The Fonseka Trial

Another unthinkable is about to happen. Next week Sarath Fonseka will become the first Army Commander to face a military tribunal. His judges would be three serving officers with career prospects, which can either be improved or marred by the Commander-in-Chief cum appointing authority. The trials will be held in camera, and, thus unencumbered by the restrictive presence of media personnel and members of the public.

The two trials will not only seal the fate of a man who dared to take on the full might of the Rajapakse Juggernaut; they also presage the sort of justice Sri Lankans can expect, if the Rajapakses get their two-thirds, and, via that, their constitution.

The fate of Sarath Fonseka, his transformation from Super Patriot to Arch Traitor, is a morality tale that is of immense relevance to all citizens of Sri Lanka. President Rajapakse had repeatedly stated that, post-war, the only division in Sri Lanka is the division between patriots and anti-patriots. And anti-patriots are the enemies of the nation, to be fought and defeated.

The enthroning of Sarath Fonseka as a patriot par excellence when he was a faithful acolyte of the Ruling Family and his subsequent condemnation as the ultimate anti-patriot demonstrate how patriots and anti-patriots are chosen in Rajapakse Sri Lanka.

What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise; to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believing that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if the people could understand it, it could not be released because of national security. And their sense of identification with Hitler, their trust in him, made it easier to widen this gap and reassured those who would otherwise have worried about it”. Milton Meyer (They Thought They Were Free)

Once, Gotabhaya Rajapakse took a group of media personnel sternly to task, for implying that Army Commander Fonseka was involved in the abduction of senior journalist Keith Noyahr: “You are attacking (Lieutenant General) Sarath Fonseka who has committed his life for the past 18 years to waging a war. He had a narrow escape (following a suicide bomb attack). When we have committed our entire lives, you are attacking us… Tell me one thing you have done for this country compared to Lt Gen. Fonseka” (The Sunday Times – 1.6.2008). That was when Gen. Fonseka was a faithful acolyte of the ruling Rajapakses and they needed his services – two factors which bestowed on Sarath Fonseka the badge of infallibility.

Today Gotabhaya Rajapakse accuses former Army Commander Fonseka of a multitude of crimes including the killing of Lasantha Wickrematunga and the disappearance of several media personnel: “Yes, of course. We know there was no other person…. Some of the media people harmed had never criticised any other person except him, or people close to him. Nothing happened to those who had been criticising me or the President….. He was definitely responsible for 5 or 6 cases of (disappearances) where media people were involved” (The Hindu – 11.2.2010). Sarath Fonseka is no longer faithful or useful; in fact he is a threat.

Suddenly no crime is beyond him, from theft and corruption to treason. And it is imperative that he meets with a fate that is an example to all those who would follow in his footsteps, especially leading SLFPers who are dissatisfied with their new servitude to the Rajapakses. Once Sarath Fonseka, hailed less than a year ago as the ‘best army commander in the world’ by the Rajapakses and their acolytes, is sentenced to a long imprisonment, the message will percolate to even the most obdurate potential rebel – This can happen to You!

The New Commonsense

Sarath Fonseka, the anti-Rajapakse civilian, is a victim of the new commonsense that Sarath Fonseka, the Army Commander, played no small role in bringing into existence. A country cannot be deemed infallible without bestowing upon its leaders, who make decisions on its behalf, the cloak of infallibility. The assumption of infallibility by the Lankan state vis-à-vis the LTTE (a post-2005 development) was regarded by most Sinhalese as unexceptionable, and even, timely. In the eyes of the Sinhala South, there was nothing wrong in the assumption of ‘Sri Lanka can do no wrong’, especially in the context of the war against the LTTE. They did not object when official lies became the truth and official crimes ceased being crimes. They learned to turn a blind eye, to censor themselves, to suspend critical thinking. Since the war against the Tigers was a just war, all its tactics and strategies could not but be just, was the thinking.

This new worldview provided the necessary ideological-moral underpinnings for the ‘Humanitarian Operation’, the war in which not a single non-Tiger was killed by the Lankan side, according to the Lankan side. This fantastic stance could be best expressed using Aristotelian syllogisms:

1) The humanitarian operation does not kill civilians.
X was killed in the humanitarian operation.
Therefore X is not a civilian.

2) The humanitarian operation kills only Tigers.
X was killed during the humanitarian operation.
Therefore X is a Tiger.

