Sri Lanka's uneasy partners in peace

Last week's outburst by Sri Lanka's President Chandrika Kumaratunga, when she roundly accused the prime minister of trying to kill her has been dismissed by most as an unseemly spat between two hard-nosed rivals.

But among the proponents of the island nation's peace process, who have brought the Tamil Tigers from the violent fringes to the negotiating table, the president's remarks set off something of a tsunami.

Everything hinges on the "cohabitation" between Ranil Wickremesinghe's government and Chandrika's presidency working like clockwork. That has not happened so far. Instead, as Dr. Pakiasothy Sravanamuttu, executive director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives said when reached in Colombo, "under the current arrangement, the co-habitation cannot be said to have not worked, but that is because the major challenge is yet to come, it hasn't been tested yet."

That challenge rests at the heart of the fractured debate on the viability of any political settlement with the Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam (LTTE), given the form of government in Sri Lanka.

At this critical juncture, when it is essential that the polity is united on holding peace talks with the rebels, the less than supportive presidency trying to work at cross-purposes against the government's peace moves raises questions on the durability of any political settlement that is reached with the rebels.

The current model has a president and prime minister who are drawn from opposing parties – two centres of power, at odds with one another, competing and jostling for the upper hand. Wickremesinghe would like his office of prime minister to have full powers to run the government and its policy initiatives, with the presidency reduced to a largely ceremonial role, having no powers over policy and unable to dismiss or appoint the prime minister and his cabinet. For this and for any other changes he might want to ring in, Wickremesinge needs a two-thirds majority in parliament.

He will also, most likely run up against a wall when he must go forward on the key poser in the peace talks – the political framework arrived at Oslo, which could provide for an interim administration within the Sri Lankan constitution. But again, any devolution of power to interim councils or bodies thereof can only be brought about by amendments to the constitution, which in turn require a two-thirds majority in parliament.

Peace talks in danger

Without these key changes, the peace talks are in danger of running aground sometime in the future. The present presidency has another three years of its term to complete. And there are indications that Chandrika too leans towards a change that would allow her a larger, more expanded role in deciding her nation's fate. She cannot run for president again, as the constitution allows a president only two terms.

Any role in Sri Lanka's politics in the future therefore can only come about if she can pave the way for a more powerful prime minister, a post that she could bid for after the next elections.

But that is in the future. In the immediate here and now, for the peace process to go forward, Wickremesinghe needs to win all party backing. With Chandrika cavilling at the direction the peace talks are taking, it is imperative the prime minister build that consensus from within opposition ranks – essentially winning over pro-peace elements from within the People's Alliance itself who support his route to peace over the president's.

Therefore, the PA must be on board, as must another key party, the Sri Lankan Muslim Congress, which split down the middle on the eve of the second round of peace talks opening in Oslo.

Party president Rauf Hakeem was sacked by a rebel group, and the Muslim leader who had lobbied to win a place for the minority community at the peace talks flew back to Colombo to staunch the rebellion.

The Muslims are an important third party to the peace process . Not only do they make up seven per cent of the Sri Lanka's 19.5 million people, and share the North and East uneasily with the Tamils, their support to Wickremesinghe's United National Front alliance government is crucial in keeping the alliance afloat. Any move to rock the Muslim boat, some suspect by the PA to pick at the inherent weakness of the Wickremesinghe dispensation itself, will worsen Muslim worries over losing out to the dominant Tamils in any peace settlement.

While the Buddhist clergy has been largely supportive and the moderate Tamils barring the anti-LTTE Douglas Devananda's Eelam Democratric People's Front equally so, there is an island wide consensus that the terrorist upsurge that has wrecked the nation must end.

But the dangers posed by the Tigers, flexing their muscle to ensure their existing legal and police system is carried over into any future government, and their continuing emphasis on a homeland, even within the framework of the Sri Lankan constitution has not been lost on analysts who warn against the Tigers taking the peace route to achieve their aims of a separate state.

In a recent interview to the Hindusthan Times, the respected former foreign minister Lakshman Kadirgamar raised the opposition PA's concerns centred on LTTE's omniscient leader Prabhakaran saying he could look after the North as president and prime minister while Wickremesinghe ran the South as prime minister.

Kadirgamar also questioned Norway's role as mediator, the implicit criticism being that the Wickremesinghe government was in danger of giving away too much to the Tigers under Oslo's urging. "Suppose for argument's sake, a separate state comes up," Kadirgamar said, calling for a bigger role to be played by India. "Nobody can say it won't affect India," he added.

Fear

It's a fear that has long dogged India's Sri Lanka experts, who are well aware of the dangers posed by anything resembling a Tamil enclave across the Palk Straits, a draw for their own secessionist parties like the Marumalarachi Dravida Munnetra Kazagham, the Tamil Nadu Liberation Front and others of their ilk.

India has been kept in the loop by the Norwegians, as well as the Wickremesinghe government and Chandrika's party. Indian Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal, who visited Colombo last week stressed that his government supported the peace agreements, emphasising in particular that they supported a political settlement based on "democracy, pluralism and human rights." The Tigers have not been known to be strong on any one of these.

India, demurring at any overt participation in the Oslo conference was an indication, if anything, that the once overbearing neighbour, who have had their fingers burned in the past, would wait and watch rather than jump in feet first.

The other and more integral challenge to Wickremesinghe's peace moves is economic. Sravanamuttu says it is imperative that the peace dividend must be economic, and the resurgence of Sri Lanka's economy run parallel to the peace track, if the people's disaffection is not to become a factor in derailing the peace process.

The major benefits of the two rounds of talks, in Thailand and in Oslo have been the path breaking commitment by Wickreme-singhe's government and the Tigers towards a peace settleme