Peter Taaffe, General Secretary of the Socialist Party (England and
Wales) and member of the CWI International Secretariat, recently
returned to London from Sri Lanka.
He visited some of the areas most
devastated by the tsunami and spoke to many whose agony has turned to
anger.
Three months after the tsunami, government inaction fuels the flame
of protest
The tsunami and its terrible aftermath is the overarching issue that still dominates every aspect of Sri Lankan society.
Peter Taaffe
When you visit the devastated tsunami areas, it is not difficult to
see why.
Speaking to the victims, in the East of Sri Lanka, as well as
on the South coast in the Galle area, the despair mixed with anger at
the inaction from the different authorities to their plight is palpable.
Three months after the tragic events of 26 December, very, very
little has been done to alleviate the plight of the tsunami people.
A
natural disaster has been turned into a man-made one of even bigger
proportions.
Visit to the East
At Pottuvil, at the tip of the East of Sri Lanka – populated by
Tamils, Muslims and Sinhalese – and I am overwhelmed by the individual
accounts of what happened on the 26th.
One young man, a fervent supporter of the United Socialist Party (USP),
tells us, almost calmly, that four members of his family were killed on
that fateful day.
His house is gone; he recognises, however, that the
USP does not have the material resources to immediately help him but has
something far more important: a programme and a will to struggle on
behalf of all the abandoned and neglected tsunami people.
He expresses
the growing anger at the ineptitude, mismanagement and outright
corruption of many of the agencies and of the Sri Lankan government in
not immediately rushing aid to the victims of the wave.
He is so
desperate, that he still approaches me privately to see whether I could
“help him” to rebuild his house and his family’s life.
And who can
blame him, when confronted with the terrible reality of what is taking
place in this region and throughout the tsunami affected areas?
These people feel that they have been stranded by the tsunami and
abandoned by “their” government and the major political parties.
Some of the Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) have at least done
something, although this has barely made a scratch on the scale of the
problem.
Houses have been obliterated, a few remnants of walls remain,
tents are pitched amongst the debris and rubbish left in the wake of the
great wave is still there.
The ‘fortunate’ few are living in
‘temporary’ accommodation – one-room wooden boxes with wafer-thin
roofs – while many are arbitrarily removed kilometres from the sites of
their original houses.
The majority don’t even have this protection
from the elements, forced to live in tents.
It rained heavily on a
number of days I was in Sri Lanka and when this happens the tents are
soaked, provide no shelter.
Their occupants are forced to flee to more
solid shelter in temples and the remaining intact buildings.
‘Help’ from Big Brothers
In Pottuvil, the Indian Army had come in and rebuilt a bridge
partially destroyed on 26 December.
Everybody knows this because a huge
sign over the bridge proclaims the achievements of the “Indian Army”
and its everlasting friendship with the Sri Lankan people.
But why did
it require the Indian Army to come here and not thousands of engineers,
architects, builders and others to recreate destroyed dwellings? Was
this the opportunity for the ‘Big Brother’ to the North and the
capitalist powers in the region as a whole to build a ‘strategic’
and military bridgehead in Sri Lanka? The people of this area certainly
think that is the case.
The same applies to the United States military, who also intervened.
Their primary concern, it is clear, was not to help the victims, who
still remain stranded, some of them literally so, like the fishermen, on
the seashore.
One fisherman calmly explained to us that he has lost ten
members of his family in the tragedy, his house has gone, as has his
boat, which was his only means of livelihood.
He hands us a photo of him
standing next to his destroyed vessel.
I am numbed by the thought of his
pain but he still manages to smile at us!
People around the world rallied in an unprecedented demonstration of
human solidarity to help their brothers and sisters in Sri Lanka and
elsewhere with more than 300 million from workers, pensioners and young
people in Britain alone.
The government and public relief aid was pushed
up to reach a figure of over $5 billion.
And yet, from the evidence of
our own eyes, not even a trickle of this money has reached the victims.
