{"id":149817,"date":"2025-05-26T16:36:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-26T23:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=149817"},"modified":"2025-05-26T16:36:08","modified_gmt":"2025-05-26T23:36:08","slug":"is-sri-lanka-still-too-colonial-to-celebrate-its-own-republic-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2025\/05\/26\/is-sri-lanka-still-too-colonial-to-celebrate-its-own-republic-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Sri Lanka Still Too Colonial to Celebrate its Own Republic\u00a0Day?"},"content":{"rendered":"

e-Con e-News<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

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blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Before you study the economics, study the economists!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

e-Con e-News 18-24 May 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018This \u2018mass murder on wheels\u2019<\/em> accelerated with the IMF<\/strong>-guided<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018explosive growth\u2019 of Finance Companies<\/strong> (FCs) after 1977.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Central Bank of Sri Lanka linked this motorized mayhem<\/p>\n\n\n\n

to the larger banking system providing \u2018market space\u2019 to<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Non-Banking Financial Institutions. The FCs exploited<\/p>\n\n\n\n

demographics<\/strong>, that the banks feared to tread. Bankers however<\/p>\n\n\n\n

financed imports to serve this burgeoning \u2018market\u2019:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

the tsunami of Japanese vehicles, TVs, etc.\u2019 \u2013 ee<\/em><\/strong> 01.01.2022,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The World Bank Driving Madness on Our Roads<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Yet it has long been alleged that policemen,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

including senior officers run private buses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If this is in fact true, it would explain why<\/p>\n\n\n\n

police checks on such vehicles, many of them<\/p>\n\n\n\n

driving like bats out of hell to reach the next bus halt<\/p>\n\n\n\n

before their competitors, are not as stringent as desired.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 <\/strong>see ee Industry<\/em><\/strong>, Kotmale bus disaster<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018A local government is, in fact, the largest wealth manager in town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the local government level, real estate is by far the most significant<\/p>\n\n\n\n

asset segment & includes transport-related assets<\/em><\/strong> such as railways, airports,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& ports, as well as former industrial areas located in or near city centres.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Dag Detter, Former President of Swedish National Wealth Fund<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(ee Economists<\/em><\/strong>, Leveraging Government-owned land\u2026for private investment)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the splutterings of editorials & gushings of tears, buses keep falling off hills<\/strong>, and trains keep being derailed. People keep getting maimed and killed. Is this an exaggeration? Is it all natural? What kind of terror is this? The media certainly thrives on reporting such horrors, minus photographs of the gory details. This ee<\/em><\/strong> looks at the thriving trade & treachery in<\/strong> importing lorry chassis for use in public bus transport<\/strong>, via the detailed witness of a Senior Customs Official <\/strong>(see ee Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>). Such chassis, not designed for passenger transport use, assure that the commuting worker comes not just tired to work \u2013 they may never arrive there at all! That overloaded Ramboda bus that helped kill & maim over 30 people, had a lorry (not a bus) chassis like all local buses. Yet this is just one factor. The powers-that-be have been insistent on maintaining the rule of the World Bank that initiated this havoc on our roads (see The World Bank Driving Madness on Our Roads<\/em>, ee<\/em><\/strong> 2022Jan 1).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The government has decided to set up a Western Province Bus Sector Modernization Taskforce<\/strong> to align with the proposed \u2018World Bank-supported <\/strong>Bus Sector Modernization Program.\u2019 The Western Province Governor\u2019s Office <\/strong>will serve as the Secretariat for the Taskforce,<\/strong> in close collaboration with the Ministry of Transport. The WP governor Hanif Yusoof <\/strong>is the \u2018former owner\u2019 of ExpoLanka, which is controlled by Japan\u2019s Sagawa Group<\/strong>\u2019s Singapore-based SG Holdings Global<\/strong> Ltd. They are linked to Sagawa Express Co, a major transportation company in Japan<\/strong>, founded by Kiyoshi Sagawa. That Senior Custom\u2019s Official has much to say about the import of cheap Indian chassis & expensive Japanese buses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>What was not said at the time & said in hushed tones<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

for fear of being name-called by those adept in the business<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

of vilification, was the fact that Ceylon was the European<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

corruption of \u2018Sinhale\u2019, the true name.<\/em> \u2013 Malinda Seneviratne, see<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ee Sovereignty<\/em><\/strong>, Today we (don\u2019t) celebrate 40 years of independence<\/p>\n\n\n\n

