It is perhaps the most unpalatable of truths that losing faith in an ideal is even more dangerous to a country's spirit and to an individual's conscience than actual loss of lives. After thirty years of active conflict and at this most crucial juncture in our history, have we (paradoxically) become the most vulnerable to shrugging aside the ideal of a functioning democracy and along with it, our reliance on constitutional forms of governance and the Rule of Law?
The centralization of power
The problem with losing faith in an ideal is that the process is irreversibly insidious. A good illustration is the judiciary. The reality is not that we have had perfect judicial institutions or indeed, perfect judges in the past. Yet, however imperfect these entities or individuals were, checks and balances kept the worst of abuses in check. To a large extent, this process was dependant on a strong Bar as well as the judicial personalities themselves. Despite being coerced, humiliated and abused at many historical points of time by the executive, the dignity of the Court was maintained at least to the extent that independence could still be seen as an ideal. And at times when Sri Lanka's Supreme Court boasted of judges who could have easily held their own in juristic forums anywhere in the world when measured on their intellectual capacity or their integrity, we could even think of higher standards to aspire to, as opposed to the conservatism of the past.
However, the centralization of power in the office of the Chief Justice as well as the various turbulent winds that have beset it for the greater part of the past decade has now made the operation of these checks and balances seem unbearably unrealistic. We have grown accustomed to regarding the Chief Justice not as one among his or her equals but rather as the sole embodiment of ultimate judicial authority, as politically 'dependant' or 'independent' as the case may be. And it is a relevant point as to whether right now, at the point of the retirement of indisputably Sri Lanka's most contested and controversial Chief Justice, we are able to look upon the independence of the Bench even as an ideal? Whether this will, (framed within the politics of Sri Lanka's Supreme Court and resulting in, inter alia, two politically aborted impeachment motions), remain the outgoing incumbent's preeminent legacy needs to be the focus of sober and balanced analysis elsewhere than in a newspaper column.
Currently also, the Sri Lankan Bar is at its very weakest, characterized by a pathetic inability even to effectively discipline attorneys-at-law who consistently violate the rules of professional ethics. Its non-interventions in respect of the physical attacks and intimidation of lawyers are therefore unsurprising. And with the 17th Amendment now being effectively vilified as flawed and (even) as possessing a separatist agenda, the stage is set for an aggravated political subversion of governance. The problem -- most dangerously -- is that we are now accepting this as a reality that cannot be overcome. We have abandoned even the ideal of good governance.
Distasteful obeisance and political repression
This question is pertinent at other levels as well. Repression continues to be manifested against governmental critics, activists and journalists. Government action is limited to farcical promises of investigations. And whereas the government may have gathered some desperately needed goodwill to itself by showing clemency to the three government doctors working in the hospitals in the somewhat euphemistically titled no-fire zone during the last days of the conflict, it has chosen to charge them under the law. Earlier, the centralization of power in the Executive Presidency was cause for general concern. Now this concern too is abandoned in the face of undiluted obeisance, ranging from the Presidency being equated to a kingship to the Colombo University Senate’s inexplicably distasteful decision to award doctorates to President Rajapaksa and his brother, the Defence Secretary (presumably) in commendation for the ending of the war. Incidentally, why do we not extend the conferral of doctorates to the three service chiefs and the head of the police and be done with it?
An increased militarization is, meanwhile, being justified on the basis that the remaining 'terrorist' need to be dealt with. We are also beginning to see formidable political (and other) forces gathering in negation of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution. Bereft of an effectively vibrant strategy to counter a virtual Rajapaksa juggernaut, the opposition (apart from making statements) remains in a state of suspended animation as much as before.
Dancing in the streets; dilemmas in governance
This week, we saw Sri Lanka Insurance employees dancing in joy at the judicial setting aside of the 2003 sale of the Corporation's majority shareholding to two private companies, (headed by a classically controversial business profiteer), on the basis that it lacked due process of law and caused huge losses of public money. For the past several weeks, we have had people dancing in the streets to mark their joy at the military decimation of the LTTE.
Yet, it is clear that (despite the dancing at many different levels) our problems are not over but just beginning. Now that we do not have the conflict to advance as the excuse anymore, are we honest enough to acknowledge that our systems of governance need careful reflection and concerted action? As a pre-condition to the government's promise to implement the 13th Amendment, should we not call upon it first to at least, implement the 17th Amendment and to remedy our internal rights record to ensure that past abuses against victims of all ethnicities will be dealt with according to law? How else can we demonstrate respect for the Constitution?
This we need to do not because the United Nations Human Rights Council intervenes or fails to intervene or because we are lectured to by other nations but because we owe it to ourselves and ourselves alone. At the very minimum, this needs to be acknowledged for there to be at least a reawakening of the ideal of democracy in Sri Lanka. |
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