The Movement in Sri Lanka
It is well known that Sri Lanka's financial crisis has caused extreme misery in the lives of the people for the past 6-7 months. This extreme crisis gave birth to resentments among the Sri Lankan people against President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his family which culminated on July 9, when angry mobs stormed inside the Presidential Palace and took over. Sensing the urgency of the situation, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa secretly fled the country in a military plane and resigned from the presidency a few days later.
The news of the success of the upsurge of people's agitation reaching inside the presidential palace and finally forcing the mighty president of Sri Lanka's most powerful ruling family to flee his residence, the highest office of the country, and even the country, has generated a new enthusiasm amongst many of the democratic intellectuals and communist revolutionaries of our country. A section of the student-intellectual-communist revolutionaries hailed this event of the movement of the people of Sri Lanka in a situation of the stagnation of the class movement in general and the unrestrained attacks of the rulers as a 'people's uprising', a challenge to the imperialist forces by overthrowing the rulers of Sri Lanka, etc.
It is a fact that a good number of agitated people have taken to the streets of the capital Colombo as a result of the intense crisis of the past several months. But without the analysis of what those people want, which way they are moving, is it possible to explain what advancement was achieved for the people's struggle for livelihood against the Sri Lankan ruling class and the imperialist forces, the creators of Sri Lanka's current unprecedented crisis, only by the resignation of the president or before that, the prime minister? More important than the apparent, immediate, success of the movement is the direction of the movement. However, doubts remain about the extent of even immediate success in the case of the current movement in Sri Lanka.
It is true that Gotabaya was forced to step down from the presidency under the pressure of the mass movement. But, in reality, has there been any change of the rulers? Ranil Wickramasinghe, who got into the office of the President, is another favourite leader of the imperialist power and the regime of the domestic capitalist class. What is more interesting is that Wickramasinghe became the President with the combined support of the ruling Gotabaya Rajapaksa's party and the opposition parties despite having no MPs from his own party. Under his supervision, the Sri Lankan government's once again new negotiations for loans with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) gained momentum. That is, after taking loans from these imperialist organizations 16 times in the past 40-45 years, being forced to accept various conditions to serve the interests of the imperialist-capitalist class of those organizations and facing financial crisis several times, the ruling capitalist class of Sri Lanka is soliciting their favour again. Gotabaya has stepped down. But there has been no change in the policy of the domestic capitalist class of looting and exploiting the workers-peasants-toiling people in collusion with the imperialist capital, which was the root cause of the crisis, even after the resignation of Gotabaya. The very same policy that gave rise to the crisis, to the miserable conditions of life and livelihood of the people and to get rid of which, the people have taken to the streets, could not change that.
Not that there was no opposition among a section of the people to Ranil Wickremesinghe becoming president. Opposition arose from a section of the people after Ranil was installed as President. But that opposition did not take the form of any mass movement again with massive public support. A group of students-youth-intellectuals who have been participating in a dharna in front of the President's Secretariat in Galle Face for several months, have even demanded that not only the resignation of Ranil or some other selected leaders but also an interim government should be formed by dissolution of all MPs and the interim government should set financial, social, and political goals according to the demands of the mass movement. Then through a people's council, the people will play the role of communicating and mediating with that government. That government will take urgent steps to overcome the crisis and pave the way for a new, democratic constitution within a year, curtailing the special powers of the president. But the preparatory meeting of the movement organized by this section of the students-youth intellectuals-professional middle class to oust Ranil Wickramasinghe did not get the same response as the July 9 Presidential Palace campaign. On the contrary, within a few days of Ranil's assumption of power, the main camp of the vocal section of the students-youth-intellectuals in front of the President's Secretariat was evicted almost without any hindrance, and the people participating in the sit-in demonstration were dispersed. Even then, no further protest movement emerged. The nature of this movement in Sri Lanka shows the level of consciousness of the agitating people. Their sole aim was to remove Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who was notorious for his autocratic rule. They didn't want to go further; they were not even in such a position.
In fact, all parliamentary political parties including Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Ranils are only representatives of a capitalist system dependent on imperialism. It was this entire system that brought Gotabayas, the Ranils to the pinnacle of power. When one Gotabaya is removed, this system brings another Gotabaya or Ranil to the fore as the manager of the system. So the emancipation of the workers, farmers and toiling people from the burden of the crisis, the exploitation and oppression cannot be attained only by removing Gotabaya Rajapakse or Ranil or the ruling coterie of Rajapakshes from power. The real question is to overthrow this entire capitalist system which is dependent on imperialism and to establish in its place a system which will make the country self-reliant by liberating it from dependence on the imperialism and end the exploitation and oppression of the mass workers, peasants, toiling masses and their poverty.
