lines co-editor Ahilan Kadirgamar interviewed Sarath Fernando,
Co-Secretary of the Movement for National Land and Agricultural
Reform (MONLAR) in January 2004. ( http://www.geocities.com/monlarslk/
) Sarath Fernando and MONLAR have played a critical role since
1990 in creating awareness and mobilizing peoples’ movements against
economic injustices, particularly in the face of an onslaught
of neo-liberal reforms. Their work over the past decades has led
them to resist not only the neo-liberal policies of the Sri Lankan
government but also of the multilateral organizations such as
the World Bank and IMF. They were instrumental in forming the
Alliance for Protection of National Resources and Human Rights
(ANRHR), a broad coalition to resist the escalation of neo-liberal
economic policies that are part of “Regaining Sri Lanka,” the
economic development program introduced two years ago. The interview
is not only about Sarath Fernando’s analysis of the political
economy of Sri Lanka, but also delves into the history of the
various political formations in the South such as the ‘Old Left,’
UNP, SLFP and JVP, and their impact on class politics and economic
policy.
Part I
AK: You have an
interesting history and you come from an interesting generation
of the Left. Can you speak about your early politicization and
your role in the first JVP struggle?
Sarath: I come from a Left background. My father was a member of the LSSP
when it started in the 1930s and remained a member till he died.
When we left the ‘Old Left’ and joined the ‘New Left,’ he remained
with the ‘Old Left.’ When I was in the university in the late
sixties, many young people began to be critical of the former
Left movements. 1964 marks the time when the dominant Left parties
went into alliances with the SLFP. They formed these united coalitions.
This was seen by the more radical organizations, and the youth
in particular, as reformism, as compromising one’s ideological
positions. Therefore, there was an effort among young people to
form their own militant, or what were called, ‘revolutionary political
parties.’ Many of the New Left parties emerged out of Shanmugathasan’s
‘Maoist’ party. There were then many other initiatives by young
people. I was in university at the time, working with the Communist
Party, but many young people had left the party and become members
of the JVP. Therefore, our becoming part of the JVP was to create
a more radical revolutionary Left tendency. So, that is how I
became a member of the JVP. I was then doing civil engineering
at the university and completed my studies in 1969, yet I did
not sit for my exams, and instead started working fulltime with
the JVP.
What was attractive
about the JVP, compared to the more traditional approaches or
analyses of the traditional Left parties, was that the JVP tried
to make a more concrete analysis of the Sri Lankan context. For
instance, they had their five lessons. First was about the economic
crisis in Sri Lanka, which was an attempt to make a concrete analysis.
Now that was attractive. Also, the other attraction was the criticism
similar to that made by Shanmugathasan, that the Old Left had
become reformist, that it had become parliamentarian, and gone
for a compromise, which was true. The JVP took a position that
was a total rejection of all that was done by the Old Left. We
were then young people with a measure of immaturity. But today
I think with that kind of perception and that kind of history
of the Left movement, there is a very clear cleavage. The new
young Left had completely isolated itself from the historical
Left movement in the country. That has created a division, of
a complete lack of confidence and faith, which has been detrimental
to not only the Old Left but also to the New Left, because they
don’t have a history.
Now, as to the history
of the Left movement. What was done by the Marxist parties from
the 1930s, while one could be critical of them, one has also to
admit that they have created a base for socialism. They have created
a whole analysis and thinking about social justice. That is the
contribution that the Left movement made in Sri Lanka in terms
of democratizing society, building a workers’ movement, the trade
union movement, and its role in protecting the rights of the people.
But all that was rejected. Of course young people accepted this
rejection because of their inexperience, but also because of their
desire to do something new. Something completely different.
There was something else that the JVP
had, about which we now strongly disagree. They also tried to
make a whole issue out of Indian ‘expansionism.’ What the JVP
said at that time was very similar to the Chinese critique, that
India was trying to become a power in the region. Perhaps there
is some truth in it; India’s expansionism was not to bring about
socialism, but for their capitalist expansionism. But this analysis
was extended far beyond the limits to which it should have gone.
