Intermediate option for crisis management: Indian backstop

As options go the Rajapaksas are caught between the West, the UNHRC, the IMF, and Delhi. Logically the least bad option is Delhi, not only because accountability is not as high on the agenda as in the West, a devolution swap can cut the price tag, and a deal with Delhi can open doors in Tokyo, Seoul and many other places

If the inevitable peasant unrest which will spillover by Sinhala-Tamil New Year is suppressed by sending in the STF or 1 Corps by the President or Security Chiefs, there will be no social and political comeback for the Rajapaksas from that. The SLPP and the ruling coalition, starting with the PM, must beseech all the deities of their acquaintance that a military response to people’s legitimate protests is avoided. Furthermore, a Sinhala Army tasked with suppressing the Sinhala peasantry will not socially survive that traumatic coercive contact; it will begin to disintegrate. The crisis must be managed urgently, before that timebomb explodes. There is an intermediate option other than going to the IMF right now, which can either be an alternative to the IMF option or can place Sri Lanka on a better footing before it gets to the IMF some way down the road. I call it an Indialed Asian Marshall Plan for Sri Lanka

The Government is in a tight time-crunch. That’s not only because of repayment of debt. That’s because the more explosive time-bomb is the harvest.

If the inevitable peasant unrest which will spill-over by Sinhala-Tamil New Year is suppressed by sending in the STF or 1 Corps by the President or Security Chiefs, there will be no social and political comeback for the Rajapaksas from that. The SLPP and the ruling coalition, starting with the PM, must beseech all the deities of their acquaintance that a military response to people’s legitimate protests is avoided.

Furthermore, a Sinhala Army tasked with suppressing the Sinhala peasantry will not socially survive that traumatic coercive contact; it will begin to disintegrate.

The crisis must be managed urgently, before that time-bomb explodes. There is an intermediate option other than going to the IMF right now, which can either be an alternative to the IMF option or can place Sri Lanka on a better footing before it gets to the IMF some way down the road. I call it an India-led Asian Marshall Plan for Sri Lanka. However, I doubt that the rational alternative will be speedily activated, and therefore we may have to be carried on a stretcher into the IMF “ICU”.

Indian-led Asian Marshall Plan

A version of the option is in play and is well known, but if handled wrongly, can blowback on the Government. It is the road not taken, and that’s the road to Delhi.

That road was not taken for two reasons. The first reason was that the Chinese had more cash and its system was such that it could be injected rapidly into the necessary post-war infrastructure investment.  The second reason was that the Indians would raise questions about the political and strategic IOUs we hadn’t paid, chiefly the promise made and repeated at the highest level, to fully implement the 13th Amendment.

MR was willing to make good on the promise and we can date exactly until when. In the first flush of victory, President MR’s team based at Temple Trees published a magazine, courtesy of Sri Lanka Telecom, called TARGET. The strap read ‘Sri Lanka: The way forward’. The cover story of the June 2009 issue was ‘Declaring the end of the Humanitarian Operations’. The cover photo is of President Mahinda Rajapaksa shaking hands with his brother, the Secretary/Defence Gotabaya Rajapaksa. A story on an inside is captioned ‘Indian delegation calls on the President’. The final paragraphs of that story read as follows:

“Both sides also emphasised the urgent necessity of arriving at a lasting political settlement in Sri Lanka. To this, the Government of Sri Lanka indicated that it will proceed with implementation of the 13th Amendment. Further, the Government of Sri Lanka also intends to begin a broader dialogue with all parties, including the Tamil parties, in the new circumstances, for further enhancement of political arrangements to bring about lasting peace and reconciliation in Sri Lanka.” (p 32)

This was of course the famous 21 May 2009 Indo-Lanka Joint Communique. The story featuring in that magazine in June 2009 shows it had been internalised in the system, at least by the Presidency. That was the line we took in Geneva.  

June 2009 was the last it was heard of. That policy discourse soon joined the ranks of the disappeared. Since that was the president’s policy as far as I knew, and I advocated adherence to the promises President MR had made internationally, my removal from Geneva in July 2009 was probably both symptomatic and symbolic. A turn had been made, as far as I could tell, under pressure from the other figure on that cover photograph, who was now articulating the hawkish anti-devolution, anti-Indian perspective of the Defence establishment.

The Rajapaksas went all the way down the Beijing Road, abandoning the balanced ‘India plus China’ formula of the Geneva UNHRC 2007-2009 model. Now they are running out of cash and is running back to Delhi. 

Delhi does seem willing to help: 

• https://m.economictimes.com/news/india/india-working-on-urgent-economic-package-to-help-lanka-tide-over-crisis/articleshow/88213984.cms

• India is planning massive bailout package to permanently snatch Sri Lanka out of Chinese hands (tfipost.com)  

There are two problems though. Firstly, the scale is inadequate. I would urge an Indian-led Asian Marshall Plan for Sri Lanka. This means, in effect, India, Japan, China, South Korea, ASEAN, i.e., India + ‘ASEAN Plus 3’ (as it is known). 