The fact that the people of Sri Lanka are not yet ready to struggle for this change is evident from their activity being limited within the "Gotabaya step down" movement. But at the same time, it cannot be denied that the student-youth-intellectual section of the Galle Face movement did not want to stop only at removing Gotabaya from the presidency. Galle Face activists raised questions against the rulers in front of them in this situation, campaigned, called for the July 9 Rashtrapati Bhavan campaign and came forward as a voice of protest. They also wanted to stand against Ranil and raised their voice for a democratic system of governance to replace the current autocratic ruling structure. But why did they try to make the slogans "Gotabaya stand back!" "Gotabaya go home!" so popular? Such slogans, instead of pointing to the entire system of exploitation, only increase the deep-rooted anger among the people against a notorious ruler and confine the movement to the limited task of ousting that ruler. Their demand for constitutional change, democratic governance can only be achieved and sustained through a revolutionary movement to change this regime. Galle Face protestors have that aspiration but is it not contradictory to focus the movement only on slogans like "Gota Go home!"? In fact, without a far-reaching struggle against this entire system at least to some extent, it is not possible to bring about even the constitutional change which is demanded for democracy by Galle Face protestors.
As a result of not taking that path, it was seen that the imperialists and Sri Lankan rulers did not fail to use the limited opportunities of the movement. They allowed the people's protest movement to move towards ousting of Gotabaya, a march to the Presidential Palace. The goal that was aspired by a large section of the people was fulfilled. For the time being, the movement has calmed down. And taking that opportunity, Ranil was placed in office with the support of the Gotabaya's party and other opposition parties on which the protestors of Galle Face depended at one stage. And right after that, the police, the army forcefully dispersed the Galle Face protestors and arrested many of the front line participants so that no movement could rise again.
The main point is that there is no way out except for an extensive struggle, a widespread mass struggle against the entire system for the establishment of a democratic system as per the demands of the Galle Face protestors by ending the autocratic rule even within this capitalist society. Efforts to limit or change the presidential system may replace the current autocratic system with a comparatively more democratic regime. But it cannot bring an end to the exploitation and plunder of domestic and imperialist capital which is the root source of the crisis and exploitation and oppression of the ruling class.
And if there is to be a comprehensive change within this society without being limited to some reforms, it is necessary to completely overthrow the reign of exploitation and plunder of domestic and imperialist capital, its class rule. To overthrow the domestic capitalists and the rural exploiters from power does not mean some reforms in the state structure and constitution only. That task can only be accomplished through the struggle to establish a socialist system by eliminating the entire production system of capitalist exploitation and the remnants of old exploitation.
And that task can only be accomplished only with the leadership of the working class, which exists throughout society as a direct victim of capitalist exploitation. It is the working class that can build the class movement through which it can sever all forms of economic relations of exploitation and oppression in the path of social revolution through seizure of power by leading the masses of workers, toiling peasants and other toiling masses, by attracting anti-establishment students-young intellectuals. It is not possible to succeed in this struggle in a small country like Sri Lanka, where the working class is objectively very weak, without the rise of the socialist struggle of the international working class.
Today, the working class is disintegrated following the betrayal of the old established leadership, the defeat of the working class in the international and national spheres. The movement to establish a new socialist society is going through a phase of breakdown and discontinuance due to the absence of the party of the working class and the deviation from class ideology. The long history of the Sri Lankan workers' movement also bears witness to that. That is why in many cases it is seen that a group of students-young-intellectuals, or a jumbled section of different classes are coming to the fore by joining the protest against the ever-increasing exploitation and oppression. The students-youth-intellectuals participating in the protest in Galle Face, Sri Lanka are also seen in that role. They are raising questions against the rulers, campaigning and a section of people maybe even taking to the streets in response to that, but the driving force of the vast working class, peasants, toiling people, the organized power of the working class does not have that direction and leadership. As a result, the movement is getting stalled after a while and is dispersing again. Even among the people, the anger that has surfaced in the wake of the crisis is not rising to the level of a movement against the entire system. We have seen the outcome of such so-called leaderless mass movements on an even greater scale and extent than in Sri Lanka, from the 'Arab Spring' movement in Egypt to M-15 in Spain and Podemos or Syriza in Greece in recent times. But, in the end, all those struggles failed to fulfill their goal of extending democracy. Even in almost every case the old autocratic or dictatorial system has returned. This is inevitable in the absence of organized working class leadership. Any attempt to truly free the Sri Lankan working class from crisis and exploitation, oppression is bound to fail, neglecting the task of the Sri Lankan working class in assuming that leading role. Today it is of prime necessity for the working class to organize itself as a class on the basis of its own revolutionary ideology, to appear before the oppressed masses of society as an organized force, to show the way.
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