Time for a reality check

The confidence and complacency that was building up after the 'victory in the east' over the LTTE, was rudely disturbed on Monday when the LTTE attacked an army outpost in the Yala National Park killing six soldiers. We hope that the contention of the army spokesman that those responsible were 'battered LTTE cadres fleeing from Thoppigala' is correct and that the attackers would soon be rounded up. However, this attack underscores the well known fact that in guerrilla warfare a surprise attack can be expected anywhere at any time, however much cocky one may feel.

A complete military victory is what Gotabhaya Rajapakse, the gung-ho defence secretary, wants but even he has estimated that it would take 'two to three' years. Whether his predictions come true or not, the immediate issue would be how the government would cope with the situation if the LTTE follows up the offensive at Yala with military offensives elsewhere.

The thinking of Defence Secretary Rajapakse and Army Commander, Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka seems to be that the back of the LTTE military resistance is broken and offensives in the north should commence. LTTE spokesmen, however, have been saying since the Mawilaru operation, that they had been fighting a 'defensive war' and not resisting the armed forces directly. Yet losing control of the east as well as four ships carrying large quantities of armaments are undeniably tremendous losses. LTTE spokesmen have also been hinting at opening up military offensives soon. November is also the month when Velupillai Pirapaharan makes his declarations of war and/ or peace. The attack on Yala also comes at the beginning of the tourist season which the LTTE by the latest attack appears all set to cripple.

This while the big guns of the Rajapakse government and their supporters in the media are booming against UN officials such as Louise Arbour, the high commissioner for human rights and ambassadors of Western nations quite forgetting in the process it is of utmost importance to have in place military and political strategies in the event of an LTTE offensive. This is particularly important because of the political instability of the government, the wobbling economy and deterioration of relations with powerful Western nations as well as the United Nations.

With the impending budget debate less than a month away, one time political ally of the President, the JVP, is at its vituperative best targeting Rajapakse and his brothers, and shaking the very foundations of a nervous government. However, the CWC has lived up to its traditions of being able to be bought over and over again and rejoined the government accepting their ministerial portfolios from which they resigned in a huff  following the gross insults  cast on them by the President's brother Basil. The quid-pro- quo was a salary hike for plantation workers that would cost the plantation companies as much as Rs 2 billion a year, which in the not too distant future would boomerang on the already tottering economy.

A no confidence motion moved against UNP renegade Milinda Moragoda who is now a cabinet minister is also threatening the stability of the Rajapakse regime. The motion is on the same lines as the charges made by SLFP government members against Moragoda when he was a UNP cabinet minister and it would be difficult for the one time accusers to be defenders having castigated him in very harsh terms. The strategy now appears to be to delay taking up the motion before the budget debate and thereafter play for time by proroguing parliament given the apprehension that there may well be government members who would vote for the motion.

This would result in those motions now on the order paper - including the no confidence motion - being taken off and being repeated as fresh motions when the next parliamentary sessions commence. This kind of political survival by postponements is indeed a pathetic state for a government to be placed in, even before President Rajapakse's second year in office has been completed.

By far the greatest problem is the state of the economy. Nivard Cabraal, the Central Bank Governor, a political appointee of President Rajapakse, is presenting a very rosy picture in his Central Bank reports projecting an economic growth rate (GDP) of around 7 per cent which economists say is pure fiction. Even the defence expenditure which is about 17.5 per cent is being included in this growth rate. The cost of living index about which the people cannot be conned, this month was 21.5 per cent, up from 17.1 per cent last month. With fuel prices likely to increase in international markets, further fuel price hikes are to be expected here too. As commented in our sister paper The Morning Leader editorial last Wednesday the budgetary allocations for defence exceeds the collective sum allocated for education, health and agriculture. These statistics indicate what is in store for the poor in the coming year. But even these statistics which some allege are cooked up hide the actual state of affairs as seen in the previous years allocations, where expenditure on certain subjects have been grossly understated.

Pro-Rajapakse media are proclaiming the US$ 500 million sale of government bonds as a great victory for the President because the Leader of the Opposition and UNP Ranil Wickremesinghe vigorously opposed this loan obtained at commercial rates of interest of 8.3 per cent. In contrast loans taken from development lending institutions such as the IMF, ADB and World Bank have interest rates as low as 0.5 per cent and  are payable over long periods. Repayment of loans obtained last week have to be paid back in five years - the time when the term of office of the Rajapakse government ends and a new government would have to face the music.

Thus, the vehement objections made by UNP Leader Wickremesinghe can be appreciated. The loans also have a destructive potential because unlike government to government assistance or loans from development banks these funds can be used according to the whims and fancies of the government although it is claimed to be taken for infrastructure development.

More significantly, the loan has to be repaid as one bullet payment in five years at 8.3 per cent interest which alone comes to over US$ 200 million. Therefore within five years the people have to pay back over US$ 700 million for a US$ 500 million loan the expenditure over which there is no transparency on the part of the government. In effect, the people will be called upon to pay back US$ 140 million every year over a five year period whilst also coping with a heavy cost of living burden and a decline in real wages.

Meanwhile, the government propaganda mills are feeding the people a daily diet of Mahinda Chinthanaya. Daily reports of LTTE camps being overrun, cadres being killed, ships and boats sunk are supposed to be keeping the people happy. And anyone who dares to point out that the figures are exaggerated and aimed at misleading the people are labelled traitors by the state no less. The Rajapakse brothers seem to value the dictum of German military strategist Carl Von Clausewitz: 'War is nothing more than the continuation of politics by other means.'

President Rajapakse can do well for himself and the country if he in between his 'war' against terrorism and reflections on his Mahinda Chinthanaya can come up with a set of proposals to meet the demands of the Tamil people which would pull the rug from under the feet of Velupillai Pirapaharan and capture the lost ground internationally. But that he won't do for fear of losing the support of the more extreme elements in government with the end result being a sense of drift while the country is fed with full doses of propaganda that the war is about to end.