Page 1
B the time diploma gatherers come out wi of who did whattopreventt Summit from taking place Lanka's foreign policy i indicate a rapid and sig Even on the very first da Summit, Sri Lanka’s rela appeared irreparably dam President Premadasa stuc lingua in his speeches to til South Asian states who pa "bilateral visits' to Colom ernment press had no rea governments's anger and India.
For President Premadasa of the SAARC Summit
happened at a worse tim from the impeachment overcame barelyamonthag for this crowning occasi crucial opening for politi trol. Now, it is yet anoth political culture where ga frequently summoned to litical disputes, one may
the conclusion that Presi is passing through a part phase.
This is not an entirely be the SAARC movement ei exercise in patient diplot nied by a well-grounded among member states, w re-cement and repair this p forum for South Asian re. tion. President Maumoon Maldives, perhaps the on member within SAARC, I
 

つつっ
M
Vol 1 No 1
November 1991
*
SIL Rupees Ten
C VI: A SUMMIT UMMARIZED
tic intelligence thaclear picture he Sixth SAARC in Colombo, Sri s very likely to hificant change. y of the aborted tions with India aged. Although k to diplomatic he three heads of lid simultaneous bo, the pro-govson to hide the
bitterness with
, this non-event could not have e. Convalescing crisis which he go, he was hoping on as the most cal damage-conSr set back. In a lactic forces are intervene in poperhaps rush to dent Premadasa icularly malefic
nefic period for ther. A gigantic macy, accompacollective will ill be needed to prematurely frail gional co-operaGayoom of the ly 'non-aligned' may find that his
two immediate neighbours are in aquarrelling mood again. They may even look beyond the region in search of friends, allies and other forms of co-operation.
Incidentally, only a little thought has sofar been given by many of us to changes that have in a way already made South Asian co-operation profoundly problematic. Surely, procedural difficulties and errors in protocol may also have affected the decisions of some Heads of States to stay
away from the Summit. Yet, organiza
tional lapses alone do not explain why, for example, India, as the Colombo press has chosen to call it, "sabotaged" the Summit. Sabotage or not, the movement is at cross-roads. The failed summit is its most telling signal.
The idea of South Asian regional co-operation originated in the late seventies and was executed in the mid eighties. Since then, the world in general and South Asia in particular has changed tremendously. The Cold-War world order is no more and the post-Cold War world is still shaping itself. The Soviet Union, which had its military presence in Afghanistan during the formative years of SAARC, has left the borders of South Asia, and it is not the world power it was any more. The NonAligned Movement, which provided the general foreign policy framework for all South Asian states, is no longer as effective in world affairs. Today, South Asian countries do not have an enduring policy line of inter-state relations, commonly subscribed to, as they did a few years ago. It seems now that some countries are unto themselves, without much concern about the responses of their neighbours. D

Page 2
Pravada
Vol 1 No 1
November 1991
Editors: Charles Abeysekera Shani Jayawardena Jayadeva Uyangoda
Pravada is published monthly by: Pravada Publications 129/6A Nawala Road Narahenpita Colombo 5 Sri Lanka Telephone: 01-501339
Annual subscriptions:
Sri Lanka Rs. 110 By Air mail:
South Asia/ Middle East U.S. S. 20 S.E. Asia/Far East U.S. S. 24 Europe/Africa U.S. S. 26 Americas/Pacific countries U.S. S. 30
TOWar(
T. political deb; impeachment cc rise to discussions issues concerning ( At the centre of th the 1978 Constitutic Presidential System operation in this c thirteen years.
parliamentary mo examined on the
should replace the which has led to exc of powers in the l
It now appearseth issues of political c the ruling party an dissidents have c centre stage of the the opportunity op public discussi constitutional cha reforms may run t clouded by partis compulsions of po
SAARC .....
It is clear that inter-state relations in South Asia have again reached a stage akin to semi-anarchy. As particularly illustrated in Indo-Sri Lanka and Indo-Pakistan relations, even the language of communication between leading policy makers has been, at times, anything but diplomatic. Meanwhile, the SAARC charter disallows bilateral issues being raised at its deliberations. Yet, South Asia lacks any mechanism for mediation in bilateral disputes. Can an inter-fragmented grouping of states successfully pretend to have reached the point of integrated cooperation? An unkind, yet brutally frank question which we in South Asia can no longer disregard.
Sharp economic competition among the majority of SAARC countries is very likely to characterize the future inter-state relations in South Asia. The New International Economic Order, the ideology of external economic relations prescribed at various Third World forums in the previous decade, has
ceased to be an
Moreover, the Sout particularly India,
and Bangladesh - abandoned the str. e conomic develc isolation from th market and interr become a thing of economies are be private foreign ca. new phase of rap world capitalism is direction. Capita and markets locatc East Asia are cru new industrializa India and her im have already laun
This makes e cor within SAARC pa to the imperatives interests of in countries. If econ to take place at a is now necessary the old concept regional grouping An economic divis
Novem

ls Democratic Reforms
te generated by the introversy has given on a wide range of ur political system. ese discussions are in and the Executive that have been in ountry for the past Merits of the del are also being assumption that it presidential system 2ssive concentration Executive branch.
at many immediate ompetition between d its opponents and ome to occupy the debate. As a result, bened for a serious on on desirable inges and political he danger of being an and immediate wer politics.
Pravada spoke to a number of individuals concerned about the future of democracy in Sri Lanka. The general consensus which emerged in these discussions is that democratization of our polity should be in the immediate political agenda. A concern was also expressed with regard to the likelihood of any democratic initiative being aborted by the imperatives of populist and ethno-nationalist politics.
It is indeed superfluous to reiterate that the constitutional bases and institutional composition of our system of government need far reaching reforms in the direction of strengthening democracy. While acknowledging that the 1978 Constitution has created an authoritarian system of the Bonapartist mould, it is nonetheless important to assert that all ills of this system cannot be attributed to mere individuals alone, howevermuch they may have utilized
effective doctrine. th Asian countries - Pakistan, Sri Lanka have now clearly ategies of autarchic pment. Relative e capitalist world lational capital has the past. Domestic ing opened up for pital. South Asia's id integration with taking place in a new l originating from, 'd in, Southeast and cial for the kind of ion strategies that
mediate neighbours
ched.
omic cooperation rticularly vulnerable of national economic lividual member omic cooperation is Il within SAARC, it o acknowledge that ualization of the needs to be recast. ion of labour within 2
per 1991
the region - to decide who should produce what to be sold in which particular market - should be in the agenda of South Asian regional cooperation. However, the crux of the problem at the moment is that there is no room for such an initiative. Consequently, the mood is set for sharp competition and permissive disregard for mutual interests.
The tasks ahead for SAARC to remain strong are more complicated than they were earlier. Now the movement has fallen into political confusin and the problems are immensely complex and delicate. Bilateral tension and conflicts involving India and her neighbours will, if allowed to grow, make the existing cleavages unbridgeable
Particularly hurt at presentis Sri Lanka. As a result, political emotions at the Presidential Secretariat may run adrift. Forming an anti-Indian club in the region may satisfy wounded feelings, but surely runs counter to Sri Lanka's long term interests, particularly economic and political. mO

Page 3
REFORMS ...
the anti-democratic opportunities inherent in the Constitution. Parallel with constitutional authoritarianism there have been other disturbing trends in the political process. Greater centralization of state power, rise in the repressive and interventionist capacity of the state, the decay in democratic institutions, and the erosion of democratic and human rights are some of the key trends which have, during the past few decades, characterized the broad political context for the weakening of democracy in our country. The political context of un-democracy in this country has also been characterized by almost twenty years of Emergency Rule which has kept under suspension many procedures of normal law and made, ironically, the Emergency an “ordinary state of affairs.
There are indeed long-term interests of democracy which no reform-minded political constituency should lose sight of. However, greater interests of democracy can in no way be served by delegating the responsibility of constitutional and political reforms to a few legal experts and party caucuses. During the impeachment controversy itself, there were proposals, which one must consider inappropriate, to entrust to a handful of individuals the task of drafting a new constitutional scheme. Two points need to be made clear in this regard. Firstly, in the current political climate in Sri Lanka, constitution-making is too serious a matter to be left to a few professional politicians alone. Informed public opinion and democratic inputs should by no means be left un marshalled. Secondly, terms of the constitutional debate should be so broadened as to
subject to criti interrogation all proposed and desi
Proposals for con should extend bey between the exec system and the pa Given the fact concentration of under both systems, effective and inn checks and balance no branch of the go the executive or t privileged to disr norms of governan that there is a broa country that the pi should be restored arises with regard
the political execut acting arbitraril legislative soverei vested with Parliam Sri Lanka woul parliamentary mo reformed and mor
In order to initiate wide range of iss democratizing refc wishes to make a
The creation of an devolution, transce! of the existing P system, is a majorp political reforms. provide the broad a devolutionary arr the first place, c starting point for political solution to Secondly, it will l deterrent to centralization
SAARC .....
Severely tested in the coming months will be the credibility of Sri Lanka's India policy, if there is one. Indo-Sri Lanka relations in the recent past have been subjected to a series of un necessary strains. Even minor irritants, which could have been easily
disregarded under normal circumstances, have assumed exaggerated proportions. The
expulsion of Mr. Karuppaswamy, an Indian journalist, from Sri Lanka is a case in point. Even two years after the
last Indian soldier IPKF - bashing occ
political leaders
reassert their pati too views Sri Lanka suspicious eye. central problem of policy in the comi India, not Pakistal national interests regime are confu never be able to f India policy.
There are already to suggest that Pr
Pra

al scrutiny and reform options
ed.
titutional changes nd a mere choice utive presidential liamentary model. that excessive lower can happen it is crucial that an ovative system of s is created so that vernment - whether he legislature - is egard democratic re. Even assuming ld consensus in the Lrliamentary system , the question still to the possibility of ive - the Cabinet - y in the name of gnty of the people ent. Therefore, what d need is not a del as such, but a e democratic one.
a discussion on a
sues relevant to a rm effort, Pravada series of proposals.
effective system of nding the limitations rovincial Councils riority in Sri Lanka's
Federalism would framework for such angement. It will, in onstitute a useful working towards a the ethnic question. be a most effective tendencies for Of state power.
Moreover, a federalist model will facilitate political pluralism in governance.
A well-defined system of separation of powers between the legislative, executive and judicial branches of the state, supplemented with adequate checks and balances, is a long felt need for Sri Lanka. Excessive use of state power by both the Legislature and the Executive has been a particularly undesirable trend in Sri Lanka's politics during the past two decades. The practice of Judicial Review of Legislation, empowering the Supreme Court to determine the validity of legislation enacted by Parliament is specifically relevant to Sri Lanka's democratic needs. A point that warrants emphasis in this regard is that the notion of legislative supremacy of Parliament needs to be abandoned as being anachronistic with the need to diffuse law-making powers to sub-national units. Citizens should be constitutionally empowered with the right to seekjudicial redress if and when the legislative bodies transgress the boundaries of fundamental rights, freedoms and natural justice.
While re-constituting the institutional relations of different branches of the state, it is also necessary that secular foundations of the state are strengthened. Secularism of the state becomes all the more important in view of growing tendencies of ethno-religious fundamentalism in our society. As we have witnessed in recent times, religio-ritualization of the state is a distinctly disturbing development in modern Sri Lankan politics. The multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-cultural composition of our society necessitates separation of the
has left Sri Lanka, urs repeatedly when are compelled to totic virtues. India through a distinctly Nevertheless, the Sri Lanka’s foreign g years will concern
or Bangladesh. If and interests of the sed, Sri Lanka will rmulate a workable
ome clues emerging sident Premadasa's 3
vada
new foreign policy thinking is becoming Gulf-bound. If the cordiality extended to Pakistan, Bangladesh and the Maldives is an indication, the region west of Pakistan can very well be the destination of diplomatic visits to be made very soon by senior foreign ministry officials. Isolated internationally, and pressurized by domestic compulsions, the Premadasa regime may seek greater cooperation in the Arab and Muslim world.
J.U.

Page 4
REFORMS ...
state from religion and culture, particularly from that of the majority community, as an essential tenet of political secularism.
The question of fundamental rights has assumed, particularly during the past decade, a crucial significance in our state-society relations. Although not quite in parallel with the sheer magnitude of rights violations, the masses have now become increasingly conscious of their fundamental rights and the right to seek judicial redress. Yet, there are still constitutional and procedural impediments to a satisfactory rights regime. To overcome the existing barriers and inadequacies, the Constitution as well as the governmental structure should extend fundamental rights to the same extent as has been guaranteed by international human rights laws under which the Sri Lankan government has undertaken international obligations. A Bill of Rights should be included in the Constitution as the minimum guarantee of all fundamental rights.
Abuse of political power, corruption in the public life, excessive
bureaucratization of public affairs and the arbitrary use of state power by those in office with scant regard for social accountability are but a few symptoms
of a long process th the institutional politic. If our pc lacks public legitin it is as much a disintegration of po governance as of a Worse still, the pl these negative tren by political parties political gains. Re: often forgotten w office-holders. obviously reachec effective and tangi political accountab into the constitu government. accountability of th longer epiphenom any meaningful d reforms. Wi
Freedom of expres the guarantee of t receive and dissem a mechanism v
democratic polity.
free of state cont effective social che power by those in media should be m sections of opinio!
The introduction c in which MPs and of the state coul
HUMAN RI
hen there is criticism of our human rights record from abroad, we hear, all too often, the sentiment expressed that other countries should mind their own business and that what happens here is solely our own affair.
Such a viewpoint, though morally wrong, would have been legally correct some years ago. But today it is legally wrong as well. It is accepted law today that the doctrine of sovereignty of states no longer holds good so far as a state treats the fundamental rights of its subjects. The concept of national
sovereignty has in this respect given way
GHTS,
DEVO
to the concept responsibility. lucidly put it:
"Had a
delegation fro on Chancellol 1936 to com notorious Nur the manner in being applie German Jev would probab such an init classic ph illegitimate in
Nover
 

ut has characterized ecay in our body litical order today acy and credibility,
product of the itico-moral bases of institutional crisis. blic outrage about ls is often exploited
solely for partisan medial promises are len critics become Our society has
a point in which ple mechanisms for lity have to be built tional outlines of in other words, Le government is no :nal, but central, to ebate on political
sion and specifically he people's right to inate information is ital to ensure a
Moreover, a media rol, can also be an ck on the abuse of i power. Similarly, ade accessible to all
.
of the right to recall all elected officials d be recalled by a
process initiated by the voters can be considered as a necessary step towards ensuring public accountability.
Elements of direct democracy would be of extreme value to supplement the existing institutions of representative democracy which paradoxically have lost, to a considerable degree, their democratic bearings. This is all the more important in the context of the existing constitutional provision for referendum belying its plebiscitary spirit. Mechanisms for direct democracy can be fruitfully utilized in a system of diffused legislative power where people's participation in provincial, municipal and rural administration is secured through plebiscitary initiatives.
Our electoral system too needs reforms. While recognizing that Proportional Representation is more democratic than the first-past-the-post mechanism, particularly to a plural society like ours, the undemocratic elements of the PR system presently in operation in our country should be removed. It should be changed to ensure better relations between the electors and the elected. Similarly, the present system of the political party constitution prohibiting the freedom of MPs in parliament
should be abolished. P P
SOVEREIGNTY AND LUTION
of international As one expert has
well-meaning m abroad called Adolf Hitler in blain about the 2nberg laws, and which they were d to persecute 's, the Fuhrer y have dismissed ative with the rase of 'an erference in the
4. ber 1991
internal affairs of the sovereign German State', pointing out that these laws had been enacted in full accordance with the provisions of the German Constitution, by an assembly constitutionally and legally competent to enact them, and that neither they nor their application were the concern of any meddling foreigners. And, in international law as it then stood, he would have been perfectly right - and so would Party Secretary-General Josef Stalin have been if a similar
m)

Page 5
HUMAN RIGHTS ...
delegation had called on him at around the same time to complain about the wholesale liquidation of the Kulaks in the Soviet Union.
Were such delegations to call today on some of the world's living tyrants to complain about the injustice of some of their laws, those protests too
would doubtless be dismissed with the same phrase. But in international law as it stands today, those tyrants would be wrong. For since Hitler's and Stalin's time there has been a change in international law so profound that it can properly be called a revolution. Today, for the first time in history, how a sovereign state treats its own citizens is no longer a matter for its own exclusive determination, but a matter of legitimate concern for all other states, and for their inhabitants."
Sieghart: The Lawful Rights of Mankind
The writer then goes on to explain that "The formal product of that revolution is a detailed code of international law laying down rights of individuals against the states which exercise power over them, and so making these individuals the subjects of legal rights under that law, and no longer the mere objects of its compassion." (ibid). It is now necessary that both the existence and the contents of this code become known more widely, not only by lawyers and politicians, but also by the ordinary citizens for whose protection they exist.
The other theme that is often talked and written about in Sri Lanka today is that of various forms of devolution. The All Party Conference is supposed to be trying to reach a consensus on this. The parliamentary Select Committee headed by Mangala Moonesinghe would, presumably, look into possible models of devolution, or modifications of the Provincial Council
system created Amendment to the de Silva's booklet system and saying Provincial Councils a proper chance t widely reproduced a national press. Dr Chancellor and Prof University of Colom argues that federali viable mechanism f a nation torn asu religious and ethnic recently, discussion different aspect government - the E. versus the "Westmin model.
The question of se rights has so far ni debates. It is very human rights facto place in all thi Whatever the mode present or a re Presidency, the "Westminster Syste model of devic fundamental rights negotiable, and ml throughout the coun be provisions to cha administrative administration of a { transgress fund Devolution must m democracy; it must 1 weakened, protecti rights. An aggriev required to seek h within the judicial devolved unit, but remedy must be a level, ie.. by a Supre such body which i which serves the w
In order to make th devolved units, it i. central government actions in the are reviewable. All reviewable by the c consistent with the merely as now at t Government must
Protocol to the Inte of Civil and Politica like instruments
individual who clai rights are infringec
Pra,

under the 13th Constitution. H.L. opposing a federal
that instead, the ystem must be given o work, has been nd discussed in the . G.L. Peiris, Vice essor of Law of the bo, on the contrary, sm can be the only or holding together nder by cultural, differences. More has centred on a
of the mode of xecutive Presidency ister" parliamentary
curing fundamental crt figured in these important that the rs be given its due es e discussions. of government (the vised Executive old or a revised m"), whatever the blution, certain must be made non ust be enforceable try. There must also lenge legislative or acts by the levolved unit if they amental rights. can more, not less, mean enhanced, not on of fundamental 'ed person may be is remedy initially machinery of the in the last resort, a vailable at central 2me Court or other s drawn from and hole country.
is acceptable to the s essential that the itself makes its own a of human rights egislation must be courts to see if it is 2 Constitution, not he Bill stage. The sign the Optional 'rnational Covenant al Rights, and other which enable an ms his fundamental to appeal to an
ada
international tribunal as a last resort. And, of course, the fundamental rights provisions in the Constitution must be amended to bring them into line with our obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Our duty to do this was forcefully and repeatedly stressed to the representative of our Government who appeared before the UN Human Rights Committee this year.
These steps should be taken by the Sri Lankan government for the benefit of its inhabitants even if there was no ethnic problem or question of devolution. But it is all the more essential to do it as part of any 'devolution package'. The Centre must be able to say to the devolved units: "Retaining ultimate control over human rights questions is not incompatible with devolution, is not an unreasonable limitation of your autonomy. Look, we too are making our laws and actions subject to review outside our territory." And the Centre will be able to go further and say to the inhabitants of the devolved unit: "You too, in the last resort, will have access to an international tribunal if you remained dissatisfied after going through the provincial courts and the national system."
Attempts should be made to get all "sides" to the conflict to see the advantages to themselves of this
approach. Therefore it should be
campaigned for not only among the government, "dissidents', the traditional opposition parties, the sectors of public opinion in the South, but also among the Tamil militants, including the LTTE, and the civilian population in the North and East. The State should offer it as an expression of good faith and a reassurance against the centre acting oppressively; the militants should see it as a vital concession obtained in agreeing to accept a solution less than Eelam. People of all ethnic groups and all political persuasions will welcome it as a guarantee of their fundamental rights against transgression by any government authority, be it central, provincial or district, present or future.

