By Edward Theophilus Wanigasekera – The University of Gorka in Papua New Guinea
Since the beginning of SARC, it has been displayed tremendous achievements despite ill criticism from Western media and some arrogant critiques within the region. Economically, at time it was established SARC was not powerful organization, but it had a power of people representing nearly two billion of population, who make market for the region. Power is defined differently and 21st century it defines people’s power as a great power that can be changed many things in the world. The power of people may be able to defeat all other powers in the world as demonstrated in the past.
Many good proposals were presented to SARC summit held in Colombo this year and majority of them indicated what is needed to the region or genuine aspiration of people as there are many hopes of vast volume of population, who had been suffering from variety problems such economic hardships, ethnic differences, terrorism, cast dictions and many others for centuries by centuries.
Individually, SARC countries are less power in economic terms, no doubt about it, however, SARC countries are in a position to demonstrate not only their power but also their ability to achieve a rapid economic progress intensively competing with other industrialized nations, if they are ready to unit within a common policy framework.
Many people or countries made insulting remarks at the beginning of SARC, they are now interested becoming observers of SARC because it is quite visible that SARC region has achieved some positive apparatus despite their criticism and differences in ethnical, cultural and religious forms and one of the secret behind this positive achievement is that all SARC leaders represent in the organization not as an invader or hegemonic leader but as a cooperative partner for each other. This was the basis for the beginning to develop in spite of as Western bloc believed not end.
Leaders have been visibly able to demonstrate that as a partner of the region, each one can be left behind individual or collective differences and get together with achieving a common agenda that will be effective in fulfilling the aspiration of general public in the region. Many Western countries never expected this type of strong quality from the members of SARC organization as the past experiences have demonstrated that political leaders in the region gave priority for petty differences among them and on the basis of internal politics of SARC countries, industrialized countries wrongly assumed that SARC will be a castle that was built on sand. In the contrast to the assumptions of developed nations, what we could say is that unexpected things are happening in the world, which is not always going on the way that developed countries were expecting.
A friendly cooperation is not new thing to the world. Since human being emerged to this world, friendly cooperation had been existed and maintained between variety of ethnic groups or nations. However, a macro level cooperation has demonstrated in modern world through European Common Market. Despite the opposition from Britain, other European countries realized the benefits of European Common Market and they united together basically on an economic agenda. Labor Prime Minister Mr. Callahan in 1972 decided to join the European Common Market as the leader of British Labor Party, who had a vision that integration is momentous than isolation because traditional imperialist attitudes and policies could not be succeeded in modern world as the global integration has commenced through the innovation in science and technology, which generates more benefits through cooperation than traditional imperialist integration for political power motivated by exploitation of small or power less nations.
Looking at the initiatives of European Common Market, many cooperative agreements emerged between countries and within regions with dynamic objectives and elements such as political, defense, trade, culture and many others. During the cold war, Russia expected India to play a role of policeman in South Asian region and other countries in South Asia did not expect or approve such a role from India because other countries expected from India to respect their sovereignty. India had to raise hand to Russian side always as India had been depending on Russian military supports in spite of the growing unpopularity among other Asian countries in the region. The attitudes of foreign ministry officers in India highly aligned to Russian influences without a vision that Russian hegemonies in the world may be ended soon and when such gigantic event experienced, India has to come back to the region for cooperation.
The collapse of Russian dictatorship and misguided hegemonism with ending the cold war encouraged India to change the attitudes and make a different approach to the region as a cooperative partner rather than a policeman or a disciplinarian. The SARC is the result of changing the attitudes not only in India but also in all other countries in the region. SARC region is highly diverse regions in the sense of political, religious, social and cultural philosophies, which are always, contradict with each other. Many of these philosophies based on mischievous manipulations rather than scientific truths. In addition to these four main diversity factors, it has a strong diversity in peoples’ attitudes toward others such the modernity and family relationships, which always assumes that faith and actions of ancestors were true than modern experimental revelations.
No sooner the cold war ended, India was monumentally worried about the loss of Russian assistance. The family of Nehru had a greatest confidence on Russian assistance than market economic possibilities, however, when leaders emerged from outside the Nehru family whole Indian attitudes revolutionized and the Indian community prioritized dynamic factors such as business, innovations, competition, cooperation and many others, which could bring advantages to the Indian community.
