Islamophobia Played A Role In The Current Sri Lankan Crisis

Islamophobia Has Become A Tool For Diverting Public Attention From Corruption And Economic Crisis

Main Points:

1.    Islamophobia was used by Rajapaksa to divert people's attention from economic problems.

2.    Hambantota port of Sri Lanka was leased to a Chinese company in 2017.

3.    In 2018, anti-Muslim pogrom was orchestrated.

4.    Intriguingly, the government did not act on intelligence reports on impending Easter Sunday attacks in 2019.

5.    After the attacks, the government stared trials after two years in 2021.

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By New Age Islam Staff Writer

14 April 2022

 

Sri Lanka asked Maldives to bury Sri Lankan Muslims dying of Covid/ Photo: National Herald

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The beautiful island nation Sri Lanka rich with natural and cultural diversity is going through a serious economic crisis. The external reserves of the country have reduced to only $1.4 bn. The government has stopped imports causing acute shortage of essential commodities. Rice is being sold at Rs 240 per kilogram. People don't have cooking gas, and long power cuts have made life more miserable for them.

But this crisis did not surface overnight. The flawed economic policies spanning decades coupled with misgovernance and nepotism is at the root of this crisis. It had come to the fore way back in 2017 when the Sri Lankan government had to lease out its important Hambantota port to a Chinese company after failing to repay the Chinese debt. But to hide the impending crisis and to divert the people's attention from it, the government colluded with Bodu Bala Sena headed by the anti-Muslim extremist Buddhist monk Galagoda Atthe Gyanasara to organise an anti-Muslim riots in 2018.

The Rajapaksa family has been at the helm of political power in Sri Lanka since 2005. In 2009, the LTTE leader Prabhakaran and his family were annihilated and with it 25 years of Tamil insurgency had come to an end. The insurgency had reared its ugly head in 1976 because of social, political and economic injustice and suppression of the Tamil minority inhabiting the north east region of Sri Lanka by the Buddhist Sinhalese majority since independence in 1948.

 

Sri Lanka''s Buddhist monk Akmeemana Dayarathana, who led hardline nationalists in an unruly protest against 31 Rohingya Muslim asylum seekers last week, is escorted to a prison bus by prison and police officers at a court in Mount Lavinia, Sri Lanka, October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte [Reuters]

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Since Rajapaksa was the head of state in Sri Lanka when Prabhakaran was decimated in 2009, the credit went to him and he became the hero of the Sinhalese majority. They called him king.

This opened the gate of nationalist and ethnic politics in Sri Lanka where the Sinhalese population is 75 per cent and the Tamil Hindu population is only 12 percent. The Muslims form only 9 per cent of the population.

As the backbone of Tamil resistance had been broken with the decimation of the LTTE, Rajapaksa family turned to the Buddhist Sinhalese majority for power. During the same time, the extremist anti-Muslim Buddhist monk Galagoda Atthe Gyanasara left the Buddhist radical outfit Jathika Hela Urumaya to form his own outfit Bodu Bala Sena. This outfit was more extremist than JHU. Gyansara started a campaign against Muslims and tried to present them as terrorists and the enemies of the majority Sinhalese. The Rajapaksa government that had adopted the policy of majoritarianism covertly supported the anti-Muslim campaign. BBS even organised the anti-Muslim riots in 2014 and 2018. BBS and other nationalist Buddhist organisations and monks spread the propaganda that Muslim traders sold sterilising products secretly to the Sinhal population to prevent their population growth. They also spread the propaganda that Muslims were increasing their population very fast and with this speed of population growth, they will surpass the Sinhalese population in a very short span and Islam will capture Sri Lanka. Sinhalese business houses even funded BBS.Therefore, they called for the boycott of Muslim traders. Gyansara targetted every religious practice and sign of Muslims. He called the skull cap, burqa, madrasas and the Islamic dress of Muslims 'social separation' of extremist Muslims. He was also critical of the Christian population in the country.

