WGO’s should be clipped
Posted on July 11th, 2014
Nalin de Silva
It is difficult to convince the Western educated people in general that knowledge is relative and not absolute, and further that knowledge is relative to the five senses, mind and the culture. Even if one succeeds in doing so, it is almost impossible to convince them that knowledge arises due to our “avidya”, sometimes translated as ignorance.
The West has given us knowledge in various fields, and very often we are supposed to treat that as absolute. The knowledge that is prevailing in the world today, which is the hegemonic knowledge, is mainly what the West has created during the last five hundred years or so, and in the process they have absorbed knowledge of the Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Mediterranean people, the other Asians and various others.
However, this knowledge has been absorbed into the new Judaic Christian culture based on Greek Judaic Christian Chinthanaya, in opposition to the Catholic culture and the Catholic Chinthanaya of what is known to the present West as medieval Europe. The last five hundred years saw the emergence of the individual as against the community, and importance was given to the five senses. Only the sensory (five senses) perceptible knowledge was believed to be true though non sensory perceptible stories (pattapal boru – blatant lies) were used to explain sensory perceptible knowledge and more importantly emphasis was given to the pursuit of the five senses. In more than one sense the western Judaic Christian culture is a culture dominated by the five senses.
Individual freedom
Though the individual has been given prominence over the society or the community strong states have evolved during the last five hundred years and the Western states have the machinery to control the lives of the individual ironically under the pretext of individual freedom. It is this camouflage we are taught as democracy. The non European states are forced to follow an ideal democracy that is not found anywhere in the world, especially in the West. The freedom of expression of the individual is there in theory but not practiced in the West. The freedom of choice is there for the individual without the freedom to produce those from which the choice is made.
This is true in general, and the West only pretends to practice what they preach. For example there is no scientific method as such but we are told and we believe that the so called scientific method distinguishes Western science from other systems of knowledge that have existed to date among various cultures.
 Anti war demonstration in Hide Park London |
Western governments
The scientists talk of only sensory perceptible knowledge as valid but use knowledge that is non sensory perceptible to “explain” sensory perceptible knowledge. They talk of statements arrived by deduction, ignoring that deduction is finally nothing but induction. The Western culture is the most hypocritical culture that has been created by human beings. The West with the knowledge they have created was able to colonize the world in a way that had not been seen before the fifteenth century, and the schools, the universities, media have been used to propagate the Western knowledge throughout the world.
Asian countries were given a very limited political freedom in the forties and the African countries were able to taste the “new freedom” in the sixties. However, no economic freedom was given, and knowledge wise the world has had no freedom at all. The so called Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) were created in the sixties by the West in the African countries first as an experiment to evolve a worldwide network similar to the missionary network of the Western Christian world.
The NGOs were financed either directly or indirectly by the Western governments and their main function was the spreading of the Gospel truth according to the Western ideologists. It is wrong to call these organisations NGOs and the misnomer is not different from calling the mega powered states of the West as democratic states.
The so called NGOs are nothing but Western Governmental Organisations (WGOs) operating mainly in the non Western countries. The nomenclature NGO is in accordance with the hypocrite Western culture, which has been summarized above. The main function of the WGOs is to propagate the Western ideology including that of objective knowledge. In order to achieve their objective they attempt to reach the people by some welfare activities. The WGOs are present day missions with the vision and mission of maintaining the hegemony of Western ideologies and establishing Western friendly governments. The Western culture pretends as if the mission and the vision could be separated but when one goes through missions and visions as formulated by various institutions it is clear that the visions and missions could not be separated. It is no better than stating that the state can be separated from religion.
Sinhala Buddhist culture
Culturally all the Western countries are Christian countries of various denominations, though they would proclaim hypocritically that they are secular. Most of the present day cultures are associated with religion, and one cannot get away from the observation that the Western countries are associated with some Christian denomination. However, the WGOs true to the Western hypocrisy, together with the other pundits who have been trained by Western education would want the non Western states to be secular.
The vision and mission of the WGOs is to make sure that Western friendly governments are established in the non Western countries. In this regard the West has evolved certain concepts such as right to protect the human rights undermining the sovereignty of the people.
Whether the concept of sovereignty was there in the earlier times or not people have valued the prospect of having their own state obviously with leaders who have been called kings very often at least from a certain date in history.
Freedom of speech
We could say that it is a right of a group of people who have evolved their own states to protect the state whether one uses the term sovereignty or not. The Sinhala people had evolved not only a state but have enjoyed the status of a nation long before the West evolved its concepts of nation and nation state. This state and nation the Sinhalas have evolved is associated with Theravada Buddhism and the Sinhalas want to protect the Sinhala Buddhist culture that has been in existence at least from the days of Gemunu Raja.
