The need for a peacebuilding model based on traditional knowledge

By Surya Vishwa

The linking of the authentic South of Sri Lanka with the North has been a perennial gap in peacebuilding initiatives run in Sri Lanka. The authentic Sinhalese South are not English-speaking elites and often represent ideologies not represented in mainstream academia or policy level thinking and certainly not represented in most NGOs of INGO agendas. 

The Sinhala wedakam lobby, those who speak of the mythical ancient Sinhalese King Ravana, some practitioners in Sinhala theatre and the Sinhala language media are some of the those who fall to some of the groups of persons we may term as ultra-nationalistic, whatever that term may mean to certain persons which is of course subjective interpretations. But the fact is that none of these segments are usually represented in any of the Western influenced peacebuilding programs run in Sri Lanka. 

Peacebuilding as we know it today, is tied to international charities which need a particular framework to source its funds globally. This does not insinuate that they are insidious or not contributing to some global good. Many Western peacebuilding oriented organisations have been founded in good faith, often by well- intentioned persons, who genuinely wanted to change the world for the better. 

However, the reality is that many Western funded peacebuilding programs in non-Western countries are token workshops in which the heart of the matter gets lost in donor seeking reports and donor show off reports. This is why the typical West dominated peacebuilding model has failed. There are many peacebuilding conferences and workshops throughout the world but no peace. 

Many of those who represent the sector are often theoretical and have no connection with ground level realities and even if there appear to be attempts at local connections, these are managed by pseudo locals who are not totally connected to the grass roots of the place. The difficult part of peacebuilding which is to actually connect people with opposing viewpoints therefore does not happen as this is difficult. 

What is often seen in many of the workshops held in Sri Lanka is that one set of people holding one set of viewpoints speaking out against another set of people, holding another set of opinions, in their absence.

This emerged at a discussion in December between this writer and the newly appointed North Governor Jeevan Thiagarajah who is also from the local peacebuilding and humanitarian sector and aware of its many dynamics. 

As a writer and practitioner promoting traditional knowledge, I wanted to see if we could look at creating an authentically Lankan peacebuilding model by involving those who are generally missed out in Western oriented peacebuilding platforms. 

As a writer who has for almost all her professional life been connected to the war-peace scenario of Sri Lanka, first as a journalist covering the peace process of 2002 as a Lankan State media journalist and foreign correspondent and later in Western run peacebuilding and training sectors while also researching and writing  on traditional knowledge and intangible cultural heritage that includes comparative spirituality I have been speaking on several platforms on the need to dispense with peacebuilding models unsuited for Sri Lanka. 

This means that Lankan NGO representatives either refuse to go along with donor proposals that do not match our actual needs or else develop a kind of diplomacy with related agencies to get them to view the importance of incorporating local priorities as decreed by local societies and communities. This will require having local NGO representatives who are from authentic grass roots and not a set of elites managing local projects. 

It also requires the prevention of the common phenomena of the grass root based persons not being peer pressured to ‘becoming or acting like elite’ that often happens in the NGO and humanitarian sector. This is however not something orchestrated by Westerners, who are at times more in tune with cultures such as ours than us, but rather the imperialist mentality of Lankans themselves.

The sum up is that a strong root with Lankan traditional knowledge is needed in Sri Lanka in the entire psyche of the nation. This has to begin with primary, secondary and especially at university level to influence how we run our policies in all mainstream spheres keeping true to what is indigenous. 

With this and through this we need to influence the local peacebuilding sector to create a model where we influence the world with the humanistic values inherent in a civilisation as old as ours and use it genuinely for the good of all our citizens. 

This would mean using nationally needed solutions that range from water resource protection, traditional nurturing of the soil through indigenous farming methods, traditional wellbeing systems rooted with nature-based science of Lankan Ayurveda and Sinhala Wedakama (Deshiya Chikitsa) and with the parallel wellbeing systems of Siddha and Unani which belong to Tamil and Muslim cultures alongside the many rich cultural traditions and beliefs held within the country. 

All these can be moulded to create an authentic local peacebuilding model. Also included can be indigenous construction methods ranging from clay to other nature-based resources that differ from province to province in this country which although a small island is extremely diverse in natural resources. 

Also, it is still possible to conserve our indigenous plant varieties, alongside revival of traditional food and wellbeing entrepreneurship which are amongst the many routes we could incorporate to a local peacebuilding model. 

The challenge is that our academic elite, who dominate every sphere including the one we call the peacebuilding sector, has to be schooled on what is authentically ours and this would mean making them see that the traditional set of knowledge and values are (1) not harmful to planet or human (2) can be used to create wellbeing, sustainability and economic security (3) can be strategically and holistically used to unite people. 

In a synthetic over immunised, over materialised and polluted reality, the revival of indigenous knowledge to unite the world and bring back humans to a truly holistic nature is the need of the hour. One basic way to start doing this is to record narrations of those above the years of 70 to understand the worldview ingrained in them as children and the life and the realities they knew in the different communities they grew up in. 

This will help to compare the current gaps in socio-cultural--economic-political and economic framework and trace the contemporary history-based events as emerged from individual experience. Where possible the exposure  of the experiences of these persons to those of the younger generation would greatly help in creating inroads to the heart as even the hardest heart can melt when confronted with someone as old as one’s grandfather addressing them. 

This was seen clearly in the North-South exchange held at the Northern Governor Secretariat last month, when 82-year-old veteran poet S. Pathmanathan (Sopa) addressing representatives from the South shared his personal experiences in the 1958 ethnic riots where despite it seeming that Sinhalese were behind it, Sinhala peasants of Polonnaruwa had guided him to safety.  