May is the month of the Enlightenment \u2013 Vesak. May also illuminates us to bear witness to the delicate treasons of the English media in Sri Lanka in choosing not to celebrate (front-page headline, illustrate, highlight) the 53rd<\/sup> anniversary of the 1972 May 22 declaration of Sri Lanka as a Republic<\/strong>. Yet can the media alone be blamed \u2013 \u2018The Government has chosen not to celebrate it\u2019 (see ee Sovereignty<\/em><\/strong>). Are such rituals outdated, superfluous, or premature?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     This 1972 act formally bid good riddance to the English monarchy as our theoretical overlords and overladies. Over a year before in 1971, the leadership and cadre of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna<\/strong> (JVP, now in office but still not in power) had been charged with attempting to overthrow a German tart named Elizabeth Alexandra Mary, aka the Queen of England<\/strong>. This charge may have perhaps reminded our learned constitutionalists (what the majority of the country knew in their bones) that Sri Lanka, decades after 1948 \u2018Soulbury\u2019 independence, was still an English \u2018dominion\u2019<\/strong> and not an independent country, at least in words. England\u2019s overruling of the 1958 Paddy Land\u2019s Act<\/strong>, and their release of those who had plotted to coup the government of Sirimavo Bandaranaike<\/strong> (but not that Hanoverian Queen?), in 1962, was meant to remind that Sri Lanka was still a colony in all but name, even if SWRD Bandaranaike had gotten rid of those English military bases, and paid a heavy price for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Two years after the declaration of the Republic, came the early warning shots in 1974 of the separatist war waged by the LTTE \u2013 a video doing the rounds states that the Indian government trained the LTTE leadership and also then used them for target practice in \u2018jungle warfare\u2019, while using the excuse of the government\u2019s repression of a Tamil \u2018minority\u2019 to invade the country (see ee Sovereignty<\/em><\/strong>, <\/em>LTTE \u2013 Explained in 18 minutes by Indian Commando). <\/em>The video goes onto show that the LTTE was trained at a joint Indian-US camp that also trained Tibetans, Baluchis and other \u2018minorities\u2019 in the arts of terrorism, to be practiced on its neighbors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Indeed, May being the month of an Enlightenment (that long preceded Europe\u2019s own \u2018Enlightenment\u2019 to the mechanisms of a wider world which they then resolved to invade & plunder), May 19 saw the 16th<\/sup> anniversary of the defeat of the LTTE<\/strong>, with a host of imperialist governments colluding to efface their role in promoting that war. The farce of the Canadian government trying to deflect their own genocidal horrors onto others is part of the coordinated attempts to undermine a nation-state by labeling military officials as war criminals, and by their NGOs\u2019 insistence on removing the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and Online Safety Act, etc. War is War<\/em> & the state is a pair of handcuffs, but it is not the place of the imperialists to determine any country\u2019s laws, or on whose wrists those handcuffs be placed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     There is another irony in Canada\u2019s purported expertise on genocide<\/em>. Their genocide of the original people, involved playing one nation against the other, and creating fake nations, tribes, bands, etc. Last week former Lankan Foreign Minister Ali Sabry called out Canada\u2019s addiction to playing on \u2018ethnic vote banks\u2019 at elections. Many \u2018ethnic leaders\u2019, MPs, MPPS, etc, in Canada have been involved in the human trafficking game, arranging for \u2018settlement & adaptation\u2019, supplying workers to break strikes, assuring them police protection etc. Sabry, however, could very well have examined the history of \u2018special representatives\u2019 in Sri Lanka, that appointed and \u2018nominated\u2019 MPs representing \u2018minorities\u2019 & special interests, such as English, Burgher, Tamil and Muslim traders. Yet, Canada as a \u2018settler nation\u2019 is considered a novel experiment in \u2018multiculturalism\u2019, or \u2018multivulturalism\u2019 (many vultures!). Canada has become one of the leading experts on modern tribalism (aka ethnicity<\/em>), having learned divide&rule from their imperial masters, England & now the USA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018The allegiance of foreign-born citizens was further assured by humoring<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

their national pride<\/strong> in the holding of Irish<\/strong>, German<\/strong> & French<\/strong> meetings<\/p>\n\n\n\n

in the hall, where each nationality was addressed in its own language. The<\/p>\n\n\n\n

more influential forei<\/strong>gners <\/strong>were rewarded with places on the Assembly<\/p>\n\n\n\n

or local ticket, and to the lesser workers of foreign birth <\/strong>were given petty<\/p>\n\n\n\n