They even began to criticize the plantation workers for having
links with India. As a result, the JVP had an anti-Tamil or racist
trend. At that time, it was not that we all agreed with that ideology
– coming as we did from an LSSP background, I would not have agreed
with that – but even those who found the anti-Tamil stand problematic,
didn’t want to pick up a fight because we were attracted by the
overall direction of the JVP. However, there were many others
in the JVP who bought into that racist trend. That is why, even
today we very strongly disagree with the JVP on its analysis of
the ethnic issue. I would say, that the JVP has been very opportunistic.
This trend of opportunism has been there from the very beginning,
but today it is much stronger. Because right now, the JVP position
on the ethnic issue is totally, totally wrong. I think its not
only racism, but also opportunism, as the JVP has now become a
parliamentary type of political party, wanting to get into power
in collaboration with any other party to make that possible, and
so they think a pro-Sinhala stand against any kind of devolution
of power will give them more votes. This is a terrible mistake.
Furthermore, I don’t think most people will support them on that
kind of platform.
Now, why did we leave
the JVP? Until the experience of the insurrection, there wasn’t
much critical thinking within the JVP. We were young people in
larger numbers wanting to have a revolution. There was no time
or opportunity within the JVP for critical thinking. But, as soon
as the insurrection failed and there were thousands of people
inside prison, we started to think critically. Very soon, we began
to criticize many of the JVP’s positions, particularly on the
ethnic issue and on other Left movements. It was this rethinking
and reflecting on the past JVP experience that helped us to realize
the following.
Firstly, though the JVP succeeded in
mobilizing a number of young people in a struggle where many of
them died, they failed to make it into a broad class struggle.
The JVP has its base among the rural youth. That was a time when
the rural economy started moving into crisis. Prior to that, the
state supported the rural economy. Therefore, the class conflicts
within the rural sector were not really visible. And therefore
it was not possible to mobilize the real rural poor against the
elitist groups in the rural areas. If you look at how the political
system in the country works, and if you look at the political
history of Sri Lanka, you are confronted with the presence of
rural elites – this history precedes the British period. The feudals,
the lords, had a dominant position and the rest of the population
were under them. When the British came, they tried to break it
up by abolishing the Rajakariya system, but the first time they
attempted it in 1818, there was a rebellion, and the British government
abandoned such an attempt. Instead, what they did was absorb them
into their administration, and the Ratemahattayas and the rural
elite kept the people under control.
When the United National Party (UNP)
emerged, it emerged as the political party of the urban and rural
elite, who had supported British rule. They were subservient to
the British and in turn they were given a lot of privileges and
sustained their power and strength. Therefore the class formation
of the UNP: at the very top you have the urban elite, pro-imperialist
or pro-British elite, like the Senanayakes, James Pierises, and
so on. From the Tamil side there were the Ponnambalam Ramanathans
and the Arunachalams who were not against British rule. So, they
negotiated with the British government and inherited power. It
was at that point that the UNP was formed as a political party,
and hence it had that historical link, the pro-British or the
pro-Western elite at the top along with the rural elite in the
regions. And through that structure it was possible to get the
support of the masses. Now, this structure was never broken. If
you look at the Left movements, and particularly the early Left,
the LSSP and such were not able to break this structure. They
were critical of the caste system and there were certain struggles.
However, they were not strong enough and there was no rural class
struggle in Sri Lanka, which could separate the rural poor from
the elite. The dependence on the rural elite was always present.
When Bandaranaike walked out from the UNP and formed his party,
a major group of the rural elite moved over. If you look at the
structure of the SLFP, the structures are very similar. The UNP
had the urban elite, the rural elite and the rural masses. What
the SLFP developed was a similar, parallel structure. They also
had their urban elite, rural elite, and the masses under control.
In order for class
struggles to advance in Sri Lanka, it was important to break up
these structures. Now, the Old Left did not succeed in doing that.