Page 6
Impeachment
should have happened a few years ago, while the Founding Father himself was at the helm. Though belatedly, the inevitable crisis flared up. As many preferred to call it, it was the long anticipated conflict between the Executive President and the Legislature. Mr. Rana singhe Premadasa, the President for two years and ten months, was besieged by a Parliament, un precedente dly assertive, outspoken and combative.
Fallen victim to the row between the Executive and Legislative branches of the state was the ruling UNP, transformed into a monolith by the ex-President Jayewardene. The party governed by a regime of iron discipline was shaken. Ten of its parliamentary members, including two Cabinet Ministers, had left the ranks. Many more were rumoured to join the rebels in the weeks to follow.
At the centre of the controversy was the motion for impeaching President Premadasa. “Impeachment', a word that had never figured in the political debates in this country, became the key metaphor referring to a wide range of issues being debated by the politician, constitutional expert and the lay person alike.
Initially, the debate concerning the impeachment resolution revolved around two key issues. Taking impeach ment literally in its constitutional meaning, it meant, firstly, the removal of President Premadasa from office. Secondly, and intertwined with the first was the abolition or reforming of the presidential system itself.
Were these two issues really connected? The proponents of the impeachment resolution appeared to think so. According to their thinking, changing the Presidential system was predicated on the removal of its present incumbent. Or at least, the curtailment of his powers, described as excessive and
and the
Jayadeva
authoritarian, was v return to what they sovereignty.
Why, then, the n
President who had
third year in offic
An impeachin a constitution to remove q office. And th lays down co, which a rem, could be in executed
Many were the e around in the ex political debate. Tl Impeachment clai Prema dasa had 'one-man-show of violating the tra collective respons decision making. T concentrated in
individual, they arg so went the argu commissions and ( magnitude. Arm modern and deadl key example they c perils of the 'one-r also a major po
allegation that the E
violated the Co Republic.
An impeachme constitutional mec President in o Constitution lay under which a rel be initiated and ex the constitutionally for an impeachmei and imprecise that Presidential actic from even semi-e executive beha example, the abuse
Novem

Constitutional Crisis
Uyangoda
iewed a must for the :alled parliamentary
eed to impeach a
not completed his ?
vent motion is almeçhanism
President in e Çọnstitution aditions under toval process litiated and
kplanations thrown treme heat of the he proponents of the med that President
been staging a governance, thereby ditional norms of ibility and collegial oo much power was the hands of one gued. And that had, ment, led to many missions of serious ing the LTTE with y weaponry was the ited to illustrate the nan-show. That was int in the serious 'resident had wilfully institution of the
nt motion is a hanism to remove a ffice. And the down conditions noval process could ecuted. Meanwhile, -sanctioned grounds t motion are so wide they can include any n that may deviate stablished norms of viour. Take, for of power clause. Or
6 ber 1991
the provisions concerning mental incapacity and the violation of moral turpitude. These are not precisely or rigorously defined 'offences', in legal as well as political terms, when it comes to the behaviour of professional politicians who happen to discharge the functions of an office of the state. Hence the long list of highly personalized allegations against Mr. Premadasa reportedly included in the motion for his removal. It was indeed a moot point that only a handful of politicians could have emerged unscathed if the wide net of these accusations was liberally cast.
Wilful violation of the Constitution would perhaps be the most serious ground to impeach a President. Has Mr. Premadasa acted in such a manner as to warrant an attempt for his removal from office on a charge of constitutional infidelity? This is exactly where many political issues concerning the Presidential system in general and the Premadasa presidency in particular should have come under close scrutiny.
Interestingly, the defenders of Mr. Prema dasa did not deny the 'one-man-show allegation, although the President and some of his Cabinet colleagues refuted it at the outset. As ably argued by some of Mr. Premadasa's younger admirers, the 'one-man-show was "regrettably, necessary" for systemic reforms; it was a style demanded by a crisis situation in order to make more receptive to mass needs a system which was "inherently anti-people, exclusionary and elitist.' Hence, a variety of “authoritarian populism’ was a foregone conclusion.
Reforms of the system or not, Mr. Premadasa had certainly been an “activist” or “interventionist” President with a single-minded determination to implement a project which he himself had conceived. He assumed office at a time when the country was engulfed in a twin rebellion, one in the Northeast
mO>

Page 7
IMPEACHIMENT .....
and the other in the entire Sinhalese South. It was also a time when the stability and the legitimacy of the state had eroded to the core. Premadasa's was thus a restorationist project, to enable the state to reclaim what it had largely lost, namely political stability and social legitimacy. Hence the Janasaviya, the mobile Presidential Secretariat, school mid-day meals, talks with the LTTE, peace appeals to the JVP multi-ethnic proclamations, the All Party Conference and last but not the least the Ministry of Buddha Sasana.
This restorationist project had been a terribly delicate one in a situation where the society and polity were immensely fragmented. By implementing his programme, ironically, Mr. Premadasa revealed some hidden contradictions of the very constitutional system which he came to preside over in January 1989.
As everybody appears to agree now, the 1978 Constitution enabled the Executive President to concentrate a very wide range of powers. Mr. Premadasa is not the first person to enjoy that constitutional facility. His pre de cessor, Mr. Jaye war dene, provided a rather uncanny example of a monarchical President in a modern republic. However, when the real crunch came closer and the system began to show signs of crumbling, Mr. Jayewardene was on his way out, having completed his second term. Indeed, what the JVP rebellion of post-1987
years indicated among other things was
that the Jayewardene Constitution of 1978 had little or no relevance to an intensely mobilized section of this society. Of course, the JVP did not demand the abolition of the Presidential system; they merely asked Mr. Jayewardene's resignation. However, writings on the wall were clear enough to suggest that he was resented not because he was Junius Richard Jayewardene, but because he was viewed as the personification of a highly centralized and authoritarian system of government.
Where Mr. Jayewardene escaped unhurt, stepped in Mr. Premadasa. The powers available to the President under the Constitution were immense and rather tempting to any individual with an agenda of his or her own. It was no mean thing to be the Head of the
Executive, the Hea Head of the Gover. the Cabinet, Com the Armed Forces, the ruling party - a There were no instit of checks and presidency either according to the C repository of the E the people. Dire people, and not b accountable to the the government, h( Parliament that 1 authority - the sover
The problem wa Firstly, had Mr. P. powers in ex constitutionally ava secondly, had he ac own construction C Even assuming, f argument, that th questions was in the issue was not just essentially politic impeached, or delegal, but on politic reasoning and pro formalities grou imperatives.
Presidents ar or de-impea legal, but grounds; the l and procedu formalities political im
It is perhaps pertir present Constitutic it comes to the pow leaves wide room curiously form{ Anglo-French cons it enables an activis the emphasis of relations of the sta personai imprint
Constitution itse Premadasa had his the fundamental l well-within its bo indication of
construction of th
and the “role' of the can be found in h to the Cabinet of what one may call
Prd

d of the State, the ment, the Head of hander-in-Chief of and the leader of 1 at the same time. utional mechanisms balances on the The President, onstitution, was the xecutive powers of itly elected by the ing answerable or egislative branch of shared along with magical source of eignty of the people.
s then two-fold. remadasa exercised cess of those ilable to him? And ted according to his if the Constitution? br the sake of the Le answer to both affirmative, the real
legalistic; it was al. Presidents are impeached, not on al grounds; the legal bcedures are mere nded on political
e impeached, ched, not on pn political egat reaSOnung ]reS ፴re ]?ጌere grounded on ጋerdtUVeS
ent to note that the n, particularly when ers of the President,
for flexibility. A :d mis-match of titutional traditions, President to change inter-institutional te by introducing a
o the spirit of the
lf. Perhaps, Mr. own construction of aw of the land, yet undaries. A clear
the 2 1978 Constitution Executive President is very first address Ministers. Making a Presidential policy
7 vada
Prema dasa.
speech on 18 February 1989, he outlined his own agenda. He also told the Ministers that it was their task to implement the policies of a President elected by the people on a mandate.
Fair enough. The tricky issue, however, was a little more subtle one. Mr. Premadasa went on to say that the Ministers were responsible to him (the President) and through him to the people. Those constitutional lawyers in the Cabinet may have held their breath with amazement. According to the Constitution, the Ministers were responsible to Parliament, and through Parliament to the people. Although largely unnoticed at the time, this was a potentially controversial mix-up of constitutional models.
It is indeed in that speech that Mr. Premadasa asserted the autonomy of the office of the President vis a vis Parliament. He surely acted on the belief that Presidential autonomy was imperative to implement his programmes. Under him, the Cabinet was turned into an implementation, not even advisory, body charged with the task of carrying out the Premadasa agenda. If Mr. Jayewardene had fused the Westminster model of Cabinet government with the French Gaullist system, still maintaining the trappings of the former, Mr. Premadasa appeared to think differently. Perhaps, he had been forging an uneasy fusion of the Gaullist and American systems of President-Cabinet relations.
The new mix-up was not a go-it-easy affair. Unlike in the French and American models, here the Ministers were still members of Parliament. They have electoral constituencies of their own, not to mention ambitions of some to reach still greater heights in politics. Mr. Premadasa's new policy of annual hiring of Ministers, and even of the Prime Minister, was extremely innovative in its potential to sow seeds of insecurity among senior and established parliamentarians of the ruling party. When party veterans with Prime Ministerial and even Presidential dreams were appointed to cabinet positions with the warning that the job was only for one year and the extension conditional, there was probably very little room for collegiality and collective decision making. The demand of unstinted personal loyalty to the

Page 8
IMPEACHIMIENT .....
President from his Ministerial subordinates on the basis of a hire-and-fire' formula could have perhaps been better assured in the American Presidential system where cabinet members had no electoral bases or legislative constituencies.
Meanwhile, President Premadasa projected the image of a statesman committed to consultation, compromise and consensus. In abstract, this was an excellent formula of governance for a conflict-ridden, fragmented and beleaguered polity. Despite the oft-repeated assertions with regard to his three 'C's, Mr. Premadasa made a cardinal error by presenting himself as the cornerstone of the consensus project. To put it plainly, he did not build adequate mechanisms to facilitate compromise and work out consensus. The All Party Conference, which could have evolved into a theatre of compromise and multi-party consensus, failed to bring into its fold important parliamentary parties. When a partial APC continued to function, sans the parliamentary opposition led by the SLFP, it appeared as though parliament had no major role to play in the political goings on.
With marginal sensitivity to the need of compromise-seeking institutions, the President could reiterate, "Trust me, I am your President." Yet, in a fragmented polity like ours, what really mattered for political compromise and consensus was not just the personal trust placed on the Head of the State, but the availability of tangible and lasting institutions to mediate among competing and conflicting interests. If politics is the art of making compromises, governance is the science of inventing mediatory institutions.
This is where the question of checks-and-balances came to the fore. The vitality of the American Constitution, for example, is largely a result of its separation of powers and intricate mechanisms of checks-and-balances. The latter enables equally ambitious branches of the state - the Executive, the Legislature, and the Judiciary - to consult each other, to bargain, to make compromises and ultimately to reach what would appear to be a consensus. In the words of Madison, one of the Founding Fathers,
institutional
'let ambition be ambition.” In contu 1978 Constitution governance pref Jayewardene and institutional and checks and balanc imbalance betw executive and a assertive, legi particularly inappr years, because th represented a ver bloc or a power el shall we say, corp
In a fragmen Qurs, what ré for political апа.cртеп availability i lInStilfillflOPS
Was there, then, a conflict in the pre To a certain extenty in the way that spokespersons are It was liberally privileged elites th of power were atten a President who rei and aspirations of th poor masses ar programmatic Premadasa, yet Mr the leader of a n opposed to a variet are in politics. Th elite-mass interpret crisis lay in the assl Lankan power homogeneous socio-political entit of Mr. Premadasa other things, that power elite had c. state power. Ecol has consolidated it decade or so, partic patronage. The e this elite were contractors, supp agents and sp ( accumulatory capac solely, been depent accessibility to stat of social origins, in from urban petty-tr particular clain socio-cultural ethol
t Noveml

counteracted by rast, neither did the
nor the styles of erred by Messrs. remadasa facilitate
institutionalized es. Meanwhile, the een a powerful subordinate, yet slature proved »priate in post-1988 le parliament too significant power ite, having its own, orate interests.
ted polity like ally mattered
сотproтиse sus was the of mediatory
an element of elite sent politics crisis? res, but certainly not the government trying to portray it. argued that the at had lost control mpting to overthrow presented the hopes le poor masses. The 'e surely in the baggage of Mr. . Premadasa is also ew power elite as y of other elites that e main error in the ation of the present umption that the Sri elites were a and uniform y. In fact, the rise indicated, among a new stratum of ome to control the nomically, this elite self during the past ularly through state conomic leaders of mainly traders, liers, commission 2culators whose ity had largely, if not dent on the relative e power. In terms hany of them came ading layers, with no 1s to bourgeois S.
ጋer 1991
Politically, there was nothing intrinsically wrong in any new elite group acquiring the status of a governing stratum. Yet, problems for Mr. Premadasa began to arise whenever there occurred tensions and conflicts among governing as well as non-governing power elites. His formula of three 'C's was obviously not meant to mediate conflicts among power elites. It essentially meant to be a strategy to win over to his side those political forces that remained outside the mainstream and thereby to consolidate the governing position of the new elite group to which he gave leadership. Little did Mr. Premadasa realize that these parallel and traditional power blocs were soundly represented not in the executive but in the legislative branch of the state. To put it in other words, not in the APC - the new consensus mechanism - but in Parliament, the traditional bargaining floor. No wonder Messrs. Athulathmudali and Dissanayake, who in the past were not great lovers of parliamentary sovereignty, quickly found parliament to be the main theatre of opposition to the executive and also the source of solidarity coming from their social e quals of non-UNP groupings. If Mr. Premadasa's three "C's failed, nowhere else was that failure more evident than in his refusal to bring about an elite consensus through compromise.
The positive dimension of Mr. Prema dasa's consensus seeking exercise, however, had been his ability to draw in the majority of non-Sinhala ethnic political parties to accept the promise of a political solution to the national question. Except the LTTE and the EPRLF, all the other Tamil and Muslim parties appeared to stand solidly behind him and the Presidential system. The affirmative position taken up by the parties and the intelligentsia of the ethnic minorities on the Presidential system was indeed a surprising bonanza for Mr. Premadasa who found all the Sinhalese political parties, including sections of his own UNP averse to the 1978 Constitution. When the impeachment crisis reached its peak and the balance of forces took an acutely delicate turn, the minority parties and minority leaders were there to give Mr. Premadasa the much needed helping hand.
ID

Page 9
IMPEACHIMENT .....
The argument of the ethnic minority parties in favour of the Presidential system was a formidable one: a President elected by the entire country as a single electorate would be more sensitive and responsive to minority demands than would a Prime Minister elected by a micro electorate. And a President, not controlled by or accountable to an ethnically divided Parliament, was in a better position to give a fair deal to minorities, went on the argument.
This 'minority argument' was linked, in a broader sense, to an important dimension of the 1978 Constitution, to which not many have paid sufficient attention. The type of institutional dise quilibrium between the very powerful executive and the subordinate legislature had an unmistakably Gaullist spirit. Perhaps, the constitutional Gaullism was not entirely in accordance with the established Westminsterial tradition in Sri Lanka. Nonetheless, Gaullism of the present Constitution had a potential that could have been utilized for positive ends. The President with all his authority and powers could have emerged as the
ultimate mediat national crises.
The role of the u to have one fundam that of being non-p which was bitterly political party lines feature of excessiv
The argumen тіпority parti the President a formida President el entire COuntil electorate we sensitive and minority de would a pri elected b electorate
populace - stan loyalties and i. awesomely difficul not ideally be a consensus-seeking in Sri Lanka, when ( of a political part the hostility of ot Messrs. Jayevarde failed to uphold principal as expecte
The Cosn
CorpuS
I was the imperatorial renaissance of Louis Bonaparte that caused Marx to make the oft-quoted statement about
history repeating itself. Since Aryanam Kshathra has had more than its share of Bonapartes, it seems only logical that the historical dramas of the past should be recreated here as divine comedy.
Aryanam Kshathra, we are told, is Paradise (or at least only a few leagues from it). A paradise is merely an aristocratic garden of the Achaemenid period. Within the ancient Iranian paradise flourished trees which bore the fruit known to the Latins as Persicum Malum, the Persian Apple'. And so, is it not apt that Indra, the ex-Lord of Hosts, should conspire with Mithra, the ex-Lord of Agreements, to change the Kshayathiyanam-Kshayathiya, Akhenaton, into a Persian Apple. For Indra and Mithra had always coveted the Peacock Throne, and wished now to seize it.
In order to transform the Kshayathiyanam - Kshayathiya (KK for short, but not to be confused with that other KK, the
Pra,