jobs in the department offices, or contract work.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Gustave Myers, History of Tammany Hall<\/em>, 1917<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This ee Focus <\/em><\/strong>continues looking into Myers\u2019 1917 History<\/em>, with this excerpt on the origins of \u2018ethnic vote banks\u2019. While Myers curiously avoids the US role in encouraging Irish emigration after the English-induced famines in Ireland, in this excerpt on the history of municipal shenanigans in New York, he described in detail how Tammany Hall became an extension of the US government\u2019s immigration department, and the history of the \u2018ward heeler\u2019 and the gangs that delivered assured votes to political parties. Familiar?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2022 Having failed to \u2018overthrow\u2019 the Sri Lankan government, by 1974 the imperialists were also showing an at-least nominally \u2018independent\u2019 state, that the economy was still in their hands. They skyrocketed oil & food prices etc, causing shortages. They bribed ruling party politicians to defect and promoted the subsequent alienation of its \u2018Leftist\u2019 partners in the coalition United Front government. In 1978, the government of JR Jayawardena reverted to the colonial \u2018Independence Day\u2019 of February 4th<\/sup> (see ee Sovereignty<\/em><\/strong>, Today we (don\u2019t) celebrate 40 years of independence).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     History repeats itself, alternately wailing and guffawing, as the imperialist powers show how they have been able to undermine any government that dares to try to change our colonial import-export plantation economy \u2013 by legislative hampering, by coup, by bribery, by terrorism from all sides\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     May being the month of the enlightenment, we are indeed illuminated by how the English media (not just the BBC, CNN, etc) has been teaching their readers and viewers to again love the Nazis and assorted fascists (all good children & students of colonial invasions), while erasing the role of the USSR in the defeat of the Nazi Germany on 09 May 1945 , along with the role of the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) in the defeat of an imperialist Japan. This ee <\/em><\/strong>records not only how we paid to finance England\u2019s wars (see ee Quotes<\/em><\/strong>, Patnaik), but also how the USSR\u2019s defeat of Nazi Germany led to the \u2018strategic withdrawal\u2019 of the imperialists from their colonial domains. We also describe the role the USSR played in attempting to advance the true liberation of our countries from the colonial stranglehold of our economies by supporting our modern industrialization (see ee Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2018You work 12-hour days, take calls at midnight when<\/p>\n\n\n\n

containers are stuck at customs, and then they tell you<\/p>\n\n\n\n

they can\u2019t offer a bonus because \u2018the market is tough\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 right after buying their third Prado.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 The Shipping Mafia\u2019s Ladies<\/strong> \u2013 This week saw \u2018women in shipping\u2019 hold their 10th<\/sup> annual general meeting. So what exactly do women ship, as opposed to their male counterparts? Do they do it differently? We\u2019re not told. But this little news item (see ee Who\u2019s Who<\/em><\/strong>) also enlightens us to the corporations behind what is called \u2018The Shipping Mafia\u2019 (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>), who \u2018invoice foreign clients in dollars but dispense salaries in rupees, without any inflation adjustment or cost-of-living considerations.\u2019 The media rarely reports on the actual conditions of port workers, unless criticizing their strikes. Yet these workers\u2019 fastidious job of documentation and cargo handling \u2018has made Colombo Port a darling of international shipping lines\u2019. Yet Sri Lankan shipping employees are the lowest-paid in the region, and social media memes compare shipping owners to pirates<\/strong>. The bosses have \u2018fought back\u2019 not \u2018with pay raises, but with glossy LinkedIn<\/em> posts\u2019, and love to import HR consultants. \u2018We value our employees as our greatest asset,\u2019 says one CEO just after proudly buying a villa in the Maldives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     In this ee<\/em><\/strong>, we are told that the Ministry of Labour and the trade unions ignore that \u2018Sri Lanka\u2019s shipping sector is notably devoid of any meaningful collective bargaining mechanisms\u2019. Most employees are on temporary or contract terms, and fear being flung overboard. The Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) is more interested in foreign partnerships than the labour rights of private-sector logistics employees. The story ends \u2013 \u2018So here\u2019s a modest proposal for the Colombo shipping mafia: <\/strong>Trade in one Prado. Pay your staff. <\/em><\/strong>It might just save your business.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2018The traditional working class is being replaced globally<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& in England by a \u2018precarious\u2019 class who have no<\/p>\n\n\n\n

permanent work or decent wages & conditions<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& are being \u2018left behind\u2019.\u2019\u2013 Michael Roberts<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(ee Economists<\/em><\/strong>, Progressive Economics & progressive capitalism)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 This ee<\/em><\/strong>\u2019s Random Note<\/em><\/strong>s also reproduce details on the move by England\u2019s largest retailers to sack almost 2,000 workers in Katunayake\u2019s Free Trade Zone (FTZ). Next Manufacturing<\/em><\/strong> gave no prior warning as required by law. It was considered a model for Sri Lanka\u2019s export industrialization drive in the late 1970s<\/strong>, as one of the first foreign investment projects set up in the-then FTZ which forbade trade unions. The company claims operating costs are too high, and indirectly blames the trade union, as well as \u2018activism\u2019. The charge of activism may be linked to their failure to pay a living wage. An NGO Living Wage Foundation<\/strong> is said to have bought Next shares and attended their annual general meeting, demanding they pay better wages. After all, Next has claimed to be a good employer while making huge profits. Yet these profits in such labor-intensive sectors are based on gross exploitation, as opposed to investment in modern technology and upgrading workers\u2019 skills. While critics claim such employers could afford to pay much more, economists claim that state enforcement could cause unemployment in the retail and labour-intensive industrial sector. The English government claims they pay billions to low-paid workers through tax credits, and retail companies \u2013 which have the highest proportion of low-paid workers \u2013 exploit austerity, effectively adding their workers\u2019 unpaid wages to England\u2019s welfare bill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018A Congolese bourgeoisie never existed<\/strong>. Internal trade<\/strong>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