When look at the major players of SARC, India has the most educated leader that India never had since its independence. Pakistan has the most acceptable leaders to Western world and Sri Lanka has the most pragmatic leader that Sri Lanka never had since its independence. Except Bangladesh, all other SARC countries have acceptable leaders to the people of their countries and these leaders have rare qualities that could be profitably employed in political administration and international cooperation.
During the Colombo Summit, all SARC leaders have identified and agreed with each other that terrorism is the most hated enemy of SARC region and all leaders agreed to eliminate terrorism through friendly cooperation to each other. The identification of common enemy is a significant and concrete achievement as the entire SARC region annually being lost US $ 500 billion worth of assists that could be used to improve the quality of life of poor people in the region. In addition to this, a monumental amount of sorrow and pain give to people in the region by terrorists’ megalomaniac actions. If SARC region get together and help each other to eliminate terrorism, they can double the GDP in each country within next decade. There are tremendous opportunities to exchange each others knowledge and skills and huge free market could be created within the region giving massive benefits to the people. The economic achievements in the region during the past two decades indicate that all countries have increased their foreign assets by US $ billions. India has increased its foreign assets for more than US $ 200 billion, which is double the Australia’s foreign reserves and the size of the economy of Sri Lanka is equal to New Zealand’s economy.
The region has average 5% growth rate, which could be interpreted that the economy of the region will possibly be doubled within 15 years and this strong signal indicates that more industrialized countries wish to engage in business with SARC region and as a result of the trade development, employment opportunities for SARC population will be increased thereby reducing the poverty in the region. International labor movement during past three decades monumentally assisted to reduce the poverty and to bring a large sum of foreign exchange from developed and Middle East to the region.
Recent paper of the World Bank indicates that the trade value of SARC region is less than 2% of the global trade value in spite of the 20% population of the world in SARC region. This is very regrettable condition as many people living SARC region are poor who have no capacity to engage in world trade with a view to improving economic conditions of their countries. SARC leaders as well as policy makers essentially need to understand that region needs radical changes in trade policies boost economy and change peoples’ attitudes. Modernization and transfer of technology between SARC countries will be motivated to grow the trade. Many cultural and religious views in SARC countries based on selfishness and self centric philosophical views that encourage hoarding everything including money, production, children as extended families etc. This cultural and religious background has become a strong barrier to trade developments and international cooperation. When look back Japanese history it is shown that before Meiji restoration Japanese culture and religious concepts considerably fortification the social and economic development, modernization and the sacrifice of Emperor Meiji led the way for rapid development through open policies despite the seclusion policy of Tokugawa period.
It is a remarkable experience that SARC region is gaining many advantages through its cooperative agreements, however, our analysis needs to focus on the weaknesses of SARC organization and vicious germ may be infected into the region through various proposal presented to the summits.
As we talked about SARC organization, it appears that SARC has a trend to follow European Community more than the required level and aspiration of people in the region. Although it has a right to follow good examples of European Community, it is not necessary to import every thing in EU to SARC region. The Colombo summit reflected a blind follow up to certain extent through the proposals submitted to it. There were two proposals to establish a SARC parliament and to introduce a common currency to the region. These two proposal attempt to import EU traditions and politics without comprehensively evaluating possible future impacts of two actions.
EU parliament is successfully operating because all member countries have common political philosophy that democracy is allowed to work on the life of all citizens in EU region. The democratic values have accepted all citizens of European Community but the attitudes of people in SARC region have adulterated with vicious elements, which are contrary to democratic values. The leaders in SARC region quite honestly should accept that democracy is not working well in most of SARC countries as the difficulty in uniting people with common ideology in administration, transparency in election system and political objectives of parties are quite different, which always animate to spread division among the community. One of the root causes of terrorism in SARC region is the divisive ideology that is based on political, religious and cultural ideologies, which contradicts with each other.
The establishment of SARC parliament will definitely be a divisive germ. The election of people representatives in SARC countries are mini civil wars that leads to destruction of collaterals and human lives. As a result of establishment of a SARC parliament, selecting of members to the parliament will be another war between countries and it would be a serious threat to the current unit of leaders. Current leaders have party and political alignments in their own countries and they cannot get away from such politics as it may be suicidal action for their political career. Therefore, SARC should not import country level petty politics, which based on inferior behavior of people to international level of organization through the proposed SARC parliament.
