An all-encompassing leadership

In his first major speech of the New Year, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa took pains to reiterate that he is primarily a leader of Sinhala Buddhists, in a country where 30% of the population cannot lay claim to that ethno-religious identity. 

Addressing a ceremony at which he was bestowed with the honorary title of ‘Sri Lankadheeshwara Padma Vibhushana,’ President Rajapaksa said, “On the day I was sworn-in as the country’s President at the Ruwanweli Seya, I declared that I was a President elected by the majority of Sinhalese. I firmly believe that the protection of Sinhala Buddhists, who have made so many sacrifices to elect me as the first citizen of this country and that heritage is my foremost responsibility.”

Sri Lanka faces one of its most daunting years ahead. The economy is in shambles. The public have been called upon to make significant sacrifices for the greater good of the nation and its perilous financial situation. Food and gas shortages are rampant, and famine is looming. The Ceylon Petroleum Corporation may not be able to import sufficient fuel to keep vehicles on our roads.

One would expect the political leadership in such times would seek to deliver only messages of unity, of the desperate need for the country to pull together and overcome the tremendous challenges that confront Sri Lanka in 2022. True to form, President Rajapaksa chose to employ a divisive narrative, the one which propelled him to the presidency, two fateful years ago.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa is not the first Sri Lankan politician to tout hyper-nationalism to further a political cause, and he will not be the last. In 1956, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, an anglophile by his own admission, championed Sinhala-Buddhist nativism, unleashing a wave of majoritarian ethnonationalism that laid the foundation for a bloody civil war spanning three decades. When Bandaranaike attempted to rectify the damage some years later, it was too late. In 1959, the ethno-nationalist scourge Bandaranaike’s politics unleashed on Sri Lanka led to his own assassination. Bandaranaike was murdered by a Buddhist monk who believed that the prime minister had betrayed the majoritarian cause when he proposed a district-based devolution of limited powers to the island’s Tamil community. 

President Rajapaksa is two years into a five-year term. Undoubtedly, he won the presidency by preying on the fears of the majority community, especially in the wake of the Easter bombings. Yet having ascended the highest office, his less-bigoted loyalists might have expected the SLPP candidate to become a president for all Lankans, whether or not they voted to elect him in 2019. That is a basic tenet of wise leadership.

Like Prime Minister S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike before him, who was an unlikely and practically hypocritical champion of ethno-nationalism, President Rajapaksa forfeited Sri Lankan citizenship in favour of naturalisation as an American citizen in 2003. His entire family continues to retain US citizenship. Yet throughout his candidacy and two years of the presidency, President Rajapaksa pandered to Sinhala Buddhist nationalism. He relies on it now to reverse his political fortunes, after spearheading one of the most stunning governance failures the country has ever witnessed. His administration’s popularity is hanging by the frailest of threads in the wake of its abysmal handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and a collapsing economy.

There is something to be said for the fact that this President does not pretend to be something he is not. His administration has made it clear it seeks to assert Sinhala-Buddhist hegemony over the country, with policies that are overtly and covertly majoritarian.

It is no coincidence that Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass in 1938 – the first major pogrom carried out by the Third Reich against the Jewish people of Germany – took place when the German economy had faltered for the first time following the Nazi takeover in 1933. It is part of the old fascist playbook to whip up nationalism and blame minorities for all a country’s woes, especially during times of economic hardship. 

These lessons from history are vital to learn, to prevent repetition. Sri Lanka cannot afford anymore pogroms. The country has already paid for politicians playing racial politics since independence. The need of the hour is to foster unity and inclusivity at all levels in the face of national challenges.