by Suranimala 

While the People's Alliance was thrown into disarray with more high profile members continuing to defect and still others refusing to contest, an elaborate Goebellsian media blitzkering came into operation last week to offset the damage.The strategy worked out is to throw as much dirt as possible on the PA rebels in particular and the opposition in general in a bid to reinforce the government position that 

For want of any achievement to show in the fields of economic development, the peace front or the law and order situation, the tactic was to go on a negative campaign and hope for the best.

Stealing a march

And with the elections commissioner now entitled to exercise his authority in controlling the state media under the 17th amendment to the constitution, the PA thinking was to fire as many shots as possible before the commissioner gets activated in terms of the law and steal a march over the opposition.

To the credit of the PA, the party has worked the numbers and has come to the realisation that it will take nothing short of a miracle to get reelected and that therefore they should throw every weapon in its armoury for the battle.

The legal niceties of defamation were of course of no concern to the ruling dispensation as it is the state that would eventually have to foot the bills for damages unlike the private media and in that backdrop sent signal for the no holds barred offensive.

It is for this purpose that even an Air Force helicopter was used to film the Hanguranketha residence of former minister S.B. Dissanayake with Urban Development Minister Mangala Samaraweera playing the lead role.

S.B. Dissanayake, the man whom both President Chandrika Kumaratunga and Minister Mangala Samaraweera defended as a paragon of virtue not many moons ago as will also be evinced in the parliamentary proceedings on the Susanthika Jayasinghe debate, was overnight the villain of the piece. It was a case of political hypocrisy at its worst.

Sadly for the government however, there were no other big players other than the president and Samaraweera to take on the might of the combined opposition.

To most senior members, it is the likes of Minister Samaraweera who together with the president reduced the government to its current predicament and they were not about to pull the chestnuts out of the fire, opting instead to concentrate on their own campaigns, rather than earn the wrath of a government in waiting.

As one minister from the south told another from the western province on Wednesday after the cabinet meeting, "They made this bed of thorns, now let them lie in it. Why should we get pricked?"

In fact, the displeasure of several ministers at the Goebellisan media strategy of the state was made known at Wednesday's cabinet meeting which incidentally, the president did not attend.

What had particularly backfired on the government was the attack on former Colombo district MP, Bandula Gunawardene, a highly respected teacher with an impeccable record of honesty. This attack on Gunawardene in the state Sinhala media accusing him of indulging in promoting nude photography led to such a backlash, even MEP leader Dinesh Gunawardene's brother Prasanna, a former UDA chairman offered to contest on the UNP ticket in a show of solidarity with Bandula Gunawardene.

Likewise, the Mahanayake Thero of the Malwatte Chapter, Ven Rambukwelle, Sri Vipassi Thero no less, told a JVP delegation led by Propaganda Secretary Wimal Weerawansha that he deplored the ugly media campaign of the government particularly against Professor G.L. Peiris.

Thus, when the ministers met on Wednesday, Port Development Minister Mahinda Rajapakse raised issue of the 'mud campaign,' stating it was totally counter productive to the government.

Counter productive

"We must act with responsibility. When you throw mud at people like Bandula Gunawardene, it lacks total credibility. People will not accept such stories. The Lake House has gone off the rails," the minister charged.

Continuing, the minister said such attacks will not help consensus politics after the elections to solve the burning problems confronting the country, a view endorsed by Transport Minister Dinesh Gunawardene.

"Don't print lies. It won't help, sooner or later the truth comes out and it becomes totally counter productive," the transport minister said.

With several other ministers expressing similar views, the prime minister himself said the PA cannot hope to win this election by lying about people. He said the people will question the government as to why it was silent all this time if the defectors were guilty of the sins they are now accused of.

Interestingly, hours before the cabinet meeting, Minister Rajapakse met with Bandula Gunawardene and appealed for him and the rebels to return to the fold by letting bygones be bygones.

It was media man, Rohan Welivita who arranged the meeting and drove Gunawardene to the minister's Gregory's Road residence at 7 a.m. on the morning of Wednesday, October 17.

At this meeting, Minister Rajapakse told Gunawardene his defection was a big blow to the PA and should reconsider his position on an agreed proposal.

"If you were with me, I would not have allowed this to happen. Can't we put it right? We can prepare a programme and start working on an agreed agenda. We will ensure the past mistakes are not repeated," Rajapakse said.

However, Gunawardene dismissed the suggestion as a dream in fantasy land not worthy of consideration.

"I came here out of respect for you. How can you promise anything? Look at what has happened to you. You were not given a role to play in this government despite your seniority. Now they have brought back Anura Bandaranaike to keep the party within the family. Only disaster awaits this country under this family," Gunawardene said.

