An open letter to the Hon. Mangala P. SAMARAWEERA, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.
Dear Sir,
A Foreign Policy Based on Logic and Justice
This letter is written on behalf of many hundreds and thousands of smart Sri Lankans who study or work abroad, especially in the West, and who quietly decide to change their citizenship to avoid the kind of hassle referred to in the following paragraphs. The policy of the present government of Sri Lanka is to make our land a ‘modern’ nation, where her citizens could be ‘really’ proud of their motherland, and where being ‘Sri Lankan’ would be a privilege and not a handicap.
To come to the point, we propose to highlight that the foreign policy of our land needs to be reformulated and promptly reformed in order for her to become a ‘modern’ nation. We are certainly concerned about being an ‘open’ destination, where tourism would flourish and where foreign investors of all sizes will abound. At the same time, we MUST see that our foreign policy is consistent within itself, that it ought to be used as a tool to better the image of Sri Lanka beyond her shores, and to see that our countrymen are treated with respect abroad.
The community referred to here does not include those privileged levels of society, who travel with diplomatic or official travel documents, who use diplomatic channels of airports and who enjoy extraordinary VIP privileges. Our concern is about the ‘average’ educated Sri Lankan, who is definitely capable of high achievements, and who travels with an ‘Ordinary Passport’ issued by the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, which is generally seen as a ‘developing country in South Asia’ in the West.
The writer of this letter is a postgraduate research fellow in an august French seat of learning. Born and reared in Kandy, he is an old boy of Trinity College, and represents a long tradition of quintessentially Sri Lankan AND internationally oriented scholarship and expertise that has been the hallmark of eminent personalities such as the late Sri Lankabhimanya Lakshman KADIRGAMER PC MP, and Dr Jayantha C.B. DHANAPALA. He also hails from an ‘ordinary’ household, being son to two government servants.
Academic requirements force the writer to travel a good deal within Europe and beyond. Very often, the writer is forced to travel to Eire, or to the Republic of Ireland, for academic reasons. In order to visit the Irish Republic, a Sri Lanka national requires a visa (this is compulsory even to transit though Eire). There is a relatively long list of countries that do not need prior visas to enter the Irish Republic, which even includes the Republic of Maldives. But unfortunately, citizens of Sri Lanka need entry visas and getting a visa is made extremely hectic when one is South Asian and… Sri Lankan. The Irish Republic is not a signatory of the Schengen Treaty, and the writer is often forced to deal with the consular division of the Irish Embassy in Paris. There, a particular employee (a French national) is extremely rude and ‘un-diplomatic’ towards South Asians, and especially towards young South Asians, who are very smart and whom she tends to see as secondary citizens or a mere bunch of idiots. A few months ago, when the writer visited the Mission to apply for a single entry visa, she accused him for his handwriting, found fault with the documentation (which was in full accord with their requirements, which was also the opinion of her nicer Irish colleague) and treated him in the rudest possible manner one could imagine of. Presently, the writer has applied for a multiple entries visa to the Irish Republic, which was approved by the Department of Foreign affairs in Dublin in April 2006, according to Irish legal provisions. But the woman in question being the doyen of the visa division of the Paris Mission, she keeps on repeating “On n’a pas de nouvelles concernant votre visa” at every single phone call.
Is it only this woman, who is definitely ‘racist’ and ‘xenophobic in the truest sense of the terms, or has the Irish State put her there to ‘perform’ that job concerning non-white foreigners is up to the wise to determine, in the words of American author Herman Melville.