The JVP also didn’t succeed in that struggle, but that was the
times. Until then the government had been able to keep the rural
masses pacified. They were given a lot of concessions, benefits
and subsidies as well as social welfare and so on. The landless
were given land. Compared to India, the structures are very different
– we don’t have a very powerful land-owning class in Sri Lanka.
We have a fairly equitable distribution of land. There is this
dependency though, a dependency structure made and maintained
by both political parties. When they came into power, they further
used their political patronage to strengthen this structure. Therefore
the structure continued and the Left failed to break it. Hence
the Left moved from the rural class struggle to urban struggle,
and their struggles were in the trade unions and so on. They were
able to develop certain strengths through mobilizations in the
urban and plantation sectors. Of course in the plantations, they
made a huge blunder on the ethnic issue. Later therefore, the
plantation workers came under the control of the Thondamans and
so on. The larger Left movement gave up plantation work, when
they gave up their position on the language issue. Anyway, the
JVP did not succeed by doing that either.
What the JVP succeeded
in doing was to get around or mobilize the young people who were
marginalized – young people not absorbed by the economy – the
unemployed youth. Now, unemployed youth can become very militant,
but they can’t break the class structure. Therefore the JVP’s
struggle is not a real class struggle. It’s very similar to the
northern situation. In the early stages of the militancy, both
in the South and the North it was the youth that fought – the
youth were not included in the economic structure, so you had
to rebel. If you are not involved in the economic structure, you
don’t have a class struggle – you have a rebellion, no? The JVP
never understood that.
This is why we thought
it absolutely necessary to go and mobilize the rural poor. That
is why we got interested in working with farmers’ organizations.
In the early stages we were very much involved with farmers’ struggles.
There were lots of farmers’ struggles: struggles around land in
Moneragala, struggles against water taxes. In 1985 the government
was ready to charge a water tax – what they called a “maintenance
and management fee.” The farmer organizations called it a “water
tax,” and resisted it! We resisted it for many years. And in fact,
the government did not succeed in implementing that tax. Then
there were the other policies, of inviting foreign companies for
export-oriented products like sugar. Again farmers resisted. So,
now there were others involved.
But it was the second
youth uprising in 1987 that made us realize that there was a much
bigger problem. It was not enough to be involved with a water
struggle here and a land struggle there; there was a larger problem
with the economy. Therefore, people had to be educated and made
aware of the totality of the problem. That is how MONLAR started
going into an overall analysis. Although our name is the “Movement
for National Land and Agricultural Reform,” from the beginning
we have been involved in much more than land and agriculture,
so as to address the total economic issue. This approach was very
meaningful and we were able to mobilize in a massive way, for
petitions and so on: 150,000 in 1994, and 300,000 later on. Now
we are working on a million-signature campaign. So, that is the
analysis that has brought us to understand that this whole struggle
has to be linked to the international movement against globalization.
AK:
You mentioned that the second uprising is what made you think
about the overall situation. What were the particular characteristics
of the second uprising that led you to analyse the overall situation?
Sarath: There was a first uprising in 1971 when 10,000 were killed and about
25,000 went to prison. Despite that experience, what were the
political results? There was nothing! The Left movement did not
understand this at all, they just said it was the CIA. They didn’t
analyse it. That was the experience of the first insurrection.
In 1971 there was this repression as a result of which the government
in power since 1970 lost very badly, and the UNP came to power
with a big majority. It was a very strong government and they
introduced open market policies. Of course there were struggles.
People resisted. People resisted when the cost of living went
up. They asked for higher wages. There was a big strike in 1980;
about 40,000 lost their employment. Many of the workers committed
suicide, and then there are other issues emerging such as land
policies, water taxes and so on. And next there was the northern
war.