which in most colonies, including West Africa, was a<\/p>\n\n\n\n

stamping ground for small-scale indigenous enterprise<\/strong>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

was dominated by Portuguese & Greeks<\/strong>. The closed<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

trading networks of these alien minorities<\/strong> were a barrier<\/p>\n\n\n\n

to all but a handful of Congolese petty traders in Leopoldville.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 SBD de Silva (see ee<\/em><\/strong> Focus<\/em><\/strong>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Could Africa\u2019s experience illuminate Sri Lanka\u2019s own political economy? Indeed, they can & do, and is indispensable. As we approach the 7th<\/sup> anniversary of SBD de Silva\u2019s passing from the planet, let\u2019s recall de Silva\u2019s efforts to scour the world to find resonances with the roots of our country\u2019s discontent. This ee<\/em><\/strong> Focus <\/em><\/strong>concludes the excerpts from Chapter 4 of SBD\u2019s classic, The Political Economy of Underdevelopment<\/em>. This chapter examines the alleged exceptions to his thesis on the dichotomy between such settler-colonial states as Algeria and in Southern Africa, & non-settler colonial states such as ours. The names appearing in this excerpt echo names sometimes broadcast in the news on the current US war on the Congo. The names from Indochina (Vietnam) echo the news of earlier European & US wars. But SBD\u2019s focus was on how these countries have been set up for destabilization and underdevelopment. Rather than strictly adhering to one or the other in SB\u2019s division of the world, he found they represent a continuum in between.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     In the Congo, expats dominated the economy, thwarting \u2018a fuller realization\u2019<\/strong> of its growth potential. <\/strong>The plantation and mining companies had \u2018to purchase more than half of its materials from Belgium and to employ Belgians to the extent of 60% of its European personnel\u2019. And yet in the province of Katanga, Flemish settlers dominated the economy, and created a different society based on developing modern industry and a home market to sustain it. The europeanized buffer class of Congolese \u2013 the \u00e9volu\u00e9<\/em> (\u2018evolved ones\u2019) \u2013 who were promoted to take over, only wished to re-enact the colonial game, minus investing further in industrial production. They also prevented real economic independence, helping to murder Patrice Lumumba<\/strong>. Continued warfare has been that legacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      Meanwhile in Asia, France<\/strong> extricated <\/strong>Indochina\u2019s economy from its geographic<\/strong> milieu,<\/strong> from which its commodities were derived. France bought rice<\/strong>, corn<\/strong>, coal<\/strong> and cement<\/strong> \u2018(mainly to help its balance of payments) but they \u2018were not<\/strong> complementary <\/strong>to the French economy; as bulky or heavy commodities, they \u2018could more conveniently\u2019 have been exported to Indochina neighbors<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Like Sri Lanka, Indochina\u2019s export trade with France was encumbered by heavy payments to middlemen & other distributive agents<\/strong>, and by high freight rates<\/strong> due to a monopoly by French vessels of the shipping between France and the colonies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Tariffs<\/strong> and financial subsidies<\/strong> encouraged the development of the production of minerals & agricultural raw materials<\/strong>, compared with industrial investment. The colonies were not permitted to compete with France in any part of the world market \u2013 in France, in the colonies, or outside the empire.<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

     <\/strong>Meanwhile, large French imports challenged Indochina\u2019s access to low-cost goods from Japan & China<\/strong> (which were then smuggled in). The French-owned branch plants did not substitute for nor reduce the dominance of French imports. Indochina\u2019s colonial export produce<\/strong> was forced to depend on a precarious<\/strong> French market, based on \u2018the vagaries of domestic harvests<\/strong> and the mood of the agricultural interests\u2019. <\/strong>Indochina served the French economy more \u2018as an investment outlet <\/strong>and a market\u2019<\/strong>. This made the French Parliament and industrialists willing to finance French PM Jules Ferry\u2019s invasion and war on Tonkin (Vietnam) in 1885.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     SBD de Silva\u2019s detailed analysis of imperialist exploitation in Africa and Southeast Asia provide fresh clues into the insidious ways and means by which the Republic of Sri Lanka is still held in the grip of thralldom He also charts for us a map of the ways and means to get out of and overcome their old non-settler colonial traps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

__________<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contents:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Is Sri Lanka Still Too Colonial to Celebrate its Own Republic Day?<\/a><\/blockquote>