Obama pledged to improve Africa’s agriculture rather than just dumping food aid. In past, there were provisos in aid deals such that all food had to be transported from the west. I think this is great. Teach a man to fish you know. In the same way, one thing I’ve seen in Sri Lankan relief and reconstruction work is that there’s a lot more we can do locally. The urge is to pump stuff out from Colombo, but the danger is that this can often atrophy the local economy. There’s all this money passing through but none of it sticks. Plus petrol, plus time, plus etc. Whereas a lot of stuff you can simply buy locally.
When I first travelled north I thought I was like Christopher Columbus going into Vavuniya. Much to my surprise there was a Food City in town, banks, whatever. In fact, Bazaar Street is just like Pettah. You can get almost everything you need, and certainly everything an IDP would get. Milk, soap powder, fruit, whatever.
However, I talked to some local businessmen and they said business was down. I was like what and they were like ‘our customers are in camps.’ The residents of Kilinochchi and Mullativu and Mannar who used to stock up in Vavuniya are in IDP camps being supplied via Colombo and the World Food Program. Which is fine, but the guys in Vavuniya do have some supplies themselves. In fact, one businessmen said the Vavuniya community would step in to even sponsor IDPs if they were allowed. He actually went so far as to say they’d vote for Mahinda if allowed.
Personally, I think this is common sense. I think that IDPs should be allowed to stay with families or Vavuniya or the south if they’re cleared and effectively ‘bailed out’. Barring that, I think the northern communities should be allowed to help, and I think they should be the suppliers of choice. For at least civilian relief I think we should try to get as much as possible in Vavuniya town.
It’s much easier than transporting and clearing through Colombo and it helps the local economy. Purely for reference I’ve included the contacts and products available through two suppliers in Vavuniya town. If you’re considering donating food items or clothes I highly recommend getting them from town itself. These guys even deliver.
They say the government is spending $2.5 million dollars everyday on IDPs. Why not put more of that money into the northern economy?
Supplier I
Kasipillai & Sons – Mr Sivapalan
Bazar Street, Vavuniya
Contat No: 024 2222387
Supplier 11
Siva Shakthi
32, Bazar Street, Vavuniya
Contact No: 024 2222330 / 024 2221172
| Items | Supplier 1 | Supplier 11 |
| 1. Anchor (400g) | 248.00 | 255.00 |
| 2. Anchor 1+ (400g) | 270.00 | 275.00 |
| 3. Anchor Non Fat (400g) | 285.00 | 290.00 |
| 4. Cerelac 400 gms pkts | ||
| a. Apple | 280.00 | 285.00 |
| b. Redrice | 280.00 | 285.00 |
| c. Apple & Cereals | 280.00 | 285.00 |
| d. Vegetables | 290.00 | 285.00 |
| e. Mixed fruit | 330.00 | 335.00 |
| 5. Lactogen 1 400 gms | 307.00 | 310.00 |
| 6. Lactogen 2 400 gms | 267.00 | 270.00 |
| 7. Golden Cow | 165.00 | 165.00 |
| 8. Aniline (400g) | 285.00 | 290.00 |
| 9. Samaposa (200g) | 42.00 | 42.00 |
| 10. Glucose (std) | —– | 35.00 |
| 11. Anmum (std) | —– | 290.00 |
| 12. Pedia Sugar (std) | —– | 750.00 |
| 13. Jeevani (std) | —- | 17.00 |
Question ?
This may sound stupid or yo may have already written about it so apologies in advance.
I am assuming each day that people are “processed” and “cleared” as “not a security threat”.
Are they not allowed to leave the camps if they so wish to leave ?
Can they not move in with relatives or with people that are ready to help them settle in a different area till their villages are cleared ?
Good lord, Ayla, where have you been?
In a lab, in a basement , middle of a country that has nothing but corn.
Our resurfacing is not timed with the international news bulletins :(
I did say that the question may sound stupid, did I not ? trying to catch up.
well the answer to your question is no.
People are screened and the people connected to the LTTE are removed to other camps. Those screened are still detained in the camps. The only legal exception is that elderly people are allowed to leave, as long as they have someone to take them in outside the camps. I don’t think this gesture of humanity was even a government directive; i read somewhere that a Vavuniya judge ordered that elderly people should be released after a significant number died during a short period of time.
You can bribe the army to get relatives out. I know one family who have had to do this. I am guessing it might be a more common occurrence than people think. (Though, most of the people I know abroad no longer have any close relatives left in Sri Lanka.)
“the only legal exception”????