Continuing Gunawardene said, given the filthy media campaign unleashed by the government devoid of any decency, it was impossible for him to even think of any links with the PA. Rajapakse agreed.

Return strike

Said the minister: "Yes, no self respecting person would return under such circumstances. These fellows are fools. We don't know what's going to happen after the election. Therefore we must act with responsibility. If there is any hope for a government of national reconciliation after the election, this media campaign does not help that cause."

And as anticipated, within hours the return strike came from former minister S.B. Dissanayake who went on a blistering attack against the president, Samaraweera and JVP's Wimal Weerawansha over the private television station, TNL, the likes of which were never seen on television earlier.

That apart, the government had more problems to cope with following several members refusing to contest not only due to the slim chances of the PA but the shoddy treatment meted out to them while in government.

Already several members including Nirupama Rajapakse, Priyankara Jayaratne and Wijayamuni Soysa have declined nominations with Dilan Perera insisting he be given an electorate other than Mahiyangana in the Badulla district, if he is to throw his hat into the ring. Even Ministers D.M. Jayaratne and Anuruddha Ratwatte have sought nominations on the national list with only Jayaratne now expected to succeed.

What has caused panic in PA circles is the inevitability of defeat given the past election results under the proportional representation system.

It is the hopeless situation of the SLFP in this regard that prompted Kumaratunga to forge a broad alliance in 1994 inclusive of the minority parties, which is today in tatters.

The PA realises only too well, it does not stand a ghost of a chance of reaching the 113 target in the current situation, hence the decision of several members not to contest leading to the panic situation.

This reality dawned after the PA top notchers went through the election results of 1994 and 2000 and found they will struggle to get 90 seats at this election.

In August 1994, with the PA popularity at a peak, the party could muster only 105 seats and it was the seven seats contributed by the Muslim Congress and Up Country People's Front Leader P. Chandrasekeran's single seat that took the alliance to the magical 113 figure to form a government.

Winning side

The PA fortunes dipped sharply at the October 2000 elections despite having on this occasion, the CWC, the Muslim Congress and the MEP on board, barely reaching 96 seats. It is the 11 seats of the Muslim Congress, four by the CWC and five by the EPDP that took the government to the 116 figure. Mind you, that is at an election where a powerful group in the UNP led by Wijepala Mendis too having crossed over to the PA and the president 10 months earlier winning the presidential election.

Despite all these factors favouring the PA in October 2000, it could still muster only 96 seats, nine short of their 1994 figure.

However, this time around, the Muslim Congress and the CWC are no longer with the PA and so is the EPDP, which has said it will support the winning side, not to mention a formidable group led by S.B. Dissanayake who spearheaded the October campaign too in the opposition corner. The roles have truly reversed.

Thus, Kumaratunga and the PA are all alone with no prospect of getting anywhere near 113 seats, and lucky to reach even 90, making it a foregone conclusion, there will be no PA government come December 6, 2001, even if the JVP decides to extend its dwindling support for the Alliance.

The question then is whether the combined opposition of the UNP, SLMC, CWC, UPF and the PA rebel team can muster 113 seats collectively. That seems more than possible.

The UNP is generally considered a minority friendly party and the inclusion of the Muslim Congress and the CWC to their lot will only help increase the total minority vote to the opposition alliance that much more. The Sinhala factor is also in tact with the inclusion of the PA rebels and the Bhoomi Putras.

This development has to be compared to UNP's October 2000 performance where the party running alone on that occasion in the backdrop of the then circumstances of a split still returned 89 members.

Therefore, now, with the new configuration, what the opposition has to achieve is getting elected to parliament just one more MP from every district. That would take the combined opposition to well over 113 members especially given the huge swing in the Western, Eastern, Uva, Sabaragamuwa and Central provinces given the Muslim and Estate Tamil votes in these provinces.

Thus, most PA members are alive to the fact, forming a government is out of the question, hence the decision to watch from the sidelines without getting involved in a bitter campaign.

The desperation of the government in this overall context is such, President Kumaratunga was constantly on the phone, on occasion for over one hour with former Minister Lakshman Kirella and his wife, pleading for him to stay put in the PA. Kiriella's wife is a cousin of Kumaratunga.

Even 24 hours before Kiriella joined the UNP, Kumaratunga was on the telephone promising to put things right and make amends for the member's ouster from the cabinet if he could only change his mind.

Said Kiriella: "I have been ill treated from the very outset and our government has failed to honour any of the promises made to the people. The economy is in a mess and there is no prospect of peace. I am sorry, you have left it too late."

Subsequently, the president was to also call Kiriella's wife but was politely informed she did not get involved in her husband's political decisions.

In contrast, UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe was only too happy to see Anura Bandaranaike go back to the PA fold, all too aware of the fact, it will before long lead to division.