Rajapaksa government ignored or covertly supported this anti-Muslim campaign of Gyanasara for political purposes. A decade of unopposed political power had made the Rajapaksa family autocratic and they took economic steps that proved counterproductive in the long run. Sri Lanka fell in the trap of Chinese expansionist policy. It took loans worth USD $5billion from China which it could not repay. As a result it had to lease out its important port Hambantota to a Chinese company. Still, in a bid to appease the majority Sinhalese population, Rajapaksa slashed the taxes to a half causing huge economic burden to the country.

To divert the majority population's attention from the impending crisis, the Rajapaksa government used Islamophobia as a political tool. After going out of power in 2015, he rode on anti-Muslim rhetoric to regain power. When in 2018, he was nominated as the Presidential candidate of his newly formed party SSLP, he had said that his main task would be to ensure that our motherland which was once again under the threat from terrorist and extremist elements was safe and protected. He tried to create the impression that Islamic extremism was another threat like the LTTE and only he could root it out. During the election campaign, Rajapaksa had announced that after winning the election he would impose "One Country one Law" programme in the country. It was a clear indication that he was leading the country to a Sinhalese Buddhist majoritarian society where minorities will be second class citizens. 2019 Easter Sunday attacks by National Tawheed Jamat with help from the ISIS gave fillip to the Bodu Bala Sena and the Rajapaksa 's anti-Muslim agenda. An organised campaign was unleashed against the Muslims in the media and social media. The draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act was passed and imposed. Burqa was banned. 1000 madrasas were to be closed but under the pressure of th UN and other human rights organisations, the decision was deferred till 'further consultation'. The skull cap was looked at with suspicion. The minister of public security Sarath Weerasekara said that burqa was a sign of religious extremism and had a direct impact on national security. Re-Integration centres were set up where Muslims suspected of terorism were put and tortured in the name of reformation.

During all this, the economic condition of the country was fast deteriorating but Rajapaksa government was using diversionary tactics to keep the Sinhalese population unaware of the severe cash crunch. In 2021, Rajapaksa appointed a 13-member task force to prepare a draft for the 'One country one law' plan. Importantly, this task force was headed by the extremist and anti-minority Buddhist monk Gyanasara of BBS. This task force was appointed at a time when the country's external reserves were just $1.4 billion and Sri Lanka was heading towards bankruptcy. Instead of taking steps to wriggle out his country from the mire of a severe economic crisis, he was taking steps that promoted religious rifts in the county.

The Easter Sunday terrorist attacks had occurred in 2019 but the Rajapaksa government did not start the trial against the accused. The Catholic community demanded speedy trial but they were harassed and tortured. Earlier, some intelligence officers were accused of ignoring intelligence reports of the impending attacks. However, the government started trial against the 25 accused in 2021, after two years of the attacks. This was obviously done with the purpose of diverting the people's attention from the severe economic crisis.

In January 2022, international ratings agencies had warned Rajapaksa government of an impending default.

It becomes clear that when the country was heading towards a severe economic crisis, Rajapaksa was taking steps that created an atmosphere of religious hatred among the Sri Lankans. He was playing the 'one country one law' card when the country needed rational steps to salvage the economy.

But thus communal and ethnic politics could not save Rajapaksa government for long. When people faced the reality at last, it was too late. They realised that Rajapaksa was serving them the opium of anti -Muslim hatred and Islamophobia only to hide his failures. All the rhetoric of 'one country one law' had now no meaning to them when they were starving with their children. They were calling a man madman whom they called king. They wanted to get rid of their 'Messiah'. They came out in the streets to protest against the wrong policies of Gotabaya Rajapaksa but the 'king' imposed emergency.

How Sri Lanka will come out of this economic mess only time will tell but it is clear that Islamophobia was used by the Rajapaksa government to hide its failures and to keep the people in the dark from the reality. The Sri Lankan people are equally responsible for this crisis because they played to the the tune of narrow minded monks and opportunist politicians and did not try to see the truth and question the irrational and counterproductive steps of the government.

URL:   https://www.newageislam.com/muslims-islamophobia/islamophobia-sri-lankan-crisis/d/126793

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