Chandrika Kumaratunga, President of Sri Lanka, recently declared that
the government had so far “not received even five cents”.
Where is
the money then? It is buried in the vaults of foreign governments and of
some international agencies and charities, it seems.
Forty per cent of
all money collected by charities, in disasters like this, is swallowed
up by ‘administration’, which is code for the fat salaries for those
who head these organisations.
On the evidence of what I have witnessed,
it is a lot higher proportionately than even this figure.
But this is
not their money! Donations have been given generously so that help would
speedily arrive to these people.
They are already traumatised by
personal and family tragedies, but their agony is now being compounded
by the outright complacency of the ‘authorities’.
On the evidence here, it will take years, perhaps a minimum of ten,
before the problems are fully addressed.
How often before has the
conscience of the world been touched by a disaster, only then to be
forgotten as ‘disaster fatigue’ sets in? This must not be allowed to
happen in this case, which touched the whole of the world in a way that
no other previous disaster has.
There is still a determination to help
the tsunami victims.
But, left to capitalist governments and
organisations, this plea will go unheeded.
Visit to the South
This is underlined by another visit we make to the coast just south
of Colombo going towards Galle in the ‘deep south’.
The scenes of
devastation along this coastline stretch from the sea for hundreds of
metres, sometimes up to a kilometre inland, and is something which even
my generation has not experienced first hand.
It conjures up images of
war disasters, when cities were razed to the ground or of the television
pictures of Grozny, or even the destruction of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
Where houses stood there are just foundations, practically every
building has been destroyed with just shells remaining, illuminating the
colossal power of the tsunami.
We stop at a spot near Galle where the remnants of the Colombo to
Galle express was lifted by the great wave and thrown hundreds of metres
inland.
A few wagons have been put back on the lines – the track has
been rapidly rebuilt – and is a source of curiosity for visitors who
have been ferried to the site in buses.
Important as this is to remind
people of the tragedy which has transpired, the views of those
‘living’ around the train are more important.
Their plight is both
tragic and shocking as an example of the continuing complacency towards
those lives which have already been shattered.
Most visitors don’t engage these unfortunate people but we speak to
a woman sitting outside her new ‘home’, a shack, albeit of new wood.
She speaks very quietly and says her name is KPW Rani, aged 49.
Before
the 26 December, there were six members of her family: herself, her
husband and four children – three sons and one daughter.
Three of her
children were killed on the day of the tsunami: her only daughter and
two sons.
We asked her if she had any photographs of her children and
she said at first, rather quietly, that the “authorities had asked the
victims not to show photographs of those killed in the tsunami”.
She
gingerly produces an envelope and shows us the photographs of her dead
children, two handsome young men and a beautiful young woman of 17.
‘Compensation’
The government has given a grant of 5,000 Rupees (£25) to the head
of every household whose home has been destroyed by the tsunami.
In
addition to this, R2,500 (roughly £13) has been supplied to purchase
kitchen utensils.
The tsunami victims receive R375 (just over £2) a
week for the three people in this household.
It is made up of R200 in
cash and R175 in goods.
She complains that she sometimes has to queue
for six hours for the weekly rations and then the rice that they are
able to buy with such little money is inedible.
They are also confronted
with big rises in the cost of living.
An old man joins us, Agossingno aged 85, whose wife was killed and is
virtually sleeping out in the open.
Another woman, M.Dulari just over
the ‘road’, from a wooden hut joins the discussion.
She had a shop
which was blown away in the tsunami and has no means of livelihood, but
there are no proposals of any means of compensation from the government.
There are “lots of injustices here”, she says pointing to the banner
of a building contractor which dangles from a coconut tree and she
complains bitterly that the contractors have “not done a good job”.
The tsunami did not take members of her family but she was swept one
kilometre inland by the wave.
We were joined by her son who complains
bitterly that the water supply on the ‘camp’ is not kept clean.
