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When the time comes, the Tamils might also wish to freely navigate global economic dynamics for themselves.
We thank Ambassador Jeffrey Lunstead for his comments on the 9th January [‘Peace and Prosperity: US Policy Goals in Sri Lanka’] outlining to the Tamil people the enormous amounts of American economic aid that they are supposedly foregoing by their pursuit of freedom.
But
he will find, on examination of the facts, that the Tamils of Sri Lanka
fully understand the benefits of economic prosperity, having enjoyed
such prosperity long before their marginalisation by the
post-independence Sri Lanka state and the ensuing the civil war. Indeed
it was the Tamils’ supposedly disproportionate educational and
commercial success that lead, in the first place, to racially biased
legislation such as the university quota system and the Sinhala-only
language act and ultimately to the anti-Tamil pogroms which expressed
the historical resentment of the majority against a successful minority.
The
Tamils as a nation are more than aware of the future economic value of
the strategic assets of their homeland, including, by way of example,
mineral deposits such as Titanium and maritime assets such as the
Trincomalee harbour. We are equally aware that the United States, among
others, will have interest in these resources too.
A
few observations on economic proficiency, to begin with. The United
States, while a major investor abroad, is facing an increasing trade
and current account deficit. Simply put, the Ambassador’s great nation
consumes more than it produces and increasingly so. The United States
also consumes more oil, a crucial economic resource for its current
economy, than it produces. It needs to ensure supplies and routes for
those supplies from regions including Asia. The present government of
the United States has also widened its budget deficit – the government
spends more than it earns, and this impacts its ability to provide
services such as welfare and disaster management to its own people.
These
potential unstable dynamics are not in themselves entirely calamitous
though perhaps incomprehensible to the rest of the world. But that is
America''s prerogative. Perhaps not entirely incomprehensibly, when the
time comes, the Tamils might also wish to freely navigate global
economic dynamics for themselves and determine the true cost of capital
for the optimal, long term exploitation of their strategic assets.
The
Ambassador is known for his scholarship of South Asia. He will of
course be aware that the Tamils are among the oldest international
maritime trading civilizations in the region, also being geographically
strategically placed. It is hence perhaps conceivable that the present
Tamil leadership has the ability and the acumen to recognise the need
to understand both international commerce and globalisation.
The
economic activity that has been achieved and sustained in areas such as
Kilinocchi in the past few years needs to be seen in the context of an
almost decade long embargo of essential goods to the Tamil areas
imposed by the Sri Lankan government. The Ambassador’s government,
while preaching free trade, had done little to oppose the embargo, and
in fact, sought to further economically isolate the Tamil homeland by
imposing restrictions on the means by which the Tamil expatriate
community supports the Tamil administration in the North East.
A
government is measured not only by its ability to create prosperity for
a portion of its citizens but also by its capacity to execute essential
functions particularly in times of deep crisis. We are confident that
the Tamil administration’s unflinching and comprehensive efforts in the
first few days when the Tsunami struck in December 2004 will stand more
than ordinarily favorable comparison to the US government’s response to
the natural disaster in New Orleans last year.
Furthermore,
any post Tsunami progress in the Tamil areas needs to be viewed in the
context of the inability or unwillingness of the Ambassador’s
government, to influence the Sri Lankan state to implement the PTOMS or
a comparable alternative. Even the great generosity of the expatriate
Tamil community in the Tsunami period was greatly hampered by animosity
towards the TRO, one of the most effective grass roots aid
organizations in the North East.
Nevertheless
the purpose of this comment is not to discuss the economic future of
the Tamil homeland: it is understood that a prosperous economic future
can be achieved only once a strong and defensible foundation of Tamils’
civil liberty is won.
Instead
let us focus on a fact that the Ambassador missed entirely in his
speech to the American Chamber of Commerce: that there are some things
that money cannot buy. These are often the most important blessings of
life.
We
speak in the context of the recent circumstances experienced by the
civilians of the North East. Jaffna has been under the occupation of an
army that speaks a foreign language since 1995. In the last six weeks
we have witnessed increasing violence against civilians by the armed
forces, including rape, disappearances. Member of Parliament Joseph
Pararajasingham, who the Ambassador has met several times, was shot
dead during Christmas Mass military intelligence operatives. The
Ambassador is no doubt aware of all of these developments, apart from
those he opted to speak about.
Many
Tamils have died for the simple reason that they were of a different
race from the majority state, and had no access to a genuine
‘government of the people… by the people.. for the people’. No amount
of the American government’s money and technology investment will bring
their families either justice or solace. Indeed, what would have been
priceless would have been something that is entirely without monetary
value: the government of America’s unequivocal condemnation of
repressive violence by the state against its unarmed citizens.
The
Ambassador asks what kind of Tamil leaders will forego the considerable
economic handouts he describes in his speech. We may respond to him
with the words of one of the greatest leaders the world has known in
recent times. “No man is good enough to govern another man without that
other’s consent.�
The
vision that drives the Tamil people and their leaders is echoed in his
words: “Our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation:
conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created equal…… . that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth
of freedom and that government of the people. . .by the people. . .for
the people. . . shall not perish from this earth.�.
And we ask, how the Ambassador and his American colleagues could have forgotten the immortal words of Abraham Lincoln?
Tamil Guardian
T. Janani
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