POLITICS, POISONOUS PENS, MURALI and DISASTER AID
Michael Roberts - 31st January 2005

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Let me strongly endorse the Moderator's decision to reproduce the article in Asian Tribune that was shaped by HLD Mahindapala, a reprinting that was included in a post by Chucker and then drew strong criticism from a host of posts. Those contributors to the Dilmah Forum who criticised this decision and expected the Moderator to be a political scientist who investigates the credentials of authors or periodicals are simply demanding too much. As it is, Mahindapala's formal credentials are considerable. He has been an Editor of one of Sri Lanka 's major newspapers and writes regularly for the Island . He has an article in the journal South Asia in an issue edited by Siri Gamage of UNE, Armidale, NSW and was one of the speakers in August 2004 at a World Alliance for Peace Conference in Oslo where such individuals as Paul Harris and Drs. Peter Chalk, Asoka Bandarage, Shantha Hennayake were speakers (see http://www.senter.no ).

The assembly at Oslo was partly sponsored by a coalition of forces associated with right-wing Sinhala thinking in Sri Lanka and abroad. Among the key inspirations, it seems, were such individuals as Susantha Goonatilake and the Australian-based organisation known as SPUR (acronym for Society for Peace, Unity and Human Rights in Sri Lanka ) . In the spectrum of Sri Lankan politics SPUR represents lines of thinking which would make it roughly similar to Pauline Hanson and ‘dry' elements in both the Liberal and National Parties within the parameters of Australian politics.

In broad terms these right-wing Sinhala spokespersons are regarded by liberals in Sri Lanka (whether Sinhala, English and Tamil-speaking liberals) as “chauvinists” because of their emphasis on Sinhala majoritarianism and their insistence on treating the LTTE as “terrorists” with whom one should not negotiate. The LTTE's record of killings is atrocious; but they have not monopolised atrocity in the recent history of Sri Lankan politics. And there is a hard reality that everyone has to confront: the LTTE have considerable popular support among the Sri Lankan Tamil people and rule a significant portion of the country. The ceasefire and MOU of early 2002 and the negotiations that followed in fact served as recognition of this reality. Yet, some extreme Sinhala chauvinists adhere to a fundamentalist position, one that implies a return to war (albeit one which rural poor rather than their own children will be the cannon-fodder for military casualties).

Though married to a Tamil, Mahindapala's politics in recent years have been firmly within this chauvinist Sinhala camp. I am reliably informed that he has close links with SPUR. Indeed, Lionel Bopage feels that he is “ the theoretician behind all extreme Sinhala organisations in Australia .” Those who have read his writings in recent years will tell you that Mahindapala believes in the power of the pen. He likes playing with words. He is a demagogue writer, a stirrer. His prose can be pithy, crisp and sometimes quite striking, though also touched with acid at times.

For all that some of his essays are prolix and poorly organised: they are like a shotgun in their scatter effect and organisation. Whether deliberately or unintentionally, Mahindapala's surveys tend to gloss over inconvenient facts and are highly selective in their coverage. Such shortcomings, however, are concealed by the powerful prose and reader-expectations surrounding feature articles. Shotguns can be deadly. In Sri Lanka 's situation during the past decade, therefore Mahindapala's ‘shotgun' has had ramifying influence in English-media circles among Sri Lankans.

Given the character of Mahindapala's writings should the Moderator have become a censor? Should he keep such ‘literature' out of the ‘pristine' precincts of cricket and Dilmah? Such a position has overtones of the standard battle cry: “keep politics out of cricket”.

I do not stand on these battle lines. Such conventional views are directed by a naïve reading of “politics” as the stuff of elections, political parties and governmental action. In contrast, I believe that politics is about the distribution of power. As such, it is a complex and pervasive phenomenon. One can speak of gender politics in reference to everyday interactions in street and home. Wherever individuals or factions compete for resources, there, then, one has politics. Every organization has its politics. Australia Cricket for one. Indeed, one has only to listen to the ABC radio commentators to comprehend that regional (state) loyalties influence the game (mostly as banter, but where there is banter there rides sentiment).

Political parties do not meddle with the game of cricket in Australia in the same manner as Sri Lanka where it is built into the constitution of the game. In any event Sri Lankan society is shaped in different ways to that of Australia or UK . Ethnic identities are far more central in everyday exchanges and popular consciousness. In the present context of sharp ethnic conflict, in fact, cricket has been occasionally deployed as a bridge builder through symbolic cricket matches between teams from the Jaffna Peninsula and others from the south. The Australian embassy even organised a coaching clinic in the Peninsula by John Buchanan and Tim Nielsen during one of the recent Aussie tours.