We wish to highlight a particular factor which the Hon Minister of Foreign Affairs ought to take into account. It is extremely difficult for a Sri Lanka citizen to enter the Irish Republic, but, it is the absolute opposite for Irish nationals entering Sri Lanka. The Irish Republic is in the list of ‘Bona fide countries’ set up by the Sri Lankan authorities. This means that an Irish national can happily land at Katunayake, get a tourist visa, and extend is if s/he wishes so, as happily as s/he wishes. One can certainly explain and even justify this practice by highlighting the importance of tourism for our ailing economy. But……
If Sri Lanka is to become a modern nation, she will definitely have to shape herself up as a land governed by strong men and women, who are extremely ‘concerned’ about their countrymen and the place of their land in the world. In order to make that a reality, we suggest that the foreign policy of the government is changed to suit the needs of the times and to benefit Sri Lankans. The Irish Republic has absolutely nothing to be doing on a bona-fide list. They do not have a direct diplomatic representation in Colombo, and it is high time the GOSL started persuading the Irish authorities to establish a diplomatic representation in Colombo. If they are not in a position to establish a dynamic entry clearance policy to Sri Lanka nationals, and if they are not ready to play a role in fields such as educational and industrial development of our land, there is absolutely no point in allowing them easy access to our land.
The writer’s main point here is that our foreign policy should be articulated in such a way that foreign nations would be forced to treat our countrymen efficiently and with respect within their shores. The inadequacy of the present foreign policy is such that many thousands of smart Sri Lankans opt to become nationals of other countries. It is known fact that the ‘cream’ of our society is abroad, living lives of their own, as the former President Mrs Kumarathunga affirmed in an interview. If this phenomenon is to continue, who will be left to travel with ordinary Sri Lankan passports? Who would be there to show to the world what we Sri Lankans are capable of?. Time is ripe for our land to draft a consistent foreign policy that would ease the burden on the Sri Lankan traveller and create a better image of our land, of which each and everyone of us could be singularly proud. We need a foreign policy that would ‘force’ foreign nations to consider ourselves as a great people, and treat us with respect, easing the formalities and queuing in visa offices. The Sri Lanka Gaman Balapathraya has to be made a document with better recognition, which would be considered with esteem within our shores.
One of the best ways to go at this would be to make Lanka and open land, a step that has indeed been taken and a step that the Rajapakse administration proposes to develop. An equally effective step would be a foreign policy based on reciprocal grounds, i.e., the treatment of foreign nations being determined by their treatment of Sri Lanka nationals. To many Sri Lankans and to members of the SLFS, this may appear to be an utopian idea at the outset. Yet, here is where policymakers and diplomats need what the writer, himself a researcher in international studies and peaceful negotiation, would call ‘strategic creativity’. To give just one example, each nation listed in the Bona Fide List could be called to grant a certain number of concessions (i.e., admission of a given quota of Sri Lankan students, support for research in the social and pure sciences, and fully efficient visa services where entry clearance would become only a ‘formality’ and not a privilege). If they do not show substantial progress within a given period, there is absolutely no reason for the GOSL to keep them in the Bona Fide List. Let prior visas be simply compulsory for all nations that treat our countrymen as ‘dirt’.
Coming back to the case of the Irish Republic, it is a land that has a many historical experience in common with our own motherland. They too have a colonial and a post-colonial past. Eire is also an island, roughly the same size as Lanka. The Irish university system has many similarities with our own, though theirs has become extremely ‘European’ and international in outlook since Ireland entered the common market. Today, it has become this highly cosmopolitan nation, with a fully developed infrastructure mainly by grants from the EU. The University of Ceylon, or the different campuses of the latter, which are considered as ‘different’ universities today, has very few international exchange programmes. The GOSL could negotiate, for example, the National University of Ireland (NUI) to take in a certain quota of students (especially those who read English, classics, other subjects in the humanities and of course the sciences) during their third year, should they wish to remain in the Bona Fide List. More importantly, some diplomatic pressure would help bring in a permanent Irish Diplomatic Mission to Colombo. We expect, Sir, that you take these issues into consideration and remove the Irish Republic (a nation that does not even maintain direct diplomatic ties with Lanka) from the Bona Fide List and issue a diplomatic ultimatum to Dublin on strengthening ties with Lanka.
Thanking you,
A Concerned Sri Lankan