Taking the plunge

Interestingly, Bandaranaike sought a meeting with Wickremesinghe last week before taking the plunge, in the hope he would be offered a national list slot in the UNP. Wickremesinghe was earlier sounded of this possibility by a mutual friend on the basis, Bandaranaike will find it difficult to win on the UNP ticket in the Gampaha district.

The UNP leader who was in the know of Bandaranaike's health problems did not want to shoot down the proposal straight away but sounded party seniors of the likes of Assistant Leader Gamini Athukorale and Charitha Ratwatte.

The response was an emphatic 'no' with Athukorale telling Wickrem- esinghe that the price of betraying the party should not be a national list slot.

"Let him go, he will wreak havoc in the PA. Already Mahinda Rajapaske is complaining about his reentry," Athukorale said.

Ironically, even as the UNP top notchers were discussing Bandaran- aike's future, in walked former Deputy Speaker Sarath Moonesinghe who was informed that Wickreme- singhe was on his way for a meeting with the former speaker.

Said, Moonesinghe: "He told me he was joining the PA," which comment saw Charitha Ratwatte telling Wickremesinghe every possible signal must be given for Bandaranaike to return to the PA.

And when the duo met, Wickremesinghe studiously avoided making any offer to Bandaranaike and he was to dejectedly later tell confidantes, the UNP made no effort whatsoever to keep him within the fold.

Meanwhile the JVP is also increasingly coming under flak with a complaint against Wimal Weerawansha now lodged at the Permanent Commission Investigating Allegations of Bribery and Corruption.

The complaint made by Lal Perera, former coordinating secretary to Anura Bandaranaike has not only referred to the account at the People's Bank branch at Nugegoda but also Weerawansha's failure to disclose in the assets and declaration form a loan of Rs. 70,000 he took from the Colombo Municipal Council.

While the amount itself is not much, the failure to make the payment to the council has seriously affected Weerawansha's credibility. Weerawansha's salary was to be deducted monthly to settle this loan but no payments were made after he left the council and entered the provincial council and later parliament.

What is significant is the fact that though the monthly deductions would have been marginal to most, for a person like Weerawansha who claims not to even have a bank account or any other income, the amount so deducted would have been a fair sum.

Pay back time

Thus, he would necessarily have known the monies were not deducted when he went into the provincial council and made no effort to either call for the deduction or pay back the monies due. Furthermore, he did not disclose the fact in his assets and liabilities declaration either.

Given what he is reported to have declared, the over Rs. 35,000 still due is a princely amount and has now left himself open to a criminal prosecution.

The full text of the complaint reads thus:

The Chairman & Members

of the Commission to Investigate

Bribery and Corruption

Complaint against Mr. Wimal Weerawansha, former Member of Parliament

Dear Sirs,

I wish to bring to your attention that Mr. Wimal Weerawansha former Member of Parliament is the holder of a joint bank account bearing account no 01741650068569 at the Peoples Bank, Nugegoda Branch with a person named P.G.R.P. Ferdinandaz. This account has been in operation for quite some time, having been opened in mid 1990's and to the best of my belief is still being operated. I annex hereto marked X1 to X9 photocopies of some of the bank statements of this account. You would note from the said statements that large sums of monies had been credited to this account from time to time. Quite apart from the fact as to how Mr. Weerawansha came by this money to be credited to his joint account, I verily believe that Mr. Weerawansha had failed to include the existence of this account and monies lying in this account in his Declaration of Assets and Liabilities tendered to parliament. This would therefore amount to a contravention of the declaration of assets and labilities-law no 1 of 1975 and an offence punishable under that law. I am aware that Mr. Wimal Weerawansha had also not disclosed a loan he had obtained from the Colombo Municipal Council, which too was unpaid at the time of his declaration of assets and liabilities.

I am bringing these matters to your attention to enable you to cause investigations to be made with a view to dealing with Mr. Weerawansha under the law.

Yours faithfully,

sgd

Lal Perera.

And with nominations to conclude on October 27, the battle lines are clearly drawn with no quarter given and none asked. 

By Erskine 

Robbing Peter to pay Paul is a biblical aphorism, the irony of which is entirely lost on the People's Alliance. Hot on the heels of the election she was forced to call in December, Chandrika Kumaratunga announced a basket of bribes which she hopes will induce voters to forgive her sins and usher in a government that would facilitate another seven years of the most vulgar abuse post-independent Sri Lanka has seen.

So endemic is corruption in the political classes that politicians seems to take it for granted that the voters too, can be bought for Rs. 1,200/- and a modest reduction in direct taxation.