Secondly, even the package in its current size, if it entails (as it probably does) the give-away of strategic national assets, there will understandably be stiff resistance on the part of the trade unions, the JVP and FSP, governmental factions, public opinion and the media. India will become the new China, which has become the old (1987) India as a target of Sinhala patriotism. 

Swap, don’t sell-out

This problem has a solution, and MR and BR may see it, but will President GR permit it? 

The secret of the solution lies in the nature of the swap. 

Consider what India wants from Sri Lanka, then assign a domestic political price-tag to each item on the Indian wish-list.

My guess is that the most expensive items politically would involve Sri Lankan economic space. Paradoxically, the least expensive item politically, would be the political item on the list. 

I don’t see trade unions hitting the streets if the Government proceeds to fully implement the 13th Amendment and hold Provincial Council Elections within a compressed time-frame. Furthermore, I expect very insignificant dissent within the government on that issue. However, if there is an economic sell-out, the trade union and intra-governmental unrest will be of a de-stabilising sort.

Logically therefore, the cheapest and safest route to go, is to use the old 13th Amendment credit card, but since this is a BJP government in Delhi and not the old Congress which enabled the Rajapaksas to get clean away without making good on its wartime pledge, the ruling clan will have to implement 13A and hold elections, while incorporating in its entirety the existing 13A in the new constitutional draft, before Indians cough up the cash in the desired quantities. Implementation of 13A may be linked to each tranche. 

India may want an economic pay-off as well as implementation of 13A, but even that is more favourable to the Government than a wholly economic price, because 13A upfront can shave-off quite a bit from the economic bill. 

It will be quite appropriate if Minister Basil Rajapaksa is the one to do this, because it was he who successfully neutralised the wartime Indian High Commissioner in Colombo who stayed till almost the end of 2009, returning without the fulfilment of a single pledge by the Rajapaksas. I gather that BR pulled the same stunt that J.R. Jayewardene did on (and through) Romesh Bhandari, but BR will find that Dr. Jaishankar and Hardeep Puri know all the Sri Lankan moves.

Multi-alignment/Pluri-alignment 

As options go the Rajapaksas are caught between the West, the UNHRC, the IMF, and Delhi. Logically the least bad option is Delhi, not only because accountability is not as high on the agenda as in the West, a devolution swap can cut the price tag, and a deal with Delhi can open doors in Tokyo, Seoul and many other places. 

Lee Kuan Yew said Singapore should occupy the spot in the shade where the Chinese and Indian branches touch. Personally, I would extend that and prefer Sri Lanka to be at the point of intersection of as many branches of as many trees as possible: I term it Multi-alignment or Pluri-alignment. 

However, if Colombo wants to go the distance and come in under Delhi’s umbrella instead, there are benefits to be had. Colombo’s road to Washington and London, runs through Delhi. India can put in a word with the Quad. 

Most pressing of all, a grand bargain with India, arrived at swiftly, would yield two strategic benefits: 

(1) India may support a softer landing for Sri Lanka at the critical UNHRC session of March 2022 at which High Commissioner Bachelet presents her written report and pulls the trigger on international prosecution 

(2) India can be an important player in any consortium of creditors in a debt re-scheduling for Sri Lanka and give the Sri Lankan economy some cushioning before it sits down with the IMF.  

Though this is a rational and viable option for crisis-management, there are two major problems, both located in the realm of extreme ideologies and mindsets. I refer to Sinhala and Tamil ultranationalism(s). 

In that he is dualistic, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa is the least hawkish of his crew.  His hardcore backers from Milinda Moragoda and Rohan Gunaratne to Sarath Weerasekara and Ven. Dr. Medagoda Abeyatissa would prefer to pay a stiff economic price to India whatever the attendant public opinion cost than implement the 13th Amendment and reduce the economic and consequent public opinion cost. Some would prefer to pay any price to China, no price at all to India, and use the crisis to send in the military to do a Myanmar.

Basil Rajapaksa has his own chauvinist supporters (Dr. Channa Jayasumana, Mahinda Pathirana) and there are lone-wolf supremacists (Gevindu Cumaratunga). Overall, however, the balance in the Pohottuwa and SLFP ranks favour retention and reactivation of the 13th Amendment than its abolition or amputation.   

Today’s Parliament potentially has broader support (across Government and Opposition benches) for the implementation of the 13th Amendment than any other parliament. It should therefore be possible for Sri Lanka to make a ‘great swap’ with India: Provincial Councils up and running with the undiluted powers of the 13th Amendment and the retention of the language of the Accord and the 13th Amendment in any new constitutional draft, in exchange for a financial and economic safety-net.

This is a rare moment in which, due to the exigencies of the economic emergency, a win-win solution is possible for the Sinhala majority and the Tamil and Muslim minorities. The citizenry as a whole would have some safety-net or hedge against plummeting material standards of living. As the numerical majority the Sinhalese are being hit hard by the crisis in larger numbers. The system as a whole would be safer if the edge were taken off the crisis, because the Sinhala working people, especially the peasantry could be driven by despair to revolt. 

