Sri Lankan identity not 'Sinha le' bigotry!

Whilst driving to work on Monday morning, a double cab overtook me dangerously and plonked himself in front of me; apart from his negligent and aggressive driving ‘skills’, what caught my attention was a ‘Sinha Le’ sticker on rear glass; a similar sticker was noticed on rear glass of a parked car yesterday at a well patronised supermarket at Hyde Park, where the well-heeled usually do their shopping.

It is apparent that the ‘Sinha Le’ sticker campaign is gaining momentum, hot on heels of racist graffiti on gates of Moslem households in suburbs of Colombo with the words ‘Sinha Le’ spray-painted in Sinhala.

This island-paradise has seen enough bloodletting since the ‘Sinhala Only’ politically expedient pronouncement from way back 1958 which consequently polarised the two major races – history has chronicled the painful lessons which even gained notoriety globally ending with the ‘30-year civil war’ as the international media describe it.

At long last a stable Government with aim of unifying the disparate forces/races/religions is at the helm.

We are indeed at cusp of making defining constitutional amendments, hopefully, towards securing a true ‘Sri Lankan’ identity instead of dividing our nation on ethnic and religious lines – the bane of Sri Lanka, thanks to short-sighted, expedient politics!

Those myopic fanatics are desperate as such entities representing the majority race are hell-bent on saying and acting ‘We are the greatest’! [Sorry Mohammed Ali!] ‘Majoritism’ or ‘Triumphalism’ should not be in equation towards a ‘meritocracy’!

Don’t those who wish to fan racial tensions realise that all of us belong to the human race with the same blood?

Reverting to those miserable ‘Sinha Le’ stickers, let all stable, decent, balanced Sri Lankans please urge the Government and the Police to bring those to book; yes, those bigots blatantly displaying racist stickers or rousing the masses [again!] to agitate against national unity. Such pathetic ‘Sinha Le’ stickers must never be tolerated anywhere, please. Period!

The UN and the international community will no doubt be closely watching these events as they unfold – let history not repeat itself, at our peril! In this 21st Century, trust that we have learnt our lessons [or have we?].

We who dearly love our island-paradise with unlimited potential are still sadly waiting it to be fully tapped!

Therefore let us all please get together and urge those in authority to snuff out all racist campaigns now!

Sri Lankan