)r and arbiter in
timate arbiter had ental characteristic, artisan. In a society
fragmented along as well - a negative a politicization of a
: of the ethnic esin favour of al system was ble one : a ected by the y as a single juld be more responsave to mands than 1ገጌe rገጌLIጌUS{er y a micro
ding above party nterests Was an t task. One could un impartial and umpire, particularly one was stilla leader y which commands her parties. Both ine and Premadasa this non-partisan 2d from them by the
mediatory spirit of the high office they came to occupy. The President was, to begin with, a UNP President and not
necessarily the Sri Lankan President.
Paradoxically, both Presidents Jayewardene and Premadasa sought to establish images of their being well-springs of social justice and authority by resorting to primordial sentiments of state power. Being at the apex of the entire political pantheon, they at varying degrees ritualized the state. Potential Gaullism thus gave way to shades of monarchism. In a society where political power still invoked many trappings of the pre-colonial state, it was too easy to succumb to drives towards paternalistic accumulation of power and dispensation of justice.
A basic issue suggested by the present crisis then is the democratization of constitutional foundations of the Sri Lankan state. It cannot, and should not, be reduced to a dualistic typology of models, Presidential vs. Parliamentary. Such reductionism, as it has already happened, is certain to limit the terms of the debate to which the public, after years of being mere onlookers, have come to participate with vigour and enthusiasm.
hic Dance
DesiCtj
Magus of the Bitten Leg, who was now the alter-ego of Akhenaton)* it was found necessary to convoke the Coven of the Immortals to an incantation of a curse consisting of fifteen parts. And it came to pass that Indra forwarded to Shiver, the Convenor of the Immortals, the text of the said curse, and Shiver accepted it.
Such was the strength of the curse that the entire land of Aryanam Kshathra was gripped by a fever, and this was even before the curse had been recited. So great was this fever that the epidemics of Force-speed and Lightning-strike fevers were soon forgotten.
Indeed, the fever was such that Pruthuvi, the goddess of the soil, was able to call upon her followers to forget their eternal squabbles and to gird their loins for a struggle against Akhenaton. "We have always been for the supremacy of the coven," she said, "now those within the pantheon realise their folly in elevating one of their number to be Kshayathiyanam Kshayathiya. And she put aside her feud with Soorya, the
)
'ada

Page 10
COSMIC .....
sun, and offered her support to Indra and Mithra. And Soorya forgot his anger with Pruthuvi. And Chandra, the moon, made peace with her brother Soorya and all was sweetness and light.
And even the ever fighting denizens of Valhalla, the Aesiro, agreed to support Indra and Mithra. Thor and Tyr forgave Loki for the murder of Baldur in ages past. "For," said Tyr, "did not Odin, the all-knowing, say at the beginning that the very Institution of the Kshayathiyanam - Kshayathiya was a devaluation of the supremacy of the coven? And did he not say that a struggle would emerge within the Pantheon over this very issue?" And Thor, swinging his hammer, swore that Akhenaton was the supreme manifestation of the world-swallower, Fenrir, so that conditional support could be granted to Indra and Mithra, who were merely minor manifestations. Loki declared that the whole of Aryanam Kshathra should know the truth of the matter, and that the truth was now more sought after than the innuendoes issuigg from the lakeside residence of Vayu, the God of Wind.
Indra and Mithra, together with several lesser gods and immortals, addressed a gathering of mortals, and to hear them came the denizens of Indraprasta and other lesser mortals. And Indra came out with his reasons for attempting to lay the curse on Akhenaton. "The KK gets too big for his boots," he said, "why should we have a Kshayathiyanam Kshayathiya, when a plain Kshayathiya, merely primus inter pares in the pantheon was sufficient? In place of the old Kshayathiya, we have Vazurgd Framadar, who is powerless. The entire pantheon is powerless. The KK appoints the chief Magi without reference to the pantheon, and gets them to do his bidding directly, ignoring the supervising gods."
"Indeed, Akhenaton has declared for the monotheistic heresy, pouring scorn upon the pantheon and upon the coven of immortals. He has devalued the power of the coven Furthermore, he not only squanders the heavenly wealth on his Tel-el-Amarna, instead of using it for the benefit of the immortal host, but he has, without reference to the Pantheon, provided Mardouk with weapons!" And the gathering was wroth.
Akhenaton was cut to the quick by these accusations. He immediately called upon those immortals who were of his persuasion to repudiate the curse, and to forward to Shiver a counterspell to fix the hex. He then called upon Vayu, to counter the accusations with counter-accusations. Vayu laid down the bucket of excreta that he had been carrying (in fulfillment of a holy vow) and sprang to work.
Vayu instructed the heralds of the gods to go forth and spread among the mortals the word of Akhenaton. "Look!" cried the heralds. "Do you not see the wonders of Tel-el-Amarna? Akhenaton has reconstructed Indraprasta there, for the benefit of you poor common mortals. Have not your crops been bountiful? Indra and Mithra want to take these away from you."
And Vayu summoned many of the Magi to debate in the
face of the mortals. And the pride of place was granted to the Kapatiyanam-Kapatiya, the Magus of the Bitten Leg.
V, Novem

"Akhenaton is restructuring the fabric of creation," he declared, "so that the Arya and Turya can co-exist and co-habit. I am a great one for co-existence and cohabitation. Am I not a great Magus, second only to the legendary Magi of yore (and of course to the greatest Magus in history, the K K Akhenaton)?"
And Akhenaton sent his emissaries to Mardouk, saying "I am in a bit of a fix over this hex, so can you give me a hand? We had our good times, and I didn't say anything when you bumped off Ea, so let's get together for old-times sake." And Mardouk answered in erotic terms. "My emissaries of love," he said, "those Turya immortals shall take their place in the coven and ward off the incantations. In the meantime, a little less heat please." And Akhenaton ordered the host to desist.
The lesser gods of Turyanam Kshathra were wroth.
10
"Mardouk bumped off Ea!" they declared. "Whilst
Akhenaton gave bows and arrows to Mardouk, we joined hands with the gods of Aryanam Kshathra. Yet Akhenaton helped Mardouk to quell us! We will overthrow the KK with this curse."
Finally, of course, it turned out that Akhenaton had another ace up his sleeve. Shiver had been unshaken by the visions of a new world, but Akhenaton appealed to the Philistines. "In the name of Baal," he declared, "those who would lay a curse upon me are but the agents of the Bedawi of Hebron. I cast them out of the temple of Mammon and they would wreak their vengeance upon me. Rally unto me, you of Philistia, and rid me of the agents of the Levites, so that Baal would have his rightful place."
And so Baal dropped in on Shiver and said, "Shiver, you had better not let the Levites win. And if they should lose, the wealth will spring up from the very rocks, like the oil springs of Sumer."
Shiver was discontented and so he undertook a cosmic dance. And gods, immortals and mortals looked on in wonder. And as he danced, visions sprang before the onlookers. Those of Akhenaton saw visions of victory and those of Indra and Mithra saw visions of victory. And at the end of that cosmic dance, Shiver declared: "The hex is fixed, the curse is accursed, the incantation is a recantation, the Khaled ibn Walid."
And Indra and Mithra were thunderstruck. It was left to a lesser god among their followers to declare: "O Shiver, you are indeed the Creator and the Destroyer." And the curse, having been created, was destroyed.
Endnotes: 1. cf OED: It is suspected by theologians that the original forbidden fruit of the Garden of Eden was not the Apple, but the Persian Apple, the Peach. However, the indigenous cosmologists of the National Thought assert that it was in fact a Pawpaw (Papaya Zeylanicus); the fig leaf being in fact a leaf of the Pawpaw tree. 2. The initials KK in reference to the 'King of Kings' also appears in the Astro-Hungarian Empire, which was both "Kaiserlich" (Imperial) and "Koeninglich" (Royal). In the post-imperial period it was used of Bruno Kreisky of Austria and Kadar of Hungary. 3. The Cosmologists of the National Thought accuse the Aesir of being an alien intrusion in the divine body politic of Aryanam Kshathra, what with the continuing controversy over the killing of Baldur. Incidentally, both the main cosmologists of the National Thought are those who quite recently left Valhalla.
ber 1991

Page 11
THROUGH A SPLIN
THE IMPEACHMENTAS
T suddenly sprung motion of impeachment against President Premadasa took the mass media as much by surprise as every other sector of the country. In the case of the people this could be understood for there had not been the slightest sign that the powerful Presidency could be so challenged. In the case of the media no such legitimate excuse can be made out. After all, the media is supposed to be “the watchdogs of democracy to use a phrase which rings with a quaint earnestness. But the media's lack of alertness is equally easily explained. During the last so many years of pressures by Governments, both of the United Front and the UNP, the media has been both emasculated and subject to self-castration.
Though we use the word “media in deference to the current verbal fashion, our analysis is here confined to how the newspapers in Sri Lanka handled the impeachment issue. The Governmentowned radio and television have stoutly behaved as if there has been no such contretemps while giving wide coverage to the speeches of the President where, in what can only look like shadowboxing to their audiences, Mr. Premadasa has lustily punched the impeachers.
The most dramatic feature of the newspaper coverage is how the Government through its newspapers was able to launch a preemptive strike on the impeachment motion while the independent newspapers were agonizing over how to break the news.
For example on August 29, The Island, the country's only English daily newspaper not managed by the Government, only had a small double column news item tucked away on page one quoting Mr. Anura Bandaranaike, the SLFP MP, that a petition seeking the removal of the President had been
Ajith Sama
signed by the OppC of the Government the Speaker. proceeded to reproc giving more details Daily News, the Government-mana had a banner pa ”Conspiracy to Impe with a strap-line "S dissolution" over : smiling Mr. Prema flag suggestivel background to the
These two examples mood in the countr was not quite sure h of the magnitude impeach what impregnable Pres News had no such looked more like ap than a page one ne News pugnaciously Government's can impeachment mc suggested that this the part of a disgru UNP which had g SLFP to prevent Parliament and g forward march of President Premada the Daily News cont work. It carried (ag an item saying tha firmly behind the three Government N the motion had signatures. It also these MPs had cla misled into signing was supported by a a series which the during this perio directly into the can contrast, the same satisfy itself by Spokesman Ranil his weekly exchange the Cabinet mee confirmed that
I Prav
 

NTERED MIRROR :
VIEWED BY THE MEDIA
ranayake
)sition and sections and handed over to The paper then luce a Reuter report . In contrast, the
flagship of the ged Lake House, ge one headline ach the President?” SLFP move fearing a photograph of a dasa with the Lion ly forming the presidential visage.
were typical of the y. While The Island ow to handle a story 2 of the move to looked like an idency, the Daily hesitations. In what olitical commentary :ws story, the Daily set the tone for the 1paign against the )tion. The story was a conspiracy on ntled section of the anged up with the the dissolution of enerally halt the the country under sa. The next day, inued with the good ain as its lead story) ut the Cabinet was President and that WPs who had signed
retracted their carried a story that imed to have been he motion. All this an editorial, one of Daily News wrote d, taking its fight ap of the enemy. In day's Island had to quoting Cabinet Wickremesinghe in with reporters after ting. In this he the Speaker had
I ada
“entertained a motion of impeachment but that to his knowledge no government MP had signed it.
The contrasting coverage of the two newspapers is easily explained. The Daily News had no qualms about getting into the fray because it obviously had the sanction of the Government at the highest levels. In fact the whole history of the impeachment controversy shows a clever and calculated campaign by the Government using the entire array of the media at its command to press its point of view home and destroy its detractors. Ridicule, calumny and all the other devices at the command of the propagandist were used against the dissident Lalith Athulatih mudali - Gamini Dissanayake group (dubbed the GAG, meaning Gamini Athulathmudali Group, by a gleeful Observer Editor) specially in the editorial columns of the Observer, its political article written by Editor H.L.D. Mahindapala and in the regular Sunday article written by Anuruddha Tilakasiri in neo-Marxian lingo. The Island on the other hand was under twin constraints. One was political. As an independent newspaper it was hesitant about how exactly to handle a story of this magnitude. After all it was not so long ago that the Colombo correspondent of The Hindu, Thomas Abraham had noted that The Island and the Divaina were the country's two leading independent daily newspapers, but could not be prevented from commenting in passing that, however, they appear tame by western standards. Longyears of subjection to government pressures, the timidity of proprietors and the self censorship and self-doubts of editors and journalists have reduced the country's independent press to this position.
The other reason was professional. The newspaper had no source to quote from. While the Daily News had the licence to lead with a political story bordering on the propagandist,

Page 12
MEDIA .....
The Island had to wait two full days till August 31 when it could quote Mr. Lalith Athulathmudali who announced at a press briefing that he had signed the motion, resigned from his portfolio and was in the vanguard of the struggle for democracy. With that news peg to hang its story on, The Island could come into the open. These agonizing hesitancies of The Island are typical of the situation where a small independent press is hemmed in by both a powerful Government and a large Government-managed media.
This brings us to a point which has been discussed in the context of the impeachment controversy. The view has been widely expressed that the controversy had released the print media from its timidity and acted as a catalyst towards a freer media. Among those who have expressed this view are some of the dissident leaders themselves. But can such an optimistic reading be supported by the actual conduct of the print media during this period?
One fact that should have struck observers of the media was the refusal of the newspapers (except, of course, those managed by the Government) to take a clear cut position on the issue. All newspapers were reduced to taking refuge in vague generalities, nebulous phraseology and high-sounding expositions of basic constitutional theory. There was a refusal to discuss the issue in clear-cut terms though reading between the lines the sympathies of sections of the press may not have been hard to determine. It was left to constitutional pundits,
lawyers and sir marshalled in the newspapers to tal either side of the or inability of the
up clear positions ( issue is the best p had not by any m from its coils of f
The awe of the E clearly pervaded e independent me Times, the inde newspaper publ Wijewardene, hei Lake House bal aftermath of the in (on September 1) to outline the virt in its editorial. H the motion was reig the same newspap enough courage to though the motion its contents had ne scrutinized; the clo newspaper came to the issue.
On the whole the were more daring counterparts but til confined to report the dissident UNF Here the Lank newspaper of the T cautious than counterpart at Up for the first time t release signified influential section c out with tales from the President. But reaction to a regim to be understood
ANCL employ
T Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd., Employees’ Independent Union has told the Lake House Chairman that the circulation of the institution's publications was fast dwindling due to their partial coverage of current events in the country.
over drop i.
In a letter to the C has said that it ha the outset the imp news presentation
The Union has ur
pay his attention view to impr(
Novem

milar personages ir numbers by the ke up positions on livide. This refusal print media to take on so vital a national proof that the press eans liberated itself ear.
xecutive Presidency ven sections of the dia. The Sunday pendent Sunday ished by Ranjith r of the legendary on, D.R., in the mpeachment motion went out of its way les of the President owever, by the time cted by the Speaker, per had plucked up say editorially that
had been rejected, ver been debated or sest an independent a bold comment on
Sinhala newspapers
than their English nis too was basically ing the meetings of 'ers at great length. adipa, the daily imes group was more the Divaina, its |ali Newspapers but here was a sense of by the fact that an f the UNP had come out of school against this was a legitimate ented press and has as such.
The opposition, during the controversy, suffered through the lack of a press of its own. It had only two newspapers, the Aththa and the Ravaya which was later joined by the Yukthiya until its press was sealed. The Aththa even started a midweek edition during this period and continued its customary racy style of journalism. The less journalistically sophisticated Ravaya was sometimes guilty of wish fulfilment journalism such as when it boldly proclaimed the abolition of the Executive Presidency at the beginning or the announcement of Lalith Athulathmudali as Prime Minister as a possible outcome of the motion being victorious. Perhaps Editor Victor Ivan, a keen political animal but not a journalist with experience in the mills of conventional journalism, must understand the difference between news reporting and commentary, particularly in the main news story. Sometimes it is necessary to adhere to conventions even in order to reject them.
All in all, the impeachment period was a period of release for the country's print media but not a period of lasting liberation. For that Sri Lankan politics will have to labour more. After the heady sense of release, the print media has again gone back to the predestined state of timid self-doubt. That is a situation which should cause concern among the liberals, dissidents and others of the same ilk who raised hurrahs to the media during the brief summer of the abortive impeachment. To liberate the media much more will be needed than spectacular pyrotechnics.
7ees concerned
n circulation
Shairman, the Union as pointed out from ortance of balanced
ged the Chairman to o the matter with a oving sales and
12 ber 1991
safeguarding the interests of the institution.
The Island, 19 September 1991

Page 13
THE BBC IDEE
O October 13, BBC radio responded to objections made by a Sri Lankan listener about reports filed by its correspondent in Sri Lanka in September this year.
In its programme WRITE ON, which solicits audience comment, compliment and criticism, the BBC defended the reports and the reporter.
The letter referred to two reports filed by Christopher Morris in the programmes Newshour and Outlook:
"After spending one week with the terrorist group Tamil Tigers, IMorris) gave vivid descriptions of training camps in which boys and girls are trained to fight against the government forces. Terrorist groups thrive on publicity... We don't hear much about the IRA over the BBC."
WRITE ON:
Yes, a fair enough point, but you do have to remember, as always, that one man's terrorist is, as they say, another man's freedom fighter. From the Sri Lankan government point of view, obviously, the Tamil Tigers would be looked upon, I would imagine, as terrorists. So should the BBC carry these kinds of reports? Here's the head of the World Service Current Affairs, Andrew Joynes.
Andrew Joynes:
There is what amounts to a full-scale civil war going on in some parts of Sri Lanka and that has been the case for
some years. During the last year, for
instance, it is thought that anything up to 10,000 lives had been lost. This report actually followed a battle that occurred at Elephant Pass. It's not a case of actually giving publicity to any group - it's a question of actually providing the background to what is a major military phenomenon in that part of the world.
WRTE ON:
The specific form of this report - do you think it rather tended to show the Tamil Tigers in a favourable light?
AJ:
Well I don't think two reports. The which was carried
gave something of
amounts almost to which very yo indoctrinated and e report that looked are involved and a involved in Tiger n it seems that they ar. their connections \
WRTE ON:
How do you answer letter to the effect not cover the activ the same kind of
AJ:
Well, it’s not the cas not cover the activ think every atrocity, explosion is report fact, programmes been providing the para military infra
It is the case that u1 government legislat with the other me unable to carry dire representatives organisations. legislation was intr. BBC and the rest c argued very strongl grounds that it wo the media here we standards. It is far - to allow the audi decent members ( make up their mind not an argument is it is valid in demo
WRTE ON:
I think that most United Kingdom wo Andrew said there in the long run y listeners make upth the rights and wrong like the Tamil Tige doing.
Pray