There’s nothing legal about this entire exercise. Nothing, nada, zilch. Not a scrap of paper to authorise the arrest and detention of 300,000 people. As for those who say, let the Supreme Court figure it out, they need go no further than read the reports of the International Commission of Jursists, and the the International Crisis Group. Also, think about it, the Supreme Court ruled that all checkpoints in Colombo were illegal. I was checked 5 times will driving today. The Supreme Court can’t do jack, and they know it. Which is why they won’t make a ruling releasing all 300,000 in this case. Not to mention that most of the judges on the Court have been appointed by the President illegally, without the nomination of the Constitutional Council. Oh, wait, the CC doesn’t even exist. The President refuses to constitute it.
just a question, how practical is to give powdered milk when water is a problem? or has the water problem been sorted by now? doesn’t it make more sense to give/ask for liquid milk (which is more nourishing as well)?
@aadhavan
all true. There is no real rule of law anymore. Just power.
@pissuperera
There is ‘acceptable’ water now. Transporting and storing liquid milk is very difficult. Milk powder you can store indefinitely. Plus many Sri Lankans drink powdered milk anyways. I did as a kid.
“all true. There is no real rule of law anymore. Just power.”
Ok, so can we stop calling Sri Lanka a democracy now, and also stop pretending that this government that does not care about the law anymore is a legitimate one.
Roman Dicators were actually selected by the Senate, for a limited time, usually under an emergency. In a purely academic sense, dictatorships aren’t necessarily undemocratic or bad. I wouldn’t use those terms in relation to this government beyond academic discussion, though.
This is a dictatorial and authoritarian government, but it is still legitimate. If you want to change it then help strengthen the opposition and beat it at the polls.
Dictatorship aren’t necessarily undemocratic in an academic sense? Dude, what the fuck kind of books have you read on democracy. I challenge you to show me one respectable jurist or political philosopher who claimed that a dictatorship, and a total respect for the rule of law are compatible with democracy, as defined. Stop spouting this ignorant, unstudied garbage. Go get yourself a proper education.
As to whether a government can be a non-democratic one and still be legitimate, that’s admittedly open for debate. I tend to think governments can only claim to be legitimate if they respect the social contract. I don’t think dictators can claim to be legimate. In that at least, I’m supported by the Sri Lankan constitution.
Looks like a lesson in political theory is due.
Here is some basic reading:
http://history.howstuffworks.com/european-history/dictator1.htm
http://www.marx2mao.com/Lenin/QDP20.html
http://democracy.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictatorship
TYFR
i think what he’s getting at is the example of civil rights in the states–it’s true that legislation is the most sustainable and just method of changing societal norms but it wouldn’t have started in 1954, if the US Supreme court hadn’t decided to do it unilaterally.
what some are hoping for is a Quick Gun Murugan-type independent authority who can, while riding a moral draft horse, tell Mahinda what to do. Of course, that ain’t gonna happen.
The US Supreme Court only reflected societal norms that were in the process of change. I don’t think it unilaterally did anything except nudge the process along. It took 10 years after Brown for the Civil Rights Act to come along, no? And the Supreme Court in Brown 2 invited the State to take their time (unspecified time) in implementing desegregation. A compromise until society itself was ready for change.
TYFR
archangel,
for your first contention, there is no evidence (and no social attitudes survey continously conducted from the early 50s till today) and no way to prove it. Aside from the executive branch’s exec order to desegregate the armed forces, there were no exec orders or legislative action taken to combat jim crow. Besides, i live here and there’s no surer dispeller of convenient myths than taking a walk down the color line in the city I inhabit.
From Henry Louis Gates Jr. being arrested in his own home to whatever the news of the day, Brown v. Board can’t be used as an example of the SC reflecting societal norms. The fact that that legislation lagged years behind the decision is only evidence for the characterization of the decision as unilateral and out of step with then-current societal norms.
Aren’t you just articulating the established opinion?
I think there was a lot of undervalued work done by the NAACP in evaluating and documenting (and communicating) the potential cost of the “separate but equal” principle in that it will cost more to establish segregated but equal schools in the secondary tier (more schools with equal standards vs. less schools with more students). It was argued that it would cost less to desegregate compared to a system which reflects the Plessy principle without compromise. So there is a theory that the movement tested the plea for desegregation at the tertiary level and the Warren Court obliged. No one doubts the value of the Opinion. I’m only wondering if the timing was entirely inconsistent with certain shifts in strategy and practical policy objectives on both sides of the fence i.e. the State policy makers as well as the civil rights movement.
I’m speculating perhaps. But if you walk these streets, you must know more than me.
TYFR