The problem of building the nation does not arise in Sri Lanka as the Sinhala people have already built a nation. It is only a question of Tamils and Muslims joining the nation, while retaining their respective cultures.
The Tamil leaders prefer to run to Tamil Nadu whenever there is a so called problem thus giving the impression that the Tamils are not only against the Sinhala people, the nation and the culture, but have not cut the umbilical cord between the Tamils in Sri Lanka and the homeland in Tamil Nadu. The Muslims when confronted with so called problems would come out with the help that Sri Lanka receives from Muslim countries. The Muslims in general are first Muslims and then may be Sri Lankans.
The Sinhala people have no such connections whether they came from Bengal, Orissa, Maharashtra or any other place (they have not but are descendents of Yagu Kauranas (Yaksha) and others and mixed with Bengalis and others), and though the Buddhists may pay their respects to Dambadiva as the place of birth of Bududahama they have no other relationship with the present day India.
It is the Sinhala nation and Sinhala Buddhist culture under threat, and when the Chief Minister of the Northern Province complains to the Deputy President of South Africa it is clear that the sovereignty of the country is under attack.
The WGOs work against the state and the country, and in order to carry out their work for the Western countries that pay them, they hide behind Western concepts such as freedom of speech, not practiced in the West itself. The so called freedom of speech of an individual or an organisation is subordinate to the freedom of the state to maintain the sovereignty of the people, and this is practiced in the West though they pay homage to the “freedom of speech” of the individual.The freedom of speech in England is restricted to some speeches made on soap boxes in Hyde Park in London. Can those in England who write to Sri Lankan newspapers get their articles published that easily in national newspapers in England?
July 11th, 2014 at 5:14 pm
But govt. has NO BACKBONE to stop WGOs.
USAID is the biggest culprit.
USAID only gives money to Arabs and Tamil Nadu people in SL.
Now USAID gives money to REGIME CHANGE AGENTS.
KICK them out or eliminate their LOCAL AGENTS.
July 11th, 2014 at 6:21 pm
yes Sinhalese are Sinhalese with no connections existing now to anybody out side sinhale.
very few people are aware of these things and very few are interested . but we have to go on writing preaching etc etc.. u do the rite thing. thanks
July 12th, 2014 at 9:56 am
North Americans know that they are dumb. Deep South of the USA which is the bible belt do not teach evolutionary theory which is perceptible to the dualistic knowledge and they they teach that the god created every thing. but, a few states away, they landed in the moon.
That is the truth.
Then understand their brain washing by the govt, saying that all over the world they are doing the best for people.
Even the Pope knows that because of cheap oil the western govts destroy christians and catholics in the middle east. the most recent case is catholics in Syria. they lived peacefully under Assad. But, they will not have the same peace under a new govt where the extremist muslims would be ruling.
with respect to Sri Lanka, the worst thing is Kalu Suddhas.
How about, Sri Lanka’s new foreign relations with Seychelles Island and now, they say, politicians transfer money into Swiss accounts via Seychelles branch of the Bank of Ceylon.
July 12th, 2014 at 4:14 pm
Talking about hypocrisy why SL is spending so much foreign money (earned by poor blue collar rural folks like housemaids most of them relatives of war heroes who gave their lives) on consuming Western knowledge (technology). After the war SL should have adopted policies of Sirima government. Instead they have gone even beyond JR policies. Is not most of the dollars earned by blue collar workers are spent on western technologies consumed by the middle class including professionals like Dr. Silva? Here lies the main hypocrisy. Without hair splitting arguments people like Dr. Silva should take a lead in encouraging higher education beneficiaries to contribute something to the economy and build a knowledge based economy which has not happened despite its existence for more than half a century. In the modern world technology capabilities ( whether absolute or not) is essential to safeguard a country and a culture which is solely lacking in our subsistence economy shouldered by blue collar workers and consumed by the non contributing educated.
July 14th, 2014 at 5:20 am
වික්රම බහු – බහු !!!