ENDS ITSELF
it did. There were re was the report on Newshour which the flavour of what the fanaticism with ung people are :qually, the Outlook at the way women actually become so military activity that e actually neglecting with their families.
š
the comment in the that the BBC does ities of the IRA in way?
e that the BBC does ities of the IRA - I every murder, every ed upon. And, in for many years have background to their structure.
nder present British ion, the BBC along dia in Britain, are :ctly interviews with of paramilitary Now when this oduced in 1988, the of the British media y against this on the uld look as though re applying double better - in our view ence - the ordinary, of the audience to ls about whether or specious or whether cratic terms.
broadcasters in the uld agree with what
and I believe that ou do have to let eir own minds about sabout what groups rs and the IRA are
3 'ada
Editor's Note:
Velupillai Prabhakaran, the elusive and reticent leader of the Tamil Tigers was interviwed by Chris Morris in September this year. A transcript of this interview was published in the local newspapers.
Cracks in the Church Of England 2
A senior clergyman in the Church of England has given a warning that there will be an exodus of clergy and congregations if women are ordained as priests. The Archdeacon of York has already suggested that the Church of England may have to be formally split into traditionalist and liberal wings because of deep differences on many issues.
The question whether women should become priests is discussed by diocese throughout the Church of England and a decision will be taken by the Church's parliament, the General Senate, next year.
BBC, October 1991
Rape in Marriage
The ruling by Britain's Law Lords that a husband who forces his wife to have sex is acting unlawfully and could face charges of rape has been greeted as a triumph by women's rights campaigners and victims of sexual abuse in marriage. The Law Lords have looked again at a ruling dating back to 1736 which said that by marrying, the woman had given her consent to sex whatever the circumstances. That, said the Law Lords, was no longer appropriate in a modern marriage which is a partnership of equals. A man who in future insists on conjugal rights can be prosecuted for marital rape.
BBC, October 1991

Page 14
The Sri Lan
Recent Performance
HOMVard
T Sri Lankan economy appeared to bounce back in 1990 badly. Output, as measured by the Gross Domestic P. the average annual rate of growth in the preceding 1987-8 20% of the total labour force during the latter period to profits rose by some 40% - 50% to around 30% of capital e of GDP, rose by 15% and domestic savings by 21%. The fell by 33% and the budget deficit was greatly curtailed - is also arguable that the long-term deterioration in the con implementation by government of two consumption oriente meals programmes - and an improved targeting of the existin which rose from 11.6% in 1989 to 21.5% in 1990. " .
The outlook for the current year is suggestive of a continuat gear. Growth in output is expected to be in the order of 4. 20%). Labour force estimates should show a continuing imp to around 15%. Inflation should settle in the 10% to 12' and the budget deficit (as percentages of GDP) are both e. to be around 6.5% of GDP, and the budget deficit around Rs43/1US$ mark by the end of the year, restoring somew
Key Macroecon
TEM
Growth Rate
investment/GDP
Unemployment
Inflation Rate
Current Account Deficit/GDP
1/
Gross External Reserves
Debt Service Ratio
Exchange Rate (Rs/US$)
Budget Deficit/GDP
1/ Gross External Reserves in months of imports of goods an 2/ Debt service payments as a percentage of receipts from go Source: Central Bank of Sri Lanka, various Annual Econor Ministry of Policy Planning and Plan Implementation, vario
1. The international parity of a currency is defined as its rela
Novem
 

kan Economy
and Future Prospects
NichOlaS
after several depressing years during which it haemorrhaged oduct (GDP), grew at a massive 6.3%, almost three times period. Unemployment fell correspondingly from around around 16% of the total labour force in 1990. Corporate mployed in 1990. Private sector investment, as a percentage deficit on the current account of the balance of payments falling by around 10% in relation to the previous year. It dition of the poor was somewhat arrested as a result of the d welfare programmes - the Janasaviya and school mid-day g food stamps scheme. The only economic blip was inflation,
ion of the economy’s recovery rather than a shift to a higher 5% to 5%, in spite of a drop in corporate profits (to around rovement in the unemployment rate - the rate possibly falling % range. The current account of the balance of payments kpected to deteriorate; the current account out turn is likely 11% of GDP. Lastly, the exchange rate should break the hat the international parity of the currency".
Omic Indicators
1989 1990 . 1991E
2.3% 6.3% 4.5% - 5%
21.6% 22.6% 23%
20% 16.2% 15%
11.6% 21.3% 10% - 12%
-4.4% -3.0% -4.0%
2.5mths 3.0mths 2.9mths
20.8% 14.2% 15.0%
40.00 40.24 43
11.2% 9.9% 11.0%
di services :: and private transfers
us Public Investment Programmes
tive international purchasing pwoer.
ber 1991

Page 15
ECONOMY .....
This review of the recent economic performance of the Sri Lankan economy will attempt to give some meaning to these numbers by providing an insight into its inner workings. In doing so one of the intentions is to contribute to the ongoing debate concerning the potential of the current development path on which the economy is set.
The expectation in the government, business circles, and the foreign donor community is that the recent turnaround in the country's economic fortunes marks the beginning of a period of renewed growth, one which should see the Sri Lankan economy propelled within the next decade or so to the heights currently enjoyed by the so-called South East Asian miracles. A central issue which needs to be addressed in this context is the conditions necessary for Sri Lanka to achieve a Newly Industrialized Country (NIC) status within the next decade, and the likelihood of these conditions being met. The possible consequences of the recent and expected economic developments for the majority of Sri Lankan people in terms of their economic well-being are closely related to this issue.
A comprehensive review of the economy requires the examination of a number of key themes.
i. International Context. A fundamental contention of the following review is that the world market is having a progressively greater impact on the Sri Lankan economy with the increasing outward orientation of the latter. This is evident in virtually all facets of the economy's performance. Hence an assessment of the current and likely future developments in the world economy are indispensable to an understanding of the current developments and future prospects for the Sri Lankan economy.
ii. Policy Context. Also crucial for gauging the poten
tialities of the Sri Lankan economy is an assessment of the development strategy and general economic policy stance adopted by the government. Of concern here, in view of Foreign Donor support for the current development strategy pursued by the Sri Lankan government and the recent Extended Structural Adjustment Facility arrangement entered into by the government with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, is the influence of external bodies on the direction of domestic policy. Of related concern is the feasibility and likely consequences of an alternative development strategy.
iii. Economic Growth. Having set the backdrop, the review of economic performance will begin with a look at the prospects for growth in output. It will be argued that growth is - as can be expected - driven by investment, but that investment has varied with the availability of foreign savings. The implication is that the objective of achieving the status of a NIC within the next decade will only be realized if an adequate level of foreign savings, primarily in the form of foreign direct private investment, is forthcoming. A second contention of the growth study will be that a major impediment to a faster
Prd

1ν.
vi.
V
To
15 vada
rate of growth in the recent past has been the deterioration in the terms of trade - the price of Sri Lankan exports in relation to the price of imports. A crude back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that Gross Domestic Product would have been approximately 50% greater than it is at present if the terms of trade had remained constant since the beginning of the 1960s. The latter is not so much an argument for an alternative, more closed, economic strategy. Rather it is to illustrate the importance of external factors in the movement of the domestic economy at the level of production.
Inflation. Fluctuations in the rate of inflation in the recent past have been explained by some economists primarily as the result of monetary impulses. An alternative reading of the inflationary process should point to the fact that the domestic price level is primarily influenced by world market forces, and that the influence of the latter on the former is, as one would expect, becoming ever stronger with the increasing extraversion of the economy. .
External Balance. The question of external balance requires careful analysis in order to dispel some existing myths. As in the case of inflation, the prime mover of the current account balance is external factors, the terms of trade, and not, as traditionally argued, domestic expansionary policies.
Employment. Given the paucity and inconsistency of available data on employment and unemployment, the study will seek first and foremost to establish the general trend in, and pattern of, employment and unemployment over the last two decades. Using this as a basis, an attempt will then be made to relate the trends and patterns of employment and unemployment to other developments in the economy. It will be argued that trends and patterns of employment and unemployment broadly correspond to the growth and structural transformation of the economy.
ii. Poverty\Welfare issues. The study will begin by at
tempting to establish recent trends and patterns in poverty and welfare. Consideration will be given to the impact which recent economic developments and policy changes have had on the poor. It will be argued that contra accepted wisdom there is little evidence in the Sri Lankan context of an in-built "trickle down" effect of market-based growth. In fact, it will be shown that the evidence is one of a deterioration in poverty, income distribution and welfare. Having made this point, the study will then proceed to argue that the post 1977 deterioration in the condition of the poor cannot
simply be ascribed to the policy changes which took
place in 1977. This deterioration is, on the contrary, the result of processes which began much earlier, although they were no doubt intensified by latter policies.
be continued in the next issue

Page 16
REPORTING
EXCESSES..... OR EXCESSIVE REPORTING
In December 1990, the Press Council of India appointed a three member committee to inquire into media allegations of Army atrocities in Jammu and Kashmir. This was in response to an invitation by the Army to conduct an "impartial review" of the accusations made against it.
The Committee came to the conclusion that the newspaper reports which claimed Army outrages were baseless. Its final Report was extensively publicised on national television and in newspapers which exonerated the Army of human rights excesses and blamed the journalists of fabrication. The Report said that human rights organisations should be "more investigative and check all sides more carefully before they come to firm conclusions which they proceed to publicise."
But it is the credibility of the Report which is now at stake. The Committee is being accused of partiality and criticised for having used unacceptable methodology in conducting its inquiries.
The Press Council, when it accepted the assignment the army offered it, reviewed only the media reports which the army was concerned about. Allegations of human rights violations by paramilitary groups were disregarded. The question is now being asked: "Is it because the paramilitary forces did not solicit the Press Council to do so?"
Excerpts:
Press Council Report on the Army in Kashmir
by Rita Manchanda, Economic and Political Weekly, 17 August 1991
The army has affected a virtual coup in the latest Press Council Report Crisis and Credibility on Kashmir. They have got the country's ace liberal B.G. Verghese to give a clean chit to the army and in passing, to the paramilitary forces in the valley. Editorial writers have hailed it for exposing as a "massive hoax reports of army excesses and atrocities in the valley. The Bharatiya Janata Party has demanded an apology from the doyen of the civil libertarians, Justice VM. Tarkunde for supporting anti-national elements in maligning the security forces in Kashmir.
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I6
Human Rights groups are supposedly in the dock. And the adjudicator in this curious trial of human rights groups vs the army is B.G. Verghese. On the invitation of the army, a three member committee was appointed by the Press Council to look into reports of army excesses. One member, the elderly journalist, Akhtar Das was unable to travel to the valley and is not a signatory of the report. K. Vikram Rao is cited as co-author of the report but as he is better known for his trade union proclivities rather than his journalistic activities, it is evident that the report rests on the credentials of Verghese.
Most human rights groups would have described him as a sympathiser if not an activist. And Verghese now admonishes these groups for being duped by "the say so of alleged victims and propagandists" masterminded by Pakistan. But as a far from demoralised V.M. Tarkunde retorted, "is the report not only based on the say so of the army? Is it not equally onesided?" The report spans the period March 1990 to May 1991 and examines some half a dozen incidents of reported excesses. Verghese acknowledged that in the selection of these incidents he was influenced by the news clippings sent to the committee last winter. In addition, the committee included the alleged Kunan-Poshpara gang rape and the killings of infiltrators at Dudhi as they were seen as the most heinous examples of army excesses. Moreover, these had been given the maximum publicity, Verghese explained. Both were found to be without foundation.
Human rights groups are, however, a little sceptical about the choice of incidents of reported excesses. Why does Verghese or rather the army show no interest in such alleged incidents of army excesses as in Panzgam in Pulwana district on June 9, 1990 or the rape and molestation of women in Kupwara during a search and cordon operation on June 11 or the Tregham incident on June 10, asks Dinesh Mohan of the Committee for Initiatives on Kashmir. These have been well documented in the all women's committee report “Kashmir Imprisoned” published by the CIK.
As for the killings of the 73 militants' at Dudhi near the line of control last May, reports in the press have alleged that the youths have been massacred in a mass 'encounter or that these infiltrators have been killed when they could have been arrested. Suspicion was further fuelled by the fact that the bodies were not brought back to the valley. In an effort to defuse tension the high court asked the administration to publish their photographs in the local press. Modifying the order, the Supreme Court ordered that the photographs be displayed at offices of the district magistrate and police stations in the valley for inspection by relatives and friends from June 10 to 18.
Verghese unhesitatingly concludes, on the basis of what the authorities disclose to him, that the allegations were unfounded. Would he have been so certain if he knew that the advertisement alerting people about the photographs appeared in the popular Urdu daily Al safa only on June 14? Moreover, according to a letter sent to the TOI (which was not published) and human rights groups by two residents of Srinagar, the majority of the names of the dead listed indicated that they were from the Doda-Kishtwar area of the Jammu division, a day's journey from Srinagar where
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Page 17
EXCESSES .....
the photographs were displayed. While night curfew is continuous, on June 12 there was day curfew and on June 13 and 14 the civil curfew of the militants, June 14 - 15 strike by the state employees and June 16 was a Sunday. On June 18 the photographs were withdrawn. The people of Doda-Kishtwar therefore, never had a chance to identify the photographs.
In the Kunan-Poshpara incident 23 to 100 women were reported to have been raped by the army during a search and cordon operation last February. The Verghese committee, however, found the charge of rape “completely untrue'. Why? Because of the delay in reporting the incident; the villagers having signed the NOC (No Objection Certificate) after the raid; the fluctuating number of rape victims; the inconsistencies in the testimonies of some of the villagers interviewed by the committee and finally, "would troops on a hazardous search and cordon operation in a village known to be harbouring militants nonchalantly spend the night carousing and raping?"
It is quite possible that the Kunan-Poshpara rape incident was concocted and the "women tutored and coerced into making statements derogatory to their own honour and dignity." But the Verghese Committee might have lent its own investigation more weight had it displayed less of an overt bias towards the army version.
Verghese chooses to dismiss the evidence of the JK police constable who accompanied the army party and that of the block medical officer who examined 32 women. He found injuries like abrasion on the chest and abdomen which however were attributed to the village folk hugging kangris. Did the men have similar abrasions? Verghese says he never thought to inquire. The medical report says that in the case of the three unmarried girls their hymen was torn. But Verghese in a statement reminiscent of standard police style
defence states, "it could be the result of natural factors,
injuries or premarital sex."
In the report, Verghese refers to a group of four to five young girls who were pointed out to a visiting committee as victims of rape. "They stood in full gaze of some young men idling nearby. They seemed quite unashamed to be lined up in public," Verghese stressed as if it clinched the lie of rape. They were very young girls, victims of an incident that took place more than three months before. Does Verghese want to suggest that they, the victims, should not come out in public?
A "massive hoax" orchestrated by the militant groups and their mentors abroad is how the Committee described the Kunan-Poshpara rape. "It is part of the sustained strategy by Pakistan to get the Kashmir issue inscribed on the international agenda when it has failed to do so on a politico-legal basis. Otherwise, why should the Srinagar-based newspaper, Al safa in its May issue reprint an English report filed much earlier by UPI correspondent Ghulam Nabi Khayal along with a human rights group report also in English about an incident that took place in February?" Verghese said waving the copy of Al safa. What the
Pra

authorities forgot to tell Verghese was that Alsafa regularly carries English language articles and editorials once a week.
It is no one's argument that there is not a propaganda war afoot in which human rights violations prominently figure. And clearly for Verghese the driving force behind his determination to counter reports of human rights excesses is the "human rights conditionalities" the USA seeks to impose on India. "As a result of these reports the US Congress now dares to suggest that training in human rights must be made a part of the advanced training programme for visiting Indian defence personnel. At a recent seminar on Kashmir in Washington one English participant spoke of Kashmir being a colony of India," he said in an outraged tone.
There is no denying that separating fact from propaganda in the valley is a daunting task for any journalist or human rights groups as was highlighted last month when militants of the Muslim Janbaz Force holding the two Swedish hostages staged an elaborate drama complete with photographs of ene Swede wounded in the leg by the security forces.
* As the Srinagar based correspondent Ghulam Nabi Khayal readily admitted, "there are only two ways in which you can go to the affected area, either the militants take you or the security forces." And reports appropriately reflect the bias of who escorts you. Besides, any local journalist who challenges the militants does so at enormous personal risk. Al safa editor Shaban Vakil dared to criticise the militants and was executed.
Tarkunde too readily spoke of the limitations under which human rights groups operate. "Very often the other side refuses to talk to us," he said. He has no quarrel with the need for greater rigour in investigating human rights violations, especially in a situation where they are grist to the propaganda mill. But the Press Council Report would have carried more credibility had it demonstrated a similar rigour in its own investigation into army excesses.
The Report has become a convenient tool to pillory the human rights groups and columnists are full of righteous indignation at the "dirty tricks against the army". Would they be so strident had they actually read the bulky report? Who indeed has fallen victim to the 'say so’ of the people or the army, the human rights groups or the Verghese Committee?
Verghese Committee Report: How Reliable?
by B.M. Sinha Mainstream, 7 September 1991
It seems that the Committee followed a procedure to carry our its assignment that robs it of the claim that it was scrupulously impartial and truly objective in its work. To prove this, an instance can be cited: It never cared to contact those bodies or organisations which too enjoy credibility in the eyes of the people and which had conducted investigations into the cases of alleged atrocities in the State. Their objective was to ensure protection and preservation of
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EXCESSES .....
human rights. One such body was the Coordination Committee on Kashmir (CCK) headed by justice Tarkunde. When N.D. Pancholi, the General Secretary of the Citizens for Democracy, one of the members of the CCK, learnt about the setting up of the Committee by the Press Council, he contacted Verghese and asked him if he would like to study the reports of the inquiries made into the cases of atrocities in the Valley by his organisation and the People's Union of Civil liberties (PUCL). In reply to a query, Pancholi told Verghese that the reports were about the atrocities committed by the paramilitary forces. Verghese then told him that he did not need these reports as the terms of reference of his committee pertained only to the conduct of the Army. Why did he not think that these reports would have at least helped him understand better the situation that prevails in the Valley?
The Committee, however, did not leave the paramilitary forces out of its investigation as is clear from para 338 of its Report. It says: "Although the Committee's terms of reference pertained exclusively to the Army it has reviewed the functioning of the paramilitary forces in passing as anti-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations are indivisible and the militants are operating under an overall unified strategy."
Why did the Committee do so despite Verghese having told Pancholi that its terms of reference would not permit it? Why did it not occur to the Committee earlier that anti-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations are "indivisible" and, therefore, a case of atrocity may involve both the army and the paramilitary forces? Why did it not seek the reports Pancholi wanted to hand over to Verghese when it decided to review the functioning of the paramilitary forces? And even when it went against the terms of reference,
A Letter to Pres
Your Excellency,
ARTICLE 19, the International Centre Against Censorship, is disturbed at reports of a break-in at Navamaga Printers and the damage to printing machinery while the premises was under seal and police guard. e
The seals and the police guard were placed on the Navamaga Printers' premises on October 4 1991, by police officers attached to the Mount Lavinia Police Station.
ARTICLE 19 notes that on September 18 1991, police officers searched the premises of Navamaga Printers and took two of its employees into custody who were released later that day. On the following day, Kelly Senanayake, the owner of the business, reported to the Article" 19.: of the . Uni
this right inclu
Mount Lavinia Police questioned and asked ti the printing work un Printers.
ARTICLE 19 believes unwarranted harassm official and unofficial of the printing by Nava edition of the Sinhale which carried leading : the attempt to impea
ARTICLE 19 ca11S C. investigate the circums the Navamaga Print( responsible, and to cor loss of earnings and
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why did it not say a single word whether it treats as true the stories about the atrocities committed by some of these forces and widely reported by the media? The critics, however, refuse to believe that this lapse occurred because the senior officers of these forces had not made a "request" to the Press Council to review the media stories against them.
For any judicious, if not judicial, inquiry into the kind of matter that formed part of the terms of reference of the Verghese Committee, it is expected from the persons conducting it that they meet as many persons as possible who may be of help to them. The Verghese Committee too was expected to meet persons like Justice Tarkunde, Justice Rajinder Sacher, Dr. Amrik Singh, Inder Mohan, Tapan Bose, Ms Premila Lewis, Ms. Nandita Haksar and Ms. Sakina Hasan in Delhi who had visited Kashmir and looked into the cases of atrocities allegedly committed by para-military forces. None of these persons were approached by the Verghese Committee, though the work done by them had been widely reported in the media. On the contrary, their human rights organisations came in for a severe criticism by it.
The Committee was also expected to issue public notice in Jammu and Kashmir inviting the members of the public to bring to its notice allegations of army atrocities. This is a normal practice and is followed by any committee - even if non-official - holding an inquiry into a serious matter like rioting, rape or murder. But the Verghese Committee did not do anything like this. If it had, it may have come to know of some other cases of atrocities than those about which the Army wanted it to review. It is also possible that the Committee may have come across some independent evidence against or in support of the charges against the Army it was looking into. It is not known why the Committee did not follow this normal procedure. But by not doing so, it has raised serious doubts about the authenticity of its Report.
idento PremadaSa
e Station where he was o make a statement about dertaken by Navamaga
that these incidents of ent and intimidation by means are a direct result maga Printers of a special ese newspaper Yukthiya articles on the subject of ch President Premadasa.
on your government to tances of the break-in at ars, to prosecute those mpensate the printers for damages caused to the
18
ber 1991
ARTICLE 19 reiterates its call to your government, as stated in its letter dated October 11 1991, to allow Navamaga Printers to reopen, and to refrain from further interference with the rights of printers and publishers to practise their professions as guaranteed by Article 14 (1) (a) and (b) of the Constitution of Sri Lanka, and respectfully requests that your government lives up to its obligations under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Sgd. Frances D'Souza Director
Article 19 90 Borough High St
SE 1 1LL, United Kingdom

