Sri Lanka Army joins people in rebuilding activity
Singapore (IDN) - Amid reports that an internal document, made
public on November 14 by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, has triggered
soul-searching in the world organisation on its failure to protect
non-combatants in Sri Lanka's civil war, a visit to the country shows that the
army and the people in the Northern Province are busy rebuilding the
infrastructure destroyed by 30 years of a gruesome conflict.
During a recent visit to Jaffna, this writer noticed a marked
improvement in the relationship between the army - which was once seen as the
"enemy" by the Tamils - and the local population. Even one Tamil fisherman
referred to the Sri Lankan Navy as "our Navy" which is trying to help them to
drive away the Tamil Nadu fisherman poaching on Sri Lankan waters.
The desire to reconcile is apparent on both sides. Increasingly
finding common ground, the people of the north and the south are now beginning
to interact. There is increased tourism from the south of the country to Jaffna,
especially Sinhalese Buddhist pilgrims who visit the sacred Nagadvipa shrine in
Nainativu Island off Jaffna. This shrine was closed to Buddhist pilgrims for
almost 30 years and it has been newly renovated with the help of army personnel.
At the army checkpoint before entering the northern zone at
Kilinochchi every Sinhalese traveller is given a one-page sheet of paper in
Sinhalese signed by Northern Division Police chief Gamini de Silva. In it he
points out that in the Jaffna area there are a number of sacred Hindu temples
and asks the people to dress properly in its vicinity, not to be intoxicated,
respect their culture and treat all Tamil people during their visit with utmost
courtesy and friendship.
Tamils themselves seem to be returning this courtesy as I found
out during my 3-day stay in Jaffna. Since I don't speak Tamil and if they don't
speak English, they tried to communicate with me in Sinhalese, something
unimaginable a few years ago.
"Damage done in 30 years can't be cured in 3 years." argues
Ishwara Sarma, a 82 year old Hindu philosopher and teacher who has lived in
Jaffna throughout the conflict. "We need to forget the past and build a future
together. This country is too small to be divided."
Travelling on the road between Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu is
reflective of what many people in the Indian Ocean Island hopes is the building
of a new Sri Lanka. This is the route where fierce battles took place in the
early parts of 2009 between the government forces and the Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leading to the annihilation of the LTTE on banks of the
Mullaitivu lagoon in May 2009.
These are the battles the BBC and some other western news
agencies prefer to harp on as "war crimes". But, the people there seem to want
to forget the past and build a new future of peace and co-existence.
On either side of the road you still see the bullet-hole ridden
walls of houses without roofs and unoccupied, even burned out mangled wreckages
of buses, jeeps, vans and cars belonging to both the LTTE and the army. Yet, the
roads are being built at a hectic pace with new asphalt carpeting with the
predominantly Sinhalese army personnel mostly in civilian clothes working with
the local Tamil people.
Hand in hand with the army
According to the Jaffna District Government Agent's office, over
USD 230 million has been spent up to May 2012 on road construction projects in
the north through funds allocated from the Ministry of Economic Development,
Governments of China and Sweden, and the Asian Development Bank. The A9 highway
which was heavily mined during the war and closed for over two-decades is now
open with newly-laid asphalt coating that makes travel to Jaffna as smooth as
never before.
Though the highway is dotted with a number of army camps that
has raised the ire of some human rights activists overseas, what impresses many
visitors is the cordial rapport the army seems to have established with the
local people since the hostilities ended. When working on road construction or
driving tractor-driven trucks on the road, the soldiers are not even carrying
guns. Three years ago they were shooting at each other or the local people were
held as human shields against an advancing army firing mortar shells.
"(After the war ended) we understood that we needed to change
the soldier from a fighting force to protector of the people," Maj Gen Mahinda
Hathurusinghe, Security Forces Commander in Jaffna said in an interview with
this writer at the Palali camp. "We now use our resources to uplift the peoples'
lives and help them to create wealth," he added.
