Focus on Rights

Coping with a cacophony of opposites
In retrospect, it is ironic that in the eighties, despite the barbarities committed by government forces during that time in Sri Lanka, one could still own to a measure of optimism regarding the future of this country. The differences then, as compared to now, are not that difficult to pinpoint. We had a strongly activist civil society, a vibrant media and most importantly, faith in at least one institution, the judiciary. Thus, despite the killings and the widespread climate of fear that prevailed, we could shoulder the burdens cast upon us with a commendable degree of strength.

That strength has however, progressively diminished through the years with the insidious infiltration of despair into almost every aspect of our functioning under non-emergency rule. We demonstrate such a cacophony of opposites in our daily functioning that one is hard pressed to isolate a single instance that is different from the dissonant whole.

Thus, we have peculiar happenings that are now accepted as the norm. In one instance, for example, such is the profound mistrust of the police, that a mother, whose son dies in police custody, buries him in the home garden (see the case of Garlin Kankanamge Sanjeewa which was cited in an urgent appeal by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) (UA-41-2003).

This was also reported by the Associated Press recently under the heading "Fearing police may steal the body [of] her alleged torture victim son, mother buries body in garden," 1 September 2003). Sanjeewa had allegedly been tortured by officers attached to the Kadawata Police Station who, in turn, claimed that he had committed suicide inside the police station. His mother buried him in her garden plot because she feared that the police might interfere with his body if he had been buried elsewhere, thus preventing the holding of an impartial post mortem.

Then again, perhaps, this is a proceeding that many mothers in Sri Lanka might have to resort to as a matter of absolute necessity, if recent news reports regarding the utter neglect of mortuaries in our key hospitals are anything to go bye. One example in this regard is the Anuradhapura Hospital, which reportedly has no functioning freezer units, leading to repugnant practices such as placing two bodies in one drawer and keeping unidentified bodies, (as well as bodies awaiting court orders for post mortems), in polythene bags outside the morgue. Meanwhile, the bodies that are left outside become, not surprisingly, decomposed and infested with maggots with flies swarming over them, thus posing a threat to patients at the hospital. All post mortems have been suspended at the hospital.

These are twin examples of something desperately wrong in our society and in our basic rule of law structures, despite the Commissions and Committees that we have in existence. These questions only reflect our dysfunction at the highest levels. While a leap from morgues to other more sophisticated entities and happenings does not require that amount of mental agility given the equal degree of putrefaction that prevails, civil rights activists in other countries marvel as to how easily corruptible our institutional structures have become.

The insidious co-opting of civil society as well as vast segments of the media, into the political structures of the two major political parties in this country and the equally insidious linking of the executive with the judiciary, overtly as well as covertly in recent years, are all faces of this same coin.

Thus, one cannot be surprised at the most recent manifestations of this phenomenon, such as secret swearing in ceremonies of the executive President of this country or the utter contempt now demonstrated for the courts as evidenced by killings in the precincts of courthouses being elevated to a new level, as it were, by the gunning down of an 'underworld kingpin' while court proceedings were in session last week. By that same token, one cannot be surprised at the largely passive and/or politicised reactions that have come about as a response to these incidents.

This same dysfunction rules in the upsurge of religio-nationalist sentiment in recent months. That the groundwork for this upsurge had been carefully - and callously - prepared long before by particular individuals at the highest levels of authority in Sri Lanka, is now increasingly knowledge within the public domain. What we should do with this knowledge, is as yet, an unanswered question. Yet again, we appear to be wholly incapable of defying our personal and collective insecurities and egocentricities in dealing with these issues.

Then again, we are poised to hold, at the very minimum, Provincial Council elections this year where some one hundred and thirty new members, (including those of the North-East Provincial Council), are expected to enter the Councils due to representation mandated for an increased population in the provinces. The Parliamentary Select Committee on Electoral Reforms avowedly plans on amending the Provincial Councils Elections Law to prevent this unnecessary increase in the numbers of provincial representation with the consequent burden on the public coffers.

While there appears to be some measure of consensus on this between the major political parties, the other matter on which there is also some agreement is that elections should be held on the same day. The interim report of the Select Committee, due to be released end this month, may or may not identify new issues on which political consensus has been reached on what manner of electoral system suits this country.

However, what we really need are not changes in the systems so much as the taking of basic steps to safeguard the rights of voters in this country, whichever system is in force. Primarily, this would include the immediate appointment of the Elections Commission, amendment of the 17th Amendment in order that the Commission is given greater enforcement powers in its conducting of the franchise and amendment of election laws in order to prevent election malpractice more effectively. Without these changes, the holding of elections in whatever manner this year will only be a repeat of the miseries that we had to undergo in the past.

While the blame for many recent institutional failures could be directed fairly and squarely at the Peoples Alliance Presidency, the United National Front government has, in turn, been singularly inept in its handling of rule of law imperatives during its two years in office. Its blindingly blinkered approach in focusing on the North-East to the exclusion of everything else, has been predictably counter productive as has its toleration of corruption and worse within its ranks. We are now facing the consequences of this shortsightedness in no small measure.

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