Page 19
Justice fo]
The Magisterial Inquiry into th
ME killings, thousands in number and politically-motivated, have occurred in Sri Lanka during the past few years. In a vast majority of the cases, both the killers and the killed remained, and continue to remain, "unidentified’. Even when the identities of victims are established, the law, in spite of its long arm, often failed to reach the perpetrators of the crime. An illustrative case in point is the death of Richard de Zoysa, the consummate media personality.
Some facts about Richard de Zoysa's tragic death are now well known. In the early hours of February 18, 1990, he was abducted from his home near Colombo by a group of armed men. As later reports indicated, he was shot in the head. and thrown into the sea. His body was washed ashore the next morning near Moratuwa, about 16 kilometres South of Colombo. The sealed coffin of de Zoysa bore testimony to the shared fate of many such bodies recovered: badly mutilated under circumstances known only to the killers.
Who killed Richard de Zoysa? It remains a question the answer to which has not yet been judicially established. Although a magisterial inquiry into this killing was instituted, and some suspects were named by de Zoysa’s mother, the case was closed when in July 1990, the Attorney General declined to proceed with it.
Public concern about Richard de Zoysa's death as well as the thwarted judicial inquiry grew nationally and internationally. International concern has meanwhile been expressed in a number of reports prepared by some eminent human rights bodies. In March and June 1990, the U.S. human rights group Asia Watch issued two statements, calling on the government to "institute an independent investigation into the murder of Richard de Zoysa." The International Commission of Jurists, based in Geneva, too took an active interest in this death. It sent a special representative, Mr. Anthony Heaton-Armstrong to Sri Lanka to observe the magisterial inquiry. The ICJ representative attended the court hearing in July 1990. He also met senior law officials to express the ICJ's concern about the way the judicial proceedings were being conducted. Mr. Heaton-Armstrong subsequently submitted a report to the ICJ.
As the ICJ report notes, what immediately followed the abduction and killing of Richard de Zoysa was “unusual in that his body was recovered in an identifiable state. The recovery of the body was in fact followed by a post-mortem, a facility which not many bodies had previously been granted. In brief, Richard de Zoysa was not one who "disappeared without a trace. The Report observes:
Since the upsurge of JVP violence there have been between 8,000 (the official figure estimated by the International Committee of the Red Cross) and 30,000 (the unofficial figure) “disappearances in Sri
P

the Dead
e Murder of Richard de Zoysa
Lanka. It is officially conceded that the security forces have been directly or indirectly responsible for some of these 'disappearances' although it is not possible to quantify them precisely.
Almost inevitably, the disappearances are absolute - i.e. the 'disappeared person is lost forever. Bodies are rarely identifiable as the killers take steps either to secrete them or to make identification impossible e.g. by burning them or by removing them to a location where identification is unlikely due to their remoteness from those who might be able to perform the identification.
Until very recently, before Richard de Zoysa’s abduction and killing, the security forces were entitled to dispose of bodies in their custody without recourse to a post-mortem or inquest.
The ICJ report has raised a number of questions concerning the incomplete judicial inquiry into de Zoysa's death. Among them are the nature of the police investigations, the role of the Attorney-General and the role of the court.
The Report specifically comments on the refusal by law authorities to follow-up the identification, made by de Zoysa's mother, of the suspected killers.
Excerpts from The Review, journal of the ICJ, no 45/1990:
About three and a half months after the killing), Mr. de Zoysa's mother, Dr. Manorani Saravanamuttu, who had been present at the abduction, claimed to have identified one of the abductors as Senior Superintendent of Police Ronnie Gunasinghe when watching a television news broadcast in which he appeared. The police authorities declined to arrest Mr. Gunasinghe. Public concern about the killing had, meanwhile, been growing nationally and internationally.
Both Dr. Saravanamuttu and the lawyer she had instructed to represent her interests at the inquiry received death threats over the telephone and in writing.
During his meetings with the Attorney-General and the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Heaton-Armstrong also observed that no credence had been officially attached to Dr. Saravanamuttu's identification of Ronnie Gunasinghe as one of those present at her son's abduction - hence the failure to suspend him from duty pending further investigation or, at least, to transfer him to an area where he was less likely to be able to influence
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JUSTICE .....
potential witnesses and to jeopardize a successful and effective investigation.
The ICJ observer is of the view that an identification parade should have been held immediately after it became known to the police that Dr. Saravanamuttu had claimed to have identified Gunasinghe. A properly conducted parade, with a 'line-up” comprising a number of individuals with similar appearances to that of Gunasinghe might have proved to be extremely helpful. The observer suggests that it is still not too late to hold a parade.
The observer states that under section 393 (5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure it is the duty of the Superintendent of Police to report to the Attorney-General on any offenses such as abduction and murder which occur within his division. This was not done in this case.
Mr. Heaton-Armstrong also expressed concern about the alleged collusion between the police investigating the case and the lawyers representing Gunasinghe and Ranchagoda, another police officer.
The ICJ observer concluded that "viewed as a whole, the police investigations into Richard de Zoysa’s killing seem to have proceeded on the unshakable assumption that Senior Superintendent of Police Gunasinghe cannot have been involved."
The ICJ observer was also of the opinion that the Attorney-General, like the police, reacted unnecessarily defensively and proceeded on the unshakable assumption that Gunasinghe is innocent.
The Attorney-General could, and arguably should, have taken a stronger stance over the question of an identification parade. His decision regarding the leading of evidence before the magistrate has the appearance of a determination to prevent the court taking the initiative over the decision whether or not to arrest or charge Gunasinghe. In the opinion of the ICJ observer this unusual case called for a public examination of Dr. Saravanamuttu's evidence in court followed by a judicial, not an executive decision. In the event the role of the magistrate has been undermined.
Mr. Heaton-Armstrong concluded that this is not a 'fleeting glance' case. Dr. Saravanamuttu has made what appears on the face of it to have been a valid identification. There are, without doubt, a number of factors which could be argued to weaken the strength of her identification but, short of disbelieving her, it seems that her evidence - all of it - must be taken at face value. This has not been a case which cried out for an immediate arrest but there is, at this stage, no alternative but for Superintendent of Police Gunasinghe to be arrested and brought before a court for committal proceedings on a charge of unlawful abduction and murder. The ICJ observer has no
2 Novenil

reason to believe that the court proceedings were not conducted fairly, judiciously and in an atmosphere of ostensible independence. The magistrate was clearly very concerned about the case and had a detailed knowledge of the material placed before her.
Counsel for Gunasinghe and Ranchagoda, both of whom could properly be described as suspects, seem to have been given “free rein' during both hearings the observer attended. They were therefore at risk of being able to pick up information of interest to their clients which might prejudice a fair and just trial. Little care appears to have been taken to ensure that they did not become privy to information which should not have been revealed to them at this stage.
The observer considered it most unfortunate that Dr. Saravanamuttu's claims had not been given a judicial and public airing, and that the magistrate had been deprived of the opportunity to make a decision about the strength of the evidence which would have enabled her to decide whether or not to order Gunasinghe's arrest and charging.
The State has conceded that the security forces have been responsible for unlawful abductions and, possibly, killings. Where these occur there are almost insuperable difficulties in identifying the culprits and prosecuting them to conviction and sentence. There is a widespread belief that the security forces have an extensive involvement in this area and that insufficient action is taken to identify those responsible by those whose duty it is to do so. If the State is not seen to take a firm stance against this type of activity private citizens will inevitably take the law in their own hands and attack the servants of the State. There appears to be a strong case for the setting up, by the President, of an independent judicial inquiry into the circumstances of the killing of Richard de Zoysa and the police investigation which followed under the Presidential Commissions Act. Such an inquiry would at least establish some useful lessons for the avoidance of similar killings in future and might point the way towards more effective police investigations into them. If it achieved nothing else, an independent inquiry of this sort would serve to 'clear the air and reassure the concerned public that all possible steps were being taken by the State to identify those responsible.
The Chairman of such an inquiry has extensive powers to conduct investigations, subpoena witnesses, order the police to bring specified documents to the hearing, question the police about possible obstruction of the inquiry, sanction lack of cooperation and make authoritative recommendations in his report. His powers are considerably more extensive than those of the magistrate under the Code of Criminal Procedure, which merely permits the magistrate to take action in an individual case - not to make wide ranging recommendations of general application.
;r I997

Page 21
RICHARD
A t the time of his death, Richard de
oysa was the Deputy Editor for Asia of Inter Press Service (IPS), the third world news agency. He was based in Colombo.
The article published below was filed by
IPS three days before his abduction. This was de Zoysa's last story.
SRI LANKA: NO MORE DISPOSAL OF DEAD BODIES
by Richard de Zoysa
COLOMBO, February 15 1990
The Sri Lankan government announced
Thursday it was lifting some stringent
emergency regulations in force since last June.
Among them are laws authorising the security forces to dispose of dead bodies without holding a legal inquiry, a ban on publications, and the government's right to proscribe political parties.
The regulation about the disposal of dead bodies - No.55 (FF) in the current emergency laws -- had been blamed by human rights groups here and abroad
DE ZON
for alleged militar anti-government ac
But other regula January 10 are still accusations here th is not sincere in its normalcy in the st
The Emergency Subversive Pol Regulation No. 1 activities "political may "adversely
functioning" of educational institu
It also bans an demonstration, pro posters at these pl
In the context of the political or oth "otherwise" covers
activity, unionists
Almost all trade ul few that support protested when th
Bala Tampoe, one o criminal lawyers an of the Ceylon Merc - the country's only
JUSTICE .....
Furthermore, the magistrate has no power to sanction a failure to cooperate by the police and must reply on what the police choose to place before him/her. The Chairmart of a Commission of Inquiry can reach much further behind the scenes and is not generally subject to having his decisions overturned by the Court of Appeal.
The observer concluded that as far as he is aware, there is no facility for the provision of a special team of investigators in a case where a serious accusation is made against a police officer and takes the view that this would be a useful and of particular importance in a case such as that of the abduction of Richard de Zoysa.
On 30 August 1990, the Attorney General announced in Court that he would not be proceeding with a prosecution against Mr. Gunasinghe.
Pra

YSA: SWAN SONG
y excesses against tivists.
tions introduced in force prompting hat the government promise to restore rife-torn island.
(Prevention of itical Activity)
of 1990 bans all or otherwise" which
affect the due
workplaces or ions.
y meeting, rally, cession or display of laces.
phrase "any activity, rwise" the word normal trade union here charge.
hions - except for a the government - 2 law was passed.
fSri Lanka's leading ld general secretary antile Union (CMU) major union not run
by a political party - describes it as a "fraudulent misuse of emergency powers."
"The term 'subversive' used to name the regulation gives the idea that trade union activities are illegal, since a subversive act means an illegal act," he argues.
"This is an infringement of fundamental democratic rights and has to be denounced as such, nationally and internationally," he told IPS.
"They the government say they have smashed the JVP and now they are dealing with the Tigers. So what are the regulations for?" he asked.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have fought first Sri Lankan and then Indian troops in Northeast Sri Lanka since 1983 in their quest for a separate state for the island's minority Tamils.
The guerrillas are now holding talks with the government of President Ranasinghe Premadasa and have said they will contest elections in the Tamil dominated Northeast Province once an Indian troop pull-out is completed March 31.
D
The ICJ's plea for a Presidential Commission of Inquiry did not go unheeded, at least partially. In February 1991, the opposition parties in Parliament moved a resolution calling for a commission "to inquire into the abduction and killing of Richard de Zoysa." The motion was defeated by 120 votes to 71. While the entire opposition backed the motion, the ruling UNP voted against it.
Mr. K. N. Choksy, the chief legal spokesman of the UNP in Parliament, stated during the debate: "The dictates of principle and the requirements of the due adherence to the rule of law and the recognition of the role of the courts under the Constitution of Sri Lanka are basic matters in a situation such as the present. They all call for this house to decline and turn down this motion. These basic factors have clearly not been considered by the signatories to this motion, and demonstrated that this motion is ill-conceived."
vada

Page 22
SWANSONG .....
The JVP (Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, People's Liberation Front) led a violent campaign against the Indian troop-presence and the ruling United National Party (UNP) from 1987-89.
Student led demonstrations and strikes called by the JVP brought life throughout the Sinhalese-majority south of Sri Lankato a halt several times last year, rocking the political establishment.
A government crackdown on the left-wing rebels last year resulted in the deaths of their top leaders and a lull in violence, but it said the emergency laws were still necessary to restore normality.
"Under cover of this kind of justification the government is trying to prevent legal actions by workers or students through their unions ... an infringement of fundamental democratic rights which has to be denounced nationally and internationally," says Tampoe.
Sri Lanka has been ruled under emergency law for the greater part of the last two decades. A public security ordinance allows the President to add new regulations, while parliament has to approve the extension of the emergency every month.
When the president and the parliamentary majority come from the same party - as is the case at present - this becomes a formality.
Before the regulati students' activitie. CMU wrote to the to revoke an emer essential services.
Under this regulati many other insti 'essential services' c a military officer w person to do any w with national
maintenance of es "By the end of Augu had already ceased came into effect Se pointed out. The l work stoppage or August 20 1989.
Linus Jayatilleke, union wing of the T Samaja Party (NSS Party) describes thi “draconian”.
Thursday's liftin emergency laws c. rights organis International releas thousands of peopl the State's anti-JV
A row erupte London-based organisation an government last m Minister Ranjan Amnesty was organisation".
An Amnesty Repor special attention to
PUBLICLY FREED,
A total of 6,556 subversive suspects have been released from rehabilitation centres in the last two years.
According to the Commissioner General of Rehabilitation, Brigadier Ananda. Weerasekera, most of the youths have been re-established in their previous schools, universities and pirivenas. Some of them are being provided with self-employment and foreign
employment trainin the Commissioner n take up politics as
Three young men Thelavala camp i recently discharged. urged by the Jayala, studies individual ѕиspects and recот or rehabilitation estimated degree involvement.
According to press after the men return Welima da, they w murdered by a gro
2 Novem

ons on workers” and were passed, the president asking him ency law governing
on, ports, banks and tutions named as an be brought under ho can "require any yrk ... in connection se curity or the sential services".
st, JVP-led violence , but this regulation ptember 5," Tampoe ast JVP-led general “hartal' took place
leader of the trade rotskyist Nava Sama New Equal Society : new regulations as
g of some of the ame as the human ation Amnesty ed a report claiming e had been killed in P campaign.
d between the human rights d the Colombo onth when Foreign Wijeratne alleged
a "terrorist
t in December drew Regulation 55 (FF)
saying, "This regulation encourages extra-judicial execution insofar as it permits the security forces to commit murder with effective impunity."
"We request you... to revoke Emergency Regulation 55 (FF), especially having regard to the fact that hundreds of dead bodies have been found all over the country," the CMU January 5 letter to Premadasa declared.
It added that these bodies were "mostly burnt or thrown into rivers with no explanation from you or any spokesperson of your government as to how these bodies came to be so dealt with, and at whose hands."
The government argued that full powers had to be given to the security forces to counter the JVP's violent onslaught on the establishment.
Giving the first indication that some emergency laws would be relaxed at a conference of political parties Wednesday, Premadasa said "No price was too high to pay to end terror."
He said he would implement "as soon as possible" the call by a commission set up to inquire into the causes of youth unrest' that the emergency should be lifted, but did not say when this would be.
Referring to the lifting of Regulation 55 (FF), one human rights activist here said Thursday, "Now there is justice for dead bodies. It's time to think about the living."
3. And a few others, oted, are expected to
Career
i detain ed at the Ratmalana, were Their release was h Committee which cases' of 'terrorist' mends their release according to the of their subversive
reports, a few days 2d to their homes in ere abducted and p of armed men.
2 "er 1991
This incident received only moderate media coverage. We publish below, excerpts from the report which appeared in the Aththa of 19 October 1991
PRIVATELY MURDERED
lthough it has been stated that terror as been eliminated and peace restored, there is evidence to the contrary emerging from a report from Welimada about the killing of three people and the burning of their bodies.
muHD

