rajapaksa himself described it, a rehearsal or a litmus test if you like of the joint oppositions mobilizing power and political strength.

Now the JO in parliament is relatively weak, at a little below fifty MPs in the two hundred and twenty-five-member assembly, the JO effectively concedes a constitution change enabling two third majority to the Sirisena / Wickramasinghe national unity government. With President Rajapaksa making only rare appearances in Parliament it falls on the shoulders of Dinesh Gunawardena to lead the JO in Parliament, but representing a single member MEP, he doesn’t carry much clout with either SLFP activists or nationally at the grass root level.

To compensate for a lack of gravitas in the House, the JO thrives on populist politics out of parliament and on the streets. However, even in this respect, the Pada Yathra was only a limited success. It did not attract mass support as it marched through towns, it was merely the organized activists who dutifully turned up as they would for a May-day rally.

Limits of ethnic nationalism

The Mahinda Rajapaksa led JO vision for the SLFP, is to turn it into a counterpart of the TNA, a regional political party with an appeal limited to only a single ethnic group. The TNA appeals to Tamil voters and draws support only from the North and East. The JO would wish to make the SLFP led UPFA to appeal only to Sinhala voters and draw support largely from the South and the Sinhala rural hinterlands and have no appeal to urban cosmopolites, ethnic and religious minorities. Coupled with disastrous and allegedly corrupt governance, such a limited appeal was what made the Rajapaksa presidency come to a premature end. The Rajapaksa political project when in government, ratcheted up majoritarian ethno-religious nationalism to its highest peak and yet at two elections last year came up well short. Why it believes that more of the same, will deliver a different result is hard to fathom. Perhaps it is what political theorists refer to as the lack of a moral imagination, the inability to see political possibilities, opportunities and necessities while being stuck in the past.

The Pada Yathra unified the Government

Given the initial two-year period of approval for the National Government granted by the SLFP central committee at the conclusion of last year’s general election, there was some genuine ambiguity at least within SLFP circles about the duration of the Unity Government. It is a well-known political fact that some activists and other political elements were working towards a rapprochement between the Sirisena and Rajapaksa factions of the SLFP, with the intent of replacing Prime Minister Wickramasinghe and the UNP with the Rajapaksa and the JO section of the UPFA. The intended outcome went even beyond a regime reconfiguration and was essentially a regime change without a parliamentary election, now barred under the 19^th Amendment.  It was to pander to this theory that the JO stalwarts kept repeating with little credibility that its opposition was not to President Sirisena but to the Wickramasinghe led government. This fig leaf came off entirely though the Pada Yathra. As best denoted by the novice Chilaw District MP, now suspended from the SLFP, for his vitriolic attacks against President Sirisena, the JO hostility is against both President Sirisena and Prime Minister Wickramasinghe. President Rajapaksa can seemingly never forget that he was beaten twice in one year, in January by President Sirisena and after wresting leadership of the UPFA campaign in August for a re-run as a multi-party exercise rather than the presidential two horse race, he again lost, this time to the Premier Wickramasinghe led UPFA in August last year. The JO hostility is towards both political entities that defeated them, not just one.

However, the political result of the JO populist assault on the Sirisena / Wickramasinghe Administration was that it made the Government close ranks. The SLFP Central Committee actually passed a resolution authorizing the National Unity Government for its full five-year term.  Most importantly President Sirisena, who faces the internal SLFP dissension, pledged and reiterated his political commitment to the national unity political arrangement. The Pada Yathra had the effect of last year’s presidential election it unified all Rajapaksa opponents against the JO. Even the JVP which had been studiously avoiding criticizing the previous Rajapaksa Administration after the general elections and focusing on being opposition watch dogs over the current Administration relaunched blistering and coordinated political attacks on Rajapaksa, the entire JVP leadership pitched into the Rajapaksa’s track record in governance and alleged corruption.

Within Sri Lanka, the Pada Yathra made six point two (6.2) million Sri Lankans to refocus their minds on why eighteen months ago they voted against Mahinda Rajapaksa and for Maithripala Sirisena. Not with standing a VAT tax increase and the slow pace of investigations into past regime abuses, there are seemingly few takers, at least willing to take to the streets, out of nostalgia for a return to Rajapaksa rule.

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