28 March, 2024

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Hollow Nationalism & The SAITM Struggle

By Dayan Jayatilleka –

Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka

“What is a Nation?” (“Qu’est-ce qu’une nation?”)  Ernest Renan (1882)

“I have been in the belly of the beast and I know its entrails.”– Jose Marti

The resumption of rumblings over the SAITM issue, due to concerns about a double-cross by elements of the Government, generated commentary which was revealing.  From the Sinhala ultranationalists, where there should be solidarity, there was only resentment, exposing the hollowness of the ideology and discourse. It is not without reason that Nietzsche warned against “ressentiment” (French for ‘resentment’) and ideologies that arise from it.  Their oft-repeated sardonic, slogans were: “There is huge agitation over SAITM but they cannot demonstrate against the new Constitution or the jailing of war heroes!” “They care more about SAITM than the Constitution or war heroes!” “What is the biggest issue today? SAITM!” 

Criticizing students and doctors for agitating over SAITM rather than the Constitution or the victimization of war veterans is rather like criticizing a trade union for agitating over a matter that directly concerned its sector of industry and its members, instead of demonstrating over larger national issues. It is like criticizing a person with an acute stomach ache of not complaining more loudly about a headache In this line of argument the only valid and legitimate issues, or the most valid and legitimate issues by far, are those connected to ‘the nation’. It acknowledges no other social or existential reality.

In the second place this criticism reveals the inadequacy of their notion of the nation itself. It is a nationalism without a social content; national sovereignty without people’s sovereignty; national liberation without social liberation. It is, in effect a thin nationalism—a nationalism without the social dimension. It is a hollow nationalism: a nation without the people, without the masses, without the educated youth.    

Those who speak sardonically of the anti-SAITM agitation by the students reveal their ignorance of how a nation can flourish, can compete, can evolve. It needs above all, education, and the guaranteed access to education including higher education, to all the people. That is why a nation which defends itself successfully against the world’s sole superpower, and punches well above its weight in the world arena, namely Cuba, invests far more in education than most nations of the world and spends more on education and research than on its excellent military.

In Sri Lanka, those who enter the state universities do so through a grueling competitive process. They are drawn from all walks of life, all strata of society, thanks to free education. This would not be the case if higher education were subordinated to market forces and the power of money, instead of the principle of merit. The medical students are the best of the best, the elite.

The anti-SAITM agitation was about the interface of two fundamental principles, egalitarian access (as distinct from backdoor entry through the power of money) on the one hand, and rigorous competition, selectivity and training, i.e. high standards, on the other.

The SAITM struggle draws its inspiration from its notion of the defense of the system and principle of Free Education. Free Education was instituted as a social right by CWW Kannangara in 1944, before national independence and sovereignty in 1948. For the educated, multiethnic Ceylonese nationalists of that time, social welfare, labor legislation, Free Education and the striving for independence and sovereignty went together. They understood that egalitarian expansion of educational opportunity was vital for nation-building.

The principle of free education cannot be asked to fall on the sword of the nationalist cause. If the anti-SAITM agitation dwarfed in numbers and forcefulness, the anti-Constitution agitation, it is because  those in the anti-Constitution movement no longer know how to reach out to powerful, organized social movements such as students, trade unions and well established movements of the higher professions. One reason is their narrow, limited discourse. No movement of university students anywhere in the world would relate to an anti-intellectual discourse. No trade union movement, peasant movement or women’s movement anywhere in the world would relate to a nationalism that is utterly insensitive to questions of social justice and equality of rights.

No patriotism or nationalism can succeed without grounding itself in the people; in the various social classes and strata. No nationalism can succeed if it cannot resonate with the educated classes, especially the educated youth led by the university and college students. Throughout history, from China to Cuba, patriotic struggles have been spearhead by the student youth or they have not had any chance of advancing towards success. In order to be adopted by the student youth, nationalism must be combined with social equality and justice as well as with the theme of internationalist solidarity. In Ceylon, the modern anti-imperialist struggle was led by leftwing students with a Western education (the LSSP and CP) and later, with a Sri Lankan education.

No patriotic or nationalist struggle that is radical rightwing in its ideology can strike a chord among the students, and without the students it will have neither the numbers nor the energy and will be limited.  Everywhere on the planet, students, especially university students are idealistic; they aspire to the higher ideals and values of solidarity which cuts across race, religion and gender. Furthermore, though there is significant participation of student monks in the university student movement, the ideology of student movements throughout the world is modernist and secular, and decidedly non-theocratic.   

There is no nation without the people. There is no National Question without a Social Question. The people are the nation. In the global South, there can be no national liberation without people’s liberation and no people’s liberation without national liberation. People’s sovereignty is not subordinate to national sovereignty and the national sovereignty and people’s sovereignty must go together. There is no authentic nationalism which is not driven by the people. The great national liberation leader of the Nicaraguans who fought US imperialism in the 1930s, Augusto Cesar Sandino said “only the workers and peasants will go on till the very end”. The Vietnamese and African leaders who fought and defeated US and Portuguese imperialism respectively, in our lifetime, said that ‘The nation and the people are one’! The people are the root of the nation, the constitutive source of the nation.