In the late 1980s came
the second JVP uprising, which resulted in 60,000 deaths. The
first uprising led to 10,000, now there was 60,000 deaths in two
years. By the time we were in the midst of this crisis, we had
left the JVP. We were critical of the JVP. We were critical of
their ethnic policy, therefore when I was in the farmers’ movement
and the Devasarana Development Centre, we took up the position
that strongly supported devolution of power and justice to the
Tamil people. Because of that, the JVP looked upon us as enemies,
as ‘traitors.’ For two reasons: the fact that we had left the
JVP, we were looked upon as opponents; and as traitors, more strongly,
because we had taken a position that was not in agreement with
the JVP’s position on the ethnic issue. And that was the time
the JVP thought they could launch a revolution, by mobilizing
people on the ethnic issue. The moment of revolution they thought
was the coming in of the Indian Peace-Keeping Force. They thought
the people would rebel. And it didn’t work, people didn’t support
them. Hence the JVP started using other methods of terror. Killing
not only their opponents, but also anybody who disagreed with
them. And they started killing people, and we became victims of
such killings. We lost about 30 people who were activists with
us in the farmers’ movement, between 1987 to 1988 – people working
directly with us in the farmers’ movement were killed by the JVP.
In some places, the state killed some of our people. So, we were
victims of both.
Anyway, that experience
required a much bigger analysis of what was wrong. At that time,
Premadasa was President, and he appointed a National Youth Commission
to look into the causes of the youth rebellion. Now, we were invited
by the Youth Commission to make a submission. The other commission
was the Presidential Taskforce for Land Distribution and Utilization.
We wrote a document called “Towards Genuine Land and Agricultural
Reform,” because both insurrections had pushed governments to
think about land reform. The first insurrection pushed the government
towards land reform in 1972 and 1975. The second insurrection
resulted in these commissions, and we submitted our proposals
where we stated that land reform alone would not solve the problem.
Land reform in the 1970s did not solve this crisis. We called
this ‘crisis,’ the crisis in the rural economies: the breakdown
of rural agriculture, the breakdown of rural livelihood, the increasing
disparity and poverty in the rural economy. Those therefore were
the reasons, we said, for a need for radical change in approaching
the rural economy in Sri Lanka. We made an in-depth analysis.
We were critical of the ‘green revolution,’ and what resulted
from the ‘green revolution’: the fact that poverty was not reduced,
hunger was not reduced, and that in fact poverty had increased.
Then came the open market policies of 1977, which made things
worse. So, that was our criticism. We submitted to the commissions,
but we also told them, we don’t trust you, and you are not going
to implement this. Instead we told them that we are going to mobilize
people, we are going to educate people on this whole issue and
on the crisis.
This is how it happened. We said it
is now time to challenge the whole of society: the intelligentsia,
the educated people, the leaderships, the religious leaderships,
and the political leaderships. Because, for 18 years after the
first insurrection, nobody in the country has tried to address
this issue. And we had a second uprising leading to further violence.
Therefore, we said, it is now up to the people to look at it and
respond. That was the objective of MONLAR, to get people to respond.
That was why we had a large education campaign by 1994. We had
this petition, and we had conducted 500 to 600 workshops and seminars
throughout the country. And it was very attractive. People invited
us more and more to listen to this analysis and understand the
situation. And that is how MONLAR developed.
AK: The “Regaining
Sri Lanka” program, what is at stake? What is at stake in terms
of poverty reduction, social investment and our resources?
Sarath: The most fundamental critique of “Regaining Sri Lanka” is that it
is an attempt to further prolong and expedite the crisis. Supposedly
a strategy for reducing poverty, it is in reality a strategy for
strengthening the rich. “Regaining Sri Lanka” is another name
for the PRSP, the ‘poverty-reduction strategy program.’ Of course,
they don’t hide this fact, because in order to reduce poverty,
they say, you have to increase growth. The first PRSP, in fact,
is named that way: “Connecting to Growth: Sri Lanka’s Poverty
Reduction Strategy.” And the first paragraph of that document
says the government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) will try to achieve faster
economic growth as a means of reducing poverty. Therefore, the
basic assumption of the PRSP is wrong, and it has been proven
to be wrong, because the PRSP in Sri Lanka is being introduced
after 25 years of experience of trying to achieve faster growth,
which they had said would ‘trickle down’ and reduce poverty.
