This week, an anniversary passed almost unnoticed: it is thirty-five years since ‘Black July’, the anti-Tamil racial riots that became a turning point in the Eelam war.
The anniversary hardly merited a mention in the mainstream media which is not shy to commemorate the births and deaths of all types of individuals, most of them politicians who have done more harm than good.
Our leaders of today did not issue ‘messages’ to recall the event although Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did. “On this day, we remember the victims of the 1983 anti-Tamil pogroms in Sri Lanka that took thousands of lives and displaced so many from their homes. We join Tamil-Canadians and members of the Tamil community around the world to mourn families and friends lost during Black July, and to reflect on the enduring human cost of the conflict in Sri Lanka”, Trudeau said in a statement.
That is not to suggest that Trudeau cares more about Sri Lanka than our own politicians. Canada was a country which attracted hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankans in the aftermath of July 1983 and Toronto is home to the largest Tamil community outside of Asia. Therefore, Trudeau was merely playing to the gallery, pandering to his electorate.
Still, thirty-five years after Black July, we must pause to ponder. Have we made progress? Is Sri Lanka better off as a nation? Have we laid the ghosts of Black July to rest?
Ask any of the so-called ‘patriots’ who are dime a dozen these days and they will tell you that we have. After all, we have ‘won the war’, haven’t we? Velupillai Prabhakaran is dead and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are no more. What more could one want?
In a strictly military interpretation, yes, we have made progress. The LTTE has indeed been vanquished though remnant organisations may exist, especially, overseas. Bombs no longer explode on our streets and on public transport. When one leaves home in the morning, he or she can be fairly confident of returning home in the evening.
However, have the issues that led to Black July been addressed satisfactorily? Can we be certain that a Black July will never happen again? The answer is ‘no’.
Black July may have happened overnight after thirteen army soldiers were killed at Thirunelveli in Jaffna by the LTTE on July 23, 1983. However, the triggers for Black July spanned generations. Historians can argue as to whether it began with D. S. Senanayake’s policy of colonisation or S. W. R. D. Banadaranaike’s ‘Sinhala Only’ agenda or Sirima Bandaranaike’s decision to introduce a ‘district basis’ for university admissions. All of the above, and then some, would be a more accurate conclusion.
The question now is, since the end of the Eelam war more than nine years ago and after Black July thirty-five years ago, where are we? Have we created conditions conducive for ‘minority’ communities to live, work and co-exist in harmony? This too cannot be done overnight but are we at least heading in the right direction?
Former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, regardless of whatever he chooses to do with the rest of his political life, will be remembered with gratitude by Sri Lankans because he ended the Eelam war. He did so earning the wrath of some western powers and human rights lobbies that were well-oiled by the Eelam propaganda lobby. For that, the nation will be grateful and history will be kind to him.
However, if winning the war was Rajapaksa’s greatest achievement, losing the peace was his greatest failure. He was astute enough to realise that, after winning the war, he could win another election. He went on to do just that and no one can blame him for that.
However, instead of playing statesman, he then played politician. If Mahinda Rajapaksa came up with a reasonable framework that addressed the grievances of minority communities and devolved a degree of power to them, the majority community would have accepted that, so high was his standing among them.
Whatever solution he came up with, he could have sold it to the Sinhalese Buddhist majority because they trusted him enough to know that he wouldn’t betray their interests. On the contrary, whatever solution Ranil Wickremesinghe offered to the majority, it would have been viewed with suspicion because, with a history of the failed Ceasefire Agreement behind him, he didn’t enjoy the same degree of confidence among them.
Unfortunately for Sri Lanka, Mahinda Rajapaksa chose not to restore the dignity of the minorities after his war victory. Though being hailed as a modern day Dutugemunu, he failed to follow in the footsteps of Dutugemunu who honoured his adversary, Elara. Of course, we are not suggesting that he should have built a monument for Prabhakaran, but he could have been more conciliatory in victory. Instead he chose to ride on the same wave of majoritarianism.
In not being magnanimous to the minorities in victory, Mahinda Rajapaksa forfeited a once in an era chance that history offered him to put to rest Sri Lanka’s ethnic discontent. Ironically, that was to cost him his third term of office where he was ousted mostly because the North and East voted resoundingly against him.
That left the ‘Yahapalanaya’ government to try and remedy all the grievances accumulated by the minorities during the Mahinda era.
They have redressed some of the issues to some extent and restored the country’s image overseas. However, enacting a new Constitution is now a dream for this government which is in damage control mode, with one party rocked by defections and the other tainted by scandal, and both struggling for re-election.
Like many governments and leaders before them, this government and its leaders have made many promises, but failed to deliver. To expect them to now deliver the minorities out of their dissatisfaction is to expect Prabhakaran to vie for the Nobel Peace Prize; it simply won’t happen.
And therein lies the danger. We, as a nation, haven’t learnt the lessons of Black July. So, we may be condemned to repeat it.