His
wife says that loudspeaker vans asked them to go to the banks to receive
compensation but when they got there they were refused any help by the
banks.
There is a real danger of illness and epidemic in areas like this
because of the dead bodies which still remain in the undergrowth as a
result of the tsunami.
Mahinda, from the USP, who has played a key role in the launch and
success of the “Voice of the Tsunami People” – the newspaper and
the movement developing in the South, asked the young man if they have
taken any collective action or if a committee exists to represent them
and air their grievances.
He says no, but he would be prepared to
organise structures like this, such is the anger now felt by the tsunami
people.
Devagoda meeting
This is again expressed very forcefully at our next stop, just up the
coast in the village of Devagoda, in the region of Ambalangoda.
This is
a village of 56 families.
The organiser of the meeting and a key person
in the village, is the ex-head of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP),
the party of President Chandrika, in the area.
He has now left this
party to join the USP.
One of the reasons for this decision is the
inaction of the government and the preparedness of the USP, through the
‘Voice of the Tsunami People’ to mobilise people to achieve their
rights.
Following this meeting, he was visited by three SLFP thugs who
beat him so badly he was hospitalised for three days.
They told him they
did it because he was campaigning against the SLFP with the tsunami
people.
The meeting place was charmingly situated under a constructed awning
with initially 15-20 people gathered.
But as the meeting progressed it
filled out with over 100 there at the end.
The villagers complain loudly
that R5,000 had been promised to all those affected by the tsunami yet
they have not received it and face discrimination.
Why now are some
people inexplicably receiving a grant and others, like them, not? Out of
56 families, 25 have not received any money whatsoever.
The main income
of the village is through a cottage industry involving the ‘hairs’
of coconuts that are turned into rope, which in turn are manufactured
into mats etc.
On the night following the tsunami, 15,000 people were crammed into
the local temple, their houses had been damaged and yet the government
refuses to compensate them.
With the help of the USP, the villagers have
organised picket lines and are now prepared to take further action in
April.
The ‘Voice of the Tsunami People’ will be organising
demonstrations throughout the affected areas with a mass march on
Colombo later if the government does not act.
Release the funds!
The working people of all countries, who have donated so generously
to the tsunami appeal, and in particular labour movement activists
across the globe, must support those who are trying to change this
shameful situation.
The Sri Lankan authorities should be bombarded with
complaints and pressure put on them to release the funds to help the
victims.
Foreign governments are quite clearly holding back resources as
a means of pressurising the Sri Lankan government to carry through
brutal neo-liberal policies, involving privatisation, which ultimately
will compound the problems of the Sri Lankan people.
The labour movement internationally should also be prepared to step
up help for their brothers and sisters still affected by the tsunami.
It
costs £1,000 to replace a fisherman’s boat and there are 1,000
fishermen in the Ampara district, involving the area of Pottuvil, who
have been affected.
The transport and maritime unions for instance could
a long way to help these victims with funds.
But why aren’t the resources of the Sri Lankan state and society
poured into emergency measures and put at the disposal of the people of
these regions? They are not begging but demanding that, if necessary,
they will rebuild their own houses so long as the government supplies
the bricks, the mortar and other resources to do this.
What about the 20
per cent of Sri Lankans unemployed, who could be mobilised in a massive
reconstruction programme? This does not take account of the colossal
fund of goodwill internationally which exists to help the people in
these regions.
Young people, workers and others have volunteered and
will continue to do so in order to help the Sri Lankan people.
But rotten capitalism, with its endemic corruption, mismanagement and
waste of resources, will not rescue the tsunami people.
Only
organisations like the USP, the ‘Voice of the Tsunami People’, the
Sri Lankan working class and its organisations can begin to mobilise the
victims of this natural disaster to change the situation by mobilising
the power of the working class and poor people to force the government
to act and free the funds already collected.
These organisations deserve
the widest support from the British and international labour movement.
