SL-ELECTION 20010: Tamils must come out of the closet...!!!

Tamils must come out of the closet
The graveyard of boycott politics

Kumar David


The 2005 presidential election was the graveyard of Tamil boycott politics. As a consequence many people have impressed on the Tamil political parties the importance of active involvement of their people in the current election cycle; recently me too. The thrust of our argument was that their people have suffered a great deal and seen many terrible things in recent months; this has shattered their self-confidence. Voicing an essential Tamil agenda will help the community commence a process of renewal and a return from the shadows. It could focus attention on their special needs at this difficult time. These efforts have suffered a setback at the time of writing, just before nomination day; it seems that neither the TNA nor another strong Tamil alliance will nominate a presidential candidate.

This is one battle lost, but it’s not the end of the matter. It only raises the next question: What then, what are the Tamil people expected to do? My preferred option, of course, is vote for one of the Left candidates, Siritunga or Bahu; but even optimistically at most only a few tens of thousand of Tamils may do so. Then what about the great majority, the hundreds of thousands? There also remains the question of the second preference, that is, which principal candidate should those who vote for the left, not just Tamils, mark as second choice?

No, no and no again, to boycott

One must make a distinction between different bourgeois alternatives - even if one inhabits the far left - depending on time, place and circumstance. Obama was a particularly easy choice. Minority communities are similarly placed; they need to choose between bad options and a practical instance where badness is so finely balanced that boycott is appropriate, is mythical. In 2005 we witnessed the imbecile, mendacious and venal LTTE "boycott" of presidential elections. It was no boycott at all; rather a calculated decision to place Rajapaksa in power, but the Tamil people did not see through it then. I do not wish to be diverted into discussing reasons (LTTE war hubris I think had more to do with it than the bribe) but it was another of Prabaharan’s monstrous blunders for which and other blunders, he paid with his life. Well that’s his choice, but he also dragged the Tamil people into a quagmire. Any Tamil who now speaks of boycott needs to have his head examined; surely twice as demented as Prabakaran must have been then.

If those voting for a minor candidate do not mark a second choice, it is in effect, the same as boycotting the principal contest. Choosing a minor candidate as second choice also amounts to a boycott of the principal contest. If counting goes to a second stage only seconds marked in favour of Rajapaksa and Fonseka will be counted; the is rest waste paper. Marking the first vote for a Left candidate is a statement of principle, in my eyes a correct statement; it is not a waste since this statement needs to be made, counted and publicised. However, not using the second preference to differentiate between the two main candidates is cowardly, just ducking hard decisions. Imagine if for some reason Rajapaksa and Fonseka had been the only candidates, would it not be political cowardice, an admission of intellectual paralysis, to boycott? Sure both are undesirable, but evading a hard choice is the way of the weak.

I would not hesitate to admit that the choice is unsavoury, especially for Tamils, even more so than in usual bourgeois democratic elections at which the people are called upon to nominate a member of the ruling class to misrule them for the next five or six years. Neither Rajapaksa nor Fonseka will bring liberty, equality and fraternity and not socialism by any stretch of imagination. Is the choice therefore irrelevant? Will the outcome make no difference to society at large? No, it matters. Speaking generically, the occasions when the badness of bourgeois democratic candidates is so finely balanced that the choice is irrelevant, are extremely rare. I cannot recall one instance in our (Lanka’s) history where the principal options were so equally bad that (in the absence of a left candidate) I would have needed to abstain from voting.

The pot and the kettle

After ruling out both boycott and its equivalent, second preference abstention, Tamils and left voters cannot prevaricate; the choice between pot and kettle is inescapable. The TNA has decided to duck contesting but will it go into complete hibernation? It has no choice but to campaign actively or be reduced to a nonentity. Having conceded half the battle to Douglas and Siddharthan by not fielding a candidate it now remains to be seen whether it can evade complete hara kiri. A cruel choice now awaits the TNA; it can actively involve itself in political space or it can allow itself to be outflanked. Either it publicly campaigns for Fonseka, or it will be bold Douglas to the uncontested helm of Tamil leadership! Why not? If the TNA’s scrotal sac is empty, why not someone else stake a claim?