Sinhala sensibilities will not be affected by a grand swap of the implementation of the 13th Amendment in exchange for an Indian economic backstop, because that amendment has been part of the Constitution since 1987 and there is no shock therapy involved unlike in the case of Ranil Wickremesinghe’s CFA or Chandrika’s PTOMS. 

This is a rare moment in which, due to the exigencies of the economic emergency, a win-win solution is possible for the Sinhala majority and the Tamil and Muslim minorities. The citizenry as a whole would have some safety-net or hedge against plummeting material standards of living. As the numerical majority the Sinhalese are being hit hard by the crisis in larger numbers. The system as a whole would be safer if the edge were taken off the crisis, because the Sinhala working people, especially the peasantry could be driven by despair to revolt. Sinhala sensibilities will not be affected by a grand swap of the implementation of the 13th Amendment in exchange for an Indian economic backstop, because that amendment has been part of the Constitution since 1987 and there is no shock therapy involved unlike in the case of Ranil Wickremesinghe’s CFA or Chandrika’s PTOMS

Perimeter and parameters

The obstacles will come from two sources, firstly, the handful of Sinhala hawks in power who think that:

(a) A new Constitution which formally redefines Sri Lanka a Sinhala-Buddhist state and abolishes the 13th Amendment, introducing minimalist devolution instead, is the only (polarising) move by which to make a political comeback and 

(b) The crisis is the best time to introduce and gradually impose military rule.     

The second obstacle comes from the camp of Tamil nationalism. The Tamil nationalist leadership has been so unrealistic in its politics that the issue of devolution and the Tamil ethnic issue which was the heart of the Indo-Sri Lanka accord of 1987 has shifted to the periphery of the Indo-Lanka equation, and instead, the strategic and economic issues which comprised the Annexures and Exchange of Letters (hurriedly) affixed to the Accord, have arrived at centre-stage. 

This has of course, been the GR-Moragoda strategy all along: the Israeli model of letting the Tamils tie themselves up in political knots while creating/altering facts on the ground and rolling up any quasi-autonomous Tamil political space.   

Correspondingly, an abiding failure of Indian foreign policy in Sri Lanka has been its inability to get the Tamil nationalists within the parameters of—or which are congruent with—India’s vital interests in Sri Lanka. These interests are to erect a buffer against Chinese power-projection within a safe radius of India’s southern flank by reactivating the Northern and Eastern Provincial Councils. The retention and reactivation of the 13th Amendment cannot await ‘federalism’, ‘internal self-determination,’ etc. Even those favourite tropes “13 Plus”, “building on” or “going beyond” the 13th Amendment require the continued existence of the 13th Amendment and its institutional incarnation the Provincial Councils.       

Ministers Jaishankar and Puri are cerebral Realists who know that a Tamil insurgency in the 1980s, India’s tough diplomacy, Norway’s peace-bubbles and Prabhakaran’s full-scale war, couldn’t secure anything beyond the 13th Amendment. They and everybody else also know that the UNP-TNA (Ranil-Sumanthiran) tango did not produce a new, post-unitary Constitution but a post-UNP electoral landscape and a deadlocked Provincial Council system just when the Chinese were extending influence on and through Sri Lanka. India’s strategic interests were rendered vulnerable to the vicissitudes of southern politics and external alignments as never before because the TNA and UNP had in effect, deactivated the Indo-Sri Lanka accord and spiked the 13th Amendment by their constitutional and legislative adventurism.     

Offering strategic assurance by restoring the buffer, the Northern and Eastern Provincial Councils with the full powers of the 13th Amendment would be an indispensable part of the Great Swap or Grand Bargain in exchange for economic insurance and the resultant prevention of a mass uprising due to deprivation and despair.        

Tamil trajectory

Sri Lanka’s Tamil and Muslim political parties and leaders have caucused recently and are in the process of drafting a common platform in the face of a perceived effort on the part of the regime to eliminate the 13th Amendment. 

MA Sumanthiran has criticised the effort in public (in Chunnakam) as an effort to limit the Tamil cause, rights and aspirations to the 13th Amendment. 

The choice today is losing the 13th Amendment or saving it. 

Sumanthiran has reminded his fellow parliamentarians that the Tamil question is no longer an internal one. True, but in its internationalisation there is no more important reality than India. Tamil politicians must realise that whoever they talk to in Washington DC, no one there is going to make a move on India’s southern perimeter outside of India’s policy parameters. 

Sinhala politicians and top military brass must know the same about Russia: it won’t make a move on India’s doorstep if it thinks it may cross an Indian red line.     

If the ITAK/TNA proceeds on its path of political excess i.e., of ideological demand that far exceeds political supply, it will find that the Tamil question has been traded-in for economic and strategic real-estate and left to the tender mercies of the Gotabaya Government to resolve unilaterally. 

If President Gotabaya Rajapaksa obdurately chooses to dismantle the 13th Amendment unilaterally in whole or in part, and for their part the Tamil parties have defended the 13th Amendment taking a realistic stand, then the regime’s hawks will find new fronts opening or old ones newly re-opening on the island’s vulnerable periphery and in the external arena, beginning with the neighbourhood and extending through Geneva, westwards.