Page 23
Nadine G
NOtes On the Whit
"Gordimer writes with intense immediacy about the extremely complicated personal and social relationships in her environment... At the same time as she feels political involvement - and takes action on that basis - she does not permit this to encroach on her writing.'
statement by the Swedish נולT Academy in its citation of South African writer Nadine Gordimer for the 1991 Nobel prize for literature, zeroes in - albeit unselfconsciously - on the controversy that surrounds both the prize and Gordi mer’s particular position as a white South African writer today.
To begin with, the lucrative profits to prize-winning author and his/her publisher that the publicity surrounding the award brings, as well as the 'supreme' acknowledgement of a work
NelOufer
or an oeuvre which to humanity the pr it a battleground fo the merits and dem in question by his/ detractors alike. recognition most Gordimer hersel hearing of her aw possible candidates given up hope.'
But controversy m only for its pres potential but also expediency many ri panel's decisions de; statements like the in which it disassoc art and valorizes t politics has not (and is telling) encroach Allen, one of the Academy elected fo position by declarin, prize is a political literary award. Th own argument - she
PUBLICLY .....
Punchi Banda Man atunga, Dharmarat na Weeratunga and Chandrasiri Rajakaruna were residents of Welimada Dikkapitiya. They were held at the Ratmalana Thelavala prison camp as terrorist suspects and released on the advise of the Jayalath Committee when investigations revealed that they had not been involved in terrorist activities.
According to reports, on the night of the 8th, an armed party, including a sub-inspector, had entered the houses of the three youths, forced them into their vehicle, and taken them to a forest not far from the railway station on the Welima da Rahangala Ohiya road. They had then been shot and killed and
finally burnt in ty bodies had not bee they were, burnt ag. the 9th and 10th so be recognised.
According to the Banda Manatunga, away by the sub-ins had brought him f Thelavala prison ( father has further d paid Rs. 1000 to ti travelling expenses from Ratmalana to also mentioned in police.
Badulla district Madduma Bandara homicides to the op
2 Pra
 

Fordimer:
e Writer's Burden
de Mel
is "of great benefit ize denotes, makes r arguments about erits of the author er supporters and It is the ultimate writers strive for. f commented on ard, “I had been a or so long that I had
arks this prize not tige and market
for the political ad into the Nobel spite, or because of, one quoted above :iates politics from he work in which I the metaphor here ned. Professor Stur 8 members of the r life reiterated this g, “The Nobel peace award...This is a at is (Gordimer’s) is very keen on that
point. Her works have a political basis, but her writing is different.”
The fact remains however, that acknowledging on the world stage a writer like Gordimer, an active member of the ANC, advocate of black majority rule and patron of the largely black African Writers Congress, who rigorously depicts in her work her own white, liberal socio-political milieu and in doing so, engages in varying degrees with the horrific structures of apartheid in South Africa, can be seen as a political message to the South African regime. The award has been used as such a vehicle before when the prize to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1974) conveyed criticism of the institutional oppression in the U.S.S.R. Thus news of Gordimer’s Nobel prize was greeted either with enthusiasm for its encouraging message to the South African government - the "London Times' correspondent stated that With the crumbling of apartheid this is a politically correct award - or derision as Tilak Gunawardhana did when he
mo
es. Because their n completely burnt, in on the nights of that they would not
father of Punchi his son was taken bector of police who "om the Ratmalana :amp. Manatunga's eclared that he had mis police officer as for bringing his son
Welimada. This is his statement to the
SLFP MP Mr. had reported the position leader Mrs.
3. 'ada
Sirimavo Bandaranaike and through her made a written complaint to the Inspector General of Police.
Although the IGP had promised to send a special group of police officers from Colombo to meet the MP, up to the time of going to press, Mr. Madduma Bandara had received no visit from any such police group.
Meanwhile, the relatives of the dead persons had complained about the killings to the Uva Chief Minister Percy Samaraweera on the 9th. Although the Minister had made inquiries from the police stations in the area, these police stations have reported that no such “arrests' were made.

Page 24
GORDIMER .
declared, "It seems a belated recognition of something anti-racist, something that had to be recognized when the black Africans could get no hearing at all in world councils.'
That Gordimer's fiction lends itself to the manichean dichotomy between politics and art the Nobel panel so easily makes, points however to an ambivalent identity she herself inhabits, circumscribed by both the strengths and limitations of her white liberal position in South African politics today.
The daughter of Jewish migrants - her father from Lithuania and her mother from England - Gordimer was born in 1923 and grew up in Springs, a small mining town near Johannesburg. Involvement in politics came late. Her childhood ambition of being a ballet dancer was dashed when she had to leave school at the age of eleven because of an accelerated heart rate. Gordimer turned to literature while convalescing, reading voraciously and writing, publishing her first short story at the age of fifteen.
Gordimer's awareness about the socio-political and living conditions of the black mine workers in Springs was first kindled on reading Upton Sinclair's The Jungle (1906), an expose of the Chicago meat-packing industry. The novel which dealt with the appalling conditions under which large sections of immigrants and black people in Chicago laboured, and which provoked public outrage so much so that the U.S. government was forced to investigate the trade, no doubt struck more than a familiar note with Gordimer who saw similar structures of racism and oppression operating in extreme against black people in South Africa. Moreover, her identification with the novel took on perhaps a more personal hue as its hero, Jurgis Rudkus, also an immigrant from Eastern Europe, turns to socialism as the only system which would redress the dispossession of the under-classes in Chicago.
The impact of Sinclair's novel on Gordimer suggests that within her own family and social background, political awareness of the condition of black South Africans and activism on that front were muted. It is when charting the limitations of her own milieu, as
James Wood descr advocate to her ow that Gordimer” s strongest. Thus in novel singled out i as an outstanding v Bamber Smales ha employers. Jul “decently-paid an servant, living in til had married, cloth sets of uniforms, kl housework, white d table, given Wedne Sundays free, allow visit him and histow him in his room'.(p gratitude for such b saves them from once the revolutio them to, and harb village. But as the flashback the past li what Gordimer insi with are the patri
classist attitudes t
charity towards Jul Maureen realizes t roles means that J calls for their gratitu towards black empl die hard.
That Gordin lends itse, manichean , d tween politic Nobel pane nakes, poin bivalent ident inhabits circ both the st limitations. liberal posit African politi
Thus in a village wh in a situation in whi for the bare mini Maureen's mat percolates to her made them so hap (p.6) - and class co warning her son V black children touc set lest they breal spontaneous reacti is forced now by ciri kittens in a bucket “Why didn't you get it?”(p.90) This assu insensitivity on the even as it provides
2 Noveml

bes, “playing devil’s n liberal principles' writing is at its July's People - the the Nobel citation ork - Maureen and ve been benevolent I has been their d contented male eir yard since they ed by them in two aki pants for rough ill for waiting at the sdays and alternate d to have his friends 'n woman sleep with 9) It is perhaps in 2nevolence that July unti-white violence n occurs by taking ouring them in his book delineates in ves of the Smaleses, its We come to terms onizing, racist and hat underpin their y, and that even as hat the reversal of uly the saviour now lde, old white habits oyees and their kin
ner’s fiction lf, tỏ the ichotomy beand art the l, so easily is to an am. ity she herself unscribed by *engths qnid of her white ón in South Cs today
ich lacks electricity, ch they are grateful mum for survival, erialism which hildren - "Nothing ly as buying things' lsciousness has her ctor not to let the h his electric train
it (p.14). Bam's in to Maureen who umstance to drown of water, is to ask one of them to do mes both a greater art of July's people way of having the
f er 1991
job done, but not at Maureen's brutalized expense. Again, their emotional investment in the yellow bakkie as their only vehicle of escape from July's village - until the helicoptor carrying 'saviours or murderers' that Maureen runs to at the end - makes them resent what they see as July's permission-unsought proprietorship over the car. As July learns to drive Bam comments, "I would never have thought he would do something like that. He's always been so correct.”(p.58)
The expose of the Smaleses in July's People is masterful. Never irritatingly explicit, the reader is alerted to a highly nuanced gesture - Maureen's outstretched hand which, given the right moment she picks, can only mean a request for the return of the car keys (p.61) - or reaction - she has to coax a black child to come to her as she remains unfamiliar, an adult not to be trusted (p.68). The portraits are without caricature, only gentle irony, and what makes them wholly credible is the anguish the Smaleses inhabit, and which emanates not only from the disruption and insecurity of their present lives, but also their awareness of their irrationality and condescension.
It is however for the centrality the Smaleses occupy in the book and for the almost sympathetic portrait of this white family living in a Gramscian interregnum in which, as the quote at the beginning indicates, "there arises a great diversity of morbid symptoms' that Gordimer has been criticized by her black colleagues. For writer/critic Lewis Nkosi, that the revolution itself is marginalized and impinges on the narrative of July's People only through intermittent flashbacks and the static of a radio is symptomatic of the white South African writer's ambivalence to the crisis in his/her country. Nkosi declared, "Too often the novel hints at or merely dwindles into the coziness (sic) of a small domestic drama. It simply cannot bring itself to imagine the murderous and tumultuous confusion that is likely to occur...no white liberal South African writer wants to imagine such a complete disruption of personal relationships.'
To insist that the oppression of black South Africans, or a new revolutionary order however nightmarish it is, constitutes the matrices of what is

Page 25
GORDIMER .....
written on the country surely sounds too rigid and may even be dismissed as the voice of the propogandist. But Nkosi's criticism is important for the debate it provokes on the burden of the writer in crisis-ridden South Africa today. The spirit of his critique of Gordimer has to be placed in a context in which the inimical structure of apartheid, which we realize with shame is only an extreme version of the corrosive intolerance, prejudice and opportunism in our own societies, is so blatantly unjust, the regime that imposes it so powerful, that it calls for explicit and continuous moral outrage.
Inability, or decision not to express this amounts, particularly for writer/critics like Dennis Brutus who have suffered for their activism, a failure of moral nerve. For the writer of talent' is for Brutus, the one who dares not allow himself to develop because to do so, to look truthfully at South African society today, and then to describe truthfully his reactions to that society, can only land him in prison. Gordimer, despite the banning of three of her novels and her outspokenness on censorship in South Africa, remains, for those like Brutus, privileged, for not having paid the price of imprisonment. And the burden of the writer to be passionate about the dismantling of apartheid, against which Gordimer’s 'disinterested, controlled technique of understatement and subtle irony operates, elicits this comment by Brutus:
Though Nadine Gordimer would say that she is condemning South African society for being dehumanized, I would say that Nadine Gordimer who is one of our most sensitive writers, is also the standing, the living example of how dehumanized South African society has become-that an artist like this lacks warmth, lacks feeling, but can observe with the coldness of a machine...
Brutus’s personal tirade against Gordimer is then, for an all too oblique attack on the system in her work. Her emphasis on the privileged white liberal whose political ambivalence she prods and exposes but gently, even seductively, falls short of what is needed as a political programme in South Africa. Gordimer’s novel The Conservationist is a case in point. Set
in the mid 1970s,
crisis, emphasis i elsewhere was on
period provides Gordimer to consi its many mutations on the reactionary owner Mehring to and power -alsoa f But as Michael To many seductive as veld, the breath-ta South African lands describes, can have sympathize with becomes then, und the natural world
Her empha privileged V whose politica she prods an gently, even se short of wha a political p South Africa
The interregnum til in her work is then emphases. Grams Prison Notebooks - the new cannot inter regnum the diversity of morbid Gordimer, the pe1 her own times in 'morbid symptoms' both blacks and wh and in different ma suffer institution violence not just by their own kind. B marginalized for wil The interregnum is a time of uncerta wrote in her ess Interregnum”, “t. declared...for (th never at home in wl not know whether at last. In this Smaleses, Mehrin Capran’s aunts - O Pauline the liberal of Nature are brou assumptions shat called into questio. they watch their fal either helplessly o this resistance is sl and futile.
Pra

he time of the oil n South Africa as conservation. The springboard for ler conservation in and ironically focus fight of white farm preserve his domain orm of conservation. ylan points out, the bects to life in the king beauty of this cape that Gordimer the indulgent reader a Mehring who orstandably fond of of his farm.
siis on, the v hite liberal tambivalence d exposes but ductively, falls is needed as rogramme un
hat Gordimer maps problematic for its ci's statement in his "the old is dying and be born; in this re arises a great symptoms - is, for rfect description of South Africa. The are experienced by ites at varying levels nifestations. Blacks al oppression and whites but also from ut such suffering is hat the whites suffer. for them, primarily inty. As Gordimer ay “Living in the he white who has 2) future, who was hite supremacy, does he will find his home insecure state, the g and both Hillela lga the socialite and activist - in A Sport ght to crisis. Their tered, judgements and roles reversed, miliar world crumble defiantly, but even own to be displaced
25 vada
At times however, a common meeting-ground between black and white can be found, but in a medium other than the linguistic. In the short story entitled "The Bridegroom', the Afrikaner supervisor of a road gang prepares for marriage. He is a reticent figure and overtly racist. The black people - "a raw bunch of kaffirs' who couldn't do anything right (p.118) - are an eye-sore. As they cannot be hidden away in the bush, he orders them to keep away from the compound when he returns with his wife - "They must just understand that they mustn't hang around.”(p.118). On his last night as a bachelor however, as he sits outside in the dusk sipping his brandy after work, a "huge man whose thick blackbody had strained apart every seam in his ragged pants and shirt begins to play an instrument which resembles a lyre. The music he makes “was caught by the very limits of the capacity of the human ear; it was almost out of range. The first music man ever heard, when they began to stand upright among the rushes at the river, might have been like it.”(p.121) It is a primordial music which makes “what the young man was feeling inside him...find a voice; (and which went) up into the night beyond the fire, uncoiling from his breast and giving ease.” (pp.122-3) Gordimer shows however that neither the moment nor its effect last long. The young man wants to share his brandy with the musicians, but holds back with a "Hell, no man, it was mad’ (p.122), and as the music stops, reverts to his role as master, shouting orders to his factotum Piet. But there had been a powerful moment in which "Nobody spoke, the barriers of tongues fell with silence' as the music transcended the values and thus the prejudices and hierarchies that language carry.
For those whites who live beyond the interregnum which Gordimer depicts in a novel like A Guest of Honour and the short story A Soldier's Embrace', it is a space signifying the loss of identity and inevitable disillusionment. A Soldier's Embrace' plots the declining status of a liberal white lawyer and his wife who resisted the surge of migration by fellow whites fleeing the country as the revolution occurred, to stay behind and be of use to the new system, which however, no longer needs them. Their contact in the government is Chipande, a bright boy from the slums whom the
amb

Page 26
GORDIMER .....
lawyer took on as an apprentice and then befriended. Chipande returns from exile to be the confidential
secretary to the President, and as the
white couple wait anxiously for contact with him, the painful realization that they no longer figure in his priority list, that even confidence in their competence and usefulness cannot be taken for granted, is made. The story ends with them joining the exodus of
whites from this new South Africa to
a difficult exile.
There is, in A Soldier's Embrace', an implied critique of a new group of black politicians like Chipande who are at best busy bureaucrats, at worst time-servers. But Gordimer more than insinuates the grip of the black regime which grows in intolerance and incompetence. Chipande is not free, or does not choose to discuss 'black men who presented themselves a threat to the Party with the white lawyer (p.16); censorship operates as news, albeit sensationalist, of arrests and investigations of foreign businessmen trickle in from outside (p.18); shops empty, looting takes place.
This then is the arena in which whites have no place, or even if they do, as Evelyn Bray realizes on returning from exile as 'a guest of honour to serve as a consultant to the new government, do not want it as hopes for the new order turn sour. The hoax of independence that has bedeviled many former colonies provides Gordimer with enough evidence of the problematic of post-coloniality today. The politics of economic aid, neo-colonial machinations, corruption, the tear at the seams which forcibly held together diverse ethnic groups and cultures under a common colonial yoke, and which now spawns civil wars, tribal unrest and fundamentalism that stalk these countries are there for all to see. But again, it is for the emphasis which only considers the impact of these on the whites, for the refusal to place them in the context of the historical ruptures that forced these colonies to leave their histories and enter others, that Gordimer has been faulted.
Gordimer is acutely aware of the bind she is in as a South African writer today. She stated, Any writer's attempt to present in South Africa a totality of human experience within his own
country is subvertec a word. As a whi may change; the c experience is black implies in South insight into the natu - the totality of hun writer is required to for it locates the writer who narrat contemporary histo then that the disto South Africa of toc of apartheid and t a serious democra to go yet), imposes writer to continuou not only at politica the creative text. his/her charact representatives of race, while crack analyzed for the awareness and con
Gordimer’s en white liberal i failure of pe cause, alt problematizes white South A occupy extrer she does so a of the black which is rele margins
Thus Gordimer’s en liberal is consid perspective beca problematizes the South African libera skilfully, she does s the black experienc to the margins. M black characters an as prototypes, Gord - their lack of ri compared to the hi of the privileged w is glaring. In July's is portrayed adro L’Ouverture figur looking after his w the revolution, who to order him to burn is the degrading (p.137), but who imperceptibly, in s But July's village, 1 terms of its squalor adult, except for
therefore humane
2 Noveml

before he sets down e man, his fortune he thing he cannot ness - with all that Africa.” Gordimer’s re of representation an experience - the make is important, predicament of the ivizes his/her own ry. The problem is rted and repressive ay (the dismantling he establishment of cy have a long way an obligation on the sly argue for change forums but also in In such a context, S are See aS milieu, gender and is in the text are writer's political nmitment.
phasis on the sconsidered a rspective behough she the space that frican liberals mely skilfully, It the expense experience gated to the
nphasis on the white ered a failure of use, although she
space that white ls occupy extremely o at the expense of e which is relegated Eoreover, when her i situations are read imer's selectiveness bundedness when hly nuanced milieu lite she describes - People, July himself itly. A Toussaint e who persists in hite family through needs someone else his passbook which ymbol of his race
grows, although tature, is credible. hostly described in
is one in which no July, is kind and n his/her response
í ፀr 1991
to the plight of the Smaleses. Its black children bathe in a river carrying "water-borne diseases whose names no one here knew.(p.138) On the one hand, that the diseases were unknown because the children were totally immune to them sounds far-fetched. On the other, what Gordimer does is deprive the village of language, for surely they would have their own names for conditions such as Bilharzia which Maureen is aware of and tries to protect her children from.
July's village becomes akin then to Crusoe's island which Defoe similarly made into an empty space, one which was uninhabited (incredible for a land so fertile), so that Crusoe could reign supreme, and without acrimony, as he did not have to wrest away the island from natives as Prospero did in Shakespeare's The Tempest. The analogy between the South African village and Crusoe's Caribbean habitat becomes further stressed in Gordimer's novel when Bam, the Crusoe-like practical artisan, builds a make-shift water tank for the villagers who had not thought of this technology before, and becomes the provider of meat as he kills wild boar with a shotgun, his skill in this stressed as a rifle would have been more appropriate for the task (p.77). What we have here then is, perhaps, an unconscious (but symptomatic?) emptying of the African village of its store of knowledge and modes of survival so that Bam, who has lost his status and urban white world remains yet privileged and supreme in this setting. Read in this way, July's People becomes a significant case study of Gordimer’s own ambivalence to the black experience despite her overt avowal of the black person's right to self-determination.
Nadine Gordimer's narrativizations speak poignantly then of the creative writer's burden, even dilemma, of having to write one's self into one's own time without being propagandist or escapist. It is a task further burdened by having to live/write in a country like South Africa which does not allow one the freedom of not engaging rigorously in its politics and getting away with it.
Endnotes
1. Quoted in Craig R. Whitney, "Nadine Gordimer: The Nobel Prize Winner, New York Times, reprinted in The Island, 15.10.1991.
mO