Our work shows that poverty has not
been reduced and it has not triggered growth. We used to have
about 3.5% growth earlier, and now we have about 5.5%. The year
before last we went into negative growth. Therefore we cannot
achieve this growth. The only sector that had some growth in industry
was the garment sector, but that was for special reasons, because
of this quota. Investors also came in to make use of this quota,
but that is the only reason. We don’t take up the argument that
economic growth didn’t work in Sri Lanka because of the war. It
requires a more in-depth analysis.
Why didn’t economic growth take place
in Sri Lanka? For instance, the kind of growth some countries
like South Korea, Taiwan, Malaysia or the Asian Tigers achieved,
was at a particular time in history, for particular reasons. If
you read Walden Bello, he says that was the time when the developed
countries in the West supported these countries for special reasons.
Firstly, they wanted to expand their labour-intensive production
into this region, for cheap labour. Secondly, if you look at these
countries that were supported, for example Taiwan, it was supported
because they wanted to counter China. South Korea was supported
to contain the threat from North Korea, and Japan was earlier
supported to contain Soviet expansion. So, there were special
concessions given, and the policies that were adopted in these
countries, again according to Walden Bello, were not mere ‘liberalization,’
they were state-assisted capitalism. The state played a large
role.
But what Sri Lanka
tried to do was different – we just ‘liberalized’ everything.
Therefore, from 1977 when Sri Lanka started ‘liberalizing,’ it
was at the wrong time in the wrong way, and we couldn’t succeed
in the same way. There was no growth in agriculture, there was
no foreign investment in agriculture, there was no other foreign
investment – there was nothing! If you look at the cost that we
have paid, we have paid a tremendous cost in terms of domestic
production, and in sum we say, the PRSP is the wrong strategy.
This strategy has been proven to be wrong. Therefore to continue
with the same strategy is foolish and not acceptable. Secondly,
the PRSP is not a strategy of poverty reduction, but a strategy
of further subsidizing or further supporting the rich and the
investors.
If you look at the
concrete proposals, there are three main areas. Firstly, what
do investors want? The real drafters of the PRSP are the World
Bank’s advisors. It was drafted over a period of four years, starting
in 1998, before the World Bank needed a Poverty Reduction Strategy.
So what was it being drafted for? It was a strategy written to
overcome the failure of the previous strategy. What were their
requirements? They said, we have to provide more infrastructure.
If the whole country is to become a country for investors or export,
infrastructure is lacking. Therefore major proposals in the PRSP
are for infrastructure development: highways, airports, harbours,
telecommunications, electricity in the regions. All that is to
provide the required infrastructure, hoping that more investors
would come in if the infrastructure is provided. So, what happens,
in order to provide the infrastructure? We borrow money. The 4.5
billion US dollars that we are borrowing is largely to fund this
infrastructure. Who pays? The investors who are going to use this
infrastructure are not required to pay for this infrastructure.
They come on tax holidays. Sri Lanka has already offered up to
20 years of tax holidays. One-hundred-percent tax holiday going
up to 20 years. One of the largest tax holiday schemes that any
country has offered. Therefore, investors – even if they come
– are not going to pay back what we have spent on this infrastructure.
So, it is the poor,
the ordinary people that will be burdened to pay back these loans.
Therefore, you have to compel, push the poor to pay what in turn
are given as subsidies to the rich. That is why we named our document,
“Compelling the Poor to Subsidize the Rich.” So it is NOT a strategy
for poverty reduction. It is a strategy for subsidizing and enriching
the rich, by compelling the poor to take up the burden. Now, why
do we say, the poor will have to pay this? Because when the World
Bank increases its loans, and we get more and more indebted, the
World Bank is not going to keep quiet – they are going to pressurize
the government to pay back. How? If you are not charging the rich,
you have to charge the poor. And therefore, other things like
social welfare, education, health – all this selling away of assets
is taking place. If you look at the PRSP proposals now, all assets
in the country are being sold. The latest is the selling of the
Galle Face grounds. They have sold it to private companies.