The victory over the UNP in 1956 and the resultant regime was defined by the US scholar Prof Marshall Singer in a reputed MIT Press book (1964) as that of ‘The Emerging Elite’. The 1956 and 1970 coalitions had formidable intellects in its ranks. Today’s majoritarian neo-nationalist project has failed to generate or attract an elite or win over the future elite that is born in the university system, among the students and staff.

The challenge Sri Lanka faces in the world today is a battle of narratives and a global battle of ideas and ‘lawfare’ (legal warfare) against us, in which the attempt is to delegitimize the war, the military and the Sri Lankan state. This is a war of the intellect, which has to be waged by the higher intelligentsia, those trained in knowledge and ideas. This training is in the universities. However great the negatives of the Sri Lankan university system and student community, one cannot get away from the fact that it is here that ideas are taught. Every student is educated and tested in the knowledge – the concepts and ideas– in their field. They cannot be reviled by those who have not been taught and therefore have no knowledge of the weapons, tactics, and ammunition and the history of combat of the ideas and concepts that are being used in the global war against Sri Lanka. While the struggle for economic development and modernization has to be waged by the professional elite, the struggle to defend Sri Lanka in the global arena has to be waged by the intellectuals, led by a vanguard drawn from the higher intelligentsia.

In the global battle of arguments over Sri Lanka, only they can win over or neutralize opinion makers throughout the world, especially but not only in the West, and indeed only they can communicate with the younger, highly educated Sri Lankan Diaspora as well.

In 1970 the electoral toppling of the UNP was spearheaded by the leftwing university student movement and supported by the university academic community, which held public rally after rally and went door to door distributing leaflets and canvassing support for the United Front coalition. While it may not be possible to recreate that alliance, the alienation of the majoritarian nationalists from the powerful student movement and its deeply felt causes and anti-government struggles will help neither the anti-UNP cause nor an anti-UNP candidate.

The dark and dirty little secret of the Sinhala Far Right is that it is a ‘wanna-be’ UNP. It is anti-UNP only because the UNP is multiethnic. The Sinhala Right shares the UNP’s ideology and program except on the ethnic issue. It would be quite happy with the aggressive ‘Sinhala First’ UNP-ism of Cyril Mathew. In its fantasy it hopes to step into the shoes of the professional, corporate and social strata allied with the UNP; it fancies itself in that role.

Imitation is a weird way to fight the UNP. Britain’s Labor Party has come within a whisker of beating the Conservatives, and may actually form a Government the next time around, not by imitating them but by propounding under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, a progressive alternative to the Conservatives and what they stand for. You cannot fight the enemy by unsuccessfully striving to become, or to at least imitate him. 

The struggle against the UNP is a struggle against the Right, by the center-left and progressive movement. There cannot be an ideologically rightwing struggle against the rightwing UNP leadership! The mainstream opposition to the center-right UNP has always been center-left, populist and social democratic, i.e. somewhat to the left of the UNP. There cannot be a patriotism that does not base itself upon a progressive platform and within a progressive project.   

This country, any country, can progress while prevailing over external pressures and rivals in the world of the 21st century’s next decade, only under the leadership of the most advanced social strata. Any non-UNP Presidential candidate must represent those advanced social strata. Sri Lanka needs a leader who can take us into alternative, Asian modernity. The most advanced social strata can be won over only by the most advanced ideas and ideology, which, among other things, sympathetically supports the urgent concerns of the best-educated youth of this country.  A new, modern society, a 21st century society, needs a new ideology, a 21st century ideology, and cannot be built on the worst, most backward of the old ideas and ideology.

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Latest comments

  • 2
    0

    What I herd, It is the Jackal Opposition or the Pohottuwa which was behind SAITM agitation. Nationalism is also their tool to hide their incompetency. thefts, thieves, etc., SAITM should be the problem of Minister concerned becoming an expert, he solves problems his way and screws it up. Who behaved ultranationalist using the miltary victory for his advantage but discussed, with TNA AND TO THE WORLD, offering more by 13+

  • 4
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    This poisonous snake repeating his “mantra” — “Global war against Sri Lanka”…. When this poisonous snake says these things in Sinhalese media and TV, our low IQ nation get these destructive thinking more strongly cemented in the core of their brains..Is he trying to poison youth too?? Where would be SL in another 10~15 years time with people like DJ?
    When you think further about what this human sc…b.. might be doing here… I guess he is just trying to please Gota.. DJ may be regularly visiting Gota these days and telling him ” Sir .. Sir … Sir.. I am spreading these venom in different forms now.. Sir .. Sir .. these will make your victory unstoppable…Sir Sir..
    “Sir .. Sir… please remember to send me back to New York as soon as you win…. Sir .. Sir.. please…… ” I can picture DJ’s face begging in front of Gota…

    • 0
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      This Dr.is an incohorent idiot.

