Focus on Rights

Where is our notion of moral law?
In 1983, the contrasts between South Africa and Sri Lanka were stark. In South Africa, a highly immoral system discriminated against blacks and whites without compunction and without shame. In contrast, Sri Lankans laid claim to the rule of law. And, contrary to what the easily cynical might retort, this is not an abstract notion. The rule of law implies necessarily the legitimacy of laws and accountability of the State, having as its core, the idea of justice as an underlying moral basis for all laws. Law must then necessarily protect basic human rights and act as a constraining and not extending fetter on legislative, executive and judicial powers.

Yet, in July 1983, we had the heart of this country blackened by a week of the most barbarous acts ever visited upon a minority people on this soil, the cumulative consequences of which we are still struggling to escape. And while the purpose of this column is not to liken the happenings in Sri Lanka to the horrors that were systematically perpetrated for decades upon black people in South Africa, there is a different point to be made.

This is simply that South Africa has managed, in the time since those even worse barbarities ceased, to embark upon the process of confronting her demons and coming to terms with the past. We, on the other hand, have not had the courage or the like wisdom even though we functioned in an ostensible democracy as opposed to apartheid and had, by far, the greater contextual history to recollect our spirit.

Twenty years on therefore, little has changed even though peace is apparently upon us and incurably optimistic editorialists wax eloquent about there being no minority riots since that shameful period. But, the central issue here is immeasurably greater than the absence of riots and puts into issue our own hearts, our consciences and our resolve to take the future of our country into our own hands while making amends for the past.

This, South Africa has done, helped undoubtedly by the glory that is Nelson Mandela but also bolstered by a collective reconciliation effort among her people that has only pale replications in this country. We, on the other hand, have left - and continue to leave- it all to our politicians, with inevitably disastrous consequences. In the alternative, we have spurious attempts at national reconciliation at the core of which there is either personal vainglory coupled with lavish use of money, (whether one's own or others), or political motivation.

A cameo portrait of our reconciliation efforts proves this point. For good example, we can look at the Presidential Truth Commission on the ethnic riots, the report of which was released recently. To the uninitiated or to those who are only superficially concerned with fundamental questions of justice, the Commission and its report may pass without note. But a deeper analysis reveals particular flaws in the process that are, in fact, symptomatic of the bigger malaise afflicting this country.

In the first instance and instantly true to the history of Presidential Commissions in this country, the Commission was not created through a collective or multi partisan process. Instead, we had a presidential appointment of three individuals who were given the herculean - and 'single' handed - task of inquiring into and reporting on ethnic violence during a particular period.

Its naming as the Truth Commission drew emotional parallels with the South African Truth Commission. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was however, quite different from its Sri Lankan namesake, both in substance and in form. Firstly, it was created following an extensive process of discussion and consultation by all political parties in South Africa in the post apartheid period. Set up by Act of Parliament, all its Commissioners were highly reputed persons whose appointments were by political consensus. Appropriately, it had a detailed composition with three committees on Human Rights Violations, on Amnesty and on Reparation and Rehabilitation.

Each had distinct tasks. The Committee on Human Rights Violations collected the stories of victims while the Committee of Amnesty heard evidence on political crimes committed during this period and considered whether amnesty could be granted on a full confession by the perpetrator.

Amnesty meant that they would be pardoned for the crime that they had committed and if they were on trial, the trial would be stopped. The Committee on Reparation and Rehabilitation investigated ways to help people who had suffered. Besides this, it considered the manner in which a culture of human rights could be built in the police force, the prisons and other government institutions. In addition, the TRC had an independent investigation unit, made up of lawyers, members of the police force and international experts, who were given powers to question persons and to search and seize documents.

Before and during its sittings, South Africans were informed through public meetings, posters, leaflets and the media, of the purpose of the TRC which was to put together a complete picture of all the serious human rights violations that took place in the country between March 1960 and December 1993. In retrospect therefore, while the South African process had its isolated detractors, it continues to be held out as a signal example of the manner in which a country could deal with its shame.

One may accordingly be forgiven for hesitating to draw analogies between this process and the Sri Lankan Truth Commission, given the almost total lack of holistic purpose by which it was created, which unfortunately indeed, impacted on the seriousness with which it was looked at subsequently.

Now, to add insult to injury, it is almost certain that the report of this Commission, like its predecessors, (most famously, the many Disappearances Commissions), will have its moment of glory during a time when it is fashionable to remember July 1983 but will pass into oblivion thereafter.

So here we have the differences between South Africa and Sri Lanka exemplified. In one, we have an immoral system replaced by full-blooded efforts at justice and reconciliation. In the other, we have empty adherence to law replaced by an even emptier façade of 'commission reports' which are at their best, weak attempts at reparation and at their worst, sadly political exercises. One can take one's pick.

Shame on a political regime that allows these things to happen. Shame on an inteellectual and activist coimmunity that achiesces in these happenings when
But the tragedy is that these happenings continue to take place, that sane people acquiesce in these things and that.

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