So gullible is Kumaratunga that she has not anticipated that the government service might just pocket the handout and still vote against her. For although the run of the mill government servant is not Sorbonne savvy (as Kumaratunga claims to be), he or she knows that at the end of the day it is not Kumaratunga's own wealth that is being ladled out: it is the people's hard-earned cash, raked in through the highest taxation since Sirima Bandaranaike's repugnant Ceiling on Income policy of 1970-77. There is no such thing as a free lunch (a truism lost on the Bandaranaikes who for the most part seem to think the public owes them a living): every cent paid to government employees comes from taxes of one kind or another, GST, NSL, SNF, customs duty and the plethora of other levies the PA has inflicted on the people so as to fund its corruption and extravagance.

If Kumaratunga wanted to make a difference, she could well have stopped work on the multibillion rupee presidential palace now being built for her. She could have suspended operations on the palatial speaker's residence now being built for her brother, luxuriously furnished in the most extravagant style by her sister. If the people have their way come the fifth of December (note that the date 5.12.2001 adds up to 11, just like so many things associated with Mr Bin Laden's attack on America last month), neither Kumaratunga nor her brother will have the pleasure of occupying the mansions they have built for themselves with the people's money.

G. L. Peiris last week provided as elegant an analysis of the handout Kumaratunga is offering the country, in order to induce it to repose its faith in her once more. Peiris pointed out that the government's incentives package would cost the exchequer a staggering Rs 11 billion and asked where the money would come from.

Last Wednesday the Daily News in a prominent front-page headline announced, "How pay-hike is financed." The body of the article however, failed notably to support the headline's promise, and stated only that the government would meet this expense "from savings on any subject of recurrent expenditure or transfer of funds provided [by law]." Fancy that: the cash-strapped government, which has imposed on the public 12.5 percent GST and numerous other tariffs, gets to October of the year and discovers that it has Rs 11 billion more than it needs. The first ever budget surplus in the history of southern Asia, and another feather in the positively avian cap of that master economist, Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. And she only studied for a PhD in economics: just think of the salad days we might all have enjoyed if she had actually passed the exam!

G. L. Peiris has made it known that his reasons for leaving the Kumaratunga Government derive largely from the President's domination over the country's finance policy, which has in turn led to economic disaster. Peiris has become an articulate and outspoken critic of Kumaratunga's, and the professor's cold, calculating reason is clearly irksome to the president. So much so that the Rhodes Scholar professor who is an Oxford first-class and PhD, was just last week accused by Kumaratunga of being 'an idiot.' And if that is not a symptom of an inferiority complex, what is?

Peiris was not slow to come back, even if too well bred to lower his language to the coarseness of hers. Alluding to the abortive referendum called by Kumaratunga earlier this year, he noted that the question framed by Kumaratunga for the referendum was so meaningless that had a first-year law student concocted it, he or she would have been failed. The professor was undoubtedly aware that her many youthful attempts at an education included several classes in law at Aquinas College. Peiris was also quick to note that though he was minister of constitutional affairs, the president's late-night decision to call a referendum was made known to him only after the event, and even then by the JVP's Wimal Weerawansa.

Poor Chandrika Kumaratunga. She is at her wit's end (and no great wit that). Deprived of her parliamentary majority, she is like a lioness dispossessed of a cub, her eyes ablaze and her tail lashing. Ready to take the credit for any success going, our president is notoriously averse to pointing the finger at herself. A spoilt childhood followed by a life of indulgence saw to that.

Looking at her evil empire collapsing about her, Kumaratunga has embarked on a witch-hunt for scapegoats, or at any rate, goats of any description. Kumaratunga is understandably irked and vexed by her predicament. Unable to see the starring role she played in the downfall and break-up of her own party, she cannot resist looking for others on whom to pin the blame. Prime among these is S. B. Dissanayake, not long ago the apple of her eye. Addressing her party organisers recently, Kumaratunga hastened to pin the blame for the country's financial misfortunes on Dissanayake. It was he who had made a mess of Samurdhi and entered into a string of odious undertakings at the behest of the World Bank. Surprise then that Kumaratunga, less than a month ago, offered the very same suite of portfolios to Dissanayake should he rejoin the fold: such was her confidence in him. If he was, as she says, so corrupt and inefficient, why did she attempt to re-appoint him to the cabinet? Or is it that ministers are welcome to be corrupt and inefficient so long as they are on her side?

It was Wijepala Mendis however, who put his finger on the nub. The fall of the PA he said, was due entirely to Chandrika Kumaratunga's arrogance and lackadaisical approach to government. She does not attend most cabinet meetings, and even when she does, she is always late, keeping the ministers waiting endlessly. In fact, the former UNP heavyweight noted, Kumaratunga's dog often enters the cabinet room on time long before she does!