      If the quality of teaching / education at SAITM is bad what has one to say about the former stuents of the SAITM faculty when they were teaching at Gov t controlled Universities.

      It the students at SAITM are of low quality, then the faculty’s former stuidents too should of low quality. Why not strip them of their right to practice medicine – the same remedy proposed by the GMOA / University students for the SAITM students.

      What a low quality intelectual we have in DJ. Has he not heard of Dr.Padmal de Silva Arts graduate- who qualified as a Doctor and Clinical Psychiatrist, Malcolm Naki – gardner who is reputed to have a major player in the first Heart transplant operation ?

  • 1
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    SAITM has not got out of proportion. IT simply reflects the prejudiced and bigoted nature of twisted intellect struggling to find a solution in the wrong place with the wrong people and hence going deeper into more wrong. The scandal around SLMC deans scrapping 1/5th part of final MBBS exam., the subject of Psychiatry, is in order to give Ryan J finals at end of 2016, for the state batch to have 100% clearance to approve their internship. This is devious, autocratic and dictatorial decision making which they believe should not be questioned. No doubt they will learn through practice. SLMC deans are above the law, so they think, accountable to nobody except terrorizing students. They are unaware and ignorant of their having to be submitted to Minister and govt.

    SAITM has verdict of internship which SLMC as statutory body of govt. needs to uphold for law and order. But under threat of radicals, and their parents too who have been admitted to the large body of GMOA as a suicide squad to threaten the govt., the deans mindsets are radically altered. These cheating SLMC deans want now to put illegal and arbitrary training in GMOA infested territorial hospitals for SAITM defeat using a phrase called substandard kade. They will deny the last substandard MBBS and interns due to lack of Psychiatry teaching in low standard Rajarata affecting the whole batch. SLMC should intern with authority, the 8yr. trained SAITM MBBS.
    An added factor in this drama is that GMOA wants high quality SAITM for state admissions.

  • 1
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    Dayan you quote Jose Marti ~ “I have been in the belly of the beast and I know its entrails”
    Either Jose is lying or hates his mother or both!
    In Roman mythology, Romulus and Remus are twin brothers, whose story tells the events that led to the founding of the city of Rome. The baby twins were suckled by a she-wolf.
    Dayan: Who is your Romulus?

  • 1
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    What is wrong with this man? Recently he praised Gota and condemned ultranationalists. Now he is criticisng and praising SITAM protestors. Bugger me if I understand!

    • 1
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      Wijepala

      “Recently he praised Gota and condemned ultranationalists. Now he is criticisng and praising SITAM protestors. “

      The public racist takes 64 positions all at the same time. Tell us why do you take him seriously?

      • 1
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        NV ~ “The public racist takes 64 positions………..”.
        Never the good old ‘missionary position’!

  • 0
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    DJ must be aware that SAITM issue revolves round a malicious violation of the Medical Ordinance, headed by misguided and failed utopian Karl Marx. He approved a faulty and inadequate MBBS of November 2016 where the subject of Psychiatry was totally erased from final exam. These cheating SLMC deans under UGC, hid this from Dr.Harsha Committee as Karl’s right hand Rye was in batch which just started internship. Rajarata had no Psychiatry. Could have trained them elsewhere like SAITM paid for Emergency training in Private hospitals which are now as overcrowded as Govt.

    Court verdict for SAITM is internship. Why should SLMC illegally and arbitrarily concoct GMOA hospitals which they are not authorized to do, in order to delay SAITM. THIS IS THE ISSUE. A defective state MBBS is secretly promoted by cheating SLMC deans. SAITM is denied justice.

  • 0
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    SAITM issue thickens with Harsha report recommending court verdict of SLMC registration for SAITM MBBS with additional training recommended by cheating deans who gave Ryan’s part MBBS full internship. Deans feeding SAITM MBBS into GMOA crocodile infested govt hospitals to be hammered, to watch, same who stopped SAITM admissions. SAITM should get internship to survive this assault and receive their just and legal rights.
    GMOA 3 in SLMC elections this month to get into SLMC authority and have already waylaid postal votes, been reported to Maradana police, but they are experts at winning elections even with fists. No more ethics, morals or integrity will be left in profession if GMOA gets into SLMC. Only proper law and order will help not only SAITM but ignorant govt. as well. Deadly and ruthless enemy.
    SAITM ISSUE is wrong terminology. It should be called GMOA ISSUE around blind ignorance.

    • 0
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      This is the country left for us by many jokers who were our “Leaders”.
      They messed up everything.

      If Minister A.V.Kariyawasm is serious he will ensure (i) that all students sit their degree exam in English and avoid wasting their time at the Fort railway station.They qualify to be emloyed anywhere in the world.(ii) That all students preparing for thier UE exam are biometrically registered (iii) That all graduates pay for cost of the education extended.

      DJ the is lying.CWW offered free education true. That did not mean that they got free education after the O.L.

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