As December in 2008 came to an end, the Sri Lanka army surrounded the Tamil Tiger’s administrative centre, Kilinochchi. Few would have forecast the rapid developments of the next five months.
By May 18, 2009, the Tigers were defeated and, for the first time in 26 years, the beleaguered
Island was looking at an uneasy peace.
Will a troubled peace pay dividends in 2010?
“Military victory over the Tamil Tigers will deliver a modest peace dividend, with a burst of inward investment driving growth to 6.3 per cent, but underlying ethnic tension and isolated terrorist attacks wills persist,’’ predicts The Economist in its “The World in 2010’’ issue. Sri Lanka actually saw around 4.5 per cent average growth in the last decade except in 2001.
But, as the Sunday Times pointed out: “the government has not been able to pass on a lower cost-of-living, as a peace dividend, to the war-weary public.’’
An important lookout for the winner of the January 26 Presidential election — and the subsequent general election — would be bringing down the high cost of living.
Mostly because of the protracted war, Lankans had gritted their teeth and gone about buying, for example, lemons at LKR 300 per kg.
Seven months after the war, the issue of high prices is only souring further.
Sri Lanka would also have to ready its defence on alleged war crimes likely to be raised at the March session of the UN human rights council.
Peace cannot be calculated in currency alone.
In 2010, it will be gauged on how Sri Lanka treated its Tamil minorities, about 87,000 of whom are still in refugee camps. More than 200,000 have been sent out of camps, some say rather hastily under international pressure and to garner support for the high-stakes January election.
In the next year and, the decade, the army’s wresting of a deserted, broken-down Kilinochchi from the Tigers will surely be remembered but the return of the Tamil civilians to a rebuilt Kilinochchi will definitely be cherished.