By Charles.S.Perera

Ethnicity is defined as an affiliation resulting from racial or cultural ties. In Sri Lanka the politicians and foreign global interfering humanists searching means to put peoples and communities asunder thus destabilising the countries of the global community to make them subordinate to another global community rich, white and powerful, gives ethnicity a different definition.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ They make ethnicity look like some thing separate an isolating characteristic that differentiates one people from another. But it should not be so, because all those characteristics that differentiate one people from another are only mind made. Because in reality we are all a part of the same cosmic family.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ All human beings no matter where they come from, no matter what colour of skin they have, no matter what language they speak, and no matter what gods they worship, they are all a member of the same global human family.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Therefore, the geographical boundaries of a country, may make the family smaller, but living together within that geographical boundaries, all the inhabitants are members of one human family. The religion is for the life hereafter, and the religious way of living is for that end. One wishes to attain , Nibbana, another to be one with the Paramathma, and others to enter the Gods Paradise.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ But we should make the religious belief the spring board to think differently to arrive at another philosophy, which is not for the here after, but for peaceful existence here and now with the same hope of peace and happiness, even if the dreams are different .

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ History is to trace the present life into the past. But it should not be utilised to bring the past in to the present to divide what we are now- members of a family, with different histories behind us. If we can arrive at finding that philosophy, there would not be problems of ethnicity. It is not idealist to turn to a philosophy that renders us members of a single family.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The problems of the Tamils in Sri Lanka do not come from the fact that they are Tamils, but from the fact that are seeking to be different from the rest of the inhabitants, Sinhala, Muslim or any other. Living as members of a larger family, strengthens the bonds of unity, and strengthen progress, development, and ways to find peace and happiness.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ But to seek a different homeland is to become smaller, and thus weaker, sacrificing development, progress, peace and happiness. When we loose this ability to think for ourselves, we depend on others to think for us . What would happen then is that , what we say as coming from us, is what we have been told, by those who were allowed to think for us.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ This is the case of a Tamil man in the Manik Farm who did not think for himself, but repeated what he had been told or heard from some one, who had taken the liberty to think for him.. This Tamil man preparing to leave the Manik Farm to be settled in his former village was asked by a BBC reporter, whether he who had gone through extreme difficulties think now that it is going to be any better.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The Tamil man replied, ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…- we have to start life again in a barren land no money no assets. He added, that it cannot be said that the problem is over. It cannot be said the issues, have been resolved . We cannot say that we are a free people until we have self rule, is there any solution in the Constitution ? ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ (..these were apparently what he said as appeared at the bottom of the images translated into English by the BBC reporter !)

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ A Tamil man who had gone through so much of suffering, used as a human shield by the terrorists, driven from place to place, without having the safety of a home, living in fear, and finally rescued by the Government Forces, if he really took the time to think on his own he would not have spoken of not being a free man until they (the Tamil people) have self rule, and spoke of solutions in the Constitution.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ This is how the Tamil politicians and the foreign interventionists give false hope to these Tamil people, ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-brain washingƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ them to prepare them to go through another spate of suffering awaiting an Eelam State. These poor Tamil people who had gone through enough of suffering would now like to forget all that and start a new life, having a roof over their heads, have something to eat , educate their children and live an ordinary life that they were used to live before terrorism came to their villages.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ They do not want a different Eealam State. They remember what happened with Prabhakaran who promised the Eealam State for them. Are they ready to once again go through the same suffering running after a dream ?

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ It is best that these people are left alone, allowing them to settle down forget their suffering and let them think for themselves, what they want to do with their lives.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The Politicians, NGOs, other foreign visitors are not doing a service to them. They force their thinking into the heads of these people and thereafter repeat them as thoughts coming out of them. They then feed these ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-second handƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ thoughts into the media reports, as coming from the people misused and maltreated by the Government.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The foreign reporters create a sordid picture of the conditions at the IDP Camps. A BBC reporter said that the Manik Farm became a de facto internment camp for defeated broken people. Barbed wire and Government Troops kept a quarter of a million of displaced peopleƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚¦ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚¦..

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The effort of these uncaring reporters , whose only interest is to make a report to discredit the government for the money that is coming to them. They do not make an objective report with out side comments, thus disallowing the reading public to think for themselves and come to their own conclusions.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ These reporters do not allow the reading public to evaluate the facts to understand the tremendous work the government did in handling a surge of nearly 300 000 people young, old, men and women escaping from the terrorists who had kept them as a human shield.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The Government Forces despite the fighting going on with the ruthless terrorists, received enormous numbers of people, accommodated them, fed them, protected them from the terrorists, while protecting themselves from any terrorists hiding among the running away people.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ No other country in the world had faced this situation and no body can understand the enormity, the greatness of the task that the Government and the Government Forces had to handle. It is easy for these reporters and the UN Officials to come when every thing had been done to the best of the possibilities available to the government and the Armed Forces.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Having come and seeing the conditions of the people in these camps, and without ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-thinking ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…- of the situation under which these people had been accommodated, make reports that do not justify the great task that had to be handled by a war weary Armed Forces, and a Government of a small developing country, which had to look after the Armed Forces, the IDPs, carry out different development projects, and administer a whole nation.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ It is possible to make a fair and justifiable evaluation, only if these reporters and Investigating UN Officisla take off time to think for themselves the situation ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-that would have existedƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ when the ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ…-corneredƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ terrorists were fighting for their lives , against the Government Forces who were defending themselves as well, using small arms against the terrorists avoiding the civilians pouring away from the ƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚terrorist holdƒÆ’‚¢ƒ¢-¡‚¬ƒ”š‚ ,into the safety of the armed forces.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ To arrive at a justifiable and realistic evaluation of the situation, one has to think bereft of what one heard, had been told, and without any prejudice. This unfortunately is not happening. The idea of a global family is far away from their thoughts. The reporters and other critics make reports and statements not to bring a defeated, broken people back into the family from which they had been separated, but to keep them away from the family to which they belong.