The government has taken the stance that the priority for the
people is to uplift their living standards rather than indulge in divisive
debates about political reforms. Thus, the army is utilized to speed up the
development activities and rebuild infrastructure destroyed by 30 years of war.
Economic strides
"Those days (during the war) life used to stop at 6 pm because
there were curfews, now it's like in Colombo, but there are now problems like
robberies (due to the extra freedoms)," said school teacher Gopalakrishnan
Gopikrishna. He also pointed out that with electricity now available the young
people are finding life better with television and Internet at their disposal,
but, they are using it for entertainment rather than for education, even
accessing pornography. "Youngsters were unable to move during war time, now they
are flashing out and us teachers are finding it difficult to cope with them."
According to Government Agent (GA) of Jaffna, S. Arumainayagam,
the local economy has made great strides in the past 3 years. He said that the
development model for the north based on improving infrastructure and building
industries and tourism is based on the Korean and Singapore development models.
He said that the government has already invested Rs 200 million (USD 1.6
million) to start an industrial zone in Jaffna.
Arumainayagam pointed out that over the past 3 years more than
250 km of roads have been improved; paddy harvest has increased by over 100
percent, red onion (a specialty of the Jaffna region) has seen its harvest
increase from 23,000 metric tons in 2008 to more than 63,000 metric tons this
year. Production of chilies - another specialty of the region - has increased by
120 percent.
During an interview at his office, the GA claimed that the most
remarkable increase has been in the fisheries sector. "In 2008 we only got 2,600
tons a year and in 2011 it has increased to 25,000 tons. This is due to a number
of factors. During that time there were restrictions imposed on fishing by the
government, but, today the government has distributed boats to fishermen,
provided a fuel subsidy and established sales centres (for their catch)," he
explained.
During the hostilities because the LTTE used to transport
supplies by sea to their bases in the north-east, the Navy restricted fishing in
the area.
Fisheries
Sinnaiya Thavaratnam, President of the Northern Provinces
Fisheries Alliance does not agree with the GA's assessment. "Last 25 years Sri
Lankan waters have been disturbed by Indian fishermen. They are fishing in
trawlers with big nets. So our catch is badly effected," he complained.
The Jaffna-based fisherman claims that in 1985 nearly 50,000
tons of fish were caught by their fishermen, but now it dwindled to below 20,000
tons. "We need to stop Indian trawlers fishing in our seas - once that happens
it will take 3 to 4 years to restore the fish resources for us to catch," he
estimates.
Though the Sri Lanka government has banned them coming in, the
Indians still fish in Sri Lankan waters and the Navy has been unable to stop
this incursion. "I think the government is not that interested, because of
certain pressures. Navy is trying to protect our resources but the Sri Lanka
government is not giving them enough support," he lamented.
Indian trawlers In September this year, India's Hindu newspaper
said that records obtained from the Indian government indicated that between
January and June 2012, Indian trawlers crossing into Sri Lanka numbered 20,662.
Fishermen from Jaffna have been urging their Navy to chase the Indians out and
in one incident in February 2011, Sri Lankan Tamil fishermen resorted to direct
action, rounding up more than 100 Indian fishermen, and handed them over to
their Navy. Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalitha, who has in recent years tried
to champion Tamil self-determination in Sri Lanka, claims that the Sri Lankan
Navy is harassing Indian fishermen and according to the Hindu has written some
12 letters to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh criticizing him for being soft on
Sri Lanka. She is another of those vocal Tamils overseas who want to stand up
for Tamil's political rights in Sri Lanka. She has refused to accept an
invitation for the Sri Lankan government to visit Jaffna to find out for herself
what the Tamil people on the ground needs at the moment. A number of Tamils in
Jaffna told me that Tamil politicians want to create division and not reconcile.
"There is no question about it that the absence of war, absence of destruction,
the ability of transact business and the ability to travel freely is being
appreciated," says Jeevan Thiagarajah, Executive Director of the Consortium of
Humanitarian Agencies. "Something we need to ask is in the process of rebuilding
what is the role of the government and at what point market forces take over.
This question is not being asked yet."
Courtesy : InDepthNews
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