සෙනසුරාදා (12 වැනිදා) “දිවයිනේ” පළ වූ පුවත් දෙකක් කෙරෙහි අවධානය යොමු කරමු. ඉන් පළමුවැන්නෙන් කියෑවුණේ මේ රටේ රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන හතරක් රටට එරෙහිව තානාපති කාර්යාලවලට කේලාම් සපයන බවය. දෙවැනි ප්රවෘත්තියෙන් කියෑවුණේ “රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධානවලට එරෙහිව ආණ්ඩුව තහංචි දැමුවහොත් එයට එරෙහිව නැගී සිටින්නෙමැයි” ආචාර්ය වික්රමබාහු කරුණාරත්න (නව සම සමාජ පක්ෂය) කියන බවය. වික්රමබාහු කියන පරිදි රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන පළමු ලෝක යුද්ධයටත් පෙර පැවතුණේය. ඒ සඳහා ඔහුගේ උදාහරණ වන්නේ සූරියමල් ව්යාපාරය සහ අමද්යප සංගමය ය. වික්රමබාහුට අමතකව තිබෙන ප්රධානතම කාරණය වන්නේ පෙර කී සංවිධාන දෙකම රටට සහ එහි ස්වාධීනත්වයට මහත් සේ ආදරය කළ, ඒ වෙනුවෙන් කැපවුණු සංවිධාන බවය. ඒ අතර ශ්රී ලංකාවේ ප්රමුඛ රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන තුනක “හිමිකරුවන්” වන ඡේ. සී. වැලිඅමුණ, පාක්යසෝති සරවනමුත්තු, නිමල්කා ප්රනාන්දු යනාදීන් හැකිනම් අත්අඩංගුවට ගන්නැයි ආචාර්ය වික්රමබාහු අභියෝග කරයි. මේ තිදෙනා අත්අඩංගුවට ගන්නේ කවර පිස්සුවකටද? හිටපු ගමන් පොලිසිය කරනවාක් මෙන් කුඩු පැකට්ටුව බැගින් ඔවුන්ගේ බෑගවලට දමා ඔවුන් අල්ලන ලෙස වික්රමබාහු කියනවාද? කාල් (1/4) මාක්ස්වාදියකු වන වික්රමබාහු යනු මේ රටේ ජනාධිපති වීමට සිතා සිට කොළඹ නගර සභාවේ නාගරික මන්ත්රීකමින් සිය දේශපාලන ජීවිතය අවසන් කළ උගත් බුද්ධිමත් ලස්සන මහතෙකි. අද වන විට වික්රමබාහු බ්රෑන්ඩ් එක කොතරම් පරිහානියට පත්ව ඇද්ද යත් කිසිදු ලෙසකින් කාටවත් අලෙවි කළ නොහැකිය. ඒ නිසා ඔහු ගැන මෙතැන් සිට කතා කරනු නොලැබේ. මෙතැන් සිට අපේ කතාව රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන ගැනය.
රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන පිළිබඳ රජයේ මධ්යස්ථානය නමැති ආයතනයෙහි ලියාපදිංචි වූ දේශීය සහ විදේශීය එන්.ජී.ඕ. 1426 ක් ලංකාවේ ඇත. රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධානයක් ශ්රී ලංකාව තුළ ලියාපදිංචි කිරීම ඉතා පහසු කාලයක් තිබිණ. (අදටත් එය එසේම යෑයි අපි විශ්වාස කරමු) සිල්ලර කඩයක් හෝ චීන හෝටලයක් අරින ආකාරයෙන් මෙය කළ හැකි විය. සිල්ලර කඩයක් හා චීන හෝටලයක් අරින විට ස්ථිර ලිපිනයක් සහ අතේ රුපියල් 500 ක් තිබේ නම් පළාත් සභාවෙහි ලියාපදිංචි කළ හැකිය. චීන හෝටලයකට නම් විශාල මකරකු (මකරුන් ගැන අපට අත්දැකීම් නැති නිසා කටින් ගින්දර පිට කරන විශාල කටුස්සකු ඇඳීම ප්රමාණවත්ය) ඇඳි බට පැලැල්ලක් තිබීම ආණ්ඩුවේ නීතිවලට යටත් නැති අමතර සුදුසුකමකි. සිල්ලර කඩයකට නම් මුදලාලි කොහොම වෙතත් හාමිනේ ඉඳීම ප්රමාණවත්ය. එන්.ජී.ඕ. එකකුත් පළාත් සභාවේ ලියාපදිංචි කර වැඩ පටන් ගත හැකි යුගයක් විය. අද එය තව ටිකක් දුරදිග ගොස් රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන මධ්යස්ථානයෙන් ලබා ගන්නා පෝරමයක් පුරවා අනුමැතිය ලබාගත යුතු තත්ත්වයක් හටගෙන ඇත. එන්. ජී. ඕ. වලින් වැඩි හරිය පටන්ගත් දවසේ සිටම කරන්නේ සල්ලි ගැරීමය. පිටරටින් සල්ලි ගැරීමට නම් මෙරට තිබෙන වෙළෙඳ භාණ්ඩ කිහිපයක් පිට රටවලට ඉදිරිපත් කරනු ලැබේ. මානව හිමිකම්, ප්රචණ්ඩ ක්රියා, ජනවාර්ගික ප්රශ්නය ලෙස හඳුන්වන ලද ත්රස්තවාදී ප්රශ්නය, ආහාර හිඟය, ජල හිඟය, නිවාස හිඟය යනාදිය පමණක් නොව පොල් අතු වහළ සෙවිල්ලීම සඳහා දැනට පවත්නා පොල්අතු හිඟය පවා ජාතික ප්රශ්න ලෙස ඉදිරිපත් කර මුදල් ගැරූ අවස්ථා විය. කොටි සංවිධානය සන්නද්ධ කිරීමේදී විදේශික රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන විශාල මෙහෙවරක් කළ බව මතක තබාගත යුතුය. මේ නිසා රාජ්ය නොවන සංවිධාන වංචනික ක්රියා කරන්නේ නම් ඒවාට විරුද්ධව තහංචි පැනවීම ඉතා සාධාරණ වන අතර, කැබලි බවට පත් වූ රටක් හෝ විදේශීය මැදිහත්වීම් නැති ස්වාධීන රටක් පවතිනු දැකීමට කැමති පුරවැසියන් එම තහංචිවලට පක්ෂපාත වනු ඇත. ඒ අතර වික්රමබාහු මේ රටේ පුරවැසියෙක්ද නැද්ද යන්න තීරණය කර ගත යුතුය.
Can someone please translate this interesting Divaina editorial into English for the benefit of our Englsih readers?
July 14th, 2014 at 12:56 pm
Dear Samanthi,
Here is a Sinhala Translation of the Island you asked for, hopefully accurate and as funny as the Sinhala version!.