Be that as it may, the reason why Kumaratunga should be smoked out of the office she holds is not her unpunctuality: it is her complete incompetence. In every front, from the war through development to honest government, Kumaratunga has been a glaring failure. She may well attribute her party's downfall to "traitors", but it is she alone who must bear responsibility for their deserting her. For six long years the media have reported her delinquent approach to politics, and she cannot be unaware that she is the object of ridicule. Well may the tragedy that has befallen the PA irks her, and well may she be vexed, but it is a folly of her own doing, and she has only herself to blame. She has presided over what is arguably the most corrupt administration in the history of this country. Thank god it is history. 

by Dayan Jayatilleka 

Marx called the economy the 'real foundations' of society. Last Saturday I realised there's a timebomb ticking in the real foundations of Lankan society - its economy. In an intellectual effort at 'holism' so rare in this town, the ICES Colombo had organised a searching session on the 'Present Crisis in Sri Lanka.' The opening presentation, a neo-realist cameo, zapped me between the eyes. If the newly-launched American military satellite sends back as sharp and clear a picture of Afghanistan's mountains as that which the speaker, Dr. Dushni Weerakoon (editor of the Sri Lanka Economists' Association Journal and Senior Research Fellow at the IPS) gave us of the Lankan economy in her crisp, unruffled exposition, and if their laser-guided 'smart' munitions operate with as much surgical precision as she displayed in that comprehensive yet lean, compact analysis (15 minutes flat), then they should break out the bubbly in the Pentagon.

I cannot hope to summarise her superb presentation (strikingly different from corporate sector-based economic analysis), but what I learned was that (a) the Lankan economy's indicators point today in the direction of a crisis, the only precedents for which, in the post-colonial period, are 1957 and the early 1970s (specially 1971) (b) this reflects a crisis that is deep-going and possibly structural (c) the usual options have run out or are running out (e.g. foreign commercial borrowings) (d) present tendencies give little hope of 'exiting' the crisis, and the possible knock-on effects of the Afghan war will exacerbate it (e) whatever the political or ideological predilections of the policy-maker or policy-analyst, the objective economic reality will have to be confronted, and confronted objectively (as, say, a specialist doctor would have to regard a very sick patient).

What follows is a pulling together of my own ideas of the crisis, an exercise catalyzed by the ICES seminar, and in a sense intended to supplement that economic analysis, perhaps balancing off some (or some aspects) of its implicit policy prescriptions.

1. Sri Lanka is undergoing a decades-long crisis, and going by Antonio Gramsci, one of the finest modern thinkers, such 'exceptional duration; itself reveals the contradictions to be structural in character.

2. As the year 2001 enters the closing quarter we cannot find a better description of Lankan prospects than a line of Gramsci's written in 1919: "we totter between catastrophe.... and a worse catastrophe". That catastrophe looms at the intersection of the 'base' and the 'superstructure', of economics and the militarized politics of identity; it is sourced in the overlap of twin crises, located in the realms of economics and ethnic relations. The country is dividing two ways: territorially and socially, ethnically and economically, horizontally and vertically. North/South, haves/have-nots.

3. These crises are interconnected, interactive, mutually reinforcing. They will intensify, reaching the point when a chain reaction of explosions are triggered. If the right kind of reforms can be introduced at the right time and in the right measure, then a new and more benign equilibrium can be achieved. If not, the result will be chaos and collapse, anarchy and barbarism.

4. While the crisis is multifaceted and each facet interacts with the other, those who discuss any one aspect of the crisis hardly ever display an awareness of the other - and that is part of the crisis. The crisis is, among other things, a crisis in thinking, a crisis of perspective. Put more rigorously, the Lankan crisis is also a crisis of theory. The crisis of theory blocks a theory of the crisis. The absence of a theory of a crisis, compounds the crisis itself. In order to manage and then resolve the crisis in reality, it must first be apprehended in theory.

5. The Lankan crisis resides in the inability to hold in equipoise, two sets of antinomies; antinomies positioned along two axes: (a) north-south (b) growth-equity. Or to put the same thing slightly and socioeconomic questions - adequately and simultaneously, and to do so while grasping their external dimensions. No Lankan administration, political party, leader, policy maker or influential intellectual has been able to continuously hold the social question and the national question in proper (albeit shifting) balance, according each its proper (albeit changing) weightage and significance. One or other dimension is ignored or misunderstood, or the two dimensions are collapsed together. The scales are never firmly held right.

6. The northern and southern questions have not been simultaneously comprehended in (a) their distinctive specificity and (b) their interaction. Sri Lanka's 'long crisis' is centrally 'the crisis of nationalities.' But the core is not the totality. The Lankan crisis cannot therefore be reduced to the Tamil national question.

7. The southern or social/developmental question cannot be addressed without recognising the crucial importance of the northern question. No southern project (social/developmental) can succeed which fails to recognise - or recognises inadequately - the northern problem.

