Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Emmanuel
The following interview originally was printed in, The Conflation, a latest book by written by
the author.
PART 01
by NILANTHA ILANGAMUWA
( April 2, 2014, Geneva, Sri Lanka Guardian) REVEREND Father S. J. Emmanuel is a priest,
activist and the president of the Global Tamil Forum, an umbrella organisation for Sri Lankan
Tamil diaspora groups.
Father Emmanuel was born in 1934 in Jaffna, in what was then known as Ceylon. He studied in
Jaffna before going to the University of Ceylon in Colombo from where he obtained a
Bachelors degree in physical sciences (Mathematics & Physics) in 1958. After graduation
he spent time as a teacher and a journalist before entering the priesthood. He then went to the
Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome from where he obtained a degree in philosophy and
theology.
In this interview he extensively elaborates the situation in Sri Lanka from the geo-political
perspectives with his personal experiences.
military. The Governments failed to identify and remedy the discontent. They killed them. So
emboldened were they by their brutal success against JVP, they went also to crush the Tamil
insurgents too.
Thus the Government failed to see the LTTE as a consequence of their own state discrimination
and military oppressions already going on in the Tamil areas. When the non-violent and
democratic protests of the Tamils against state-discriminations were attacked by mob-violence
with the connivance of the Sinhala military, and later by military-violence itself, Tamil youth
most affected by discriminations and pushed to the wall without a future, responded with Tamil
violence.
The spiral of state and counter-state terrorisms became a war that was brutally ended in May
2009 with the collaboration of the international community including India. But the stateterrorism continues even today in other subtle forms of military-dictatorship, rape, grabbing of
lands, instilling fear into the population etc. Hence the international donors, who collaborated
with finance and weapons, to crush Tamil terrorism (and acknowledged as over 20 countries by
the President), have now waking up to the truth that it was not merely a war against Tamil
Terrorism. But much more, it was a mass massacre of civilians too as found by the UN-Panel
Report and other photographic evidence.
The majority Sinhalese for whom the Tamil problem was merely Tamil terrorism from 1983
onwards, must look at least into the last 65 years of history and ask how the Government
treated the Tamils. Celebrating victories of one phase of the Tamil struggle, and eradicating the
roots of Tamil existence will not bring peace on the island.
parliament, were able to bulldoze any discriminatory law against the Tamils. They were blinded
by the Mahavamsa mentality and the Sinhala Buddhist nationalism which was exclusive in
character. It was so embedded into the minds of the majority that even a President of the
country remarked that the Tamils are like creepers and suckers of the Sinhala population. Only
when they came to facing the LTTE which was clearly a result of the policies and actions of the
successive governments, they woke up to a threat of violence from the other.
At least after celebrating a victory, the Government could have undertaken a sane and sincere
approach towards reconciliation by following boldly the path of truth and justice. There was an
iota of a chance of this politician becoming a statesman. But he messed up even his brutal
victory. Without knowing the truth about the conflict and war and taking responsibility or
accountability for the crimes committed against the victims, there cannot be reconciliation.
Without admission of guilt there cannot be forgiveness and reconciliation. But unfortunately
the Government is moving quite in the opposite direction by adding injuries to insult and
making true reconciliation recede further away. Bulldozing the cemeteries of the LTTE and
building military bases over them, preventing people even from mourning over their dead,
asking the Tamils to sing the national anthem in Sinhalese, are acts of pouring oil into the fire.
Building better roads, houses and hotels for increased Sinhala military presence and settling
their families, instead of building houses for the victims of war, exposes their concern for
reconciliation through rehabilitation.
You say that The ordinary Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims did not support the war. Yes the
ordinary good people did not support the war. But they are not innocent of the war. In some
way they also are the causes of war. Conflict, violence and war are all results of the so called
ordinary people living a selfish and egoistic life, without concern for the others and the larger
humanity. It is these large mass of ordinary people, by their disinterestedness and passivity help
evil forces to thrive and take over leadership. Politicians and governments come to power, not
so much on the intelligence and the truly patriotic giving support, but on the ignorance,
disinterestedness of such people. They do not speak up their minds, do not take part in
elections, and live a closed up selfish life. See to what extent the Rajapaksas are able to mislead
the ordinary masses!
But who really supported the war when the conflict became a war? The war, in so far it is in
consequence of oppression executed by the Sinhalese and suffered by the Tamils, is
participated in different ways by each of the communities. For the majority Sinhalese, their
government was using its forces fighting the Tamil terrorists to keep the country as a truly
Sinhala Buddhist country without losing a part of the land or its power over the island. Their
support was only passive, especially from the poor who sacrificed their sons joining the army
and dying in the far away North in fighting Tamil terrorists. But the major support for the
war led by the government came from foreign funds and weapons won by false propaganda of
the Government. Whereas for the Tamils, who were targeted as threats to the country, and war
was thrust upon them by long years of state-terrorism, the Tamil youth joining the LTTE were
fighting in self-defense of their homeland and people. Thus it was not a war between two states
or equal forces. One side was supported by the whole world through its misunderstanding
whereas the other side was fighting in self-defense using its own children and its own
resources.
But the government claiming to fight Tamil-terrorism received aid and weapons and succeeded
in wiping out the LTTE and thousands of civilians. Basking in the sunshine of a victory, the
Government and people are refusing to render accountability to the very donors of finance and
weapons for the alleged war-crimes and not caring for the victims even after four years after the
war ended.
At least now, what prevents the majority people from common sense and reasoning? The
majority Sinhalese still suffer from a minority-complex . Of being threatened by those around
namely, the Tamils. Hence the need to attack a pre-emptive attack on the imagined enemy!
Power hungry politicians find the Mahavamsa chronicle to be very useful to keep the masses
with them by preaching Tamil-threats to Sinhala-Buddhist existence. Why are the Rajapaksas
encouraging extremist Buddhist monks to further attacks against churches and mosques? It is a
shame on all the religious leaders in the South where these attacks are taking place that they
have not woken up against injustices and freedom. Self-centered religions and religious leaders
commit a crime by their silence in the face of injustice.
Hence true liberation for all will begin when the majority Sinhalese liberate themselves from a
Mahavamsa mentality, when power hungry politicians stop whipping up false Sinhala-Buddhist
nationalism and when religious leaders become courageous enough to stand up for truth and
justice. I wish the rise of at least a few courageous statesmen and religious leaders to lead the
Sinhala people, and see the Tamils not as opponents and threats to their race but as co-habitants
and cooperators.
To be continued on next Monday ( 7.4.2014)
Nilantha Ilangamuwa edits the Sri Lanka Guardian, an online daily newspaper, and he also an
editor of the Torture: Asian and Global Perspectives, bi-monthly print magazine. He is the
author of the just released non-fictions, Nagna Balaya (The Naked Power), in Sinhalese and
The Conflation, in English. He can be reached at ilangamuw