Rajpal's Column

1st March 1998

It cannot go on

By Rajpal Abeynayake

Security checks in Colombo

Very often, the Co- lombo resident is hit on the head with the guilt complex. If you live in Colombo, and maybe go a discotheque on a stray weekend, you could be accused of not empathising with the foot soldier in Jaffna. But anybody claiming there is no war in Colombo, would have been bamboozled by claims that do not reflect the truth.

Fourteen police complaints have reportedly been made about the new "suicide - hike'' syndrome to Wellawatte police alone. The syndrome involves a woman in a suicide jacket forcing herself into a passing vehicle . She then threatens to blow herself up if she is not dropped off at a given location.

Also, the case of the teacher from Urugasmanhandiya who was manhandled by the army last week for being sleepy and negligent at a checkpoint is a measure of the frenzy and panic that goes with maintaining city security.

The causes behind the security situation in Colombo however point to a conundrum of mind-numbing proportions .

If the forces do their job, it is natural that at least some of their work will be construed as being racist. If the Tamils in Colombo find themselves in the crosshairs of the security search, that will be because of the enormity of the security challenge that face the authorities. If the probability of Sinhalese carrying bombs is less, it is logical that the work of thinly concentrated security forces will be more focused on Tamils. But, the moment this happens, the Kumar Ponnambalams of this world would be crying foul. Mr P himself doesn't really matter. But other ostensible rights organisations would take up the cry of persecution, even though the situation is obviously a chicken and egg scenario. Interested parties can can say the chicken came before the egg and argue that the security focus on Tamils is a result of racism, rather than of circumspection.

On the other hand, if the security forces do their job, they could also be very obliquely and inadvertently helping the LTTE, who want to spread word that Tamils are being unfairly persecuted within the Sri Lankan polity. The forces and the state are therefore damned if they do and damned if they don't.

But bombs do not distinguish between Tamils and Sinhalese, a fact made obvious from the Slave Island bomb blast in which two Tamil businessmen travelling in a van were killed when the suicide bomber blew herself up. ( Recent events support the conclusion that the woman bomber in this instance would have probably arrived in the van. This van may have been hijacked in the same fashion that's described in the earlier part of this article. )

Therefore the fear psychosis corrodes the discourse and warps the reality. But the fact that Tamils themselves are at risk should make the ethnic communities consider these matters more dispassionately. Mr Pakiasothy Saravanamuttu or Mr Kumar Ponnmbalam complaining in the seminar circuit about lopsided security focus on Tamils in the city, are themselves not immune to being blown to bits from a LTTE bomb attack in Colombo. That's particularly because the ball bearings inside LTTE explosive devices are not equipped with sensors that make them avoid the Saravanamuttus or the Sivathambys. These balls, they pierce through all and sundry.

Obviously, these are not observations that will qualify a writer for any journalistic awards. Rational and objective observations will not be considered kosher in the hypocritical and incestuous back slapping world of peace workshops and seminar circuits. These are places in which facts can easily be obfuscated by the sentiment that only the person who purportedly represents the underdog is the social crusader.

No matter. If there is "apartheid'' at the checkpoint that's very unfortunate reality but its also because of the fact that there are security imperatives .

These considerations endanger the lives of both the Sinhala and Tamil innocents within city confines. The security risk is now at saturation point which makes it almost a necessity for the forces to be practical which means that one way or the other, the Tamils will face more of the pressure from increased security efforts.

This doesn't obviously place the thousands of innocent Tamils in a enviable situation, but if the forces cannot act sooner or later the situation would lead to the formation of private vigilante groups .

The sporadic attacks on the city cannot go on, and hopefully both Sinhalese and Tamils (Muslims etc.,) who are all potential victims will not tolerate such attacks. If the persecution argument is taken to a logical end, the Sinhalese and the Muslims can argue that they are persecuted in the North and the East. In most of these parts they have not been exactly welcome , under pain of death, for a long time. But that observation is no inverted quid pro quo argument. It is in order to indicate how successfully the lobbies and the interested parties have distorted the security related focus on the Tamil community as a racist exercise — in extreme cases an argument that has been extended as to justify separatism.

All this is not to say that Tamils in the city should be subject to arbitrary persecution. Accusing me of advocating that will be the next step of any clever spinner of facts who would want to extend the existing distortion of the reality even further. It is to say that the self preservation instinct of the collective community, which includes Tamils Sinhalese and Muslims, will eventually prevail . They would eventually see the security conundrum for what it is. If the city is bombarded by more explosives in the near future it is likely that the community will become more sensitive to security risks, which may originate next door or two doors next or somewhere in the neighbourhood. The communities may even become more polarised (sad ) but strictly from a security point of view, if that doesn't happen scores of innocents could be falling victims to bombs ( something even sadder )….

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