By Col R Hariharan
Sri Lanka is currently rocked by reports of ‘Grease Yakka” (Grease
devils)
suddenly appearing in rural areas and terrorising villagers.
Traditionally a
grease yakka is a prowler in the dark who attacks women; he is said to
wear
only a loin cloth and cover his body with oil to escape capture. Already
five lives have been lost in more
than 30 incidents of vigilantism against grease yakkas by paranoid
villagers. In two recent incidents a policeman was killed by irate
villagers and a traffic-cop beaten up and four others were injured. In
one
incident naval sailors and the public got into a fracas over grease
yakka
attack. What is interesting is most of these incidents have been
reported from eight
Tamil and Muslim minority inhabited districts.
Some years back there was a similar series of mysterious animal
attacks in outskirts
of New Delhi in areas where illegal low cost colonies had mushroomed. It
was identified
as mass hysteria triggered by feeling of insecurity due to fear
of child snatchers and other criminal element prowling in the area. The
administration tightened law enforcement in affected areas and the
hysteria died a natrual death.
The suspicion and violence triggered in these villagers probably have
similar
origins. It is probably symptomatic of the feeling of insecurity and
lack of
trust in the administration and law enforcement agencies among minority
population. They are not yet fully recovered from the traumatic effects
of war; many have lost their kith and kin, property and livelihood.
While they struggle
to cope with these problems, they have also to deal with criminal
elements
moving around with political patronage. Unfortunately, the government
has failed to create climate of trust and security in its actions during
two years of post war peacce; there is a big gap between what it says
and how it acts. This clouds their perceptions of security and trust in
the rulers.
Why is the government having the Emergency in force even after two
years of peace? Can a couple of defeated LTTE prisoners held in prison
overthrow
the militarily powreful government? Find no answers to
these questions, the continuing state of emergency and
its draconian enactment is a constant reminder to the minorities that
the normalcy the government talks of is yet to arrive. The larger than
life presence of battle
hardened troops in their immediate neighbourhoods only reinforces these
fears.
And how can the government conduct free and fair elections when many
of the
Emergency provisions confer special powers to the executive to directly
interfere with the campaign process? But the government had conducted
elections
in such a setting. The media continues to be wary of hostile reaction
(usually
from goons in white vans) to what they write or utter. And mediamen who
do not relent continue to pay the price. Can these acts create
confidence in the government among the population burnt by three decades
of
insurgency and terrorism?
Even on the larger issue of Tamil grievances President Rajapaksa’s
government appears to be moving from prevarication to doublespeak. Otherwise it is difficult to explain the
tortuous political journey of this issue in recent history. Even before the war
started in 2006, President Rajapaksa had repeatedly affirmed that he wanted
Tamils to join the national mainstream as equal partners. That was the avowed
goal of his ‘humanitarian war’ against the Liberation Tigers. He frequently
repeats these affirmations to India, talking about his contemplated actions (I
have already written about this, so I do not want to repeat it) so that the
Indian government, beleaguered by vociferous demand from Tamil Nadu, could buy
time.
However, of late the President’s two brothers – Basil and
Gotabaya who hold responsible positions in government – have repeatedly stressed
that the present constitution was adequate and nothing more was needed to be done
for Tamils. They say so even as the President announces his plans to form a
Parliamentary Select Committee to deal with the issue. And
his brother and Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapakse goes on the Indian TV and
says “The existing constitution is more than enough for us to live together. I
don’t think there is any issue on this more than that. I mean this was given as
a solution for the whole thing with the discussion of these people. I mean now
the LTTE is gone, I don’t think there is any requirement. I mean what can you
do more than this? This gives power at a lower lever. Even now we had the local
government elections…” If this is not doublespeak, what is it then?
Government representatives held ten rounds of talks with the Tamil National
Alliance, the largest Tamil party. According
to TNA, it got cheesed off with this exercise as the government came up with no proposal. In disgust TNA withdrew
itself from the talks as it considered an exercise in futility. Immediately, treasury benches accuse TNA of
LTTE mindset. Few weeks later 13 ministers and five other parliamentarians give
notice to parliament to enlarge the scope of the Parliamentary Select Committee
and dilute its exclusive focus on Tamil grievances.
Do these actions indicate that the government is serious about attending to
Tamil grievances? Far from it; on the contrary, one has to
come to the
sad conclusion that the government’s focus had all along been to milk
maximum
political mileage by using the Tamil issue and harp on
international conspiracy to destabilise the country. Is the government
seeing a political grease yakka or creating one? We don't know.
But in the bargain, ethnic
divide has been given a fresh lease of life. And the Tamil minority, whittled
down in numbers now, will have to continue to cope with this anomalous situation.
The Channel 4 allegations of war crimes issue has now reached across the
Palk Strait; and the U.S. has told Sri Lanka that it wants the final report of
the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) discussed at the 19th
sessions of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva in March 2012. A more
vociferous chief minister in Tamil Nadu is vigorously espousing the Sri Lankan Tamil
grievances. All these issues provide ample scope for furthering political
opportunism in Sri Lanka. These issues, coupled with the constant focus on the
likely resurgence of Tamil terrorism (which the government had claimed was
wiped out forever) there is a real danger of political paranoia becoming
endemic, infecting the government. And it might be too late for Sri Lanka to
get out of the grease yakka syndrome.
Courtesy: South Asia Analysis Group
URL: http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cnotes7%5Cnote635.html
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