So all roads lead to Rome. For Left voter second choice, Tamil and Muslim voter first or second choice, and the generic Sinhalese voter from Hambantota to Trincomalee, it’s Hobson’s choice. Fonseka is the beneficiary only because a second term for the Rajapaksa Administration is out of the question. For four years we have protested against ubiquitous corruption courtesy of the UPFA, sustained intimidation, assassination, attacks on the press, a climate of fear, and rampant abuse of state power and government property. Are we to have second thoughts now! To be personal, I did not involve myself in the Anti-War Front (till it was scuttled by Rupesinghe), the Platform for Freedom and the Democratic and Left Front, to become rudderless and anchorless when a presidential election is announced! The decision of left, democratic and liberal minded Lankans was settled by the experiences of the last four years. We cannot admit a second term for the Rajapaksa Administration; there is nothing to reconsider or review again.

Out of the frying pan into the fire?

A final concern needs sober assessment. Bad as things are, will junking Rajapaksa for Fonseka be a worse option? The decision turns on three issues. Are Fonseka and the political entities supporting him racist? Will he militarise the administration and stamp democracy even deeper into the mud than it now already? Will we simply be changing from one cesspit of corruption, infested by this regime’s crooks, for another populated by new ones? Fonseka’s "majority-minority"remarks in Canada show a typical majoritarian, reprehensible mindset. He has been making some efforts to woo the minorities recently with a different stance, but he has never apologised or explained himself. Not good enough General! If one compares Fonseka’s Sunday Leader interview (13 Dec) and his denials at the 14 December press conference it is manifest one or the other is a shameless bunch of lies. Nevertheless, I am more comfortable with the forces behind Fonseka than Rajapaksa’s bandwagon. The UNF is a modernist liberal-capitalist consortium, while the other lot are remnants from the Dark Ages so far as the national question is concerned. The JVP is a worry but if a Fonseka-TNA equation materialises, the TNA with its much larger vote bank, can tip the power balance if the delicate viscosity of its scrotal sac does not inhibit its boldness.

Regime change will liberate political and democratic forces repressed for four long years. If the people grasp the opportunity that the eviction of Rajapaksa will offer, then "the price of freedom is eternal vigilance" exhortation realised. I do not expect Fonseka, if elected, to keep his or his spokesman Mangala’s promises of respecting democracy, rescinding the executive presidency within months and calling a constituent assembly, unless people’s power is manifest and assertive. Public mobilisation to ensure that Fonseka, if elected, cannot retreat on his promises is the only way to get things done; call me a cynic if you like but the General is as adept as the regime in contradiction and untruth. A regime change inflicting a political defeat on this undemocratic State creates such an opportunity; a second Rajapaksa term precludes it.

If a new constitution is written, the 13th Amendment becomes irrelevant. Why should the national question be confined to an amendment? Administrative decentralisation in general and the devolution of power to address minority concerns are aspects of the balance of power between centre, regions and minorities. These matters are central to, and must be located in, the heart of the constitution.

If there is a change of president, filth seeking faecal flies will swarm round the winning team. Will a new administration succumb as cravenly as the previous one did? Will it be musical chairs; a new set of carrion eaters in cabinet and crooks and hangers on as corporation chairmen? Well a new broom should sweep cleaner, at least for a start; but public vigilance and mobilisation and the alertness of civil society not trusting dignitaries is the deciding factor. Furthermore, everything has to be placed in the wider context of an economic programme. Fonseka is a blank slate, a hollow vessel in this respect! Lateral thinking is creative so I refer readers to a futuristic piece by Vasantha Raj in www.lankaeye.com entitled "Sarath Fonseka: A potential De Gaulle or Chavez?" It is speculative, but timely and interesting.


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