8. The country's economic development is tripped up by the ethnic fault lines, the lines of ethnic fissure in the social formation taken as a totality. Thus periods of high economic performance and prospects (there were none under the SLFP) turn out to be episodic, non-durable, unsustainable over the longer term. One way or another, they were shipwrecked on the crags of the ethnic question: July '83, the '87 anti-accord upheavals and the southern insurrection - on J. R. Jayewardene's watch. In the case of Premadasa, extermination at the LTTE's hands - extinguishing his successful experiment in growth with equity.

9. What marks the Lankan situation sharply from that of other states and societies, is the war: its presence, its prolonged persistence, its high levels of intensity, the unique resoluteness of its prosecutor, the LTTE, the persona of Prabhakaran. Inextricably linked with the war is its older sibling, the ethnonational question. Those who concede this symbiotic linkage, regrettably also confuse it. They consider addressing the ethnic question coterminousness with stopping the war; and the struggle for peace, co-extensive with talking to the Tigers.

10. The northern question cannot be resolved without recognising its 'embedded-ness' in the southern matrix. No solution which generates a majoritarian backlash can resolve the national question. The facile recommendation of negotiations with the LTTE and de-facto federalism, ignores the blowback effects on the economy of adventurist reforms on collective identity issues. A blinkered reformism which adds majoritarian ethnic misapprehension to mass socioeconomic disaffection would create a highly explosive compound. The contemporary economic history of the country is forgotten - July '83 as well the abysmal growth rates that resulted from the post-accord southern mayhem. The conceptual problem is the substitution of economics for political economy.

11. At stake is the state, without which there can be no survival for society or nation. The Lankan state is threatened on several fronts. The LTTE strive to decapitate it, slicing away part of its territory. Moreover, the activity of this powerful parallel army ceaselessly undermines the stability of the state as a whole i.e. in the south as well. Economic neoliberalism rolls the Lankan state back in the public sphere and that of material resources. Externally-supported pressures for federalisation (as distinct from genuine devolution/autonomy) would, if acceded to, crack the foundations of the state formation. If the state cracks up, beyond its ruins lie atomisation, lawlessness, warlordism, anarchy. The Mad Max mode of social being.

12. Mass economic hardship impacts toxicity to ethnic relations. Neo-liberal economic practices turn liberal ethnic reforms radioactive. Economic 'stabilisation' packages tend to de-stabilise the social equilibrium, which in turn de-stabilises the economy. Real-time, real world. Many more people have died in Sri Lanka as a result of political violence - insurrections and their suppression - in the south, than as a result of the north-eastern war. What is worth the risk of re-opening the southern front?

13. While macroeconomic progress is unviable without sensitivity to and swift redressal of mass economic grievances, the converse is also and quite as true: a sustainable rise in mass living standards and indeed even the protection of them at current levels is impossible without a mature sense of macroeconomic responsibility.

14. The discussion on the ethnic problem proceeds along polarised lines. The cosmopolitan left-liberals are for peace with the LTTE and for federalism; the xenophobic left and radical right, for relentless militarism and Sinhala hegemonism. Either utopian pacificism and a destabilising degree of reform or the unsustainable retention and strengthening of the status-quo. What is required however, is a centrist position which stands for regional autonomy (not federalism, still less a confederation) and armed struggle against the fascist LTTE. Empirical evidence from numerous opinion polls shows that the bulk of the people are for precisely a two track policy of war with the Tigers and fuller provincial (though not quite regional) devolution. Somewhere between the '13th amendment plus' and the August 2000 draft, and nothing beyond, would be saleable to the majority.

15. Federalism (even by another name) is not a metaphysical evil but neither is it a viable option. Had a federal/quasi-federal constitution been in place for the past several decades, there would not have been - because there could not have been - land reforms, the Mahaweli project, Swarnabhoomi, land redistribution through the presidential land task force, the million and the 1.5 million houses programmes, Janasaviya, the 200 garment factories programme etc. In as volatile a polity as ours how long would the system have survived without these interventions? How long would the system survive in the future without such programmes and more pertinently, without the capacity for such programmes?

16. Those who advocate still greater liberalisation and privatisation of the economy and of certain public spheres, are blind to the Alpine range of evidence presented at the Copenhagen UN Social Summit in 1995 and in numerous other global fora and unimpeachable reports since, on the social devastation and abject mass misery - as well as the fundamentalist backlashes - which follow in the wake of such policies. Similarly, the anti-open economy forces are blind to the social consequences of the policies they advocate: the disaster of the United Front's economics of 1970-77 in Sri Lanka, the famine in Mengistu's Ethiopia, famine and episodic cannibalism in China during the 'great leap forward' and the cultural revolution. Today's economic emergency requires the transcending of polarised policy packages, not in the spirit of assembling a buffet of the desirable, but of undertaking the difficult struggle for synthesis.

