The Real Stories

As I sat down to as is custom to think about my next blog, I felt reluctant to touch on the security situation in Sri Lanka as perhaps would have been expected, because I felt that enough seems to be said about it without the need for me to elucidate further.

I reflected on a conversation that I had with an old friend of mine who had called from the States to find out ‘whether I was ok?’, since she had heard the situation in Sri Lanka was really bad.  For a moment I lost track of the conversation and assumed that she was talking about how bad Sri Lanka had played on the first day of the first cricket test against England before I realised she was talking about the recent spate of bomb attacks and security situation.

I think the sad fact is that increasingly one becomes desensitised to these unusual occurrences as they become part of every day life.  The mere fact that there are more police and army on the streets of Colombo, more checkpoints, more stop and searches has really not done much to dent people’s enthusiasm to shop or go out to eat, two of the favourite past times in Colombo. 

Whether it is the incredible resilience of people who have seen the highs and lows of this now 24 year old conflict or whether, it is apathy or weariness, one thing is for certain, people will not change their routine.

‘Why should I change?’ remarks Thushan, a manger who works in one of the most security conscious parts of Colombo, the fort, close to Colombo Port, the President’s Office, the World Trade Centre. ‘I can’t change my routine.  It means that those intent on disruption have won.  It takes me longer to get to work because of the security risk, but that’s the price we pay’

Of course those in the north and east would perhaps feel that they have gotten the raw end of the deal with increased security concerns preventing them from free movement.

There is no clear explanations to situations like this.  It is obvious that the losers in all of this are the civilians not only in places like Colombo and the North and East but also elsewhere in the country.

People often say that the south and the west of Sri Lanka are unconcerned with the conflict.  Perhaps not directly but indirectly, issues of poverty and lack of investment also mean that the south (mainly) suffers from malnutrition and extreme poverty.  Vital resources are either diverted for the defence budget or to support re-election campaigns.

In my travels around the country I have been amazed at how many times I have come across the direct contradiction to the assumption that Sri Lanka is a middle income country ‘except in the north and east’

It is this misnomer mainly given by donor governments and development agencies that has meant Sri Lanka for a long time to come will continue to receive skewed funding.

In the meantime, Murali, perhaps one of the greatest cricket players in the world, has taken his world record 709^th text wicket and Sri Lanka have comprehensively romped home to defeat England in Kandy (ironically the last stand of the Sinhalese King against the British colonial rulers).  For a brief period, all of Sri Lanka (without exception) in that quirky and unique Sri Lankan manner (when it comes to cricket) would have united to rejoice this achievement in some way.  Murali (and the cricket team) to some extent represent what Sri Lanka can be: united in all ethnicities and religions where you are judged and rewarded on your merit, your diplomacy and what you can deliver on the field, not who you are or what ethnicity you represent.