Next, they have decided
to go into an agreement with the United States. They adopted this
law called the Tropical Forest Conservation Act. When the US was
not willing to sign the Kyoto Protocol to reduce carbon dioxide,
the US was blamed. So, the US is going to develop a new strategy
of saying, if certain countries are willing to protect their tropical
forests, they are willing to reduce some of the debt. The GOSL
is going to do that. What are the consequences? It is not only
a case of protecting tropical forests, we would have to put these
forests under the charge of the US. The US will exploit this whole
thing for their bio-piracy! One of the most valuable resources
we have in Sri Lanka is our bio-diversity, including the medicinal
plants found in our tropical forests. If we are going to hand
over these resources to the US for their research, you are giving
away our valuable bio-diversity assets. That is a small part of
the bargain.
We are going to privatize
water. They say, there is a water crisis; there is going to be
a water shortage. All nonsense! The real reason is the big water
companies in the West, the French and British companies, are now
pushing for water privatization around the world, so their water
businesses could be expanded. It is for that reason the GOSL got
into the water privatization business. In fact, this is obviously
seen in the documents, in the chapter on water they say we have
to invite foreign companies. It’s illogical. We will need 50 billion
rupees as infrastructure investment up to 2010. They say the government
can’t put in the investment – can’t even put in half – so it needs
private investment. But if you look at the PRSP proposal, at what
they have borrowed or asked for water infrastructure, the total
amount is more than the required investment. The required total
investment is 50 billion rupees. If you add the water-related
projects in the PRSP, it comes to 77 billion rupees. Which is
more than the required investment. So, if the government of Sri
Lanka is already borrowing that money, why do we need investors?
Is it because ordinary people are going to pay back this money?
So, there is absolutely no reason why we should invite foreign
investors. Do they have better technology? No, Sri Lanka has much
better technology and a much better history of ecological water
management. Many of these people who are now calling themselves
‘experts’ on ecological water management have learned from countries
like Sri Lanka.
Another very clear
reason, they say, is that they want to provide safe drinking water
to 80 percent of the population. Again, there is absolutely no
reason why we should privatize water. Now, if the requirement
is that we need to provide safe drinking water, one of the first
priorities should be to reduce pollution in the country. Because
there is enough water, Sri Lanka is not a country that could have
a water crisis in the near future. In 2025 still we will have
enough water. In the water maps, Sri Lanka remains very blue.
So, our priority should be to reduce pollution, but there is nothing
in the water policy about this. We are going to invite commercial
agriculture. All this export-oriented baby corn and other crops
are going to be chemically intensive. There is a lot of potential
in Sri Lanka, and we have our own proposals and have implemented
some of these to promote agriculture without using chemical pesticides,
and to reduce inputs. But again there is nothing in the water
policy about this and hence its quite clear, the idea is not to
provide people with safe drinking water. As for irrigation, the
privatization of irrigation is in order to get people out of paddy
farming and out of their lands for a different purpose. Therefore,
what is happening is that they are going to give away a very valuable
resource – water! So that companies can make their private profits.
So, water is given
away, forests are given away. In relation to marine resources
or fisheries resources, the policy for fisheries resources in
the PRSP is to invite big foreign companies to do deep-sea fishing
and also export-fisheries in the coastal regions, like prawn farming
and lagoons. So, the entire fisheries resources, or marine and
inland resources, are to be given away for practically nothing.
We, in fact, are building some big harbours. Down south they are
building some deep harbours just for big fishing vessels to come
in. The PRSP also contains policies about mineral resources: they
are going to sell away all the mineral resources. They attempted
to sell the phosphate, and people resisted. There was a long struggle
against the selling of the Eppawela phosphate resources to a US
company. But now with the new laws in relation to mineral resources,
they are going to give away all of it. So, the PRSP or “Regaining
Sri Lanka,” firstly they are going to tax and burden the poor.