Pathmanathan and other senior representatives around his age also spoke of the value-based differences when comparing the past with the present, (where the past was free of one time used plastic pollution and the plastic water bottle phenomena). The past was when water was a free entity and public taps were there on almost every street corner, representative of the hydraulic civilisation that was Sri Lanka which prioritised the availability of water to all persons. 

The possibility for those such as Pathmanathan to address a group from the South emerged when in January, after some discussions the previous month, it was agreed that Governor Thiagarajah will speak to the Office for National Unity and Reconciliation (ONUR) to look at supporting an initial pilot step to bring a small group from the South to the North representing the kind of people that are neither elitist or representative of typical INGO programs. 

These persons from the South included wedamahattayas, a Sinhala print media representative specialising in writing on Sinhala heritage and Sinhala medium theatre practitioners and a Sinhalese poet writing in the Tamil language. 

It was also agreed that the book launch of the three senior-most artists of the North (aged 80s and 90s respectively) representing poetry, art and theatre will be chosen and the launch of their books to be a point of focus for the South group. 

Thus, three of the iconic figures of North; S. Pathmanathan, better known as Sopa and the launch of his latest book, the theatre practitioner Kulandai Shanmugalingam (91) and the launch of one of his dramas in book form, and the posthumous launch of the book on the art and life of Jaffna based artist, Asai Rasiah was chosen.

It was also decided to have a discussion with a few rural North female entrepreneurs of traditional food products and introduce them to the group from the South.  

The long-term goal of event was to develop a Lankan peacebuilding model replete with the use of local artistic talent as carried out by ordinary people of Sri Lanka and the  overarching objective to help Sri Lanka usher in a fully and authentic indigenous peacebuilding model by reviving local arts as part of intangible cultural heritage and its ancient knowledge to solve current national/especially rural economic issues and move away from international dependency and needless national communal disharmony. 

As explained by Governor Jeevan Thiagarajah in his address at the event, Sri Lanka could look at identifying key forms of traditional knowledge of different spheres in different locations of the country and work with provincial authorities in reviving and fostering this knowledge for a sustainable economy. While the provincial level authorities could be key drivers of continuing such initiatives the incorporation of mainstream central ministries also would create a meaningful result. 

Among the outcomes and conclusions of the February event was to create an online platform for all forms of cultural and traditional knowledge of the North initiated by the office of the Northern Governor where former Northern Cultural Department  head Sujeewa Sivadas was appointed as an advisor. Comprehensive work with other governors will be needed to make this linked to islandwide representation. 

It was decided to work with Jaffna based Civil society groups such as Aaruthal, which works with pre-school teachers (headed by the former Education Secretary S. Diwakalala, to document traditional nursery rhymes of the North and to work with Sinhala heritage scholars of the South such as Prof. Nimal de Silva to look at compiling the Sinhala nursery rhymes with an interpretation of the deep rooted philosophical meaning that would speak of values that cannot be evaluated materialistically. 

To consider the publication of books such as above through the Northern cultural department and to look at such publications through other stakeholder affiliation belonging to both State and non-State institutions were discussed. The need to influence international agencies and funders was also discussed.

To look at staging popular current day Sinhala dramas such as Suddek Oba Amathai in Jaffna with language adaptation as needed was also discussed. The producer of this drama Udayasiri Wickremaratne was part of the South group along with another Lankan dramatist Nilanka Dharmadasa who was the highest winner of awards at last year’s drama awards. 

The major potential to link the North, the South and the rest of the country with indigenous traditional medicine was discussed. Present at the North South Exchange was traditional physician in the Sinhala wedakama tradition Kalutharage Sampath, who reached international fame for curing hundreds of COVID patients here and abroad, that includes a 95-year-old COVID stricken patient who was cured without oxygen at the Sinhala Weda Uruma Baraya run traditional medicine hospital based in a hotel in Kelaniya. 

Proficient in Western science and Western medicine, Kalutharage Sampath spoke of the need to propel indigenous medical systems to ensure Sri Lankans will not be immune resistant to vaccines as the Westerners are and to create national level programs that will create domestic entrepreneurship through traditional herb exchange between the North and the South. 

On the 27th evening, Zoom and WhatsApp facilitated meetings attended by Chamber of Commerce of Jaffna former head Poornachandran marked the first discussion representatives of Sinhala traditional medicine had with a business representative from Jaffna to discuss the linkages through indigenous wellbeing products of the North and South. 

This exchange saw Kalutharage Sampath Wedamahattaya purchasing several Gingerly oil bottles from Poornachandran who brought as samples the produce of a well-known Gingerly oil manufacturer who has created rural women groups to produce the oil in a traditional manner that preserves its best quality. 

Discussions are to be facilitated to encourage the exchange of indigenous wellbeing products between the North and the South as it was revealed that the herb usage between the North and the South is different and that some herbs rampantly available in the North are luxuries in the Sinhala wedakama tradition. 

It was discussed to motivate rural women to be educated as to what herbs that were aplenty in the North could be useful for the Sinhala wedakama in the South and thus a process facilitated for rural indigenous medicine entrepreneurship. Subsequent discussions are expected to be facilitated between Siddha, Unani and Sinhala wedakama physicians. 

It was also concluded that the month of March and April could be a prospective time frame to organise an exchange program that will look at promoting home tourism of the North looking at the Mullaitivu district as a sample and using the traditional knowledge for environment and human wellbeing  while strategically looking at Southern linkages while also keeping in mind the need to build Sri Lanka’s image internationally.