…………………………
Vikramabahu – bahu!
An article that appeared in The Island newspaper (Sinhala edition) on the 12th Saturday deserves our attention. That article primarily focused on four Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) which are lodging complaints against the country at foreign Embassies. Secondly, the article reported that Prof. Wickramabahu Karunaratne (New LSSP) is urging people to “Rise up against the government if restrictions are placed on NGOs”! According to Wickamabahu, NGOs, such as the Suriyamal Movement and the Alcohol Prohibition Society, have existed before even World War I. The principal aspect missed by Wickramabahu in offering those examples is that they were patriotic movements committed to the welfare of the nation and its people, and not in the pay of foreign powers. Meanwhile, Wickramabahu also urges three of J.C. Weliamuna, Pakiasothy Sarvanamuttu, and Nimalka Fernando, three “premier” NGOs, be arrested and taken into custody, if at all possible. What madness would require these three to be arrested? Is Wickramabahu advocating that drugs be planted in their bags to justify the arrests? Wickramabahu, a Karl (1/4) Marxist, who aspired to become the President of this country only to end his political career as a Minister of the Colombo City Council, is an educated and intelligent man. But today, the Wickramabahu brand has decpreciated to such an extent that no one would want to become associated with him. For that reason, we will cease discussing him further, and will turn to addressing the NGO issue.
There are 1426 local and foreign NGOs registered with the government. For some time, and we believe even now, it has been extraordinarily easy to register an NGO in Sri Lanka. An NGO can be registered in the same way that a grocery store or a chinese restaurant is registered to open for business. To register a grocery store or a chinese restaurant, it is only necessary to have a permanent postal address, and the princely sum of Rs. 500 in hand. For a chinese restaurant, of course, the display of a large dragon (substituted by a large garden lizard for us who are unfamiliar with dragons) on a bamboo board is an entirely appropriate additional enhancement, albeit not required by government regulations. Of course, for a grocery store, “hamine’s” presence on the premises is sufficient to offset the “mudali’s” absence. An epoch when an NGO could even begin operations by registering with the Pradeshiya Sabhawa had also dawned. Now, it has gotten far worse, with the capability for an NGO to be registered and approved simply by filling out a form at the Government NGO Center. From the very day an NGO begins operations, the only activity they engage in is to raise funds. To justify the inflow of foreign funds, that might raise eyebrows, they export a few locally produced goods to foreign lands. Not only intellectual rights, abuse of human rights, the terrorism problem misrepresented as an ethnic question, food scarcity, water scarcity, and homelessness but even the scarcity of cadjan to cover the roofs of huts, are conjured up, trotted out, and posed as “national questions”, and exploited as opportunities for attracting and securing funds from foreign donors. Needless to say, those citizens who support the Eelamist Tiger Cause flock to these NGOs. Given this unpatriotic behavior now become a characteristic hallmark of NGOs in Sri Lanka, Wickramabahu should decide whether or not he is a Citizen of Sri Lanka.