In this context, then, the moderator's decision was welcome because it brought a way of thinking that may not have normally entered the purview of the Dilmah-Cricket readership into their horizons of experience. It is a horizon that should not be shut out.

There is yet another reason why I, for one, am grateful to the Moderator for ‘sponsoring' what became a raging debate. It has revealed how so many of you detest Mahindapala's type of thinking. And not only that: you saw through his manipulative techniques. To me you represent Citizen Bandara, Citizen Marikar, Citizen Heyn, Citizen Rajendra, one thread of the popular voice. So, I thank you FELLOWS. Your responses have been heartening. As heartening as Charlie Austin's comprehensive and highly readable accounts of the tsunami relief work being undertaken by a battery of cricketers in association with Sri Lanka Cricket.

Mahindapala's article shows little awareness of the range of activity and the regional spread of this enterprise. (Significantly, his recent defence in the Dilmah site takes a legalistic and pedantic line – not unlike that of SL Gunasekera). The role of SLC requires emphasis here. Though Murali has been an inspirational force, SLC has expanded and institutionalised the operation. Very early in the day, for instance, they decided to set up relief camps at Matara, Badulla, Dambulla and Kilinochchi.

Moreover, while Murali and others were playing the tsunami appeal match at Melbourne , a SLC team were in LTTE territory hammering out an agreement (see Austin 's report, 10 Jan 2005). Critically these ‘point-men' included Thilanga Sumathipala, Aravinda de Silva, Mahela Jaywardene and Russel Arnold. Arnold is a Methodist and Tamil and his inclusion was surely no accident.

At this meeting the original plans seem to have been reversed and two of the ‘cricket aid villages,' it appears, are now to be located at Mullaitivu and Batticaloa, not Dambulla and Kilinochchi. Let me stress that this step is a major breakthrough and act of rapprochement between Tigers and the rest of Lanka. Mullaitivu is a high security zone where the LTTE thalaivar (leader) and his HQ are located. When I visited the north in November 2004 a Reuters reporter informed me that no Sinhala journalist would be permitted to travel to Mullaitivu. The impact of the tsunami, it appears, has made the LTTE more amenable to combined relief efforts. And the reputation of the cricketers seems to have been such that SLC's project has received their approval.

If Sri Lanka remains as one entity 20 years down the track, and if and when a Saravanaparan from VVT or a Jeyaseelan from Mullaitivu plays for one of the Sri Lankan cricket teams, then, we will be seeing the fruits of this type of enterprise (building on the normal structure of SL cricket which in fact pits teams from all over the island in junior competitions).

The question therefore arises: how would SPUR, Mahindapala and others of similar persuasion respond to such a prospect? That's fantasyland I suppose. In the here and now I am pleased that the Moderator and the initial post brought those sitting within the comfortable confines of the cricket couch into the vortex of ethnic politics. With blokes like Mahindapala around, believe me it is always a vortex. He is quite incorrigible. His pen rules, pensiveness has little place in his mind.

While I understand Tusker's desire to take him outside and bash him, I am afraid that remedy does not work. Indeed, Mahindapala does with pen what Tusker is inclined to do with fists. Mahindapala is a basher-by-pen (do not be fooled by his temperate response to the Dilmah posts). It is precisely this type of rhetoric in print and on public platform that exacerbated ethnic tensions in Sri Lanka from the 1940s (if not earlier) and eventually led to underground war, spasmodic war and then continuous war.

Some Sinhala chauvinists in the 1950s said the Tamils had too much and sought too much. So they bashed them (Sinhala Only Act, 1958 pogrom, etc). The Tamils then asked for yet more. So some Sinhalese bashed them (1977, 1983 pogrom). This, clearly, is an oversimplified summary of a complex story. But it is one strand of plausible argument within a more complex analysis that would have to incorporate numerous threads, including Sri Lankan Tamil actions.

Writing in the 1960s, Sinnappah Arasaratnam observed that the extremists on both sides of the Sinhala-Tamil fence were feeding off each other. They continue to do so today. Bashing a Mahindapala here, and a Goonatilake there, will not resolve such processes; it will only raise the tempo and the stakes. But, then, so will my little essay! Await verbal repercussions.

I wish I had an easy answer. If I had, I would be in line for a Noble Peace Prize. I can only say: “be aware” and “beware of intemperate voices and seductive complaints.” The Dilmah debate is a step in this direction.