Page 27
GORDIMER ..... 8. Nadine Gordimer,
Jonathan Cape, 19
2. Quoted in Craig R. Whitney, "Nadine from this edition.
Wh; New 9. Nkosi, Tyo York Times, reprinted in The Island, Exile :: 15.10.1991. Óf course, the western bias to || 10. Brutus was particul such awards and their blatant political for the expediency have been well noted before. The sport, and ငုံ' Ο L yyy 0SLT0S SL yyySS KKZz the western bias to such awards and their ၀ပ္ပံ and § blatant political expediency have been well ed. Cosmo Pieter noted before. (London: Heinem 3. The London Times, 4.10.1991. p.12 italics. 4. Tilak Gunawardhana, Nobel Laureates in 12 E. p.97. lan. “TI
Literature - Significant Biases, Ceylon Daily 13. Р ichael Too *ı News, 23.10.1991. p.15. glitics and Style, 5. Gordimer’s first collection of short stories ಕ್ಲಿಲ್ಲ: L yyy y Ly myLLSSSS SKy Since then she has published 10 novels and ಬ್ಲ: over 200 short stories, her most recent 15.§ t ဒီ့နှိမျို' ̈ဦး collection of stories being Jump which she C 0. C d was promoting in the U.S. when she received .L.Innes (Londo news of her award. Pagination will be
6. The London Times, p.12. 16. };üပြို့ဝှဲဝှိ 7. James Wood, “Lyrical Analyst of a Nation,The ondon: R : Guardian (London), 10.10.1991. p.27. agination will be
UNIVERSITIES : A GATHERING
STORM
ension is building up again in the universities. This time,
the issue is the Affiliated Regional University Colleges being set up by the University Grants Commission. Student opposition has so far been expressed by posters and leaflets and at meetings and seminars. The higher education authorities appear to take little notice of the protests. However, anybody who is sensitive to the goings on in the universities will notice the clear signs of student discontent turning into confrontation.
The "regional university college' is an innovative idea aimed at reforming the higher education system in Sri Lanka. It was conceived and recommended by the Presidential Commission on Youth Unrest. The government readily accepted the proposal and advised the UGC to set up 9 regional colleges before the end of this year. According to reports, plans have been finalized to take in the first batch of students.
On paper at least, the new scheme seeks to ease the terrible bottle-neck crisis of Sri Lanka's higher education by expanding vocation-oriented tertiary education. The Colleges are not micro-replicas of existing universities. They are expected to give academic training a vocational orientation linked to the economies of the respective provinces.
In its Report, the Youth Commission recommended a scheme
which should "constitute a major re-adjustment of our tertiary education system." It also recognised "the fundamental
Pra

fully's People (London: 17. Gordimer considered emigrating to
31). Pagination will be Zambia once, but was very aware of
"the truth, which was that in Zambia I Reviews, ' Home and was regarded by black friends as a (sic) ngman, 1983), p.158. European, a stranger.' Quoted in Craig irly active in canvassing Whitney, p.14.
oycott of South African 18. Gordimer, quoted in Michael Toolan, n Robben island. ፳፭ est Against Apartheid, 19. Toussaint L'Ouverture, eventual leader
it in African Literature of the Haitian revolution of 1792-1803 e and Donald Munro which was the first war of independence ann, 1969) p.100. My fought by a colony against the colonizer
(in this case France), joined the revolution late as he stayed back to
aking Hold of Reality: protect his white employers from in Nadine Gordimer,” anti-white violence in the first phase of no.1, 1985. p.87. the struggle. For a compelling account ife in the Interregnum, of the Haitian revolution and f Books, 20.1.1983. p.22. Toussaint's role in it, see C.L.R. James, he Bridegroom,” African The Black Jacobins (London: Allison Chinua Achebe and and Busby, 1983). This book was first n: Heinemann, 1985). published in 1938.
from this edition.
A Soldier's Embrace
Cape, 1980).
from this edition.
challenge" facing tertiary education as the maintenance of high academic standards with limited resources.
Why is it that perhaps the vast majority of university students and a considerable number of faculty members appear to object to this scheme?
According to Dr. S. Hettige, the Senior Student Counsellor of the University of Colombo, "Many students feel that this will bring about a devaluation of university education. In the national universities, there are serious problems with regard to trained teachers, with many departments being understaffed. The students, therefore, expect the universities to be affected. They would rather see the existing universities being improved and expanded."
The Student Counsellor, however, did not want to speculate on the likely percentage of students and academics who decidedly opposed the new scheme: "The views are divided, of course, among the critical, the supportive, the indifferent and the non-committal."
Certainly, some sections of the student community have been unequivocal. The General Student Assembly in a statement issued on 23 October states: "This is a fraudulent scheme meant to dupe the youth of this country. If there is a sincere need to provide a university education to every student who qualified for it, the government should stop its wasteful celebrations and divert the money saved to improve university education." The statement also underlines a concern about the newly established “elitist’ private institutions which provide, to a select few, a professional' education far more marketable than university education.
This controversy raises a fundamental issue with regard to public policy. Shouldn't the government submit its policy proposals, however well intended they may be, to informed and serious public debate and discussion? On the issue of regional colleges, it appears that the government thinks otherwise.
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The Youth Commission was astute enough to 'suggest' that such a readjustment scheme "should be fully discussed in the overall setting of a national policy on education and placed before the public in the form of a white paper." In a perceptively formulated paragraph, the Commission advised that "the views of academics and students should be canvassed before any final decision is made on the matter." Obviously, the Commission was sensitive to the initial scepticism with which the campus community might respond to this proposal: "If it is acceptable to the university community," cautioned the Commission, "then it should be phased into operation over a period of ten years."
Have the authorities noted the suggestion made by the Commission? At a seminar organised by the SLAAS on 1 November to discuss the regional colleges, Dr. Arjuna Aluvihare, Chairman of the University Grants Commission, took great pains to explain the rationale of the regional colleges to the audience. He said that the courses in the new colleges will have a heavy emphasis on practical involvement. "The question won't arise," he declared, "about the usefulness of the education."
The large student representation, who appeared restive and hostile, were not easily convinced. A number of undergraduate students denounced the UGC for having taken an arbitrary decision. They accused the UGC of using the first few batches of students for "experimental purposes" and warned that it should "be prepared to accept the responsibility and take the consequences if the 'experiment did not work."
According to university sources, protesting students are as ill-informed about the colleges as the authorities are recalcitrant about their establishment. "There is little dialogue between the students and the authorities," says Dr. Hettige. "The students often form their opinions on the basis of emotions, not facts. And they believe they have to be assertive or aggressive simply to be taken note of."
Some students appear to reject the new scheme on moralistic grounds: they are accusing the higher education authorities of introducing “anti-cultural disciplines like the 'art of massaging into the proposed syllabuses. This, presumably, is a reference to "Beauticulture' - one of the specializations offered for the Certificate/Diploma course in Home Science and Nutrition by the affiliated university colleges of the Western Province and the North Western Province. Many posters which came up on the university walls in recent weeks describe the setting up of regional colleges as the "bastardization' of university education.
A more serious allegation made by the students is that the regional colleges will erode the free education system. For them, the new scheme contains a “hidden agenda'. The authorities have not taken the trouble to dispel such fears - or myths. Still more puzzling is their reluctance to explain the whys and hows of this 'experiment to the public.
The recent past has been replete with reforms implemented unilaterally without due concern to the people affected by
2. Novemb

them. School educational reforms in the early 1980s and the setting up of a private medical college led to student dissatisfaction which transformed schools and universities into recruiting grounds for the JVP. Even today, campuses are not devoid of self-proclaimed gurus whose political survival depends exclusively on mobilized youth.
Any well-intended reform programme, if it fails to obtain public consent and support, is certain to create more problems than it attempts to solve.
Social legitimacy is crucial for public policy to succeed. This is one of the fundamental lessons the government should have learnt. The violent controversy that followed the introduction of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution is a case in point. Denied popular support and acceptance, the entire provincial councils system has now degenerated, in the hands of the government, into a mere appendage of
the centre.
w
Centre for the Study of Human Rights
T Centre for the Study of Human Rights at the University of Colombo commenced its work this month. The primary objectives of the Centre are to provide well-developed educational programmes for both students and the public and to provide facilities to conduct research on human rights related issues. Research that will enhance our understanding of recognized human rights and contribute to the development of human rights jurisprudence will be particularly encouraged.
That Sri Lanka's human rights record is a tarnished one is no secret. All Sri Lankans have, as a whole, experienced unprecedented cycles of violence and brutality in the past decade -- violence perpetrated by all parties to the conflicts in the North and East and the South. Images of burning bodies by the roadside, of young men and women being dragged away from their homes and the trauma of living in constant fear, still haunt us. Denial of basic fundamental rights, whether they be civil and political, or economic, social and cultural in nature, is a daily reality to many. So, how do we bring about change? How do we bring about a social and political order which incorporates sacrosanct liberal democratic values?
Some are of the view that we in Sri Lanka are in this predicament because there is no vigorous public opinion. It could also be said that many do not have an opportunity to let their views be known, or else, most are fearful to express their views and opinions. Yet many are simply complacent and apathetic. Shouldn't one expect more from a society which has a literacy rate of over 85%?
Why our literacy rate does not correlate to political maturity and the ability to sustain democracy could partly be attributed
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Page 29
to our education system's total preoccupation with the preparation of students for examinations while encouraging rote learning of facts which, to a great extent, have no relevance to the production of socially responsible citizens. Analytical skills necessary to think for one's self are not developed by this process. Today, many educationists and civil libertarians are of the view that human rights education must be an integral part of education at all levels. Hitherto, no attempt has been made, in spite of an acutely felt need, to introduce human rights issues into the curricula of universities. The Human Rights Centre will endeavour to fill this vacuum.
One of the first tasks of the Centre is to introduce courses on Human Rights Law and human rights components to the curricula of other disciplines. The Centre will maintain an inter-disciplinary approach to its work. To facilitate academic/research programmes, a large portion of the USAID award which helped establish the Centre, will be used to build a comprehensive human rights library collection that will include UN and SAARC documentation. The educational efforts of the Centre will certainly not be confined to the university students but will actively encourage the participation of the public through public lectures, workshops, symposia and the like. It is hoped that a wide range of topics (e.g., civil and political rights, economic rights including labour rights, women's rights, rights of the child, rights of the disabled) will be subjected to discussion by these fora.
Deepika Udagama
Sexual Harassment:
a panel discussion
A. informal discussion on sexual harassment was held on 6 November at the University of Colombo under the aegis of the Legal Aid Centre set up in the Faculty of Law. The panel of discussants included three law students, Ms. Mrinali Thalagodapitiya, Ms. Manjula de Soysa, Mr. Nishan Muthukrishana and four lecturers, Mr. Rohan Edirisinghe and Dr. Deepika Udagama from the Faculty of Law and Dr. Nira Wickramasinghe and Dr. Jayadeva Uyangoda from the Department of History and Political Science.
The audience consisted of young English speaking students of whom some were motivated by a real concern for the issue, some simply by curiosity and others attracted by the slightly contentious nature of the topic.
It is in the wake of the Clarence Thomas affair which recently shook America that interest arose over the issue of sexual harassment and that Ms. Rangitha de Silva, a visiting lecturer at the Faculty of Law, took the initiative to open the topic for debate. Thomas, who today is sitting in the Supreme Court, had to appear before the US Senate Judiciary Committee to defend himself against charges of sexual harassment made by Professor of Law Anita Hill. Anita
{
4 Prag

9
Hill alleged that while she worked for Thomas in government positions from 1981 to 1983, he had repeatedly harassed her sexually. The senate vote in favour of Thomas shas in no way closed the chapter. Today, men and women in America as well as in other parts of the world are re-examining their behaviour in the workplace and rethinking gender relations and power relations. This is perhaps the most, if not the only positive outcome of the Thomas - Hill confrontation. The Colombo University panellists attempted first to clarify the complex notion of sexual harassment. The example of the U.S. was put forward. Under U.S. law an accuser should prove that “a hostile environment has been created in the place of work for allegations to be carried through'. The absence of any legislation related to such offences in Sri Lanka was deplored and it was suggested that the adoption of something similar to the American Civil Rights Act of 1964 Title 7 (section dealing with sexual education) would be a decisive step forward. Indeed in the U.S., following this legislation, many firms initiated mechanisms to educate employees in gender relations and set up special committees open to grievances of sexual harassment. Another direct consequence was the beginning of law suits on charges of sexual harassment.
It was pointed out in the course of the discussion that apart from passing laws, a radical change in attitudes was necessary. Sexual harassment has to be understood as an abuse of power which involved economic intimidation. It is gender related owing to the overwhelming presence of males in positions
of power. In Sri Lanka it can be read as part and parcel
of the ideological construction of the woman as being agentle non-offensive non-threatening creature who is expected to look after her specific space that is the home, instead of mingling and competing with men in the workplace. Interestingly, the experience of most members of the audience in terms of sexual harassment consisted solely of unpleasant acts when travelling in a bus. Grudgingly, however, some male students admitted having been sexually harassed in the course of ragging.
Among the mechanisms suggested to combat and prevent sexual harassment in general were sex education at a school level and consciousness raising at a university level. The danger which arose in taking a moralistic attitude was stressed. Instituting too rigid codes of conduct would mean siding with the most conservative forces in society which for instance condemn, in the same vein, pornography and nudity. This could mean sacrificing basic liberties of speech, artistic integrity and sexual freedom.
The specific case of the university was taken up. It was
decided to work towards setting up a committee which will look upon complaints of sexual harassment voiced by students against lecturers and of students against students (ragging), complaints which in most cases are never formulated due to the fear of being victimized. A real need was also felt for starting, at the university, an interdisciplinary study group on gender and related issues which would be an active forum for concerned men and women. The panellists expressed the hope that in the near future a similar discussion will take place in Sinhala and Tamil so as to widen the scope of the debate.
Nira Wickramasinghe
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UNDERGRADUAT REVERSE DIS
S.T.
A. important factor that contributes to student unrest in
our universities is the widespread feeling among undergraduates who are underprivileged that many of the teachers are at best indifferent to their problems. While there is often a communication gap between the teachers and the students, the diverse problems facing the students are not fully appreciated by many teachers. The result is that teachers and students are unable to establish a rapport. This, in turn, results in the gradual but steady breakdown of the moral authority which the university lecturers in general
had over their students.
This state of affairs reinforces the anxieties, frustrations and sense of despair among the students caused by such factors as poverty, lack of proper accommodation, and poor prospects for employment after graduation. Many undergraduates suffer in silence while others express their feelings through organized protests and other forms of overt behaviour.
The situation prevailing in today's campuses necessitates a fresh approach to student problems. The provision of basic educational facilities and student bursaries alone is grossly inadequate. Most students need much more than that if they were to overcome the serious handicaps originating from their impoverished backgrounds and make full use of university education.
Many students from poor families in the peripheral areas have had no opportunities for acquiring life skills which are usually available to their more fortunate urban counterparts. Given their poverty and social background, they are unable to acquire such skills on their own while they are at the university. The result is that, most often, many of them do not obtain anything other than the university degree certificate which alone is not sufficient to secure a place in the changing social structure of our country.
It has become increasingly evident that many university students also suffer from serious psychological and personal problems owing to such conditions as tensions and conflicts within their families, political victimization of family members, and alcoholism in the family. Our universities are ill-equipped to offer any worthwhile support to such students.
Novem,
 

ES: A PLEA FOR CRIMINATION
Hettige
0
Given the above background, universities can no longer persist with the conventional arrangements for teaching and student welfare. There is an urgent need to review the existing situation and to develop strategies to deal with the changing circumstances. This would no doubt require certain changes in the allocation of resources and the organizational structure within the university system.
From the point of view of social justice, there is in fact a
need for a policy of "reverse discrimination' in favour of the disadvantaged undergraduates who constitute the bulk of the university population. Programmes of welfare, skill and cultural development, and personal counselling have to be developed and implemented so that they can make full use of university education. It is only on the basis of such a strategy that the concept of social justice can become truly meaningful in the context of the present day universities of Sri Lanka.
Implementation of these programmes requires resources, organizational development and a certain degree of commitment on the part of the university staff; all of which are scarce at our universities. The need of the hour is to mobilize resources, effect organizational changes and promote staff participation to formulate and implement innovative programmes of reverse discrimination in favour of disadvantaged students. This is perhaps the only way to prevent many rural students from returning home disillusioned after three or four years of university education.
Prava da welcomes contributions from the university community on significant events and issues ON CAMPUS
er 1991