AK:
Can you talk about the new land policies and land alienation.
How will it impact labour?
Sarath: Now there are two new land policies. One is about land use and the
other is about land ownership. In continuing the same policies,
they ask the question, what can we offer to investors? We have
talked about infrastructure and other resources. Now, we don’t
have very attractive resources, such as oil or gold, but we have
land, marine resources and bio-diversity. These are the resources
to be given away. Therefore the World Bank (WB) and government
thinking – as stated back in the March 1996 policy recommendations
of the WB – entitled “The Non-Plantation Sectors’ Policy Alternatives,”
written by Robert Hunt and Douglas Lister – says, that as long
as these people remain on the rural land, they will be cultivating
paddy and other domestic food crops, and since these are of low
value, there is thus a necessity to shift from low-value to high-value
crops for growth. By high-value crops, what they mean is export
crops. So, they want to invite companies to take over land, developed
and irrigate land, for export production by foreign companies.
To do that, they have to get the people out of the land, and hence
this land policy.
There is an added value:
because as long as these people remain on the land, because they
are poor, they have no other employment; but they nevertheless
survive on the land. I am talking about small farmers. Even if
they are running at a loss, somehow there is a livelihood. But
once you push them out of their livelihood, out of their land,
they become cheap labour available for exploitation. In the PRSP,
they have said, they envisage a large migration of people from
the rural areas to the urban areas as destitute beggars. And they
will be used as cheap labour. Therefore, that would be a factor
that would help the government to have labour at a lower cost
than now. And that is a requirement for the economy, because we
have to compete with China and other countries if we are to retain
the investors. So, that is another concern.
Another aspect, which is seen as obstructing investors,
is that labour is protected in Sri Lanka. In fact, in1996 the
WB made a policy recommendation that was called, “Sri Lanka in
the Year 2000.” In it they say, that in Sri Lanka labour is “privileged.”
That is, labour is protected in Sri Lanka. We have from the 1930s
and 1940s onwards, trade unions that were very active, and we
have certain labour laws that are relatively in favour of the
workers. You can’t remove workers as you wish; there has to be
a legal procedure and there must be sufficient compensation. They
say we can’t have a labour market like that if we are to function
in the ‘liberalized’ markets of the world. Therefore, in the WB’s
words: Sri Lanka must create a pre-labour market; and the business
community in 1998 said: create a flexible labour market.
Recently, about a year
ago, they introduced the Termination of Employment Act, which
gives employers the possibility to remove labour by paying them
much less compensation. What are the requirements with the new
legislation? If a worker that has been working for many years
needs to be removed by the employer, then the employer has to
pay half a month’s salary for each year of work, if he has worked
for over five years. Then for the future period, a maximum of
fifteen months. All this is much less than the compensation that
they used to get, if they are terminated. This is again another
proposal. That is, they want to remove the labour that is protected
by law, and recruit new labour, which can be recruited much cheaper
from the rural areas.
Therefore, these are the three major
aspects of “Regaining Sri Lanka.” One, create infrastructure at
the people’s cost. Two, provide natural resources such as land,
marine, forest, minerals, etc. Three, privatize the remaining
services such as education. They say that in education beyond
tertiary education, a private-public partnership should be established
for higher education. Meaning that private companies will be invited
to sell education. Private-public partnership means that the assets
of the government schools and universities, libraries, etc., will
be given over to private companies for their profit-making. Similarly,
with health, private-public means they will essentially become
private hospitals. Now our position is that the essential services,
that is the basic rights such as health, water, education, food
security, should be provided by the government. But the government
wants to give all this to the private companies. Ultimately, how
is this going to reduce poverty?
AK:
Can you speak a little about the process by which they came out
with “Regaining Sri Lanka”? Was it consultative, transparent and
participatory?