17. Historically, the SLFP has best defended the sate, most ably representing its interests and enhancing its prestige in the global arena. The UNP has been the party of economic development and the material welfare of the masses. Each has been deficient in the area of achievement of the other - hence the natural pendulum swing of our post-war evolution. The positive capacities remain, perhaps residually, in collective memories and instincts of the mainframe of each party. The country requires that these historic strengths be excavated, tapped, reactivated, harnessed; that synergies be created.

18. We face an economic 'Elephant Pass.' After September 11, and with the US-led 'War on Terror' impacting on the South Asian region, all equations may be erased. Crisis management is too important to be left to any incumbent administration and the crisis too dangerous to be left as the agit-prop plaything of any opposition. The crisis must be socially co-managed, drawing on the talents and energies of the community as a whole. On economic matters an inclusive approach should be adopted, bringing together capital, labour and state in a trilateral alliance which will result in a new social contract. This contract should be based on a balance of interests between all sectors, resulting in mutual trade-offs plus incentives for all. A constructive, centripetal process predicated on an inclusionary rather than an imposed (top-down) or unilateralist one; an approach which recognises an interlocking of social interests and strives for a balance of contending concerns. The objective should be to make all of society stakeholders in the economy, thereby leading to economic resuscitation, greater productivity, higher incomes all around and greater competitiveness in the world economy.

19. A wide ranging review of the negative trends in the Lankan economy with a view to rectifying them, can be undertaken by means of a structured policy roundtable - with the state, the parliamentary opposition's, leading business associations and trade union federations as participants. Remedial measures - which by definition would exclude those that may jeopardise the viability of Sri Lanka in the world economy - should be swiftly implemented. Such an 'economic policy roundtable' could construct a consensus on the content of policy, balancing fiscal and social realities and hammering out mutual social trade-offs at least for the duration of this economic emergency.

20. We need an economic 'war room' run by an Economic Crisis Management and Response Team, with multi-party underguiding, bringing together our best economic minds (and chaired by Minister Ronnie de Mel) to monitor the war and the global recession, brace for impact, work out scenarios, do projections of damage, and spin-out options for counter measures. 

By Amantha Perera in Washington 

Travelling through the land of paranoia, there is a very basic difference between the manner an American fills a wine glass of a guest from the way a Sri Lankan would. While the latter would fill it almost to the rim, the former would only fill it half way. Why? Dr Joann Craig, an anthropologist at the San Francisco State University thinks she has the answer.

"The American fills it half because he wants the guest to smell the wine, to get the aroma, he looks at the guest as a connoisseur of wines. Like himself, who knows the art of wine," she said. She observed that the simple difference is one example of the way the American culture collides with the Asian counterpart. "Americans tend to be very scientific and the individual is more important than the group for them," she opined.

The same cultural shock may come to haunt America in its quest to maul the Osama bin Laden terrorist network. Yes, President George Bush may have put together a coalition, but his country would be hard pressed to root out the basic cause for the creation of another Al-queda if it proceeds with the attitude of the global bully. Even at home the culture shocks are now making the news. While the US theoretically leads a coalition internationally, on the home turf the cultural differences among groups that make the melting -pot of the modern world are becoming more pronounced. Arab Americans are coming out airing their fears of personal safety, while other groups have come up with difference of opinion.

Right through, in my meetings with Americans from all levels in society, from cab drivers to university professors, I have felt the polarization of opinion along racial lines. While most white Americans have very little doubt as to how the country should proceed with taking out the perpetrators of the September 11 attacks, others like the Hispanic and the Asian communities are more circumspect.

The differences are not limited to race or religion, in San Francisco punks and war veterans clashed two weeks ago because the younger generation had defaced a flag put up by the older one with the letters 'ATM' that stood for Anti Terrorist Movement. Yes, every where there are the Union Jacks, but here and there incidents of flag burning have been reported.

What makes America tick these days is the war and the fear of more attacks. "I expect more attacks," says Prof. Orville Schell, dean of the journalism department at Berkley University, San Francisco. And what would be the reaction if there are more attacks. "The US will get angry and more nationalistic." The fear is manifested in the form of Bin Laden. Last week, I walked into a bar in down town Washington DC and found the drink of the day titled 'The absolute prick - Osama bin Laden.'

To the outsider, it looks as if the US is only interested in the military action and wishy-washy diplomatic deals to hold it together. Just talk to State Department officials and you get the picture. "All other issues have to take a back seat for now," officials said when questioned as to how the US plans to tackle the tricky issues of Kashmir let alone the one on Eelam. Meaning, for the time being lets take out Osama and clan, and deal with the other issues at a later date. Politics as usual.

According to Stephen Hess, Senior Fellow of Government Studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington DC, who has served as an advisor to US presidents, the US is walking a fine line when it has to deal with organizations that base their action on geographic definitions like the LTTE. The Bush administration is praying to god that it can hold together the coalition from splintering along country specific agendas. "We are concerned that the focus might shift to Kashmir from Kabul," state department officials pointed out last week.

