Writing in the Hamilton Spectator, Gwynne Dyer, questions who is responsible for Sri Lanka’s dire economic and political status. Comparing Sri Lanka’s post-independence history to that of its south asian neighbours, Dyer notes that “none compares with Sri Lanka for sustained, large-scale violence across five decades”.
Dyer notes that in addressing this question there are many contenders;
“You could blame the Buddhist extremists of the majority Sinhalese population who led the first pogroms against the Tamil minority in 1958, or the Marxist insurrection that broke out in 1971 (30,000 dead) and resumed in 1987-89 (60,000 dead), or the government-backed attacks on Tamils that started the 26-year-long civil war in 1983 (100,000 dead).
Or you could choose the massacres of Tamils that ended that war in 2009 and brought the Rajapaksa clan to power, or the deluded Sinhalese Buddhists who went on voting for the Rajapaksas even as they looted the economy, or the 2019-2022 economic collapse that made even food and medicines unavailable to much of the population”.
Turning to Sri Lanka’s recent elections, he explains the victory of Anura Kumara Dissanayake, the Janatha Vimukthi Peremanuna (JVP) candidate, is due to the “despairing and disillusioned electorate [that] was willing to bet on any party that has not already failed”.
He expressed scepticism over the new administration stating;
“Dissanayake will not get better terms on Sri Lanka’s debt while he is simultaneously cutting taxes and raising welfare payments. He will probably have to start printing money again (inflation is currently under control) to cover even half his promises”.
He concludes his argument reflecting on the island’s history under colonial rule and stresses that blame on the British empire is insufficient;
“this is really an inadequate explanation for the mass murders of Tamils by Sinhalese mobs, police or soldiers which are a recurrent feature of post-independence Sri Lankan history”.
Instead he notes that;
The “likelier answer is that Buddhist communities in south and Southeast Asia feel besieged even when they are in the majority, and lash out against communities of other faiths that really pose no threat to them”.
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