Sarath: Totally unparticipatory and totally undemocratic! Now, why do I say
this? The strategy for poverty reduction had been worked out over
a period of four years. Now, they say this has been a consultative
process. If so, how is this possible? First, you have to let the
people know, so that people can make their comments. Nothing of
that sort happened. Nothing was revealed. The first occasion the
PRSP was made known was at the Sri Lanka Development Forum hosted
by the WB and GOSL in June 2002. This document was discussed with
the WB and there was an agreement. When that was agreed upon between
the WB and GOSL, this document was not made available to anyone.
Even after the WB and GOSL meeting, there was nothing that was
published about what happened at that meeting. Nobody knew! Then
the original PRSP was made available on the internet – that was
in August 2002. That was two months after the agreements were
reached and it was only on the internet in English, without any
printed copies. In fact, on several subsequent occasions, the
WB’s country director Mr. Peter Harrold openly complained that the PRSP has not been discussed in parliament.
The parliamentarians are not aware of the existence of the PRSP!
The only time this
was revealed was on the 5th of July 2002, when the
Prime Minister addressed the nation, but he did not say anything
about the PRSP. Instead he said: the country was in a crisis,
there was indebtedness, the country’s debt was so much that each
individual is indebted to the amount of 83,000 rupees! And therefore,
certain big changes have to be made in the economy. Then he said,
parliament would be convened continuously over the month of August
and they would approve 36 bills. People didn’t know what the bills
were, but the PM said they were going to approve the 36 bills
in one month. Can you think of any country where 36 bills have
been approved in parliament in one month? What does it mean, nobody
will know anything about it. On the 5th of July he
said this: the bills were not even drafted. Prof. G. L. Pieris
said on the 18th of July that, some 18 Bills were drafted,
the rest had not been drafted. In August they started passing
these bills.
They have now legalized
many of these bills. Only a few remain, like on water and land.
But most others have been passed; the latest one was labour, the
termination of employment. None of these draft legislations are
made public. They are only available to the public after cabinet
approval has been given. Then it is gazetted, or when Cabinet
has approved it and if people want to take legal action, we have
six days. Members of Parliament are given the draft bill just
a few hours before it is brought up in parliament. No consultation
at all. We raised these issues with WB, IMF and GOSL. We said
this is not consultative; and they said, no, we have consulted
civil-society organizations. We asked for the list of organizations
with whom they had consulted.
In Washington in April last year, when
we were lobbying with the executive director of the World Bank,
I raised that question again. Where are the organizations that
you consulted? Then they provided the list, there were some 150
names. Of these, 40 were NGOs, and all the rest were government
officials, WB, IMF, private sector, the kind of names which were
already supportive of the PRSP. Out of the 40 NGOs – we went through
it right there – we said there were more than 25 NGOs disagreeing.
We told them, these people don’t agree! Then Peter Harrold, the
country director, said, having consulted doesn’t mean they agreed.
Meaning, even the few people they have consulted have not agreed.
Then, this was taken up in the Washington Conference of April
2003. And then at the Tokyo Donor Conference of June 2003, where
it was approved with 4.5 billion US dollars, on the condition
that it be given in instalments of 3 months. But within the 3
months, the GOSL has to prove that they have carried out the agreed
conditions of legalizing it. So, every 3 months the WB or IMF
will send their missions to check if the GOSL has met the conditions.
Therefore, there is tremendous pressure on the GOSL to push through
this legalizing agenda.
The moment you allow
some consultation, there is resistance. Therefore, this is a totally
undemocratic process. We raised the issue of language. If this
is a poverty-reduction strategy, the most affected are going to
be the poor. And the poor must know what is going to happen –
that they are going to borrow 4.5 billion US dollars. For what?
They can’t read the internet in English! It was not available.
We raised this, and only about a month after the Tokyo meeting,
they published it in Sinhala and Tamil. But those copies are 700
rupees each. The decisions have already all been taken. So where
is the consultation?
(To be continued in
the May 2004 issue of lines…)
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