While they were talking with The Sunday Leader their fears were coming true with India shelling Pakistani territory along the disputed Kashmir border. Pakistan denied Indian accusations that there were attempts by militants to infiltrate. The US was seemingly giving into Pakistani pressure when Secretary of state Collin Powell announced the day after the Indian attacks, that any post Bin Laden administration in Afghanistan should include representation from the Taliban. Pakistan is a major backer of the regime while India openly supports the Northern Alliance. Personally they all admit that they are worried about the tag 'fighting global terrorism' attributed to the present military action which they believe could allow various interpretations to be heaped on it.

And the US has had to soft peddle issues that it has championed at least on the books to fight Al-queda. It has gone slow on human rights and autocratic regimes. "In carrying the coalition we are in bed with a lot of autocratic regimes," Hess admitted adding that it has been a very practical coalition right from the onset. But the US has been doing this for a long, long time. The problem is that most policy makers fail to realize that flawed US foreign policy is partially to be blamed for the present mess.

Hess believes that Bin Laden latched on to the Palestine cause and Iraqi children as comfortable excuses and did not feel that foreign policy had a major deal to do in creating the extremists. Even journalists do not see the folly of US foreign policy. While admitting that the focus shifted inwards soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990's (coverage of foreign news has fallen to 2% in the US national press), they argue that the militancy in the Middle East has more to do with the situation in the region.

They still feel that the almost 6000 lives lost on September 11 are far more important than the thousands killed in wars like in Sri Lanka or Afghanistan or Somalia. The attitude of holier than thou and only American lives are important still lingers imbedded in the tone of their speech after so much of suffering and heartache. But funnily enough, US decision makers understand that the country has been propping up regimes like the one in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and that such conduct has created a bad impression, especially among the general public in such countries who look at such regimes as corrupt.

"We have a real problem in dealing with the people on the streets (in these countries) and the governments," Hess said admitting that there was a gap that existed between the two groups but the US might not be getting the correct message. The on going attacks against Afghanistan are a case in point here. Though bombs keep falling, the US hardly has access to first hand information on the ground where they fall, according to journalists covering the war. Not that the US is not taking the PR dilemma seriously enough to try to tackle it head on.

The food drops, national security advisor Condoleezza Rice's interview to bin Laden's favourite media outlet, the Al-jazeera news channel, even British Prime Minister Tony Blair's visit to the region, all have been interpreted as PR ploys to keep the governments like Pakistan from buckling under extremist pressure. However, such moves have fallen far from the expected results. Unfortunately, all the public diplomacy efforts under taken by the Bush administration have reeked with the age-old in your face attitude and have come too little too late.

As the war effort builds up Bush and his war cabinet would have to face the real test. The US public's state of mind is on the edge these days, it has been for the past month. There are anthrax fears all over the place. Every day buildings are evacuated. Capital Hill remains closed for visitors and politicians want to go home far from the capital to avoid anthrax contaminated letters. Travelling by air is like walking through a prison. Last week in San Francisco, even footwear was checked for explosives. Passengers are selected randomly for further checks.

The fear is so much that it would even over ride issues like individual freedom, and it has. The fear drives the nation, and the fear looks for protection, as safety is a very important part of US culture. And that fear, drives the mood for action. And for action, the administration has to do the juggling job. And the juggling job has turned the world political scene inside out. "The kaleidoscope has totally shifted after September 11. We are holding back on certain policy issues. Who knows what can happen tomorrow," Hess observed.

A lot will however depend on one thing, how the US handles the Middle East, and more importantly how it handles Palestine. Bush's remarks that given certain conditions, he supports an independent Palestine shows that it weighs heavy on the administration. But, so far it has remained just a remark, and nothing tangible has been visible by way of a policy shift. And last week there were some ominous signs that in fact there would not be any major change after all. "I can not see September 11 making a fundamental change in US policy on Middle East," a very high ranking State Department source told The Sunday Leader.

He observed that if at all there was to be a change it would come in the form of intelligence gathering and corporation between the US and states in the region. On the issue of the independent Palestinian state, he pointed out that the US could go as far as both sides involved in the conflict wish to proceed. On the other hand if more attacks come and body bags keep arriving at mainland doorstep, the mood will change for the worst. While demanding for more drastic action, the US public would demand that it clamp shutters on the outside world. Such possibilities have been suggested by Congress representatives who are fighting for tougher visa procedures, arguing the annually three million visitors to the US go unaccounted.

Folks back in Sri Lanka might still be thinking of the USA as the land of free enterprise, but last week it was nothing but land of free paranoia.

When mango friendships turn sour

THELMA