This ‘logic’ was used to conjure civilian casualties of the war out of existence – except when the LTTE was the guilty party. However, this vanishing trick could not be performed satisfactorily, so long as some degree of independent reportage of the war existed. Therefore a total ban on independent media coverage of the war was introduced. The next step was to equate any criticism of the ‘Humanitarian Offensive’ with treachery. This enabled the government to brand as traitors those who expressed concerns about the human rights of civilian Tamils. Gradually and insensibly, patriotism became equated not just with unquestioning support for the Lankan war effort, and but also with unquestioning support for the ruling Rajapakses. Equating any opposition to the Rajapakses with treachery was the next inevitable step of this politico-ideological transformation. Sri Lanka can do no wrong became transliterated into the Rajapakses can do no wrong, because everything they do is, by definition, for the protection of the nation from its enemies and the triumph of the nation over its enemies.

The monstrousness of this new commonsense was most evident in the phenomenon of welfare villages – that inexcusably unjust and immoral incarceration of more than 300,000 men, women and children, just because they were Tamils who lived in Tiger controlled areas. The glossing over/justification of this moral outrage by the Sinhala South helped entrench a climate of permissiveness and impunity. The fact the Sinhala South has not reacted with overwhelming anger to the incarceration of a man who, less than one year ago, was one of its primary heroes is a direct result of this new psychological climate which renders even rank injustice acceptable so long as it is depicted as a patriotic necessity. The stage was set for the Rajapakses to act with total impunity.

Persecution Mania

Last week, the dissolved Parliament met, at an enormous cost, to debate and pass the Emergency regulations, for one more month. Emergency means just that, an exceptional situation, a negative departure from the norm. The retention of the Emergency, its monthly renewal, would be comprehensible in the context of a war in the North or instability in the South. But the war has been over for almost a year and the South is stable and peaceful. In such a context, why should the Emergency be extended, month after month?

The war is over but the persecution mania is thriving. The Rajapakses subscribe to the Sinhala supremacist myth of a vast, Hydra like, everlasting, internationally orchestrated Conspiracy to subjugate Sri Lanka, the sole refuge of the Sinhalese and of pure, pristine Buddhism. According to this perception, neither the war nor the LTTE was an outcome of the ethnic problem. There is no ethnic problem. The war and the LTTE were progenies of this diabolical internationally driven Conspiracy. The defeat of the Tigers was but a temporary setback to this Conspiracy; it is now trying to spread its tentacles via more insidious albeit peaceful means. And its main object is to remove the ‘patriotic’ Rajapakses from power.

According to this worldview, the Eelam War is over, but our enemies remain legion and their menace undiminished. Therefore we must be vigilant, taking care not to be blinded by such snares as ‘human rights’ and ‘media freedom’. Therefore though the war is over the Emergency and the PTA must remain in place. As Prime Minister Wickremenayake said during the Emergency debate, the Emergency is needed because there are international forces and local elements ‘that wish to destabilise the government and arrest the country’s rapid economic drive’; and that the ‘intelligence units have information of the sinister moves against the country and the government’ (The Daily News – 10.3.2010). In a related move the government issued a Gazette notification some weeks ago, setting up 8 new detention centres, including in the Army and the Navy Headquarters. Opposition candidates are being grilled by the TID about their support for Gen. Fonseka. The tempo of repression will reach a crescendo, post-polls (especially if the Rajapakses get their two thirds). As the incessant search for enemies continues, any Lankan who commits lèse majesté can be deemed an anti-patriot, an agent of the diabolical International Conspiracy against Sri Lanka, and treated accordingly.

The patriotism of the Rajapakses’ is based on blind faith, which permits no doubts let alone criticisms. To doubt is a sign of a patriotic deficit while to criticise is nothing less than treachery. This patriotism demands the abandonment of independent thinking and critical perception, of logic and reason; it demands total obedience - unquestioning, mindless and conscienceless. And this patriotism absolves its adherents from normal moral compulsions, from restraints imposed by religion and custom. Patriotism everywhere anytime has both a Jekyll version and a Hyde version. If the negative potential of patriotism is denied, the Hyde side can gradually take over.

The dangers inherent in the continuation of the Emergency and the PTA are manifest. In a post-war context they can be used and are being used primarily and predominantly against democratic opposition, to punish or discourage actual or potential opponents of the regime.

The opposition’s unwillingness to take up in a systematic manner and persistently, two issues which are of paramount importance to both democracy and to its own survival, demonstrates the extent to which President Rajapakse’s concept of a patriotic vs. anti-patriotic divide has come to dominate Sri Lanka. The regime’s remarkable success in passing off anti-democratic, repressive measures as patriotic necessities (and the opposition’s incapacity to debunk these myths) bode ill for Sri Lanka’s future. The military trials of Sarath Fonseka and their foregone conclusions would be important mileposts in Sri Lanka’s journey away from democracy and individual freedom and our transformation from citizens into subjects.

- Asian Tribune -