July 14th, 2014 at 12:56 pm
Dear Samanthi,
Here is a Sinhala Translation of the Island article you asked for, hopefully accurate and as funny as the Sinhala version!.
…………………………
Vikramabahu – bahu!
An article that appeared in The Island newspaper (Sinhala edition) on the 12th Saturday deserves our attention. That article primarily focused on four Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) which are lodging complaints against the country at foreign Embassies. Secondly, the article reported that Prof. Wickramabahu Karunaratne (New LSSP) is urging people to “Rise up against the government if restrictions are placed on NGOs”! According to Wickamabahu, NGOs, such as the Suriyamal Movement and the Alcohol Prohibition Society, have existed before even World War I. The principal aspect missed by Wickramabahu in offering those examples is that they were patriotic movements committed to the welfare of the nation and its people, and not in the pay of foreign powers. Meanwhile, Wickramabahu also urges three of J.C. Weliamuna, Pakiasothy Sarvanamuttu, and Nimalka Fernando, three “premier” NGOs, be arrested and taken into custody, if at all possible. What madness would require these three to be arrested? Is Wickramabahu advocating that drugs be planted in their bags to justify the arrests? Wickramabahu, a Karl (1/4) Marxist, who aspired to become the President of this country only to end his political career as a Minister of the Colombo City Council, is an educated and intelligent man. But today, the Wickramabahu brand has decpreciated to such an extent that no one would want to become associated with him. For that reason, we will cease discussing him further, and will turn to addressing the NGO issue.
There are 1426 local and foreign NGOs registered with the government. For some time, and we believe even now, it has been extraordinarily easy to register an NGO in Sri Lanka. An NGO can be registered in the same way that a grocery store or a chinese restaurant is registered to open for business. To register a grocery store or a chinese restaurant, it is only necessary to have a permanent postal address, and the princely sum of Rs. 500 in hand. For a chinese restaurant, of course, the display of a large dragon (substituted by a large garden lizard for us who are unfamiliar with dragons) on a bamboo board is an entirely appropriate additional enhancement, albeit not required by government regulations. Of course, for a grocery store, “hamine’s” presence on the premises is sufficient to offset the “mudali’s” absence. An epoch when an NGO could even begin operations by registering with the Pradeshiya Sabhawa had also dawned. Now, it has gotten far worse, with the capability for an NGO to be registered and approved simply by filling out a form at the Government NGO Center. From the very day an NGO begins operations, the only activity they engage in is to raise funds. To justify the inflow of foreign funds, that might raise eyebrows, they export a few locally produced goods to foreign lands. Not only intellectual rights, abuse of human rights, the terrorism problem misrepresented as an ethnic question, food scarcity, water scarcity, and homelessness but even the scarcity of cadjan to cover the roofs of huts, are conjured up, trotted out, and posed as “national questions”, and exploited as opportunities for attracting and securing funds from foreign donors. Needless to say, those citizens who support the Eelamist Tiger Cause flock to these NGOs. Given this unpatriotic behavior now become a characteristic hallmark of NGOs in Sri Lanka, Wickramabahu should decide whether or not he is a Citizen of Sri Lanka.
July 14th, 2014 at 7:08 pm
Hi Ananda,
Thank you so much!
Once again an excellent Editorial and its briliant English translation.
I just want to add one simple point! Wickrema ‘Bahu-Bahu’, in Sinhala. You know which animal makes that noice?
July 15th, 2014 at 12:02 am
Dear Samanthi,
Ah, yes … I did miss the all-important space between Wickrama and the first bahu, although I understood at once the reference to the barking dog.
Sorry .. I blew it it right there in the Title of the article itself!
That is not all, my eyes are beginning to miss things as I grow older leading to even more mispellings in my writing.
A man-at-arms in his youth now serves on his knees. C’est la vie, mon enfant!
July 15th, 2014 at 12:28 am
Never mind Ananda. You did a great job.
Please send it to Lankaweb to publish it so that it will be SEARCHABLE in web space.
Even the dog himself will read it in English!
The curse of the nation.
BAHU – dog
RAHU – pig
VASU – mongoose
July 15th, 2014 at 9:45 am
Ananda, don’t worry. That’s life my friend!
You’ve done a very good job, as also proved by Lorenzo’s comment above.
I can’t figure out who RAHU is, though! Can someone give some hints?
July 15th, 2014 at 1:58 pm
Clue: HACK-HIM.
July 16th, 2014 at 9:30 am
Thank you, Lorenzo!