Page 31
HOW FREE IS YOUR COUNTRY
an human freedom be measured? The UNDP appears to think so.
Freedom is the newest human development factor included in the Human Development Report 1991 of the UNDP. The recently formulated Human Freedom Index (HFI) has been used to rank countries according to their levels of human freedom. (See Box p. 32)
The freedom indicators used in the UNDP measurement include: the right to ethnic language, the freedom from extra-judicial killings O “disappearances', the freedom for political and legal equality for women, the legal right to a prompt trial and the personal right to practice any religion.
The Human Development Index (HDI), which was introduced by the UNDP in 1990, is based on three indicators: life expectancy, adult literacy and purchasing power'. Although the Human Development Report 1990 conceded that "human development is incomplete without human freedom," the HDI is yet to reflect the factor of freedom because "freedom is easier to talk about than to measure." The problem is that there isn't enough reliable data available.
In the 1991 Report, the human freedom ranking is based on 1985 data and covers 88 countries. The Human Freedom Index, designed by Charles Humana, is said to be the most systematic of the human rights classifications and measurements drawn up so far. Existing systems differ in concept, definition and coverage.
"Applying a system of measurement to human freedoms," the Report reiterates, "will always be a precarious exercise."
This involves two difficult areas: deciding what constitutes serious violations of rights or curtailments of freedom, and working out the relative importance of different rights.
It is likely, however, that the Humana
Index will be contes of freedom violati 'some violations o ‘substantial oppre denial'. In its p selected countries computation is base method of judgem approach bett guaranteed' and 'f
The Index has als "insensitivity" to freedoms, includi freedom of a people or control, and th individual human 1 Muzaffaer in a r Network Features cr Freedom Index say political freedom d enjoy in the inter the freedom that a international arena upon the individua shape the political There is no point “participatory” di options available to are severely limited system dominated actors."
The Report does n questions will be ra believes that "this v systematic resear human freedom, w scarce."
... ANI FA
he 1991 Human has been made factors of income
A distinct improv measurement of la construction of a g - applying the di female and male HDH.
It has been possit
countries, female a
life expectancy, a rates and mean Separate computa male HDI s reveal ; of gender discrim
Pr

ted on its gradation ons - ranging from infringements' to ssion' on to "total esent ranking of (see box) the HFI ion an even simpler nt - a 'one' - 'Zero' veen “freedom eedom violated'.
o been accused of
certain kinds of ng the 'collective from “foreign' rule eir relationship to ights. Dr. Chandra ecent Third World itique of the Human s: "How much real o most states today lational arena? For State enjoys in the has a direct bearing 1 citizen's ability to future of his society. in advocating more 2velopment if the a people to develop by an international by a few powerful
lot doubt that many ised on the HF and will encourage more ch and studies on hich today are very
) HOW
R?
Development Index more sensitive to the and gender.
ement on the HDI st year has been the ender-sensitive HDI parity between the HDIs to the overall
le to obtain, for 30 nd male estimates of dult literacy, wage 'ears of schooling. ions of female and remarkable pattern nation even though
I vada
the HDI is not expected to capture its full extent.
The female-male wage ratio ranges from a low of 51.8% in Japan to a high of 96.6% in Paraguay. In labour force participation, the lowest ratio is 26% in Paraguay with the highest 87% in Czechoslovakia. The female-male wage-income ratio was obtained by multiplying these two ratios.
The female HDI gained from the near equal or better ratio in life expectancy but lost somewhat from unequal access to education.
The female HDI, as a percentage of the male HDI, is as low as 52% in Kenya and 65% in Singapore. Nine countries have ratios below 75% and only four - Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Czechoslovakia - have ratios of 90% or
1OC.
These inequalities were reflected in the overall HDI of the country by multiplying the HDI by the ratio of female to male HDI. If the country has full equality, its HDI is unaffected.
The HDI values for all 30 countries declined. Japan dropped from its number 1 position to number 17 and Finland moved up from number 12 to number 1.
Sri Lanka’s HDI was transformed from 0.665 to 0.484 - a drop of 27 per cent.
Gendersensitive HDI HD
100
FNLAND - FRANCE
USA
JAPAN
800
600 KOREA, REP
SRİ LANKA PHILIPPINES
400 "ESALVADOR
200

Page 32
The goal of human development is to increase people's choices. But for people to exercise their choices, they must enjoy
freedom-cultural, social, economic and
political.
The World Human Rights Guide, by Charles Human, uses:40indicatorstomeasure freedom:
The right to
o travel in own country O travel abroad
• peacefully associate and assemble o teach ideas and receive information o monitor human rights violations
ethnic language
The freedom from o forced or child labour
• compulsory work permits o extra-judicial killingsor"disappearances” O torture or coercion o capital punishment
• corporal punishment o unlawful detention
The human f
• compulsory religi in schools
o frts control
o political censorsh
• censorship of n tapping
The freedom for o peaceful political o multiparty electi universal ballot o political and legal e Social and econom
minorities 6 independent news o, independent book
• independent rac networks o independent court o independent trade
The legal right to o a nationality o being consideredi
guilty o freelegal aid when of own choice
• compulsory party or organization open trial membership o prompt trial
HFI ranking of selected countries Country total of freedoms, 1985
High freedom ranking (31-40) 25 Jamaica 38 Sweden 24 Ecuador 38 Denmark 23 Senegal 37 Netherlands A 21 Panama 36 Finland 21 Dominican R 36 New Zealand 19 Israel 36 Austria A 18 Brazil 35 Norway 18 Bolivia 35 France 16 Peru 35 Germany, Fed. Rep. of 15 Mexico 35 Belgium 14 Korea, Rep. c. 34 Canada 14 Colombia 34 Switzerland 14 Thailand 33 USA 14 India 33 Australia 14 Sierra Leone 32 Japan 13 Nigeria 32 United Kingdom A 13 Benin 31 Greece 11 Singapore 31 Costa Rica 1 1 Sri Lanka
Medium freedom ranking (11-30)
30 Portugal 11 Ghana 30 Papua New Guinea 29 Italy Low freedom ranking 29 Venezuela A 10 Poland 27 Ireland A 10 Paraguay 26 Spainì A 10 Philippines 26 Hong Kong 10 Tanzania, U. 25. Botswana 9 Malaysia 25 Trinidad and Tobago 9 Zambia A 25 Argentina A 9 Haiti
Note: Ranking of countries with the same degree of freedom is done in accor
32 Novemb

'eedom index
on or state ideology
p of press ail or telephone
opposition ons by secret and
equality for women icequality forethnic
papers
publishing io and television
恩
unions
nnocent until proved
necessary and counsel
o freedom from police searches of home
without a warrant o freedom from arbitrary seizure of
personal property
The personal right to o interracial, interreligious or civil marriage o equality of sexes during marriage and for
divorce proceedings o homosexuality between consenting adults o practice any religion a determine the number of one's children
Drawingon the 1985datain the World Human Rights Guide and assigning a "one" to each freedom protected and a "zero" to each freedom violated, the country ranking in table 1.5 emerges. Clearly, this ranking for the human freedom index (HFI) needs updating. Adding recent information for only one of the 40 aspects of freedommultiparty elections by secretanduniversal ballot-makesformany changes. Eighteen countries see their HFI improve.
The world today is a freer world. An updated human freedom index based on a limited number of observable and objectively measurable key indicators is more than overdue.
A Recent move
towards greater freedom (multiparty elections held)
0-10)
Rep. of
lance with HDIranking.
8 Yugoslavia A 8 Chile
Kuwait Algeria Zimbabwe Kenya Cameroon Hungary Turkey Morocco Liberia Bangladesh German Dem. Rep. Czechoslovakia Saudi Arabia Mozambique Cuba Syrian Arab Rep. Korea, Dem. Rep. of Indonesia Viet Nam Pakistan Zaire Bulgaria USSR South Africa China Ethiopia Romania Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Iraq
UNDP
r 1997

Page 33
DOCUMENT:ASA 37/14/91 issued by Amnesty Internations
In June 1991, for the first time since 1982, the Government of for research purposes. During their two-week visit, AI had disc rights activists. They interviewed victims and relatives of victi Lankan security forces and paramilitary groups associated with
AI also met members of the Presidential Commission of Inquir of the Human Rights Task Force which was established, by
We publish below, excerpts from the 44 page document, rele
SRI LANKA : T
Human rights violations in
HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS BY GOVERNMENT FORCES AND ALLIED
GROUPS ඉදං.
Tಳ್ಲ: cited as responsible for committing human rights violations on the government side include members of the military, the police and the Special Task Force (STF, a police commando unit). In some areas of the east, members of unidentified groups who wear plain clothes and use unmarked vehicles have also been cited. These people seem to operate in much the same manner as the plainclothes “death squads' linked to government forces which were a feature in the recent counter-insurgency drive against the JVP in the south.
Other forces opposed to the LTTE have also been cited for committing abuses. The government has assisted the creation of armed groups within the civilian population, such as Muslim home guards, and has also mobilized the armed cadres of anti-LTTE militant Tamil groups to assist in its campaign against the LTTE. Sometimes, members of these groups appear to be used as proxies for the regular security forces, committing abuses which the security forces ignore, and for which members of the security forces cannot be held directly responsible. The armed cadres of several Tamil groups opposed to the LTTE are deployed in different areas under army control. e
Amnesty International was told by the authorities that they were operating under direct military command. Muslim home guards were provided with arms by the government in August 1990, after the LTTE had killed hundreds of Muslims in the east, including 103 worshippers in two mosques in Kattankudy, Batticaloa District on 3 August 1990. In the Moneragala District, village defence units were set up among Sinhala villagers in April 1991 after attacks by the LTTE in which about 40 people, including women and children, were reportedly killed.
Muslims collaborating with the security forces are reported to have provided lists of Tamil people for the security forces to target as terrorist suspects. Local rivalries are believed to have found expression in the creation of these lists. Muslim guards are also reported to have detained Tamil people and then handed them over to the police.
3 Prag

al, September 1991
Sri Lanka allowed Amnesty International to enter the country issions with government officials, political leaders, and human ms of human rights violations allegedly committed by the Sri : them, and by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
у
into the Involuntary Removal of Persons and the chairperson
the government, during AI's presence in Sri Lanka.
ased in September 1991, based on this visit:
HE NORTHEAST
a Context of armed Conflict
Over 3,000 Tamil people are reported to have "disappeared in the custody of government forces in the east since June 1990. Most of the case material collected by AI is related to the second half of 1990. That such serious abuses have
continued well into 1991 is confirmed, however, by recent reports in the Sri Lankan and international press as well
as from other sources. The number of "disappearances' and
extrajudicial executions reported since the beginning of 1991
3.
amounts to several hundred.
On 17 February 1991, after 45 soldiers from the Vijayabahu regiment had been killed by the LTTE in an ambush in Kondaichchi, near Mannar, army personnel from the same regiment were reported to have killed four Tamil school teachers who were travelling from Mannar, Their bodies were found dumped in a well at Vankalai.
Again, on 30 March 1991, after the LTTE had opened fire on a police patrol at Iruthayapuram, Batticaloa, killing one policeman, eleven bodies were reportedly found on the roadside.
In another incident reported to AI, a convoy of Tamil civilians travelling to Batticaloa from Colombo to Valachchenai on 20 February 1991 were attacked by Muslim home guards outside Eravur. Six passengers on the bus were killed. Others were injured and some were unaccounted for.
Reports of killings committed by so-called vigilante groups in Batticaloa in late April 1991 were a most disturbing development. The methods used in the killings were much the same as those used in the death squads believed to be linked to the security forces in the south in recent years. Headless bodies were reportedly found in the Batticaloa area on several occasions in April 1991.
Abductions by groups of armed men, in plainclothes and driving vehicles without number plates, had been reported several months earlier from Trincomalee.
Amnesty International has gathered full details about many hundreds of cases of people reported to have "disappeared'. Many of these people are believed to be victims of extrajudicial execution, deliberately killed in custody and
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disposed of secretly. Inquiries made was the security forcës” or government authorities about the whereabouts of detainees frequently produce no result, or an unsatisfactory explanation. It is possible, however, that some of those who have been reported as "disappeared’ may be held in unacknowledged detention, as the authorities have failed to provide lists of those held in their custody.
ABUSES COMMITTED BY THE LIBERATION TIGERS OF TAMMIL EELAM
After the outbreak of fighting between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan security forces in June 1990, the monitoring of the human rights situation in areas controlled by the LTTE became particularly difficult. People fleeing the Jaffna peninsula expressed fear of reprisals if they were to provide information to AI about human rights violations by the LTTE. AI has not visited the areas said to be under the control of the LTTE. During its trip to Sri Lanka, AI had the opportunity however to interview victims of abuses by the LTTE who were residing in other parts of the country. As with reports of government abuses deriving from opposition sources AI has taken particular care inscrutinizing allegations made by opponents of the LTTE who may be seeking to damage the organization.
On the basis of the information gathered, AI is concerned at consistent reports that LTTE cadres, particularly in the Jaffna area, carry out arrests on various grounds, including people's alleged sympathies for rival Tamil groups or cooperation with them, sympathy or cooperation with the Indian Peace Keeping Force during their stay in Sri Lanka, suspicion of providing information to the security forces or refusal to pay contributions to the LTTE. AI has also received information about the arrest of people as a result of what appeared to be personal feuds (such as over land or marriage arrangements) and of people critical of the LTTE. A number of Muslim businessmen were also detained for
aSO.
One of the people interviewed by AI in June 1991 described how late one evening in April 1990 three armed members of the LTTE ordered him to come with them for interrogation. They blindfolded him and took him in a van to what seemed to be a transit camp. He was held there for nine days with an estimated 40 - 45 others. He was not interrogated during this period. On the ninth day he as transferred to Tunukkai, Mullaitivu district where one of the largest places of detention of the LTTE at that time was established. Each prisoner was allocated a numbered space of 3' x 2. Their feet were shackled together with a rigid 9 inch bar. He estimated that around 800 people were held in this hall at that time. He also alleged that those considered to be "hardcore" prisoners were held separately in eight foot deep pits surrounded by barbed wire. There were five such pits in the camp, each of which, he thought, contained approximately 20 - 25 prisoners.
AI has also received several reports of torture of prisoners held in LTTE custody.
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In mid-November 1990, 28 Muslim traders from Jaffna were taken by local LTTE cadres. Three of them were released, one was reportedly killed in custody. Twenty four of them continue to be held as of early June 1991.
Hundreds of Sinhalese and Muslim villagers have been killed by the LTTE since the outbreak of the fighting of the northeast. Villages in areas bordering the present Northeastern Province, particularly in the Polonnaruwa District, but also in the Anuradhapura and Moneragala Districts, have been attacked.
Among the victims of extrajudicial executions by the LTTE are also a number of people who have disobeyed LTTE orders, including LTTE members, and people found guilty of misappropriating funds or abusing the name of the LTTE. One such victim is 39-year-old Vasantha Sulosana from Navatikiri in the Jaffna District. She was publicly executed on 15 August 1991 at Muthiraisanthai, together with Shanmuganathan (alias Guru Master), whb has reportedly been found guilty of fraud. Vasantha Sulosana was tied to a lamppost and executed by a woman LTTE cadre. Her body was later dropped in front of her home.
In October 1990, the LTTE issued an ultimatum to Muslims in Mannar, Mullaitivu, Kilinochchi and Jaffna Districts to . leave the areas or be killed. An estimated 40,000 fled south to Puttalam and Colombo. Similar threats have been reported in mid July 1991 in some Muslim villages in the еast.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONALS RECOMMENDATIONS
In making these recommendations, AI recognizes the enormously difficult law and order situation in the northeast of the country. Nevertheless, it is important to stress that, regardless of the atrocities committed by armed groups such as the LTTE, however provocative they may be, it is the responsibility of the Sri Lankan government under international law to safeguard the rights of citizens. However difficult the circumstances, derogation from the international obligations of a government to protect all people under all circumstances from extrajudicial execution, torture and "disappearance' cannot be justified.
To create a climate in which human rights violations are less likely to occur
AI urges the Sri Lankan government to make a public statement acknowledging that widespread human rights violations have taken place in the country during the past seven years and recognizing the responsibility of its security forces in perpetrating these violations, most notably “disappearances' and extrajudicial executions.
Making this public acknowledgement is essential to create a climate conducive for the introduction of effective remedial and preventive measures.
AI urges the government to repeal the Indemnity (Amendment) Act as a clear sign of its
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commitment to bringing those responsible for human rights violations to justice.
To put a halt to 'disappearances':
In view of the prevalence of the phenomenon of "disappearance' throughout the country during the past seven years, AI recommends that the mandate for the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Illegal Removal of Persons be extended to include cases of "disappearances' which occurred prior to 11 January 1991, thousands of which remain unaccounted for.
AI recommends that the Presidential Commission takes all necessary steps to publish details of its work in local newspapers in all areas of the country with a special effort for those areas obviously most affected by the present fighting between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan security forces.
Providing death certificates in cases of “disappearances' should not be considered to absolve the government of the responsibility to try to establish the fate or whereabouts of these people, bring to justice those responsible for the “disappearance' and provide adequate compensation to the victims or their relatives within a reasonable period of time.
To promote human rights for detainees and their families:
AI welcomes the establishment of the Human Rights Task Force. It urges that sufficient resources be provided to it to guarantee its effectiveness.
Given that the risk of human rights violations occurring is greatest during the initial period after arrest, AI suggests that the Human Rights Task Force establishes a 24-hour information office to allow relatives and others concerned to make inquiries at all times.
When visiting places of detention under army control, the Human Rights Task Force should be give unrestricted access to people detained at local army detachments and be empowered to undertake unannounced inspections on their own initiative.
The Human Rights Task Force should consider establishing regional offices, to ensure speedy and regular access to people taken into custody.
Anyone arrested without a warrant should be taken before a judge as soon as possible to determine the legality of the arrest.
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All vehicles used by the military and police should have number plates displayed at all times, and whenever possible be clearly identified as military or police vehicles.
The Human Rights Task Force should be informed by the arresting agency immediately of any arrest with or without warrant.
Detainees, including those taken for questioning in mass round-ups, should be released into the care of their relatives in the presence of a representative of the Human Rights Task Force.
To bring a halt to extrajudicial executions:
AI reiterates its appeal to the Sri Lankan Government to abide by the Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions and to ensure that they be fully implemented and enforced in Sri Lanka. These principles, as endorsed by the UN General Assembly on 15 December 1989, clearly state that extrajudicial executions cannot be justified by the existence or threat of a state of war, nor by internal political instability or public emergency. They provide numerous safeguards, including the establishment of a clear chain of command over all officials responsible for apprehension, arrest, detention, custody and imprisonment, as well as over all officials authorized by law to use force and firearms. (Principle 2).
In the light of the use by the security forces of several armed groups within the population, such as Muslim home guards, and the use of armed cadre of anti-LTTE militant groups, AI urges the government to set up a review of present command and control structures in the security forces.
Bearing in mind the communal character of the present conflict, particularly in the east of Sri Lanka, a system of strict and effective control over the issuing of weapons to civilians for self-defence should be developed.
The results of all human rights investigations should be made public. AI strongly believes that the only way that public opinion will be convinced of the authorities' commitment to bring the perpetrators to justice is to see public proof that human rights violations will not be tolerated.

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