EDITORIAL

A Nation In Peril

For all the thunder with which the alliance government took office, the reality is slowly sinking in to the new administration that they are in a pretty tight fix. Put simply, President Kumaratunga wants to discuss the Interim Self-Governing Administration (ISGA) for the north and the east with the LTTE concurrently with what she calls the "core issues" of devolution. The Tigers will have none of that, and insist that the ISGA be agreed to unconditionally, as the foundation on which talks will take place. If the President accedes however, it will inevitably lead to a split in her ever-so-delicate coalition, for the JVP has pledged that the ISGA will be granted only, in effect, over its dead body.

Without agreement on the ISGA therefore, Kumaratunga is unable to proceed with the peace talks which, after all, is the cornerstone of the peace process that the international donor community uses to monitor progress for the purpose of unbelting that US$ 4.5 billion pledged in aid over the next three years. Indeed, when Sri Lanka's key donors met in Brussels last week, they showed visible signs of impatience, hinting openly that if Sri Lanka could not get its act together on the peace process, they would start looking at other countries that needed the money more urgently than we do.

While Kumaratunga could be confident that the ceasefire with the Tigers will hold for the nonce, that is not her primary concern. She needs desperately to secure another term of office for herself as head of government, thereby changing the constitution. In order to achieve this however, she needs to keep her fragile coalition intact, and here the signs do not augur well for her. The JVP insists that the alliance's manifesto promises must be kept, and right quickly, too. The JVP's leadership is coming in for increasing ridicule and criticism from among its rank and file for not delivering on a single of the promises made to the electorate. This in turn has seen the JVP leadership gradually seeking to give itself an identity distinct from the alliance.

As much as it is true that the JVP is suffering from an identity crisis, they should not be allowed to distance themselves from the SLFP the moment it starts looking like the alliance is going to be a lame duck. They fought on a common ticket, on a common platform, under a common symbol, and most importantly, a common manifesto. The four-page tale of woe the JVP sent to the President last week, taking care to release this also to the media, was a clear signal that they are now seeking to distance themselves from Kumaratunga. The latter's terse, two paragraph response however, clearly shows she knows full well that she's got the JVP between a rock and a hard place, for the JVP's options too, are pretty much circumscribed. They cannot walk away from the SLFP now: they have made their bed and must lie on it.

With no prospect of getting the peace process started, and therefore having no access to the $ 4.5 billion previously pledged to the UNF government in foreign aid, the alliance is now desperately piecing together an economic policy. But that is no cakewalk either, with Finance Minister Sarath Amunugama pulling one way, and his estranged but more powerful Secretary, P.B. Jayasundera, pulling the other way. While it is abundantly clear that Amunugama will be the loser in this power struggle, there is no doubt either that his vision of a liberal, market oriented economy is the right one.

With the government looking more fragile by the day, the public service has done what it always does when times are bad: go into hibernation. For all practical purposes, government has come to a halt, and the desperate search is now on for a final solution - one that will perpetuate Kumaratunga's reign while delivering a modicum of progress on the peace front so as to balance the budget. The election pledges made by the Alliance will cost the exchequer a fortune, and the hunt is on for where the money will come from. Higher taxes and fuel prices are unlikely to be stomached by an electorate preparing for provincial council elections in weeks, and a referendum in months, and the Treasury will therefore have no option but to borrow itself into temporary liquidity. A rise in interest rates however, is likely to put the cap on economic growth, sending the country back into a 2001-like recession.

Unable to deliver, the alliance has now focused all its energies towards luring CWC and SLMC MPs to its ranks. Tens of millions of rupees are being spoken of, and while the parties are unlikely to cross en masse, individual MPs could well find themselves tempted. And it is here that Indian High Commissioner Nirupan Sen has come into his own, busying himself in his role as kingmaker. Sen is now the chief adviser to the alliance government, giving reassurances of bridging loans to tide over the crisis and desperately lobbying ministers to toe the line.

Having been instrumental in helping JVP Leader Somawansa Amarasinghe illegally to flee the country in 1989, Sen is also calling on his IOUs from the JVP. Indeed, it is now a matter of routine for cabinet ministers to take their cue from the Indian High Commissioner, with the less important ones actually having to be guided by lowly first secretaries, so busy is the High Commissioner himself.

What resonance Sen's activities in Sri Lanka will find with the new administration in Delhi is yet to be seen. The appointment of Mani Dixit as national security adviser to the Congress government however, must have sent shivers down Sen's spine, for on pages 81 and 82 in his bestselling book, Assignment Colombo, Dixit gives an insight into Sen's mindset in these terms which help throw light on his conduct aided and abetted by colleague Taranjith Singh:

"My No. 2 in the mission was an articulate and intelligent officer, Nirupan Sen. Though he had abilities of a high order, he had some genuine intellectual differences about India playing a balancing act between the Tamils and the Sri Lankan government. He felt that given the Sri Lankan government's long record of betraying Tamil interests, India should have played a more assertive role. He was perhaps of the view that the Jayewardene government will never deliver the goods and therefore we should keep the Sri Lankan President on the defensive  by manifestly opening up contacts with various opposition groups in Sri Lanka."

Be that as it may, one wonders whether the international community in general and the donors in particular, will stand by the milestones they set for the Sri Lankan government in terms of democracy, human rights, pluralism and the like. Of particular concern is their reaction to Kumaratunga's stated ambition illegally to change the constitution. Lacking the two-thirds majority she requires according to the law, she plans to request the Supreme Court to ratify her proposal to amend the constitution with a simple parliamentary majority backed by a referendum. Whatever her views on that, the international community needs to make an assessment of what it calls democracy in the light of Kumaratunga's imminent subversion of the very concept of democracy.

At the April 2 general election, the alliance won only 45% of the votes cast. Indeed, only 37% of registered voters voted for the alliance. Is this the mandate with which Kumaratunga now intends to tamper with the constitution? And will she do this merely to perpetuate her reign, rather than addressing the far more important question of genuine north east devolution? Is this what Sri Lanka's donors - yes, the Norwegians included - call democracy: dictatorship by 37% of the electorate? If the means of constitutional change were to be made so simple, no meaningful constitutional safeguards would be possible. For example, even if extensive devolution were granted to the north and east through a constitutional amendment, there is nothing to prevent a future government undoing this through a similar manoeuvre. In such a scheme of things, is it likely that the LTTE would ever agree to a negotiated settlement?

Thanks to the UNF's leadership being sound asleep, it is likely that the forthcoming provincial council elections will be a walk over for the alliance, which fact again will be trumpeted to claim that the people endorse the government. Democracy is a much prostituted word in Sri Lanka nowadays, and we have barely seen the beginning yet.

Even as this struggle unfolds and our nation's leaders scuffle desperately for power, it is the people of Sri Lanka who will be the losers. It is easy to say it serves them right, for they elected the government, but this is hardly fair given the promises made to the poor by the JVP-SLFP Alliance. We are a nation fallen on hard times. God bless the people of Sri Lanka: goodness knows they need it.