The introduction of a common currency to the region is also not a pragmatic proposal as it is not easy task like in Euro introduction. Before introduction Euro, there was a considerable opposition to the policy action within the community especially from Great Britain and Nordic countries. Some under developed countries such Portugal Spain, Greece also had considerable opposition as the economic power in the region varied and issue of common currency would have impacted on the economic status of sovereign nations and major countries in the community would have given concession to less developed countries. The introduction of common currency to SARC region means accepting entirely free trade and free labor movement within the region. For this purpose it is essential to accurately assess the economic value of each country in the region.
The SARC region has more than 50% of black economy, which is based on illicit activities such as smuggling, narcotic trade, illegal arm dealings and tax evasion. It is difficult to clearly estimate the value of this black economy but it is strongly involved with the formal economy of the region. In this situation formal value of the economy in individual countries smaller, however, when the black economy integrated into formal system, the real value of the economy may be much bigger. The integration of black economy is impossible task as it is entirely not only within the country but also internationally illegal activities such as narcotic trade and smuggling. In this situation, the determination of reserves and converting existing currency to a common currency will be a complex task. Currently there is sizable restrictions for currency movement within the region as well as internationally. However, the illegal system provides opportunities for currency movements within the region and internationally. Could countries agree to free movements of currencies within the region and internationally?
In this situation, SARC essentially requires to construct financial and trade infrastructure within the region to improve free trade and labor movements. This cannot be done overnight. The first priority for the region should be the achievement of economic progress as well as upgrading living condition of people through free trade and creating employment opportunities to people. Creating a common currency unit for the region requires to postponed for another several decades and the region should realize that SARC is a growing child, who is not matured enough to take responsibilities for complex issues such as common currency management.
When a common currency and a parliament introduced, the countries must ready to sacrifice the sovereignty they enjoyed to certain extent and handover the central bank authority to a committee comprised with representatives of countries. In such a management system, it is possible to dominate the interest of major countries such as India and Pakistan at the cost of small countries such as Bhutan and Sri Lanka. Would major countries be ready to sacrifice their sovereign interest for the benefits of small countries? This is a serious question that should be answered by all countries. Before introduction of a common currency to EU, all members had a referendum to get endorsement from general public and gaining such an endorsement from the general public from SARC region would be further complicated the issue.
Currently there are tremendous barriers in SARC countries for economic progress. There are many rules in financial and investment markets. Attraction of investments and movements of investment from one country to other are controlled by current regulations and markets are volatile without proper infrastructure to protect investors from possible risks. Many SARC countries are reluctant liberalize trade and financial regulations.
Most central banks in SARC countries are performing financial operation activities ignoring their role for supervisory and regulatory activities. For example, Central Bank of Sri Lanka perform operational activities such as management of employees’ provident fund and rural credit provisions, which are not the role of regulatory authority but the role of market players. There is a serious conflict of interest within the Central Bank of Sri Lanka as a market player and regulatory authority. Sometimes ago, the chairman of the Stock Exchange in Sri Lanka was a member of the Board of Directors of PERC (Public Enterprise Reform Commission), which lists stocks of privatizing enterprises of Sri Lanka’s government.
The prime obligation of SARC should be maintaining financial and economic stability in the region. There are many visible and invisible factors such as terrorism to create instability in financial and economic fields in the SARC region. Identify these factors and hit them hard to eliminate from the region and maintain the stability.
The illiteracy is a serious issue in SARC region and current religious and cultural barriers, attitudes against modernization activate in SARC region especially due to illiteracy of people. Except Sri Lanka, all other countries in SARC region has lower literacy rate and the policy direction to eliminate illiteracy from the region should be given priority and the establishment of a SARC university with campus in all SARC countries is a very fruitful proposal and it is needed to implement as soon as possible.
Edward Theophilus Wanigasekera, Sri Lankan born Australian citizen. He works as the Head of Technical Vocational Education, at the University of Goroka, in Papua New Guinea.
- Asian Tribune -
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